Where has the year gone

Well todays the last day of November which means that's it's the start of December tomorrow and thus 2009 is only a month away. Eek! Where has the year gone? It only seems like yesterday that we were in January this year.

Mind you I am impressed that I have managed to do at least one blog post every day that I have been able to this year, I wasn't expecting to have kept up to date with it as well as I have done when I initially set myself the challenge in January.

Church was well Church for want of a better term. The YSA were a bit thin on ground and they've also cancelled tomorrow nights YSA FHE which is annoying but not the end of the world I guess :-)

Mechanicus and Photoshops brother, Gadget, well his wife has just given birth to a new daughter. It was very funny though watching his eldest son as he had just been given a advent calender and was loving it as it had Thomas the tank engine on. Someone from the ward was trying to talk to him about his new Sister and he was giving simple one word answers like yes to the question " Do you have a new sister" but was extremely keen to emphasis the fact that he had something with Thomas on! Well I gues he had his priorities in order. He'd already got a little sister before the new one arrived but now he had a calender with Thomas on!

Well Work tomorrow, so another week of fresh 'oppotunities ahead'.

Later folks!

One word

If theres one word to sum up today it would have to be 'cold'. Yes it's been extremely cold all day. It started off a 1 on the temperature scale in Grumpys car and rose to a high of 3 degrees by mid day before then getting colder. That combined with the fog that was hanging around all morning meant that it wasn't one of the best days to go shopping.

It was also extremely busy with it being payday weekend, combined with the fact Christmas is alsmost upon us meant that there were some extremely long queues in places. Of course there wasn't a lot I could do about that so I had to just try and be patient and zen like. It didn't work nost of the time as I just felt cold and bored but on the plus side I did get a large part of my Christmas shopping out of the way today.

I spent most of the afternoon feeling very grateful for the invention of central heating even if we have had to crank it up high to keep the house warm. Still at least I was able to get some painting done so my next article will hopefully go up next week.

So Church tomorrow and I've actually had so many announcements for the bulletin this week I had trouble fitting them all in. Lets hope thats a sign of progress rather then an indication that things are alway busier at Christmas, hey?

Later folks

Lorry Driver

Some of you may remember that earlier in the week I was saying that I couldn't get the tune of Britney spears womanizer song out of my head due to a paraody called 'Lorry Driver'. Well after some searching I foudn the lyrics for the parody.

( keep the tune to Womanizer in your head whilst reading or you could just go to youtube to hear the actual version. Oh and where it say's 'horn' in the chorus they actually played a sound effect of a trucks horn. )

You're a man
Who knows exactly where he's goin
On the road
With all your eighteen wheels a' rollin

You deliver milk or sand
or pigs or paint across the land
That's what you do
What you do, mister

A workin man
You drive a wagon for a livin
Arrive on time
Cos that's important when deliverin'

Bread or bikes or garden chairs
or sheds or beds or dancing bears
That's what you do
What you do, mister

Lorry driver, lorry, lorry driver
You're a lorry driver
Oh, lorry driver,
oh You're a lorry driver,mister

Horn, get out of
Horn Horn, the way
Lorry driver, lorry driver
Lorry driver

Eating sausage rolls and cornish pasties
crisps and jaffa cakes
Drinking coffee and some red bull
on your scheduled tacho breaks

You work away
For several days
Life on the road
You're a lorry driver

Live behind the wheel
You drive from Devon up to Aberdeen
Pull off at the services
for diesel and nuts magazine

You read the Sun
And have a saggy bum
Everyone can tell
You're a lorry driver Trucker man

You crunch the miles to make a dollar
It's just a shame
You've got the body of Rik Waller

You should be on Slimfast
you spend your life sat on your ass
But that's the way it is
The way it is mister

Off you go
You've had a kip and had your dinner
And hung up your
New centrefold of Lucy Pinder

You're the greatest driver
fuelled by Yorkie bars and Tizer
That's the way you roll
The way you roll mister

Lorry driver, lorry,
lorry driver You're a lorry driver
Oh, lorry driver, oh
You're a lorry driver, mister

Horn, get out of
Horn Horn, the way Lorry driver,
lorry driver Lorry driver

Eating sausage rolls
and cornish pasties crisps and jaffa cakes
Drinking coffee and some
Red Bull on your scheduled tacho breaks

You work away For several days
Life on the road
You're a lorry driver Live behind the wheel
You drive from Devon up to Aberdeen
Pull off at the services for diesel and Nuts Magazine

You read the Sun
And have a saggy bum
Everyone can tell You're a Lorry Driver

Maybe if I didn't drive a truck for my work
My wife would look like Jordan
rather than Pauline Quirke
And she does a bit, a little bit

Lorry driver, lorry, lorry driver
You're a lorry driver Oh, lorry driver,
oh You're a lorry driver, mister

Horn, get out of
Horn Horn, the way
Lorry driver, lorry driver
Lorry driver

Eating sausage rolls and cornish pasties crisps
and jaffa cakes
Drinking coffee and some Red Bull
on your scheduled tacho breaks

You work away For several days
Life on the road
You're a lorry driver

Live behind the wheel
You drive from Devon up to Aberdeen
Pull off at the services
for diesel and Nuts Magazine

You read the Sun
And have a saggy bum
Everyone can tell
You're a Lorry Driver

Eating sausage rolls and cornish pasties
crisps and jaffa cakes
Drinking coffee and some Red Bull
on your scheduled tacho breaks

Lorry driver, lorry, lorry driver
You're a lorry driver
Oh, lorry driver,
oh You're a lorry driver, mister

It's not too clear

Well I got up this morning to discover not only was it cold, there was also lots of fog around too! On the plus side it wasn't icy so at least I didn't have to mess around trying to de ice the car.

Work was good today if a little on the quiet side but at least it enabled me to get lots of stuff cleared, just in time for the inevitable Christmas rush to start next week.

It had got even colder by the time I was leaving work. It was so cold it took four minutes of the engine running and the heater turned up before I stopped seeing my breath and that was inside the car!

Still It's the weekend now, two whole days to myself and I am planning to get some contructive stuff done. Whether or not I actually do it is another matter entirely.

Later folks!

Not one of the best days of the month

I have said it before and I will say it again. Nobody is better at stuffing the roads up around here and causing huge confusion then the people who actually use the roads.

The problems on the road this morning couldn't have been more effective at causing things to come to a near complete halt if they were planned. There was a crash on the main motorway which closed it between junctions 22 to 24 northbound. So that was one main route between Leicester and Nottingham down. So everybody goes to the other route the A46 which then suffers an accident blocking it. People then start to come through Loughborough causing near gridlock then as they attempted to come across country slowing that route down and to then finally add to the fun the one main route everybody was now using to get into Nottingham was then half jammed by someone who managed to flip their car and get it on it's roof on a straight bit of road. There was no ice, no roadworks, no ramps apparently.How this guy managed to flip his car I have no idea. So it took me 1 hour 45 minutes to get into work.

