Does this mean I worked a day for free?

Well one of the main topics of conversation( not that it went on for that long mind you) today was as it's a leap year and the 29th Feb only comes round every four years were we technically working for free today? Just a thought.


I appeared to have strained a muscle in my right leg, on the back in a really awkward postion too, which means it's been hurting like mad. I've been using deep heat which has been helping a lot but the only trouble is the smell from that stuff. It seems to take ages to get it off your hands.


Well it's the weekend, Yaah!!! I will try and repeat my success from last weekend and actually do something constructive. Of course with my social life currently DOA another saturday night in, in front of the TV seems to be looming. Well at least when Summer finally gets here there should be some good films at the cinema.

Well Prince Harry is apparently on his way back from deployment after news of him being out there broke. In hindsight it was obivious something was going on as he had dropped off the Radar for 10 weeks! It is a bit sickening as to how all the UK media outlets are falling over themelves to emphasis how good they were that they stuck to the agreement not to mention his deployment and it wasn't them it was a American which broke the story.

later!

I'm afriad I've been thinking, which apparently is a dangerous past time

It was one of those mornings today when the alarm went off. You know the kind I mean where the knowledge that you have to get out is overshadowed by that need to stay in bed and just pretend the rest of the world is going to go away for 24 hours. Unfortuantely thats never happened and as work have that pesky rule of only paying you if actually go to work the former is always going to win over the latter option.

There's been another sign that spring might actually be approaching. It's light when I leave for work and it's light ( wel lightish) when I leave for home. It's still cold though. Well I guess we can't have everything.

One more day to the weekend and it's payday tomorrow. I may treat myself to a new book on Saturday ( last of the big spenders I know :-) but my main must do for Saturday is to go and get a hair cut. I may not be quite at the stage of looking ike the thing from the Adams family but I'm starting to move in that direction. Plus it's really annoying having to comb it all down first thing in the morning otherwise I end up looking like one of those mad profs who've just stuck their fingers in a plug socket.

It was a bit of a quiet day at work, which was good as it allowd me to catch up with a few things and answer emails and stuff really quickly. In fact so quick for most of the ones which came in today it was in half the time specified for my KPI's so yah me I think!

Hometeaching. Well I guess I've not really got any choice now but to query it with the bishop per Alices advice. This has just gone on for far too long now. Mind you maybe I'm not the only one without a list. We haven't had a visit from the hometeachers in a while either.

I've almost finished that book on the tudors. So I should hopefully be able to post a review in the next couple of days. Well it will save you from having to listen to my ramblings for a little while won't it ? :-)

later!

well thats enough excitment for one day

If there was one good thing about the earthquake this morning it was that it gave people something to talk about at work with the two main questions being, Did it wake you up? and what did you think it was? Answers ranging from people thinking it was a HGV going past to the next door neighbours roof falling off. Several people said they had great difficulty getting back to sleep. Me? I simply shrugged and fell back to sleep straight away. Which did lead to a little bit of confusion when I woke up and as I wondered if it did actually happen or had I just had some crazy dream.

Grumpy of course slept through the whole thing.

Traffic was light this morning. Amazingly light as a matter of fact. It's worrying when that happens. It's usually a sign that the other shoe is about to drop and we're going to be hit with several days worth of bad traffic. I just hope they finish those roadworks soon. I hate to sound like Grumpy but I can never figure out why it takes them so long to do the darn things!

It was the last lesson of the eternal marriage course tonight. Hurrah!! in fact I think it deserves a double Huraah Hurrah! Yes we will have to have two lessons on the old testament for the next three weeks, and yes the old testament is hard but at least it wouldn't depress me as much as some of the marriage course lessons have. Based on the usual rotation of courses this should be the last time I do the marriage course ( I think) as by the next time it roles round I wouldn't be YSA anymore as I'll either be a SA or married. As most of you can probably guess I'd prefer the latter option as opposed to the former.

anyway, two more days to go until it's the weekend again.

later!

Shake, rattle and roll

Well I have to say that this was a first. Rather then getting woken up in the early hours of this morning by my alarm, the light from the neighbours back garden or Grumpy banging around I got woken up by a earthquake. Yes you read that correctly, I got woken up by a earthquake.

It hit just before 1am and measured 5.3 on the richter scale. Even though it's epicentre was in Lincoln we still felt it.

Lets hope thats the most exciting thing that happens today.

Did any of my english readers feel it/ get woken up by it? Where were you in the UK?

It's been a long five years

Well with the end of February fast approaching, I've recently realised that I have now been with the company I work for in one form or another for five years. Which means I will or at least should ( if they ever figure out who has got the darn thing) be getting a inscribed silver tankard to celebrate this and yes before anybody points this out I am well aware of the irony of getting a tankard! Five years, wow thats heck of a long time but a more important question is where has all the time gone! It only seems like yesterday that I finished uni and I have to admit when I finished uni I certainly didn't imagine I would be where I am now. Yet alone still single and living at home. Oh well I'll just hope I'm not still single and living at home in another five years time otherwise I might really start to panic.

Well asides from that feeling old moment not much else happened today. Same old, same old really. Get up, go to to work, do work, come home, have dinner etc.

Oh well.

I think there's really only one thing I can end on;

" A social life, a social life, my kingdom for a social life."

later

Mad monday motorists

Well road works are always fun. However when the clever clogs who are performing the roadworks at a intersection add traffice lights then failed to syncronise them properly it just gets more and more fun. Yes geek fans, as you may have guessed the trip into work this morning held all the usual fun and games from Mondays plus more. Especially the genius who was following me most of the way into Nottingham and was so close I couldn't see his headlights anymore.

Work was also fun and quiet. It was a bit Marie celestie like. Which I needed as I had a huge amount of work to do which wasn't helped by my new KPI's I have to stick to. And before you ask ,no I don't know what the heck KPI stands for. I suppose I really ought to ask.

We also had to move some stock back into the office as there had been a show at the weekend. Of course the two people who had been to the show and driven there and back had managed for blag today off so they had left a note asking us to unload. Which was a lot easier in practise the it was in theory. Mainly because we had trouble opening the door and when we did open it we found three huge boxes that required us to wheel a trolley round the length of the building to get the stock into the office, which was extremely annoying as the van was parked round outside of our office.

I actually got some post today. Of course it was all junk mail. Especially one which was offering me cheap car insurance for the over 50s. Maybe I'm older then I thought, either that or that got me and Grumpy confused on their records. I really hope it's the latter!

anyway,

later!

Well this must be some kind of record

Well another Sunday and surprise surprise, well not any sort of a surprise to be honest, I still wasn't given a new hometeaching list. I'm sure this must be some kind of record by now! There were also lots of people at church today. I got one of the last car parking spaces, Engineseer bagged the last. Quite why there were that many people there I have no idea.

Primeval was good last night. It was the last one in the series and ended on a real " What the heck moment?". It wasn't as good as this weeks Torchwood though, which I wouldn't go into detail about as Engineseer hasn't seen it.

Sunday dinner was interesting today. Mainly as instead of gravy we had tomato ketchup. Mainly because grumpy had got a new kind of gravy powder and when he tried to make the gravy well lets just say things went horribly, horribly wrong.

Well at least the light in the kitchens now fixed. It broke earlier in the week and as neither grumpy and I thought to get a extra replacement bulb last time it broke we couldn't replace earlier it as it's one of these special ones. Well at elast there will be no more trying to clean the kitchen up by torch light.

Asides from that I've spent the afternoon painting. Not very exciting I know, but thats what happens from time to time in the life of a geek I guess.

anyway,

later!

35 channels and still nothing on

Yes it's a saturday night and of course due to the wonderful activeness of my social life at the moment I'm at home yet again and to rub it in theres nothing good on the TV. Nothing at all. We have 35 channels with freeview. How can there not be anything good on that is either new or not a repeat. I don't know...

So I've spent most of the evening glueing models together. Yes I'm at home on a saturday night and doing something geeky. I'm in no way enforcing any stereotypes here am I?

I haven't been able to use the time to spend extra time on the bike. My Knee's been hurting the past couple of days so I haven't wanted to push it. I've just spent the minimum amount of time possible on the bike each day. There's no point injuring my knee again for no gain.

Well It's church tomorrow. It's scary to think it's almost the end of February. Where the heck is all the time going? It only seemed like new Years a few days ago.

I was searching for something constructive to do and I did make the mistake of going back to visit 'that lds website' which I've commented on before. Alas it seems that the site is still capable of bringing out the worst of the YSA and SA. I've reminded of a quote that someone once said " Every church and organisation has it's good people and it's not so good people". It just seems that all of our not so good people go to that site.

Grumpy got new hearing aids this week. Well I say new, their technically his old ones. He finally got round to getting them fixed. The problem is now he can hear stuff he couldn't before, especially the radiators and central heating. He keeps asking every few minutes if they have always made that noise.

It's starting to get annoying.

Oh well.

later!

So secure not even the users can get in

It used to be oh so simple to log into the computers at work. You come up with a password for your file, log in and maybe every once in a while you were asked for a new password but you could keep your old one if you wanted. Not anymore, your asked every thirty days to change your password, it has to be of a precise number of letters and it remembers your last six passwords so you can't keep alternating them. It gets oh so annoying, especially when you've just changed your password then have to spend ten minutes the following morning trying to remember what you changed it to. Which is what I had to do this morning. Argghhh!! Well I guess it makes sense to some techie somewhere.

Well the announcement was made at work today, which although made a lot of customers very happy will probably upset a lot of staff as they won't be able to buy the range from us and get a staff discount. Well I suppose if they ring on Monday I suppose I could pass them onto one of the managers. It's not like the diversion manager, chief editor, direct sales manager, marketting manager and accounts manager are all going to be out of the office at the same time on Monday is it?..........

oh wait..... I might be in trouble come Monday I think.

I was invited to sit in on a planning meeting for forthcoming releases today which was very interesting. the only downside is hearing about these cool books which won't be released for another year. I want to read them now....

In the news today. Katie Holmes changes her hair style, Catherine zeta jones flies in for her grandmothers birthday, Ricky martins looks are fading, Rod stewart keeps an eye on the bill for a shopping trip, Anna Friel smokes and Billy piper gets a tattoo. Wow real fun life being a celebrity isn't it? You could almost think they face the problems regular people do........ wait a second!

Well it's the weekend now. Hopefully I can forget about work and get on with what I usually do at a weekend. Kick back and don't do much of anything that can be classed as constructive.

later!

Getting home should be easier then this

Well it has just taken me a rather depressing 1 hour 55 minutes to get home. Yes you read that write, a trip which on a direct and clear route took me 1 hour 55 minutes! I have only one thing to say. arrrrggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! and it was apparently all due to a coach breaking down in the wrong place which resulted in a 6 mile tail back. I was seriousily not amused by the time I got home.

But on the plus side I am home now and only one more day to survive until the weekend. Of course with whats happening tomorrow surviving until the weekend might be harder then it seems. It will probably be a reverse of the problems from a couple of weeks ago. Customers will be happy but staff members from our retail stores will probably be annoyed. Oh well as the saying goes you can please some of the people some of the time but you can't please all of the people all of the time and those you can't please will sure to be ringing me.

working in Customer service. Great sometimes init?

well at least I get free books.

In the news today. Apparently a six minute power nap can help improve your memory. Try using that excuse at work :-)

They have been lots of complaints about swearing at the Brit awards last night. The show was presentedby Sharon and Ozzy osbourne. Seriousily what did they expect?

The Lion, The Witch And The Wardrobe has been crowned the ultimate childrens book in a poll released today. Harry potter only made it to sixth place. The Americans shot down a spy satellite, as you do, the space shuttle atlantis landed yesterday and charlottle church has dyed her hair red. Quite why that last one is classified as news I have no idea.

anyway,

later!

in need of a Sugar rush

The downside of being on a diet and cutting out sugar and caffine is that it gets very hard to keep going when you feel tired as you don't have anything to fall back onto give you a energy boost. Like today I just felt really tired all day and couldn't stop yawning. No idea why, I just couldn't stop. But then again was one of those days. So much so I don't really have anything to blog about. It was just a same old, same old day where everything just seem to blur together.

Never mind hey, hopefully I'll have something interesting to write about tomorrow.

later

If i Didn't know would is still be as cold?

Grumpys car has a great little gadget that mine doesn't. It's a temperature gauge which displays the outside temperature on the display in the centre of the dashboard. When the temperature gets too cold it beeps and flashes a mesage warning you that there's risk of ice and if the temperature gets below 0 the display will keep flashing. Now yes this is a good thing but I suppose it also can be bad in in the sense that sometimes you just don't need to know how cold it is and telling you theres a risk of ice when you've just spent the last 10 minutes de icing the car seems a little pointless. However I was shocked this morning when I started Grumpys car to discover the temperature was at - 5! But we'll get to that in a minute.

Well on Sunday night there was a YSA Fireside at the stake centre. For a change and because I felt guilty about Engineseer always giving me lifts to these things, I borrowed Grumpys car and have Engineseer and Black widow a life. We had no idea what the topic was going to be and we finally decided that it was likely to be marriage or dating etc. So we were somewhat surprised when the fireside started to be told it was about communication! Which some people looked surprised about. Well I was suppose there was goign to be a YSA Fireside on something else asides from marriage eventually.

Work yesterday was actually quiet for once. Which was quite scary for a Monday and I did spend five minutes after clearing the email inbox by Lunchtime that something was wrong. That kind of thing just never happens on a Monday. Still mustn't look a gift horse in the mouth. It shoud ( and I emphasis should) mean that I have less stuff to do when we're back in the office tomorrow.

We finally had YSA FHE last night. ( the next ones only in two weeks). It was a lot of fun, especially the activity afterwards. When I get round to it I'll post one of the girls 'pictonary' attempts at drawing bacon and eggs with her eyes closed. Cordeila was there as well, which was nice as we haven't seen her in a couple of weeks as ( in her words not mine)" She gets around".