Now unless your perfect saint you can not start your day stuck in traffic for that long with out getting very ticked off, so it did mean that I wasn't in the best of moods when I got to work and it just seemed to influence the day totally, so everything just seemed to drag... As soon as the day ended I was out that door ready and eager to get home and what happened. Yep I ran smack bang into another long traffic jam. I was tempted to bang my head on the steering wheel at this point in frustration but I realised the way my day had been going all that would have likely been to set the air bag off.

Still hopefully this day will be a one off and to be fair it has been the wost day I have had since my holiday and it could have been worse. I could have been stuck in the traffic for over two hours as happened to some people at work.

Chemistry and I went home teaching tonight. I know. I'll say that again for thoseo fo you who missed it or might be in shock we actually went hometeaching. We could only see one person but hey that still counts as 25% based on our list. We did have a small but significant problem initially when we turned up at his halls of residence to see him and we rang him to ask which door we had to use to get into his hall. He not in halls of residence anymore. The EQ presidency had given us an address for him for last year. I'm sure irony was off laughing his head off somewhere.

Well the fate of Batman has been revealed. Apparently Bruce wayne died in a helicopter crash taking out a villian. There was an explosion and he died. Apparently he must be dead as no ones seen him since. My reaction, Oh come on! It's so obivous he's not dead. I mean in comics it's a regular occurence for someone to come back from the dead when you have a body and it's been buried. The fact that he was last seen in a helicopter that exploded means zip. At least when Captain America died you saw him actually die.

Oh well I suppose in the grand scheme of things that isn't actually that important.

Well one more day until the weekend.

Later folks!

Well thats just annoying

I've had the tune to the Britney spears new song stuck in my head all day. Not because of the track itself more down to radio 1 doing a parody version called " Lorry Driver" Which made me laugh so hard my stomach hurt whilst listening to it this morning on the ward to work.

Insitute was interesting this evening as our substitute teacher was actual 'teacher' who's currently working towards his PHD. His teaching style was certainly different to Brother H's as he actually finished the lessons half an hour early. Which everybody was very grateful for as the heating wasn't on so it was absolutly freezing in the stake centre. All of the girls were wearing coats, scarfs and gloves. Which was amusing to watch as you can imagine the problems they had trying to turn pages in their scriptures with thick gloves on.

Still it was nice to get home early as the house was lovely and warm when compared to the Ice box the stake centre had turned into.

Apparently Sky One is bringing back the new Gladiators show for a second series and " Wolf" is going to be returning as well as some new gladiators. Although the Guys costumes make them look like giant size action figures but only less life like and the ladies costumes make them look like well " Forgot to get fully dressed this morning barbie". Although I think most guys who remember the first version of the show still won't be watching it as none of these new gladiators are as great as Jet or Lightning which were probably the two main reasons most lads watched the show to begin with.

anyway,

Later folks!

Hmmmm

Well it was another one of those days where it was hard getting up this morning. But that probably had something to do with the fact that we had, had frost overnight so it was very cold! But as they don't pay me for not working (mores the pity) I kinda had to get up regardless of whether it was cold outside of the bed or not.

I didn't have a easy trip into work as I got stuck behind a lorry most or less the entire way whic hwas only capable of doing 40. Which meant it was a very long slow trip.

Still at least it was a good day at work and I got lots done. Even if I didn't leave til late as there had been two major accidents on the motorway meaning that the traffic was just backed up everywhere. So not wanting to site in a traffic jam for ages I just stayed for half an hour and did some painting waiting for the traffic to die down.

Geek moment! A issue of the Batman comic will be released tomorrow which will show the end and I quote " Of Bruce wayne as Batman" but there keeping it tightly underwraps as to whether he's killed or just retires as the mantle passes onto another. Well they killed Captain america so I guess all bets are off as to what happens.

Insitute tomorrow. We have a substitute teachers as Bro H is off on some training course. It will be interesting to have a different teacher for a change to see how someone else handles the lessons.

Anyway, that's all for now. I've got more Romans to go and paint.

Later folks!

What the government give with one hand they taketh away with the other

The government has cut VAT by 2.5% which means petrol would be among those things that are cheaper right? Wrong! They're going to be increased fuel duty to make up for the reduction in VAT. So basically motorists are no better or should be no worse off. Of course this works at the moment as oil prices are very low but if they soar back to their peak people are not going to be happy, especially considering they've said nothing about dropping the fuel duty when they put he VAT back up in 13 months time. Still it could be worse at least I don't smoke or drink.

It was a good day today at work even if I really struggled to get out of bed this morning. I don't like cold mornings. I especially don't like cold Monday mornings but then I guess theres not many people who do.

I heard that one of my friends from my old department who now manages a store had his shop broken into at the weekend. They didn't take any stock, but they did spray paint the walls, urinated on the floors ( charming little swine weren't they?) but worst of all they ran off with all of the staff members personal armies, which proves it was a pointed attack againist the staff in my view as it was a little too specific. Now admitally it doesn't sound like a big deal that they ran off with a few painted toy soldiers but as a hobbyist that would be my worse nightmare. As you spend so much time and effort in collecting and painting the models, have someone take them would be heartbreaking and yes I know that they could replace them/rebuild their armies but it's never the same.

In only one more week it will be December and that means it will soon be Christmas. Yah! I'm still not sure what to ask for mind you. But I better think of something quick, hey?

Anyway, got to sign off there. Got some more Romans to paint.

Later folks!

An important lesson

Well I as well as the rest of the ward was taught an important lesson at Church today about the importance of always paying attention otherwise you might well be caught out like one sister who while putting her hand up during the vote to sustain someone to newcalling, starting talkign to her friend, failed to realise that the bishopric had called for any 'againist' and still had her hand stuck way up in the air. D'oh!

We also had someone return home from their mission today so as you can imagine he had had three quarters of the ward flocking around him. Still a new addition to the Loughborough YSA, or I guess in this case a 'readdition' is always welcome.

I pointed out to Physics that the YSA notice board hadn't been updated in a while and his first response was " We have a notice board?" I really should be surprised that no one bothered to tell him that when he was called but unfortunately I'm not. Still he has some ideas of what to put on the board. One suggestion he had was a huge poster listing all the qualties in a women then a big picture of him underneath saying something to the effect " This man free to a good home of any free single YSA woman who has all these qualties ". I then joked that maybe he could do a variation of that first world war poster. However I forgot that Physics will run with ides no matter how strange they might be so he suggested a poster with me and him pointing 'at the camera' as it were with a slogan to the effect " Young, Free, Female, Single, Clever, Intelligent? ( i asked if he had forgot modest but he assured me he hadn't as he has enough modesty to share :-) Then Saxon and physics wants you!". At which point I really wasn't sure if he was serious or not. So I guess I'll just have to see what's on the noticeboard next week. He doesn't have any pictures of me to do a variation of that last poster.