So we had this team away day training thingy today. I had to get up half and hour earlier then usual which was not fun. Grumpy let me use his car however as I'm a lot more confident driving in his car if I don't know where I'm going and have lots of duel carriageways to negioate. I was glad of his car when I came across a patch of ice on one of the roads ( Ice is my all time driving fear as I wrote off my first car after encountering some black ice) but I managed to keep calm and it didn't cause me any problems as I kept the car under control and slowed right down. I did pass two other cars which weren't so lucky.

It was a interesting day. We got our 'team management profiles' which were the results of those questionaires we had to fill out. So apparently according to the Margerison-McCann team management wheel my major role is that of Reporter Adviser with related roles of Creator innovator and Upholder Maintainer. Makes me sound a lot cleverer doesn't it?

The only downside to the day was that there was next to nothing I liked in the lunch we were served. I ended up having several pieces of bread and that was in. Oh well hazards of being a fussy eater I guess. I suppose it could only help in the old diet, which by the way is going well as I've just lost my first stone. Yah me! I think

anyway,

Later!

Just a quick one

I've only got time for a relatively quick post. It's late and I've got to get to bed as I'm going to have to get up early for this course thing tomorrow.

So in brief this is whats happened in the the past 24 hours. I went to a YSA fireside last night, I spent the drive home getting worried as the temperature dipped to -5. I had to spend 15 minutes de icing the car this morning, it was so cold I'm sure the de icer was freezing. Work wasn't busy today, not sure what happened there and we had the YSA FHE this evening.

I'll go into more detail tomorrow, I promise.

later!

Just to prove I am a geek.

Well I thought I would post a couple of photos of some of the painting I've been doing recently just to prove that I am a geek.

This is creation is called in 'game terms' a Brass scorpion and I converted it from several other kits. I'm quite happy with how it turned out.
This is a Ork Trukk from my new Ork Army I'm currently working on. Like the rest of my Ork models it's only painted to Gaming Standard.
This is a squadron of Ork wartraks. I converted the two on each end.
Ork Bikes.

The ork warboss and his bodyguard.

Okay that enough geekyness for now I promise. We return you to our regularly scheduled ramblings

Just for Nemesis

you may be gone but we certainly haven't forgotten you.

perks of the job

Well I guess to compensate for the annoyances of having to deal with customers every customer service job has it's perks that you can't get anyway else. My perks? Well I get to read books I would read anyway well in advance of their release date, not to mention getting them free, as well as getting a nice big discount on the models I buy ( before any of your make a comment about model making being a geeky thing don't. yes I am a geek, I know. the clues in the blog title) However Enginseer in a post last night mentioned one of the disadvantages my job has that he doesn't. He got to meet the entire Southampton vixens cheerleading team, thats about fifty cheerleaders in total. So yes his 'perk' is that he gets to meet girls in his job. I don't. Unfortuantely it's just a fact that the hobby our company 'makes' does tend to be a boys hobby. There are a handful of girls out there but only a handful. It is quite amusing to see the effect on the gamers in a store when a girls walks in.
" Girl in the store, girl in the store, what do we do??????"

They then tend to get very quiet or gather together in a large group and get very loud. Obivousily some sort of mutal protection thing going on. I guess you could call it a 'gaggle of geeks'.

Well as it's Sunday, it was Church of course and I'm sure it won't surprise any of my long term readers in the absolute slightest that it's another Sunday down and yet again I still do not have a home teaching list!! I am totally confused as to what's causing the problem here. If these keeps going I will start claiming 100% home teaching ( as I've done exactly what I've been given. Nothing) just to try and prove a point.

Traveller was there again today. She's always so happy and cheerful and looks for the best in everything. I guess I could learn a lesson or two there. She had to leave early as she had to get a train back to uni. I did give her the blog address, so if you are visiting hello Traveller! If your not visiting there was really no point me starting this sentence as your not going to be reading it are you... Okay that sentence seemed to make so much more sense in my head.

Well it's Monday tomorrow. My favourite day of the week. I am hoping that it's been a quiet weekend as I'm going to aim to clear as much as possible as we've got this training day of Tuesday. I just hope I don't get lost on the way there. This is one of those times where satnav would be useful See there Engineseer I've said it. Are you happy now?

Somebody made a good point about the new bond film the other day. How exactly are they going to fit the name Quantim of solace into a song?

I've just seen a trailer for a film called the "Other Boleyn girl" . The trailer does not seem encouraging that they've actually stuck to the 'real history' of Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII. But hey it can't be any worse off historically speaking then that awful Tv series the tudors. Speaking of which reminds me, I'm halfway through my second book on the tudors and shoudl be able to post a review soon.

I'm currently looking out of Grumpys office window as I type this. It's 5pm, it's still light and theres a nice blue sky outside. Maybe we're moving towards spring after all.

anyway,

later!

Blame it on the weatherman

Well I don't know what the heck is going on with the weather this week. We've had snow, rain, overcast skies, clear skies, bright blue skies, bright sunshine, fog and now apparently the temperature is set to reach -9 overnight. All I can say is thank goodness for central heating. Lovely invention :-)

I've got this training away day thing on Tuesday. We all had to fill in one of those questionnaire things. I'm sure you all now the type I mean, do you agree or disagree with this statement etc. Their also the ones which say something like " There are no wrong answers" I always imagine there is a second part to their statement " but there are answers your bosses may not like". We also had to fill in a thing saying what our priority for the next month and three months are. Mine was returned as my line manager said I had put nothing about meeting my Kpi's. Me thinking logically of course assumed that was a given anyway but I had to rewrite it anyway. So my top priority for my job for the next month is to basically do my job.

No I'm not sure why I had to specify that specifically either, but again mine is not to reason why.

Shopping went the same as usual today sides from the fact it was flipping freezing out. It was not a nice sensation to keep walking into boiling hot shops then having to go back into the cold outside.

Manuscript reading's going okay for work. This one is much better then the one I was reading last week. Although to be fair to the previous author he had to write in a lot shorter time than usual.

Celebrity news! ( yes, I've been reading the celebrity news on website, I'm currently that bored) Cheryl Cole from Girls aloud is back in the UK after taking a holiday after her husband cheated on her. I have only one thing to say to the Husband. Are you Crazy?? You have seen who your married to right?

You can now buy a model of the monster from the movie cloverfield complete with 10 parasites, 70 points of articulation with incredible ‘life like detail ‘, isn’t this a odd thing to say when talking about a monster that was a special effect in a movie! But the strangest thing has to be that is comes complete with an accessory of the statue of Liberty’s head! Yes you read that right. This is the sort of thing that doesn’t appeal to uber geeks like me. The only ones it would probably appeal to are either people who spend a lot of time in a padded room or a “ Geek king” a species of geek so rare nobody is even sure if they actually exist. I’m not going to embrace the stereotype here and make some joke about it probably being because they never leave their Mum’s basement....Oh wait I just did.