Or at least I hope he doesn't.

Still we were also discussing various things and whilst listing our various skills, I mentioned I can cook, clean, hover, iron, do the washing up, the laundry and drying etc. He looked at me funny in a way I think implied he thought I was winding him up about being able to do all that. He said " If you can do all that shouldn't it be really easy for you to get married as your well trained." My response " In theory yes, in reality at the moment sadly no." His response " Well if we wanted to we could become married by the end of the year", " Is this where we have to drop all our standards in order to do so?" I responded " Oh no" he assured me " You simply go out to thail land and flash your uk passport around." At which point I decided to leave the conversation there.

I had a small accident when I got home as whilst trying to avoid Owen in the doorway the door handle caught the inside pocket in my jacket and the linning ripped. Argghhh :-( Still Tap dance now has it and is going to see if she can fix it. Here's hoping!

Anyway, work tomorrow so a fresh week of interesting 'opportunities' now lie ahead.

Later folks!

Tis the season for busy streets, knock off music and cheap deals

It must almost be Christmas as it seemed like every shop I went into today has starting playing the Christmas music. Not the good Christmas music of course more the cheap cover versions by which ever small band charged the least.

Oh well. At least it wasn't as a cold as I was expecting ans there were some very good deals around. Which was nice as I was starting the Christmas shopping today. The best deal of the day were found was in one supermarket who were selling two litre bottles of drink in a " Buy one get two free deal" Suffice to say we took full advantage of that and the garage is now rather well stocked with Drink.

There was also a brand new stall on the market today which was oh so good, but in another sense also oh so bad as it's called " The sweets that time forgot" and basically has every kind of sweet going from snowdrops, to jelly bears, to wine gums, to fizzy coke bottles all in large boxes and each box is only a £1. Unsurprisingly there was a huge queue for that stall.

But then agai nthere seemed to be huge queues everywhere today which I was surprised about as I would have thought they won't have started till next weekend but oh well.

I spend most of the afternoon reading, doing some painting and sorting through my DVD collection. Why to the last one? Well I'm one of these people who is very bad at putting things back in the right boxes and it was starting to get hard to find things. Still at least it was constructive and I didn't waste the afternoon by having a snooze.

Anyway,

Later folks!

Lets hope it's as inaccurate as usual

Apparently according to the weathermen we are supposed to get lots of cold weather this weekend and I'm guessing it will be quite cold if their right as they seem to be using the word 'Artic' a whole lot. So I guess the best I can do right now is hope that their inaccurate as usual. Failing that I will try to look on the bright side that at least this cold weather arrives at a weekend when I don't have to drive to work and thus avoid the inevitable tenseness and freaking out about having to drive in my least favourite weather condition which would have resulted.

This does remind me a quote that that I heard once which went along the lines of " you know when your getting old when the idea of it snowing turns from being fun to be annoying"

Still regardless of the weather it is now the weekend which means two whole days to myself before having to head back to work. I also have plans to get something constructive done as well. But hopefully more news about that on Sunday.

The News today seemed to be much more focussed one what celebrities have been getting up. Because someone, somewhere obivousily thought that it was vitally important that Lindsey Lohan and girlfriend had a arguement, madonna got divorced, Michael Jackson now spells his name Mikaeel, a cheeky girl posed for photos, Jordan also posed for photos in her underwear but nobody cared and most of the Female contestants on I'm a celebrity get me out of here seem to constantly be spending their time in bikini's getting wet under waterfalls. Can't possibily imagine what their trying to do there.

However not to be outdone by not getting in the newspapers, Katy perry performed a show dressed up as a flamenco Dancer, although to be fair compared to her usual dress sense " She looked Fine!" Which is probably the first and last time I will ever use a phrase like that and finally in a 'if the situation was reversed and it was a male pop group using Female models people would be screaming from the rooftops" the sugarbabes have released the video to their new single which shows them surrounded by men acting as motorbikes, cars and pieces of furniture. Also apparently to help in said needed potrayals of items all the men have to be wearing as little as possible.

Still saying that ( and yes my memory does work in strange ways sometimes, c'est la vie :-) it reminded me of a time at uni when one of the girls from one of my courses asked a group of lads after the lecture about what sort of girls 'caught our eye' and what sort of clothes they would be wearing. When we asked her why she had asked this question she said she had noticed that a lot of guys didn't seem to be noticing the girls in 'revealing clothing' as much and seemed to be more looking at girls who were 'covered up' as it were. After a brief discussion we realised she was right and came to the conclusion that it was more a case that girls 'covering up' on nights out were rare and stood out from the 'norm' of more revealing outfits which is what was attracting guys attention.

She seem satisfied with that answer then asked the guys another question. As she was doing a joint with women studies for her degree she was debating an idea for a dissestation which for some reason ( and I really can't remember why she thought of this) which needed some feedback from the guys. So we agreed ( d'oh should have waited for the question first) we would try and answer for her from the males perspective. She then proceeded to ask and I'll put this as delicately as possible why Guys were not as interested in the idea/image of two guys kissing as they were in the idea/image of two girls kissing. There was a long awkward pause, followed by every guy not only in our little group but in hearing distance making an excuse and disappearing from the canteen as fast as we could possibly move. Needless to say she never asked that question again and decided on a totally different idea and I also learned to always hear the question first before agreeing to answer anything.

Anyway on that slight note of reminiscing I'll call it a night.

Later folks!

No longer Absent

So a mere two and half week after they first put the signs out to say that they were starting roadworks in the centre of geekville they have in fact now started. Mind you only after completly changing all the signs they had already put out. Which means that them putting the first lot of signs out to begin with seemed a rather pointless exercise. Mind you I have long since learned not to dwell on things like this to do with Roadworks as they rarely make sense no matter how long you spend thinking about them.

We were a bit thin on the ground in the office today as the winter season of illness is hitting particurly hard at the moment. But this doesn't include the poor editor who broke her wrist after falling off a horse. There aren't many worse times of the year to break something then in the run up to Christmas. Mind you at least she has a excuse to get her husband to do all the chores and shopping.

Speaking of shopping apparently the big UK Store woolworths is in serious trouble right now as it's share price has collapsed to 2pence a share. I hope it doesn't go under as the high street wouldn't be the same without good old woollies.

Mind you this wasn't the top story of the day. With everything thats going on in the world, lets the credit crunch, pirates hijacking ships off somaila, wars etc there was only one story that most people seemed to be talking about and as I'm sure you've probably guessed it wasn't any of them. No, what everyones talking about is the fact a contestant off strictly coming dancing has quit and everybodies wondering did he jump or was he pushed? My opinion? Couldn't care less, don't watch it :-)

Anyway, it's only one more day to the weekend, then two whole days all to myself.

Later folks!

Whatever.

It was quite odd when I tried to get up this morning as despite not feeling tired for some reason it seemed a real struggle to pull myself out of bed. No idea why, it was just one of those mornings.

Still on the plus side the traffic was really light so I more or less had a straight run into work asides from the small stop I had to make to get some petrol. Speaking of which Asda has just announced another price cut, their petrol is now all the way down to 90 pence.

Work was good but the only problem I've had all day is that I seem to have done something to my left shoulder (or to something in that area) as it's been really sore all day. Of course the trouble is being left handed I do use that arm a lot ( unsurprisingly) so I suppose that hasn't helped it. Fortunately I had some ibuprofen in the car so at least it didn't bother me for too much of the day.

However Grumpy is also under the weather as he's done something to his back! So he's hobbling around at the moment. Lets hope Owen doesn't hurt himself or no one will be able to do much here at Geek towers.

Insitute was alright this evening. There were a few of the 'regulars' missing as it were ( gee wonder where they could have been? Football by any chance?)

Still on the bright side it was nice to see some of the YSA and chat etc in between the lessons. You really do notice the 'lift' you get from seeing everybody midweek when insitute isn't on during the summer.

I'm midway through my first book on the Romans and my next article is all but finished for the website so hopefully that will go up soon.

Later folks!

Cry Havoc and let slip the tetris block of wars

I was so not impressed when checking facebook this morning to discover that one person in my 'friends' network has raced past me in the rankings for Tetris and has consigned me to second place in all four different Tetris games you can play. Which I have to admit is incredibily frustrating. True in the grand scheme of things it doesn't matter in the slightist but this fact still doesn't detract from the fact that it's annoying.

Our missing roadworks are well still missing. We're now three weeks past the start date for them and they still haven't started despite their being signs out for the roadworks everywhere. I was wondering if this meant that they actually have two divisions. One to put signs out and one to do the actual roadworks because I can't see why else they would put signs out including divesion signs then not actually start.

Still it was a good day at work today. I was able to get a lot done as well as starting a new project. Top secret project one as was is still coming along great and the next of my articles should be going up soon (hopefully). I'll let you all know when it does.

It was too nice coming home this evening though as it has suddenly turned quite cold so I was actually shivering whilst walking to the car from the office and I had a coat on!

Still I'm home now, so I don't have to go out again into the cold :-)

Institute tomorrow, which will hopefully be as interesting as ever. I got a text from EP today asking me to confirm if I would be going to the Christmas Party which was odd as it seemed to be too early to be thinking about that but I then I realised , no it wasn't! Christmas is just over a month away. Wow where has the year gone hey?

Anyway, I'm off to do some more readng about romans.

Later folks!

Just another Monday

I've been having another one of those days where I've been struggling to come up with enough to write about. It's basically just be another Monday. I got up, I went to Work, I did work, I came home.

Not terribily interesting I know and hopefully not a potent of the week to come.

Later folks!

On, off

The room we meet in for Sunday school is usually very cold and most people spend the time complaining that the radiators aren't on. However the radiators were on today and the first thing most people said? they complained it was too hot and asked for the windows to be opened.

I'm sure Irony must have found the whole thing very amusing.

Cordelia was also there today as she was visiting family. It was great to see her as Loughborough YSA hasn't been the same since she left. I have to admit I'm still finding it hard as there ae a lot of new 'young' YSA who have banded together and I can't help but feel a little out of the group. Which is probably my paranoria speaking again but I couldn't shake the feeling I was the butt of a joke in the Sunday school lesson of which I wasn't aware.

Still mustn't dwell on it. If I'm not then dwelling on it will just make me very paranoid and if I am well theres not a lot I can do about it.

I also have yet another new Home teaching companion. Lets hope this ones the charm. Who knows at this rate I might even get out hometeaching this year!

We also have YSA FHE tomorrow. It seems that the 'new management' aka GF and Physics have decided that we're going to have them every other week. So it should be interesting to see what tomorrow is like and if the enthusiasm for them can be maintained.

anyway,

Later folks!

Friends, Romans, zombies?

Well it's been an interesting day. We had to do a lot of running back and forth between shps this morning because as the fairs still in town the whole of Loughborough city centre is for all intents and purposes closed off to traffic meaning that we couldn't get to our usual supermarket which in turn meant we had to try some other shops which we could get to. However as none of these shops stocked everything we usually get from our usal supermarket we had to go to a couple of diferent ones to get everything.

Still despite all of the extra running around I was able to get everything I wanted to done plus I was able to get a couple of books on the Romans from the bookstore. Being involved in this project I'm doing for work means that my historical interest in the Romans has been revived.

I was also pleased to see that one of my favourite sci fi books " World War Z" is to be turned into a film. It's a great book and it's written in the style of a historical account via different eye witnesses of the events of World War Z or 'The zombie War'. It's a fascinating story particurly with the technological extremes of the International Space Station become the man orbital reconnaise assest for mankind, armoured divers fighting zombies underwater, to the fortfied safe havens which in the UK are built around medieval castles whose musems have to be looted for swords and claymores for use by the defenders when their ammo runs out!

I'm also starting to feel a little more hopeful about the new star trek film as I've read the reports of the first footage to be shown from the film. Yes the film might be well be changing away from the official and much loved cannon but it's apparently still recognisably star trek. From the look of the ships to the warp Drive, to who's likely to die in course of an away Gee will it be kirk, Sulu or Engineseer Olsen who we've never met before and is wearing a red shirt ?:-)

Anyway, I'm off to do some reading.

Later folks!

Fairs fair

As promised here are some pics from the fair last night. For those of you who don't know the fair comes to Loughborough every November and basically takes over the whole of the town centre for three days. One of the main rides of the Fair set up near the Iceland supermarket. In case your wondering none of us went on it as (we for once) displayed some common sense.

Benn was unable to resit the lure of the bungey ride for the second year in a row even though it cost £10 a ride!

And off he goes fired into the sky.

Physics (2nd from left) wasn't too sure about this ride when it started off

and was even less sure when it got to this point!

Whilst we were also wandering around the fair we passed several 'funhouses'. One of the girls looked at it and said she was wondering if she should go on it. Someone else said she shouldn't as they had heard they weren't very safe and she could hurt herself. The first girl said she had never heard of anyone getting hurt on these funhouses and she was sure no one had been of course at which point I had to enter the conversation begging to differ as Multi task fractured her leg on one sometime ago now.

Anyway, it was a fairly quiet day at work today which allowed me to get everything cleared and do some get ahead work as it were for next week. Things are going well at the moment. Lets hope it lasts!

Later folks!

The case of the missing...

Last week lots of signs appeared around geeksville to indicate the fact that the main road running through the town would be closed for major roadworks for sometime. There were signs to say when the roadworks would start, signs to indicate that there were roadworks and even lots of signs put out to show the diversion around the outskirts of the town. But today over a week since the start date one thing is still missing.