Well Grumpy is out as per usual on a Saturday night ( I really have no social life right now do I?) So I have the house to myself. Just finished watching Primeval. It's fun but I do agree with what one reviewer said in the paper " It's like the anti-torchwood". At least you don't see the main character in primeval trying to kiss something every episode.

anyway,

later!

We know.........

Well it’s a interesting time at work at the moment. Our departments restructuring is soon to be followed by some building restructuring because as another department will be moving into our area of the building and another one will be moving out, with this new department arriving they are having to build a wall. Right across the centre of the space we currently occupy, Don’t ask me why I’m sure it makes sense to someone somewhere, which is likely to result is us having to play musical desks yet again.

However news of our department restructuring including names of anyone who might or might now be leaving the department is still ‘secret’ until the end of March. Despite this one of our authors let slip on his blog some of this news, so now people know one of the most important effects on our department as a whole. And we know that they know. But despite us knowing that they know we can’t admit to what they know even though we know that they know. And they probably know that we know that they know. Some of them even know that we know that they know and even though we know what they know is what we know they know we can’t admit that they know that we know that what they know is true. So at the end of the day we know that they know. They know that we know that they know. But we can make any comments on that we know that what they know is what we know that they shouldn’t know until the end of March.

Clear?

No not to me either, but someone waayyyyy about my paygrade decides these things. I’m just the muggins who has to deal with it.

We found a great funny review for one of our books on the internet this week. Well funny in the sense that it was from brazil and so wasn’t in English. One of the editors decided to run it through google translate and the end result was…. Interesting. He’s a brief example of part of the translated review.

“A publisher small but pujante, which has already begun in the best style kung-fu-shaw-brothers-tarantino: Walking in the door and attitude, will face?”

Well it makes more sense then some of the posts on that LDS message board that I’ve commented about previously.

There was a interesting article in the news yesterday, a gambling addict is sueing a bookmakers for more then £2 million, money he lost gambling after asking the bookmaker not to let him bet again. At what point does an addict stop becoming culpable for his actions? From what I understand in the news story he requested that they close his account and prevent him from using it. He then went and opened a new account and used that one instead. So the bookmaker had done what he requested initially. It will be interesting to see if this is successful. Could it prompt other addicts to try similar things? An Alcoholic suing an off license for selling him beer? A smoker suing a supermarket for letting him buy cigarettes? Where would it end?

The new European space lab has been installed on the Space station. Now some people wonder why interest in science is dying out. But considering this story about Humans in space constructing the largest space station ever and installing this new state of the art lab module which could let to breakthroughs impossible on the ground, is being reported by some news organisations with the same enthusiasm they would give to paying bills you can see why the wonder and excitement of space and science is rapidly disappearing. I mean the best the BBC website could do was a two paragraph report from a reporter standing in the mock up at ESA HQ in Germany! Hardly riveting stuff even for a geek like me.

Engineseer has believe it or not actually started updating his blog again. So use the link on the list of blogs I read to go and visit his blog and leave comments. Hopefully if he gets enough it might encourage him to keep going, that or to improve the times between posts to days rather then months : - )

Well as has been the norm for Friday nights so far this year it looks like another night in for yours truly. Nothing going on YSA wise at all. Or rather nothing going on YSA wise that anybody has told me about. Either option as likely as the other with the way communication is at the moment. Well I’ve got another manuscript to read for work, a great big HA! Directed to all the people who said that I wasted my time learning all the background for our games. It’s proven to be more profitable then all those stupid plays we had to study for English. But the least said about my English GCSE class the better. Especially the teacher who asked me to give a talk about the church in front of the whole class!

Anyway,

Later!

Today is a Thursday and nothing else

Just to reiterate there is nothing special about today in my eyes. Nothing is going on, there were no displays in lots of shop windows, there’s nothing on the radio, news sites or even on the front page of google to suggest there is anything going on today. That it all…..

Yeah I know, I didn’t believe that either and I wrote the thing. Yes V Day is here and I’m just hoping to get through the day without having to run into lots and lots of happy couples! And that would just be fate rubbing it into the nth degree! I guess it will just be me and book this evening.

Getting to institute was ‘interesting’ last night. There was fog, lots and lots of really thick fog. So of course in weather like that what do all the idiot drivers do? That’s right put the pedal right to the floor. There was a bad accident on the other side of the carriageway. I couldn’t see it (coz it was foggy) but they had shut the whole road and there were three fire engines in attendance. I could only tell that due to the shape of them I could see through the fog and the flashing blue lights which were lighting up the fog in a rather odd and ‘unearthly way’.

Of course the whole having to have a class on eternal marriage the day before V day wasn’t exactly the best way to get my mind off today, especially when there were two married couple and one engaged couple in a class of 12! Of course the class started with a comment about girls studying which lead into Bro H making a comment about how it was good for girls to come institute as they could meet Rm’s and by studying they could be on the same levels as RM’s who came back from their missions disciplined and knowledgeable which would help them when they got married. Which was the closest I have come to total despair in a while because if even Bro H is saying girls should look for Rm’s I’m in real trouble here. Maybe those girls in Coalville branch were right after all. : - (

But I’m going to try and stay positive here because I know this issue as it were is going to be make or break. If I let this one get to me and knock me down I don’t know if I’ll be able to get back up again and keep going to church as I don’t know if what self confidence I have will be able to take it. I’ll going to keep going and will just have to hope that there is another girl out there somewhere who would be able to look past the fact I’m not a RM, because I would hate for those girls in coalville branch to be proved right.

And on that rather self pitying note (I’m really struggling with that darn resolution) I’ll think I’ll leave it there. (Kitty really would be kicking me from one end of the building to the other if she knew I was in this kind of mood and was here ). I guess at the end of the day none of us know whats coming in life so I’ll just have to keep plugging away at things and hang on in there, whilst being the geek that I am to see what life brings me.

( I'll try and avoid the self pity posts from now on. As it will be past V Day I should be getting less cynical. thanks for bearing with me :-)

Tune in next time folks, same geek ramblings, same geek channel.

Later!

La la la I'm not listening, or watching, or reading.....

Well it’s the dreaded V day tomorrow and what better way to take my mind of that day and my single status that going to institute to the eternal marriage course. Wait a second…… Well I suppose it could be worse, it could be V day today and I would have to sit in a lesson about eternal marriage whilst being single on the most romantic night of the year. Well I guess it’s just me and good book tomorrow night. I’m resisting the temptation to get a bar of chocolate though. Maybe I should just refer to tomorrow as the day that shall not be named.

I’m hoping for one of the happy institute lessons tonight. If it’s one of the depressing ones I might have real problems getting up tomorrow. Torchwood is on again tonight and hopefully it will improve over last week’s effort and not having Captain Jack kissing things again. He’s bi, we get it, we know! It doesn’t have to keep trying to prove it the entire time. I have no idea why they have increased him doing that this series. There’s no need for it. (Wow I sound old here don’t I?)