Yep..

The Roadworks themselves. A lot of people are starting to get very bemused at where the roadworks are, it's usually a case that the roadworks start and no sign are put up until after they have been going for sometime. Not that the signs are put up and the roadworks don't appear for sometime.

Still mine is not to reason why. Mine is to simply pay for the roadworks via taxes :-)

It was once again a good day at work. I was able to get a fair amount done and out of the way which is always satisfying. Plus I was able to finish that task I don't like and I don't have to do itagain till after Christmas. Yaah! This really is turning into a good week.

I also went to the Fair in Loughborough this evening which was a lot of fun even if we were very thin on the ground YSA wise. There were only 7 of us! Still we had fun and I even managed to win a cuddly toy on one of the stalls. No idea what I'm going to do with it though. I'll post some photos from the fair tomorrow.

Anyway,

Later folks!

This is why I stopped playing

He, he I've made a big mistake with facebook. I accepted someone's request to start playing tetris and I've now remembered why I stopped playing it in the first place it's too flipping addictive! Still at least I haven't yet reached the stage Grumpy and Tap Dance were at playing the game 'columns' as they would sit their for hours. Not that I'm aiming to do that of course I have many more things I could do to waste time :-) he, he, he....

Anyway, As promised Top secret project one has arrived. Sort of. If you follow this link all will be revealed. Theres not much there right now as it's only gone live today but more will appear soon.

It was another good day at work today even if I had to do one of the more boring jobs I have to do every few weeks. Still it could be worse and I could have to do it everywhere so I ain't complained.

Yes in case you haven't guessed I am still feeling full of energy and feeling positive too. So that's three days in a row! Wow that's weird, maybe it's not as hard as it looks to not be down in the dumps and mope around :-)

Random fact of the day. Physics actually served in the Luxembourg Ward on his Mission where Engineseer now lives. Although co incedences like that do tend to happen i nthe church. It's like th Mormon version of " Six degrees" although it seems like it rarely takes the full six to make a connection.

It was fun coming home from Insitute as I gave physics a lift which made I had someone to talk to and with Physics you can always guarentee that the conversation will be interesting. We got onto ( and don't ask me how as I can't remember) that old saying that some church members come out with and it mostly seems to be the smug ones who've just got married who say this " Those people who are single in the church could get married if they really wanted to just like that" and they usually tend to snap their fingers at the end for emphasis. My take on this saying is to wonder if theres some Sunday school lesson where they teach you the secret to do this that I missed. Physics said that there was no lesson but he could tell me the secret. When I asked him for what it was he said it was easy and all you have to do to get married like that ( he didn't add the finger snap) was to just drop all your standards for what you look for in a partner and You'll find someone 'just like that'. Ths set me off into a complete fit of the giggles, because what he said was funny and also imaging the reaction of our Sunday school teacher CF if he ever comes out with that line in class.

It seems there will be a ward YSA trip to the fair tomorrow. However when I asked GF what time we would be meeting she errd, said there were too many questions and then guessed at 8pm tomorrow. When I asked where she would be meeting she again erred and said at the fair? Obivousily forgetting that the fair covers all of Loughborough city centre. So I think that proves that although Ward YSA reps will come and go the lack of forward planning for YSA activies is for ever :-)

later folks!

Plane crazy

Ryan Air the nice budget airline who I flew with last week to and from Luxembourg has just got into trouble with their latest charity calender. Apparently they do one every year featuring cabin crew from the airline for good causes. And why has it got into trouble I hear you ask? For it being too exspensive? For the cabin crew wearing small amounts of clothing or the titles they have given the crew for each month such as Miss Wet, Miss Wild and Miss fuelpump.

Ehh no,

it has gotten into trouble with the Insititute for Women in Spain because they claim it's sexist as it only features pictures of Female cabin crew and not men. Apparently in a statement the Insitute claimed it was significant that only women were used and they were not talking about morals or nudity more that as they had only used women it portrayed them as 'sexual objects'. So according to this train of logic their following if the airline had used some male models as well as Female, they would not have considered pictures of women in very little clothing with names such as Miss Wet, Miss Wild, Miss check in and Miss take off in any way to be portraying them as 'sexual objects'. I also wonder if they would have objected if all the models in the calender were male.

Anyway, there was worse news then that today. Yep I'm a celebrity get my out of here is about to start again. Argghhh......... Why? Haven't we suffered enough? Someone make the bad men stop. All hysterics aside I really can't stand that show. We're now going to have to put up with weeks of z list celebraties running around making fools of themselves in the Jungle.

A remake of the Karate Kid is apparently due next Summer. The lead role will be going to Will smiths son but the big question everybody will probably want to know is when it comes to cleaning should it still be " Wax on! Wax off!"

Yes in case you haven't guessed from all of the terrible jokes I am feeling in a good mood today and still got some of that energy, so my get up and go hasn't yet got up and gone.

It's institute tomorrow which should be fun. The Fair is also in Loughborough this week. As far as I'm aware theres no YSA trip going to it but of course they may well be one but I just don't know about it as lets just say with the new management in the YSA one of them has or at least seems to be forming a 'clique' which I am certainly not in. But I'm not going to dwell on that possibility in the slightist. If I'm wrong about it, well I've been wrong before and will not doubt be wrong again and if I'm right well theres not a lot I can do about it and I'll just depress myself if I stew on it.

See I told you I was in a good mood.

There is also a Dance on Friday in Nottingham which I'm still in two minds about. One I should go as if 'Miss right', no, no scratch that I'm being positive. Wherever Miss Right is out there it's unlikely that I'm just going to just bump into her in the Street so I should get out to these things, because as the saying goes who knows. There are after all plenty of girls out there and maybe even one or two geekettes :-)

The other mindset I have is that these things are not that fun if you don't have someone to go with or a 'wingman'. Which is my main problem right now as my usual wingman now leaves in another country and my choice for other 'wingmen' is extremely limited as most of the guys I get on well with are eiter married, dating, don't usually turn up to Dances or have just got engaged, which makes them poor choices for wingmen. Of course I suppose the other way I could look at it is that I should just stop making excuses and go to it as after all I went by myself to the national conference and that was a lot more nerve wracking. So I can do this. Think postive thoughts there Saxon, your not that old even if all the young YSA running around making you feel like your ready for the OAP home :-)

Tune in tomorrow for the reveal of Top secret project one. Admitally at first there won't be much to see but it will get better I promise. I also hope I haven't built it up too much but I guess thats neither here nor there right now.

I'm off to try and do something constructive.

Later folks!

Whose been sitting in my chair?

The shrill ringing of my alarm at 7am this morning was the final confirmation that my holiday was officially over and it was time to go back to work! Still despite it being miserable outside I was able to get up with no effort what so ever. Maybe I am actually more energised as opposed to just feeling it.