The weather has been behaving a little oddly this week. There’s been bright sunshine, blue skies and for some reason it’s freezing. Literally! I’ve had to de ice every morning this week. Although it could be worse I suppose. If we’d had any snow we would probably be in real trouble!

The number of difficult emails at work is reducing. The unfortunate side effect of this is the ones that are still coming in seem to be increasing in nastiness. Despite my Sunday school teachers advice to Engineseer and I it is very hard to feel charitable to someone who’s taken the time to write a nasty email with lots of swear words in it, even if it’s not directly at you personally.

I just found out then one of the American YSA students who was studying in Leicester last year is coming back to visit for a couple of days and the YSA are planning a trip to the coast with her on.. Monday. See this is the problem with being one of the ‘older’ YSA. Your not a student and have to work for a living which means its impossible for you to re arrange your schedule on such short notice, or get time of work. So it looks like I’m going to miss seeing her, which is sad and annoying in equal measure.

Anyway,

Later !

When will I learn ?

Well I suppose it was my own fault. I mentioned yesterday how with it being half term it should be easy to get back and forth into work each day. Oops, shouldn't have said that now. It was fine admitally until I got into Nottingham then I hit the absolute Chaos which was caused by the traffic lights going out at one of the main roundabouts. It was scary how fast the traffic backed up. But as I've said before and will say again there's no need for terrorists to try attacking our road network. We're more then adept at screwing it up ourselves.

This is a suggestion for a customer service email address someone mentioned today that I wish I could forward all of the difficult and nasty emails I receive onto;

Im-not-listeninglalalala@pleasegoaway.com

Well I can dream can’t I?

Apparently the new Indiana Jones trailer is released this Thursday. Shrewd planning there on behalf of the studios marketing department. Their obviously aware that the people who usually spend most of their time on the internet watching movie trailers (geeks) are probably going to be in the house with nothing better to do on the 14th.

Speaking of which in a effort to avoid feeling depressed I will try and treat the 14th as any other Thursday and if anybody mentions the V word I will simply deal with it in a grown up adult like way. I will stick my fingers in my ears and start singing “ La la la I’m not listening,” whilst maintaining the hope of having better luck next year : - ) ( still dreaming I know)

It takes a special kind of madman to ever contemplate bigamy. It takes a ever more special kind of madmen to actual do it. But even these prime examples of muppetdom pale into insignificance when compared to the genius I saw a story about in the news today. Yes a Bigamist was caught out when he invited the same guest to both weddings. Only one word to say to that D'oh!

later!

Mondays, flipping Mondays

As long term readers might know, Mondays are far from my favourite day of the week. Firstly it's the start of a new week of work and I also have to deal with three days worth of emails and so forth in one day. Turf in the usual traffic I have to fight my way through, it's easy to see why I'm not keen on this day. It didn't help this morning that I was running late and legged it out the door to discover the car was iced over. After saying one or two words of a dubious nature I frantically hunted out the de-icer and tried to clear the windscreen. By the time I finally got it de iced and the inside demisted I was running nearly 15 minutes late. I really thought I was in trouble.

But I had forgot one thing.

It's half term in the UK which means that more then two thirds of the morning traffic well wasn't around. Not only was I able to make the 15 minutes up I also got to work earlier then I usually do. Result! So I have a week (touch wood) of easy driving to and from work.

Unfortuantely the level of emails that had come in over the weekend decided not to be so nice and I had nearly a hundred to answer. The total wasn't helped by a lot emails regarding the recent changes we announced to one of our product ranges, on the plus side if there are any swear words in these emails I have been told that I can count them as abusive and ignore them. Which paradoxically is a good and bad thing. It means the number of emails I have to answer is reduced but there is also a lot that I have to ignore. It's not a nice feeling to get nasty emails.

Another thing which is increasing the emails is a competition we're running. We run one on a regualr basis and they are always very popular. However no matter how clear or how much we explain the rules there are always people who just don't 'get it' or try and look for the loopholes. One of the main rules is that they have to stick to our official background. Which means I have lots of questions if using information from Wilkepedia is valid! I do wish I could tell them to pick up a book instead of relying on the internet!

I slowly starting to master publisher at work. It's early days as it were but I've just produced my first order form using it and it's looks a heck of a lot better and is a lot easier to use then Microsoft word :-)

I had to give feedback on that manucript I read for work. It seemed to go well. The only nerve wracking part was that the editor I was giving the feedback to had actually wrote the book! That's the first time I've ever given feedback to an author face to face!

anyway, I guess that's all for now. I'm starting to put myself to sleep :-)

later!

Well maybe one day

Well I once heard somebody say that it's in the depths of the night when you can't sleep that the biggest and most life changing thoughts will come to you. Well maybe that was true for that person for me, the only thought which came was that I really don't like the stupid automatic light that the house whose garden backs onto our has. Yes in case you didn't guess I had real probems sleeping last night. I was tossing and turning near enough the whole time. Don't know why, just one of them things. The downside was it was very hard to get up for church. The temptation to stay in bed was almost overwhelming.

Sacrement was interesting. We had three new Elders move into the ward this week so they all gave testimonys and photoshop and his son both gave talks. His son did look like he wished he was somewhere else, but considering it's nerve racking enough for a adult to get up there and he's only 12 it's understandable. He gave a very good talk.

Sunday school was a bit quiet. Mainly becuase we only had four people in the class. Traveller was there though. She was back from her uni course as it's half term. It was great to see her, as she's great to talk to and she's a good listener. It's not the same without her around.

Priesthood, was well the usual. Engineseer was in a nagging, eh I mean 'prompting mood' and kept encouraging me to go and speak to the EQ president again about my home teaching list. So I did, or at least I tried to as I didn't even get a chance to speak before he started speaking and said that yes he was still aware that I hadn't got a home teaching list or partner as it was on his to do list. Mind you he didn't specify where it was on his to do list so who knows when it will actually get done. Oh well maybe I'll get a new hometeaching list someday.

I've finally finished that manuscript for work. It's interesting and a fairly good read. There are some bits that need changing but there's still plenty of time for that.

They've just told us we're going to be having a 'away day' for our diversion', which is always nice. The chance to get out of the office for a day etc. What's not so nice is it's on the far side of Nottingham and according to the Map it's a 55 minute drive on clear roads, so goodness knows how long it's going to take during rush hour!

I bought a new book on the tudors yesterday and had to buy a new pair of trainers. My old one spilt right across the sole which is annoying as that seems to happen to all of my trainers these days. Grumpy reckons it's due to wearing them whilst driving. Which is probably true and theres not a lot I can do about it. I could try using it a excuse to miss work " Sorry, can't come because If I drive it's damages my trainers. Hmm what's this bit of paper your giving me, seems to have the ltter P and the numbers 4 and 5 on it"

Anyway, I've spent a large part of the afternoon sticking models together. I know, I know. Could I be any more geeky? ( rhetorical question by the way).

YSA FHE has been moved back again by another week. If it keeps getting moved back it wil lbe time for Marchs before we had Februarys!

oh well,

later!

Totally empty

I've been sitting here like a muppet staring at the screen for the past 10 minutes trying to think of something to say. However I'm determined not to break one of my resolutions and miss a day of blogging when I have posted something everyday this year, even if my post is to say that I have nothing to post.

Confused? Trying being me.

Hopefully it will be back to normal service tomorrow, I don't know why but I just feel so drained and tired today.

So sorry, I hope you'll come back tomorrow.

I'll try and be funny then, I promise.

What happens at 4hrs 22min then?

I've been watching the TV tonight and low and behold a advert for quaker oats of all things came on. Now apparently Quaker oats can keep you going for 4hrs and 21 minutes. Now two things spring to mind, firstly where did they get that precise a measurement from and secondly what happens when you get to 4hrs 22. Do you just keel over?

Talking of Adverts, we also saw that Skoda advert where they make a Car cake. Which is the same size as a full scale car. Grumpy always asks this so just out of interest does anyone know what they did with that cake after the advert finished? Please let me know so I can then at least answer Grumpy and make sure it stops asking the same question, again, again and again.

I had a new bugbear! Yes it's people who write emails using text speak. I have only one question, WHY?

Grumpy decided we were going to have something different for Tea tonight. He decided to do chops and sausages. Don't ask me why, he just did. Well at least it makes more sense then when he serves up baked potatos with Sprouts and cauliflower.

We've only got two more weeks of the eternal marriage course, then we'll be on double lessons of the old testament course until easter. This weeks lesson involved the importance of Faith, Hope and Charity and it's importance in dating. Which is true, I have Faith in the hope that one day a girl might show charity and agree to do on a date with me :-)

anywy, it's the weekend now. Time to relax and most probably spend my weekend the way I usually spend most of my weekends. Do nothing constructive and just lazy around :-) Tis the life!

later!

Maybe they did listen?

Well outside of work I don't tend to get a lot of emails. Sad I know, so when one does arrive which isn't a promise of being able to buy the latest medical marvel dirt cheap, the news that I've been pre approved for a loan, somebody in the middle of Africa who has several hundred million pounds and all they need are my bank details, or a email from a bank I don't bank with to say my non existance account has been accessed by somebody other then me it does tend to liven things up. Not by much I grant you, but with the state of my social life it doesn't require that much to lighten things up for me.

Well I've just recieved the first email of the year from the national YSA conference organisers. It seems this years website is about to go live, so after the hidiousily rushed mess of last year it seems, ( not I've said it seems, just in case it all goes pear shaped) they have decided to plan ahead in plenty of time. So it seems that when they said they wanted feedback they actually read it rather then filing it straight into the bin. Now the conference isn't until August, but unless a YSA Geekette happens to cross paths with me at point in the next week, I think you would be safe in placing a bet that I will be there this year, as single as ever and a object of curiosity to the younger YSA some of whom have probably never seen a YSA over 25 years old and would have be sure until that point that they were a myth. I can just imagine it now. " Look whats that over there" " Why it's either bigfoot or a YSA over 25, It's hard to tell which as I didn't think either existed"

Well it didn't only contain the news about the website going live soon. It also contained the YSA acts of service challenge card which apparently one of the speakers promised to share with us at the conference. Now I know what the idea is behind the card even if it sounds like something from a quiz show. There are 12 tick boxes, one for each month of this year strangly enough. You put a tick in each months box when you have performed a act of service. Seems simple enough, just like me. Two things do worry me though, are we going to have to take it with us to the conference like homework and we'll get marked on it? And secondly how do they expect us to get a tick for a act of service (from the list on the card) we perform for every month this year when they sent it out to us to start in February. Think about people !

In the centre of the card it advises us to do three things. Learn the duties associated with your calling, this is easy I push a cart full of books around and stamp them, Magnify your callings with dillegence and excellent must pratice with date stamp, Perform your home teaching responsibilities, d'oh! Well being able to do two out of three isn't bad. But I guess it does bring up that old argument Engineseer and I had. If you haven't been give a hometeaching list can you claim a 100%, as you've done exactly what you've been given. Nothing :-) (just kidding, I would never actually claim 100% without doing anything)

So the choices for acts of service in the order they wrote them on the card are;

• Attend the temple
• Write to a missionary
• Wash up at a ward social
• Participate in helping hands
• Keep a journal ( does blogging count? could this be my tick for january?)
• Visit a homebound person
• Spend time with your family
• Polish your flatmate's shoes (don't think Dad would be happy if I polished his trainers)
• Qualify for a temple recommend (shouldn't this be at the top of the list)
• Be an Usher
• Help keep the chapel clean
• Research your family history
• serve a mission
• Smile ( have trouble doing)
• Help a neighbour or friend. (can do)

Hmm, I wonder if I'm going to have to expand my resolutions list to fit some of these in as well? Who knows. Well I'll be interested to see what they have on tap for this years conference. Aslong as he ditches his buzz phrase, and those early morning scripture study sessions, I mean seriousily some YSA had problems getting up for the first activity at 9.30am let along 6.30am, things can only get better.

Use the YSA conference label to find my extensive posts about my experiences at the last two conferences.

later!

It's been a interesting 24 hours

Well for once I think the title of the post really says it all. It’s been a mildly interesting 24 hours. But of was this interesting 24 hours comprised hmm?? I think it’s time for a flashback ( cue Wayne’s worlds sound) Do, le do, do le do, do le do.

Well due to the strangeness of the roads round here I never go home before institute. Mainly because it takes longer for me to get home from work then to get into Leicester (the journey is about twice as far). So as it would take more time to get home and then go onto institute, plus the extra distance I would travel, I always head straight into Leicester and stop off to get tea somewhere. I was in the queue to get some food when AR and EP walked in. Now I’m only referring to them by their initials as I am completely stuck as to what codenames to give them, but I digress. After sitting and chatting to both of them for a little while and it made eating Tea much nicer to have some female company, rather then sitting their eating in silence by myself, huddled in corner like I usually do. They asked me to send their apologies to Bro H as they wouldn’t be making it to institute that night.

( Note: Just before my American readers wonder why I’m eating a ‘drink’ allow me to explain. In the UK most people will refer to the evening meal as dinner or ‘Tea’. )

So I get to institute, I pass on the apologies to Bro H and what then guess what happens halfway through the first lesson? Yes both of the girls walk in. Leaving me somewhat baffled as to why they said they weren’t coming to begin with but I suppose their you go. Mine is not to reason why, especially when it comes to the Female mind. That way doeth madness lie!