Anyway even the traffic was co-operative this morning and I was able to get to work without getting stuck in any jams. I got into the office sat down and almost immediatly realised that something was wrong with my chair. So did I come out with a deep insightful question? Catch the attnetion fo a co worker to inquire if they knew what had happened? No, I came out with a freaking line from the three bears
" Whose been sitting in my chair?"

Real smooth and clever, huh?

I did also spend a large chunk of the morning trying to get my chair back the way it was. I just about managed it.

R has a new mobile phone which has a alert tone for emails called 'Sonar', yep it makes a sound just like sonar. So everytime it went off someone said " Contact!". It was funny for today but I have a feeling it might well get old fast. Plus I guess you had to be there :-)

Good news! After one or two problems Top secret project one actually begins on Wednesday. I do have the feeling I might have built this up just a little too much but I guess you can all judge for yourself on Wednesday. Be sure to check then for some news.

Anyway, it was a good first day back at work and things are looking good. Hopefully the rest of this week will be just as good and I keep keep feeling this energised and positive.

Please?

Later folks

Holiday Pics

I thought I would post some of the best pics I took whilst on Holiday. For those of you who are 'my friend' on facebook you can see all of the photos I took as I've posted them all there, Here is the view from Engineseers Apartment Balcony. I'm sure you'll agree that it's amazing and I wish I got a view like that from my window!
Heres the park in the centre of Luxembourg. You can't tell very well from this shot but it's a lot way down to the park floor.

Heres a shot of one of the bridges that crosses the park in the centre of Luxembourg which seperates the 'old city' from the new. In the bottom of the picture you can see some of the cities battlements.

This is what Engineseer described as " The Luxembourgs royal families summer house"

This is the HQ for Engineseers bank which he calls 'Gringotts' after the bank in Harry potter as it does bear a resembelance.

Here is a shot of "Gringotts" fron the far side of the park.

This is a shot from the floor of the park of the cities Cathedral.

and heres a shot of the battlements from the bottom of the park. It shows you just how deep it is!

Proof Why we need Adult supervision

or to put it another way
proof why Engineseer should not be given big bags of sweets

Art Attack

I like to think I have some talents, but appreciating abstact art really isn't one of them as on my recent Holiday to Luxembourg I found some pieces that really rather confused me.

I have no idea what this thing was supposed to be and quite frankly I think I'll be better off not asking.
This appeared to be a running pregnant woman. Why? Who knows? (well hopefully the artist)

Well it's sightly easier to understand what this statue is even if I again have no idea what it means. It could well be the town mascot which if it is probably indicates it has a interesting night life.

This is apparently called the Blue Lady. Quite what it symbolises I have no idea.

This thing, well I have no idea what it was supposed to represent but it was very creepy. Because as the faces were rounded and mirrored they followed you as you walked the length of the street.

So I suppose there you have proof that I was right. I may be able to recognise abstract art but I have no talent for appreciating it whatsoever.

Plane stereotypical

Whilst heading out on the plane to Frankfurt Hann I happened to overhear part of a conversation between two girls.
One of whom happened to be blonde and what she said could not have fufilled the 'blonde' sterotype more if she had actually thought about what to say before hand.

We had just broken through the cloud cover to see white unbroken clouds for as far as you could see and the sun blazing away. Blonde turns to her friends and announces

" Wow, I thought they were joking when they said the sun was still there above the clouds during winter"

I don't think I really need to say anything in comment do i?

It was yet another Dark and Stormy Saturday night

The weather seems to have settled into a rather predicatable pattern right now. Every saturday night it seems to be gloomy, rainy and windy so far this winter and tonight is no exception. Apparently there forcasting that there could be tornadoes on some places!

Still, asides from, all of the rain and howling wind it's been pretty much a standard Saturday. I did have to go and get my haircut as it was starting to look like I had an overgrown mop on my head.

I also treated myself to the new futurama DVD movie. It's alright but definately the weakest of the three DVD movies so far.

I decided to have a fairly easy Saturday afternoon and just did some reading. I'm currently feeling all calm and relaxed and want to hold onto that feeling for as long as possible. Still I think if I was ever to come into a lot of money I would be one of those people who would keep working just basically to keep myself busy and active. I would probably go nuts sitting at home with nothing to do.

anyway,

Later folks

One hour forward, one hour back

Well the day started much, much earlier then I would have wanted at 5.45am this morning. Of course whilst getting ready the very early morning fog that seemed to be clouding my brain was not helped by trying to figure out what time it was is the UK. We left Engineseers apartment to find there was thick fog everywhere which just seemed to compound the fun of having to get up that early immensly.

After saying our goodbyes I boarded the bus to find it all but empty but then again considering the time of day it shouldn't have been that surprising. I was looking forward to see what the luxembourg/German countryside looked as the sun came up as it was still dark at the time I boarded the bus but the fog persisted so I didn't actually see the sun at all. It just seemed to change from dark and very gloomy to just gloomy.

We go to the airport bang on time ( must be German efficiency :-) which was the exact time check in opened so I was able to get rid of my case straight away. Of course the boring part was then waiting around two hours for the Flight which gets very boring when your by yourself. Still we were finally able to get on the plane and after a very brief delay we were off.

We actually got a tailwind on the journey back to the UK so we landed technically only ten minutes after the time we set off. If we hadn't been delayed we might even have landed the same time we set off. Which would have really messed with my head as travelling across timezones tends to make my internal clock go all screwy.

I was able to get through passport control with no problems and my bag was already on the carousel when I got there so I was able to go straight through to arrivals with no real delay. Grumpy was already there to collect me so I didn't have to wait around at all. We did discover when we got back to the carpark that he had been in the car park for 61 minutes which meant as he was over the hour the ticket went from £3.30 to £6! He was only out by one minute.

I found it mildly disconcerting to be back on the 'rightside' of the road again as having only just got used to being on the wrongside in Luxembourg and it also didn't feel like I had been on the go for over six hours at that point, although if you went by the local time.

argghhhh!! My body clock is so confused right now and I don't see why it should be. It was only a hour difference.

Still it was good to get home and put my feet up although my putting my feet up for a moment turned out to be a very long moment as I fell asleep in the chair for half an hour. Owen seemed intrigued to see that I was back but was more interested in seeing Grumpy as he wanted to go out for a walk.

Anyway over all I had a very good week and it was a lot of fun to go on a actual holiday and get away from it all for a few days. It didn't seem like a week though. Time does fly on Holidays when you actually take a holiday.

I was surprised to see a news item today about a protest being held outside of the LA Temple in connection which church members support of proposition 8 ( I think thats what its called) in Califonia. It just seemed well odd. I don't really know what else to say about it but to be honest I haven't really followed anything about this story or the whole thing about proposition 8 so I don't have any knowledge to be able to make any informed comment about the whole thing.

Still, it's the weekend tomorrow so two more days until it's time to go back to work. But I don't have to worry about that till Monday. So I guess it's time to find something fun and constructive to do for the next two days.

Later folks!

Leaving in on a jet plane

Well after another late start, kind of a running theme for the week isn't it, we had breakfast and confirmed out plans for the day. Which mainly consisted going to the cinema as the new James bond film has just been released and we both wanted to see it, so why not?

The cinema here showed the film in English but with French and Germany subtitles which weren't as annoying as you might think once you got into the movie as you just kind of ignored them. Our opinion of the film a resounded "meh!"It was a good film but it's certainly not the best James bond film I've seen and I didn't think it was quite as good as Casino Royale. But still compared with a lot of films released this year it was still very good.

I did suggest to Engineseer that he needs to get one of those grabber sticks as he has a problem with a english car when going into car parks here as of course the ticket machines are on the wrong side of the car. So if he had one of those sticks he could just reach over with that instead.

We went for lunch at The generic high street restaurant brand that he used to work for which was interesting as for some reason they don't have BBQ sauce over here. No idea why it just seems to be one of those random things :-)

We were having lunch when some guy came round giving out leaflets which at first glance seemed very cheap printouts for a charity. We were extremely surprised when the guy came back round after putting leaflets on every table to ask for money for the leaflets. We refused and did the only thing we could do in the situation, gave him the leaflet back whilst speaking very loudly and slowly to indicate we were English and we did not understand.

Well my time in Luxembourg is now all but up. I'm having to catch the coach to the airport at 7am tomorrow which means I'm going to have to get up extremely early. Of course with the time difference I will arrive back in the UK only half an hour after taking off from Germany which will in turn mean I will technically have a 25 hour day tomorrow. I hate traveling through different time zones!

I have started to see why Engineseer likes Luxembourg so much. It's a big city but it's also quiet too and you do get one heck of a view.

Anyway ,

See you tomorrow folks

Heading up river

We had another later start this morning as Engineseer had decided to stay up later to watch the US election coverage. He had gone to bed before the final count had been confirmed but he had stayed up long enough to not be surprised that Obama had won.

We set out for remisch just before Lunchtime. I'm still finding it very weird that we're on the 'wrong side' of the road especially when we get to roundabouts and go round them the wrong way! Still Engineseer is more then used to it which is good as he was driving after all :-) He showed me the school where he worked and also pointed out the sheer crazyiness of roundabouts in Luxembourg. I thought the ones in the UK were bad sometimes!

We reached Remisch which is on the border between Germany and Luxembourg. Basically it's Luxembourg on one side of the river and Germany on the other. There is a sign in the middle of the bridge which marks the 'official' border as it goes down the centre of the river. We resisted the temptation to do an impression of Homer when he gets to a border.

We had a look round the town and ended up having lunch on the river bank as we got some takeaway from one of the cafes .

After Lunch we looked around the town for a bit longer before heading back to Luxembourg. We went to visit the main shopping center here which is absolutely huge and had a bewildering array of shops. Most of them seemed to be clothes shops though so not really that interesting to me at least :-)

We headed back to Engineseers whilst he pointed out some more sights including the chinese embassy. Which is in a house at the bottom of the hill from where he lives. I think the closest major thing to where I live is the pub.

We had to the coyote Bar for dinner which is a film themed restaurant. It was great which lots of memorabilia and a life size Alien and predator. Even though it was called Coyote It didn't have the coyote ugly girls behind the bar though. Unfortunately :-)

Engineser warned me that the portions were legendary there but I didn't realize that he wasn't over exgasarating in the slightest. When my starter arrived I was gob smacked. I've seen main meal dishes which were less then half the size of the plate of potato wedges I had plonked down in front of me. Needless to say I finished less then a quarter of the plate. Mainly as there was so many and that if I had eaten any more of the wedges my mouth would probably have melted.

We don't have a definite plan for tomorrow so we're aiming to play it by ear but we will definitely be getting up to something as it is my last day of Holiday after all.

Later folks!

Wandering wonder

Well after a somewhat late start to the day, (hey both Engineseer and I are on holiday so we can have a lie in, although there is there age old question to consider how much of a lie in is too much?) we eat breakfast out on their balcony as the weather is somewhat better here then compared to the weather in the UK. Engineseer was right, they do have one heck of a view of the forest.

I also had fun trying to open the blinds as well in the room where I'm staying as I couldn't figure out which way to work the handle to open the outside blinds. I'm staying in Engineseers room and he's sleeping in his sisters as the rest of the family is currently away. It seems that everyone prefers blinds over here rather then Curtains. I am intrigued though as to why they have blinds on the inside as well as the outside of the windows but I guess it makes sense to some designer somewhere, somehow.

We got the Bus into town which was actually really cheap at only 1.50 euros per ticket and you basically get unlimited travel for two hours. The one thing I have noticed is that theres a bewildering number of bus company's operating in the city and there are many different designs of bus in use too. Theres no double decker's though which admitally is a slightly odd thing to notice but there you go.

We wandered round the town looking at the 'sights' as it were. I did take some photos which I'll post when I get the opportunity. We decided to have lunch in a place called 'quick' which is a fast food burger restaurant here in Luxembourg which I'm sure will claim that any similarities between Engineseer's Generic high street restaurant's, burger King and it are totally co incendental.

After Lunch we went into the centre of town to see the cathedral and a building which Engineseer refers to as " Gringotts" after the bank in Harry potter. I had to admit that it does bear a remarkable similarity. We also went to have a looks at the battlements from the old town and the park in the centre of town which runs along the foot of the battlements. It was one heck of a long way down to get to the park floor, it seemed even longer to get back up. Engineseer was kidding when he said that we would walk off our lunch pretty quick.

Engineseer was claiming this morning that he hasn't learnt the language very well, so has had to get very good at gesturing to get his point across. Mind you despite his protests he seems to have learnt the important phrases pretty quickly. Like how to get a bus ticket and order 'food' :-)

I also saw the shop where Engineseer gets his GW stuffs from. It was a huge toy store which all my nieces and nephews would have loved as it was just crammed full of toys across three huge floors!

We returned to his late afternoon. Tea was interesting as Enginesser decided to try using some German Lassana. How lets just say that he do not meet the usual standard of 'German Efficiency' as it were and neither of us were that impressed.

Still Engineseer had a plan B as it were but that would have to wait as he had his institute class to go to so I said I would come too as I was intrigued to see what it would be like compared to Leicesters. Well the main difference was it was very small. I increased the class size by a third! the ward here also doesn't have a chapel. They have a very small office type building instead.

After institute we went to get pizza for pizza hut. See it's still pizza hut over here none of that pasta hut rubbish. Of course the problem we ran into was decided what to get as we both asked the other to make the decision what to get! This is why we usually need a third person so they can make final decisions. As part of his job ( and I'm still not sure how or why but I'm not complaining) Engineseer gets a lot of Luncheon vouchers for free which meant in essence the pizza we got was free. And that's the best kind of pizza :-)

Anyway we've off to some town down south as it were tomorrow. I can't remember the name but engineseer describes it as the closest thing to the seeside that you can get in a landlocked country.