I headed home, carefully though as my tires are still with the ‘100 miles’. I got in at the same time as Grumpy, who wanted me to help with something on the computer again. Now what happened next is especially ironic considering I have been doing lots of exercise at the moment (weights and bike). I got up from the chair in office to feel something for want of a better term “ Happen” to one of the muscles in my thigh. And it hurt, a lot. In fact so much I had trouble putting any weight on my leg at all. Other people hurt themselves when exercising, me I can hurt myself standing up from a freaking chair. What are the odds? ( well quite good obviously)

After taking a couple of ibuprofen ( I’m so glad I learned how to swallow pills. I never used to be able to do it), I settled down to watch torchwood. There was something to do with a space whale in this episode apparently but A I’m not sure and B to be honest I found it the first bad episode in this series. There was one good line though.
“ I hunt aliens!”
“ In CARDIFF?”
It was just the way he put the emphasis on Cardiff which made it sound like it would a much more plausible story in any other city in the UK.

I woke up late this morning. Obviously the first time my alarm went off I must have caught the snooze button, but fortunately the second time it went off it did the job and woke me up. I was running around getting ready when I realised my leg wasn’t hurting at all. Which seemed odd, considering how much it had hurt the night before. So goodness knows what I did there. Whilst trying to make my lunch I discovered that we hadn’t got any fresh bread out, so I was left with the option of having breakfast, or making sarnies for my lunch. I finally opted for making lunch, otherwise without it, those vending machines might have proved just to tempting to resist.

When I finally rolled out and hit the roads I discovered something quite disturbing. There were no traffic jams. None at all! I had a clear run into work the entire way. Not that I’m complaining it’s just without the kids being on half term it’s just odd.

I have been dealing with several long running customer service issues at work. One of which involves a Frenchman who seems to have developed extensive powers of sarcasm. Which I thought summed up the bizarreness of the past 24 hours rather well. If there’s anything I don’t need right now it’s a sarcastic Frenchman!

It’s also Tap dances birthday today. So Happy birthday tap Dance! Unfortunately or fortunately depending on your point of view I don’t have any old photos of her I can put up. I could have used them as part of a history lesson about changing hairstyles through the years : - )

One more day to survive and it’s the weekend.

Later!

What is it about wednesdays this year

One of my responsibilities at work is making sure that all of the nice shiny new books we make get out to people as soon as possible. For review, reference etc. Sending them out to magazines and stuff is hard and usually give me a headache as I have to look at the same 15 screens in sequence and the same set of numbers 130 times in a row. Taking the books around the buildings to various people in the company is easy. Usually…..

Yes the freaking Wednesday curse which has been dogging me so well this year has struck yet again. Not only have I got to sort out the external samples, I also had to take a trolley full of books over to the other building and everybody who I have to give the books too is on the third and top floor of these building. Of course it being a Wednesday things couldn’t be that simple! I finally get inside to discover that the people in that building had broken their lift (elevator to all American readers). So that left muggin’s here lugging two very heavy boxes all the way up the stairs!

On the plus side one of the books I was taking round was a short story collection with one short story which has the title “ Evil Robot Monkey”, which I think is just a brilliant title and people should buy the book just for that.

I have to take it easy with my driving for the next couple of days as I’ve now got two new front tires. According to the garage I’ve got to take it easy for at least a hundred miles until their ‘worn in’. I was just thinking the term garage will probably be very confusing for Alice, as depending where you are in the UK a “Garage” can something attached to the side of your house which you put your car in, It can be a place where you can get petrol for your car and it can be a place where you take your car when it needs fixing.

Anyhow, it’s institute tonight. Hopefully it will be a nice uplifting lesson as opposed to one of those that makes me incredibly depressed.

Later!

Their not picking a football team

As long time readers may now towards the end of last year I did a series of posts based on the discussion boards of a certain LDS website . I haven't visited this site in a while but I thought I might try to see what they were saying after the announcement of the new 1st Presidency for our church. Well decided to visit was my first mistake, actually reading anything was my second I don't know what it is about this site but it seems to bring out the worst in church members.

There was one thread about the new presidency. The person who started the thread said words to the effect of that although President Monson was the traditional choice for president, he didn't know if his choice of counselors were traditional. So he asked if people thought President Monson had gone with a traditional choice or was trying some new and innonative. At which point I stopped reading appalled by this thread which seemed bad even by this sites standards. " traditional or innonative" it makes it sound like that he was picking a football team!

Well never let it be said that eastenders is struggling for storylines. In their latest " not attempting to push the boundaries of taste and cause a media frenzy in order to boost our ratings, honest" storyline a wife whose husband cheated on her will seduce him, drug him, then bury him alive in the woods in a coffin. See that happens all the time in soaps doesn't it? In fact I'm sure no one will raise a eyelid over the fact she's driving round with a coffin on the backseat of her car!

I got to drive Grumpys car into work today as he was taking mine to get some new tires. I was actually impressed with my last set of tires as they lasted a lot longer then we thought they would considering we got a warning at my last MOT. I think grumpy was glad as well that they were actually replaced this time as I think he had enough of taking my car in only to be told that there was no point to replace them yet.

I stopped to get petrol yesterday to discover valentines dispalys are even taking over the petrol stations. Is there no way to escape this day which is only good for people in relationships and only serves to make people who aren't in relationships even more painfully aware of this fact? Hmmm?? The petrol station I stopped at, did have quite cheap fuel. it was "Only" £1.02 a litre. which works out at something like $7.72 a galleon in US prices. I remember when eighty pence seemed like a lot.

oh well,

later!

A tale of Boats, manuscripts, hair dye and telescopes

I arrived at church yesterday to notice that Engineseers car was not in the car park, so I was fully expecting a load of comments asking where he was. Fortunately he did then appear, right at the last moment mind you, which saved muggings here from a load of comments from the Sunday school teacher.

Some of the young men and women had managed to get hold of some hair dye and lets just say the results were not hard to miss. When D came into the Sunday school class, I asked him
“ Who gave you lot hair dye to play with?”
His reply was high brow, intelligent and insightful
“ Ummm, well who gave you a portion of shut up”
My quick response
“ No one gave me a portion of anything so I’ll repeat my question”
That left him a bit dumbfounded and SF highly amused.

In Sunday school we’re studying the BoM this year. Which lead to a lot of Fun as our teacher started asking a lot of questions which physics with his rather dry sense of humour couldn’t resist answering in his own unique way.

Teacher: Okay we’re going to talk about the story where Nephi built a boat. So What was Nephi commanded to do?
Physics: to Build a boat?
Teacher: No, I mean yes I know that but what did he do once he was commanded to build a boat.
Physics: He built a boat.
Teacher: No, no. I mean once he had been commanded to build a boat what did he have to do first in order to complete building the boat.
Physics: He had to start building it.

At which point the teacher realised she wasn’t going to get a serious answer and it was going to be one of those lessons.

Priesthood was even more meandering. It was supposed to be priesthood instruction and they thought they would start the lesson by reviewing the quorum goals. At which point they found out the most important part of setting goals. It’s much easier for the quorum to achieve its goals if the majority of the quorum actually knows they have goals their supposed to be achieving to begin with!

I’m still waiting for a new home teaching list. This is starting to get a bit annoying.

I’m half way through that manuscript for work. It’s a so so read. But then again I’m only halfway so I’m trying to reserve judgement on the book as a whole until I get to the end.