Sounds interesting.

Later folks!

I may not be able to spell it but I'm here anyway

Well in a first as promised this blog post is actually coming to you from a totally different country and yes it may be one where I can't actually spell the name of it without looking it up but I'm here anyway.

My day started off fairly early this morning as Grumpy wasn't sure how bad the rush hour traffic would be so he insisted that we set off nice and early. Of couse irony decided to step in at this point and we arrived nearly an hour and a half before check in even opened. But as grumpy put it better a hour early then one minute late. After a quick check to make sure I had everything he headed home whilst swearing about the cost of the short stay car park, £1 for 20 minutes and £3 for every 15 minutes after that.

After sitting around for and a hour and a bit the check in finally opened so I was able to check in and get rid of my case for a bit. Of course before I was able to get into the departure lounge I had to go through the fun of the security which now includes you having to remove your shoes and having them x-rayed! I did get a bit worried when one of the security guards asked me to hold on but it turned out she had seen my DS and wanted to ask me if I knew where to buy a copy of the simpsons game as her son wanted one and she had no idea where to get one from.

After a further hour and a bit of waiting it was time to board and it was a quite different way of boarding as I've experienced with other times I've flown. Basically your not assigned a seat number, you basically get on the plane and choose your own which was nice as I was able to bag myself a window seat.

What wasn't so good was I got really thirsty on the flight and I hadn't got a drink with me due to these new rules about liquid. I had to buy a drink from the drinks cart which was 1.5 euros for one of the really tiny 'fun size' cans. Which was about the equivilant of 0.30 euros per sip.

Still the flight was nice and quick at just over a hour, bu we 'landed' two hours after we had set off. Boy I hate time difference! the other thing I didn't realise was how small Frankfurt han airport would be, it seemed to be all of twenty steps from getting off the plane, to going through baggage claim, to going through passport control to getting to the airport exit!

I wasn't impressed when I got my case back as the new luggage tag I had bought hadn't survived the trip! It had snapped straight off so goodness knows where that ended up.

Also with the airport being so small it meant that I had over an hour to wait to catch my coach as I had left a lot of time to get through all the various contrels which I didn't need. Of course I'm sure that if I hadn't irony would have once again stepped in. Fortunately the earlier coach hadn't left so I was able to catch it as it wasn't full. It was a very interested trip seeing all the countryside between Frankfurt and Luxembourg, even if it felt really weird being on the wrong side of the road. I also found it amusing that theres a big difference between the idea of 'major roadworks'. In the UK it's retarmacing the road, in Germany it's closing half a road off whilst three huge diggers and four trucks plus a whole lot of workers rip trees out of the mountainside!

Finally reaching Luxembourg I soon met up with Engineseer ( okay I had a short wait but it was partly my fault for catching the earlier coach thus waylaying his earlier plans) and we caught the bus back to his. As it was dark when i got here I haven't yet been able to see the view he keeps talking about but he assures me it will be worth the wait to see it in the morning.

So the rest of the evening has basically been spent catching up as it were as Engineseer wanted to catch up on all the gossip, erhh sorry, sorry I meant information about certain events around leicester YSA he might find interesting or relevant. and also discussing what we will be doing for the rest of the week. He has big plans as he rattled off a huge list of what we could do for the rest of the week and I nodded thinking the week would be jammed packed. He the paused and added "and on Wednesday and thursday" so I think it's safe to say this is going to be a very busy holiday.

Of course I wouldn't be me if I didn't bring my camera along! So expect quite a few photos to follow.

Later folks!

Appealing to its better nature

I found myself in a familiar situation this morning. Appealing to the better nature of the photocopier not to jam yet again whilst I was copying the sacrement programs off. Fortunatly it seemed to be in a good mood and didn't jam.

Also we had a surprise in sacrement as Physics has now been called as the male ward YSA rep. they obivousily decided that the ward YSA is still big enough to warrent two. SF also announced her engagement today. well sort of, she didn't really announce i but her sister let it out of the bag and a couple of other peole knew and you know what the gossip network at church is like. Umm, sorry I don't mean gossip network we don't gossip, I mean the network of people who pass along information they or other might find intersting :-) Although there did seem to be two main reactions from people on hearing the news, firstly congrulations and secondly a feeling of 'it's about time!' SF and her boyfriend have been dating for years and mean that literally!

I did have problems in Sunday school as my attempts are maintaining a christian attitude are being sorely tested by DB. I annoucned that there would be YSA FHE tomorrow and someone asked what we would be doing. DB piped up at this point that probably be carving very bad pumpkins again " then he looked at me and added " Especially yours, that was rubbish"I gritted my teeth and ignored him. I was determined not to rise the bait. Although no doubt he will try again next class to wind me up.

Well thats all for today. I'm having a early night for obivous reasons as I have a long day ahead of me tomorrow travelling. So depending on how things go blog posts until Friday may or may not be a bit sporadic, but if they are I will catch up with them on Friday.

Later folks!

Twas yet another Dark and Stormy night

Well as the title says it's somewhat dark and stormy this evening. It's been raining for nearly the last two hours solid and yet people around the estate are still setting off fireworks. Which means Owen has been going absolutely loopey as we've discovered he really, really doesn't like fireworks at all.

Speaking of Owen he and Grumpy are going to have to keep going to training as today was supposed to be his last lesson but when it came to the final test where he had to sit, then lie down and stay for a full minute he decided to be somewhat difficult. He did sit on command but when Grumpy gave him the command to lie down he decided to charge of down the hall they were in, setting all the other dogs off and leaving Grumpy to race after him and try and catch him.

Unsurprisingly the teacher declined to pass him.

Loughborough was quite busy this morning which was annoying as I had to rush round quite a few different shops to pick up a few bits and pieces but on the plus side the shopping was cheaper then usual. Mainly as I'm not going to be here next week so I didn't need to get as much food in.

Asides from that it's been another pretty quiet day. I did finally finish the book I bought last week. I've been exceptionally good with this one and tried to make it last as long as possible as I know the next one in the series isn' out until 2010! However a spin off novel from the main series is released next year so that should keep me busy. The downside to this series is you have to wait ages to get them in the UK as it's not released in the UK and they have to bring in copies from the USA. I've also discovered that their about to release a online game based on the series which is looking very interesting, plus they also do a minatures game based on the series as well which seemed brilliant until I found out that it's also done in the USA and the only place you can get it in the UK are at specialist games suppliers which of course sell it for stupid amounts of money as it's a import. Oh well I guess painting my very own manticorian fleet will have to wait until after Christmas when I will have some spare money again. Well I can guess I can read the whole series from the start again. Might keep me busy for a week or two :-)

so later folks!