In the news today apparently in a move ment to commerate the 40th aniversary of the release of the The Beatles' peace anthem, Nasa will beam the song into space using it's deep space network. Two questions, firstly why? Have they got nothing better to do with their telescopes and second what happens if they get a reply saying the Aliens prefer U2? Just a thought :-)

I was quite pleased to discover when I got home for once I had some post. However it all turned out to be useless junkmail. A offer to get a discount the next time I renew my home insurance which would only be useful if I had home insurance to start with. A offer to get 0% if I switch my credit card to my banks credit card. One problem I only have one credit card and it's with my bank anyway and finally I've apparently been preselected to get 1% cashback on my card if I spend over £250 a month on it. I may not be the worlds best at maths but even I can see that deal may not be the best one!

anyway,

later!

Is it very wet snow or simply very cold rain?

Well it snowed yesterday, well sort of. It was only the most miniscule of layer of snow that formed on the ground and it disappeared very quickly. Sigh I remember the good old days when snowfall round here could be measured in feet, not the Cm it's measured in these days.

Mind you despite it being a rather poor snowfall it has been very windy and cold the past two days so we've had to have the central heating cranked up. It's also been very annoying going to the freezer as we're still having to go right the way round the outside of the house to get to the garage as the back doors still stuck. I hope Grumpy gets a move on and gets someone to fix it soon otherwise it's got the potential to become realllllyyyyy annoying.

Well back to work tomorrow. Maybe it's because I'm getting older and in full time employment but it doesn't seem like the weekend last very long anymore. Hopefully things will have calmed down at work but after reading a couple of posts on our forums, I visited a certain authors blog to discover he has managed to let a rather important piece of information regarding the restructing at work out of the bag which wasn't supposed to be announced until the end of march. This unfortuantely has the potential to give people a 'second wind' as it were to encourage them to send in complaints. and guess which muggins will have to answer them.......

My appraisal went well on Friday. A couple of improvement points, but nothing to get a slapped wrist over. Which is always nice.

I got myself a couple of DVD's at the weekend. I'm amasing quite a collection now. But when I was in one shop I saw a display that reminded me it's approaching that time of year again. Yep, Valentines day. Now most people know I used to be somewhat cynical about valentines days, but I wasn't last year. The main difference being last year for the first time ever I wasn't single for valentines day, but this year I am back to being single again, so it's back to my usual cynical ways and watching all the happy couples with the envious eyes of a singleton.

Oh well, time to go back to sticking that Ork Truk together me thinks. Yes, I've been having a geeky afternoon :-)

later,

All I can think of to say

After watching the service for Presiden Hinckley this evening it seems a bit inappropriate to say anything else apart from sharing the words to this hymn that has been in my head all evening.

1. We thank thee, O God, for a prophet
To guide us in these latter days.
We thank thee for sending the gospel
To lighten our minds with its rays.
We thank thee for every blessing
Bestowed by thy bounteous hand.
We feel it a pleasure to serve thee
And love to obey thy command.

2. When dark clouds of trouble hang o’er us
And threaten our peace to destroy,
There is hope smiling brightly before us,
And we know that deliv’rance is nigh.
We doubt not the Lord nor his goodness.
We’ve proved him in days that are past.
The wicked who fight against Zion
Will surely be smitten at last.

3. We’ll sing of his goodness and mercy.
We’ll praise him by day and by night,
Rejoice in his glorious gospel,
And bask in its life-giving light.
Thus on to eternal perfection
The honest and faithful will go,
While they who reject this glad message
Shall never such happiness know.

For my LDS readers I hope you take a moment tomorrow during Fast sunday to reflect on President Hinckleys life and works. For my non LDS readers I hope you will also take a moment this weekend to reflect on all of the good things you have in your lives.

Footprints in the sand

One night a man had a dream. He dreamed he waswalking along the beach with the Lord. Across thesky flashed scenes from his life. For each scene, henoticed two sets of footprints in the sand: onebelonging to him, and the other to the Lord.

Whenthe last scene of his life flashed before him, helooked back at the footprints in the sand. Henoticed that many times along the path of his lifethere was only one set of footprints. He also noticedthat it happened at the very lowest and saddesttimes in his life.

This really bothered him and hequestioned the Lord about it. "Lord, You said thatonce I decided to follow you, You'd walk with me allthe way. But I have noticed that during the mosttroublesome times in my life, there is only one setof footprints. I don't understand why when I neededyou most you would leave me."

The Lord replied,"My son, My precious child, I love you and I wouldnever leave you. During your times of trial andsuffering, when you see only one set of footprints, it was then that I Carried You."

Well a good end to a awful week

Well I have never been so glad for it to be Friday. I think this week has to rank as one of the worst I have experienced at work. But on the plus side as the bosse's boss was worried about the weather he let us go home early, a full hour and a half early. So that helped make up for this week a little :-)

It looks like the weather is really closing in right now. But then again that doesn't both me because as has been the case for every Friday so far this year, I'm at home this evening. Well it could be worse, Grumpy could be out and that would really be the final proof that my social life is non existant right now and I'm happy in my delusion that it isn't thank you very much :-)

Well it's February all ready so I figured now would be as good a time as any to look back on my resolutions; (resolutions in bold, progress underneath each one)

1) Exercise more. Two days down of the year and two session on the bike. I'm starting slowly and building up each day. I'll let you know how this one goes.
Well I'm on the bike everyday most of the time. Only three missed days so far.

2) loose weight. Well I've needed to do this for a long time and lets be honest, my build at the moment, probably not that attractive to the ladies.. So I'll keep you posted on this one too.
I've almost lost a stone. Yaah!

3) Cut back on sugar. This one is tied into 1 and 2 so I guess you could say it's one uber resolution. Of course in ctting back on the sugar I'm also cutting back on the caffine. Consider this fair warning that I may be cranky as hell for the next few days as I work through the caffine headaches, but only got myself to blame.
My caffine and sugar intake are way down on what it was, So another yah for me I think!

4) Keep the blog more up to date.
One month, forty posts, I think that counts as keeping it up todate.

5) Try and get more people to read my blog and leave comments. It really does feel like I'm rambling to myself sometimes. Although of course that might be because I'm the only one who can understand me.
As the comments and maps can atest. I'm making progress here too.

6) Get Finances under control and start saving. ( this is going to be a tough one)
I'm making good strides here too. I finished the month which more money then I was expecting.

7) Try to minimize the amount of time I spend wallowing in self pity.
Hmm this one is still proving difficult. I'm going to have to keep working on this one.

8) Make a new friend.
I've made new blogging friends (Alice and scully), maybe I should adapt this resolution to cover blogging and outside of blogging.

9)Develop a new skill
I'm starting to learn how to use publisher at work.

10) Broaden my history knowledge by studying about the tudors. ( that TV show is so far wrong it's beyond belief!)
Well I've finished by first book on the tudors. I'm takinga break by reading about the American railway before I get another book on the tudors to read.

So 9 yahs! and one must try harder. Well I'm doing better then I thought I would to be honest :-)

later!