Website Suggestions #1

running from camera (2 seconds)

The rules are simple:
I put the self-timer on 2 seconds, push the button and try to get as far from the camera as I can.
If you would like to see the full set of photos from this absolute genius click here.

I challange everyone to do their own twist on this idea of leaving the timer on the camera for two seconds and then do the same thing over and over again.

If only I had a camera to capture my bottom gaffs.

Blackberry Blogging on the sofa

I am trying out the life changing experience that is mobile blogging. I am currently sat on the sofa watching Antiques Roadshow and also typing this out at the same time. Who said men can't multi-task? Probably some bloke, as women's opinions are never given the oxygen of publicity and respect. Ofcourse I am joking..... Or am I?

No I am joking. Or atleast trying to.

Anyhow, back to the sofa blogging. It isn't quite as easy as conventional blogging, but mainly due to the fact that the keys on my blackberry are very small and my fat thumbs (who has thin thumbs?) haven't managed to be filed down into a point yet. Come on evolution, sort it out!!

The main dissadvantage of mobile blogging is that there are no photos or spell checks. Nevermind eh?

Say Cheese

After too many months of dormancy I am finally going to give my bogging life another go.

I have been shamed into this by the constant high quality entries by my wife, and also by recognising the benefit that you get by sitting down for 10 minutes a day and registering your recent thoughts and experiences. I also have been spending more and more time reading other peoples blog, so it must be the thing to do............

As the title of this entry suggests, I am re-entering the blogging world with small steps only. Above is my favourite photos of the day.

Favourite quote of the week is:

"You can have a threesome if you need it" - Band Leader from SteamChicken

Favourite dance move of the week is:

The Gypsy

I hate lifts (sorry elevators)

I wish that someone would try and dabble inside my brain. A lot of people would say that there is not a lot in there, but I think that maybe some times I am shut to the outside world and that my brain is still active. I hope that is the case anyway.

Let's be honest, even some of Paul McKennas friends are fat, smoking, kangaroo eating weirdos.

Ok, the thing I want to mention is lifts. British lifts. Not elevators, they are lifts.

I hate lifts.

People ignore each other, and don't even talk. How crazy is that? It spans the multi-cultural expanse of life. Put a Budhist, an American, an African and a Chinese man (or woman) in a lift and they will still ignore each other for the period of acsending or descending. It's completely mad.

Well I've had enough. I would like to ban lifts. Take the stairs. Except for disabled people. But I expect they would probably ignore each other too.

Damn those lifts!

Around the world in 80 days with 2 pairs of socks

The world of the international traveller is a lonely one. Over the last couple of weeks I seem to have been away from home a lot. And whilst people may dream of the jet setting liftsyle, and seeing the world at someone elses expense, in reality it is early mornings, grotty airports, flying next to people who smell (and snore and use your arm rest), poor quality (but high quantity) food, faceless hotels, dirty hotel bathrooms and dodgy wifi.

Ok, I don't want to lay it on too thick, but I'm not really enjoying travelling at the moment. Some of the enjoyment of travelling (as with everything else in life) disappears over time. It's natural and I understand that. Most of all though, I think that I am not enjoying travelling as I know that my family are growing up at home and I am not there. A little soppy I know, but even us blokes get a bit hormonal every now and again. Thankfully Christof is pretty good with her blog, so I catch up with family life and photos on the internet. When I can get a wifi signal that is.

Anyhow, I am currently in Egypt for the umteenth time in the last few years, so for me it's nothing special. As it is early December the weather here isn't anything to write home about. This evening it is raining, windy and a bit chilly. On the plus side, my hotel room windows nearly shut, so most of the weather is staying outside. The hotel I am staying at in Alexandria is actually quite nice and full of historic character. It was built in 1906, is called the Windsor Palace and has rooms named after the British Royal Family. Later I might go for a pint in the Prince Charles bar, or maybe have a meal in the Queen Elizabeth restaurant, and maybe finish the night off in the Prince Albert gym. Or maybe not. The room is OK, although I hate beds without duvets, as I just can't convince myself that the bed spread is new for every visitor.

In order to give a lasting record of my view of travelling and Egypt especially, I have looked on the internet and downloaded some photos which represent the parts of Egypt that I get to see with my job. I can confirm that I have borrowed most of the photos from Boots In The Oven for which I whole heartedly thank them for, even though they don't know it. I wish to make it clear that this is of course a slightly biased view of Egypt, but in reality it purely demonstrates that I have not been fortunate to experience the other side of Egypt which I am sure is beautiful and exists somewhere outside the realms of my routine business trips. I really believe that there is a part of Egypt that is tranquil and clean, beautiful and full of relaxed people ready to lend a hand, not chop it off. OK, lets get into it before I get accused of being too bitter.

P1 - Egypt By Air

P2 - Cairo View From Mosque

P3 - Cairo Street

P4 - Cairo Street 2 (The Return)

P5 - Cairo Street 3 (Honey I sold the Donkey - to some Kids)

P6 - Cairo Traffic P7 - Egyptian Museum (with the Hilton Ramsis hotel I normally stay at in the background, just off the October ther 6th Street)

P8 - I am Sailing

P9 - The Real Pyramids

P10 - Windsor Palace (don't be fooled by the photo)

P11 - A Stoning (Are there any women here today?)

Bucks with Granny in August 2005, Anya in Belgium 2006 and Euan in a Tube in 2009

Man Alive!

Another strange but very quick week. Since last weekend I have slept 7 times, had some quite vivid dreams (for a change) but I am struggling to remember what happened during the days. Let me think....

Saturday - Tried to have a lie in, quite successfully if I may add. The secret to it in my house; I think; is to look like you are actually getting up and out of bed, but just do it very very slowly over the period of about 3 hours. When you have kids and a hard working wife who needs a lie in just as much as you, you'll understand. The 16 year old me would be quite disgusted looking at the nearly 36 year old me trying to secretly have a lie in. When you are 16 life is one big lie in and there's nothing to get up for part from maybe to change your crispy pyjamas.

Also went to the local wood flooring shop and signed our life away on some nice solid wood flooring for the front room, and some replacement flooring for the stinky bathroom carpets. Lunch at Old Mcdonalds Farm and back home for some more quality relaxing time and arguing with the kids. Watched Strictly Come Dancing (urrghghhhhhh!!) and then fell asleep in front of a DVD at about 11pm. Rock and Roll!

Sunday - Tried to have a lie in, quite successfully if I......Oh that was Saturday wasn't it. Sunday was another quite relaxed day. Rolled around the house in the morning with the kids. Had lunch and then we went swimming as a family in the afternoon which was good fun. Got back and the weather wasn't great so we watched a movie in the kids room. Fantastic 4 and the Silver Surfer - 2.5 out of 5 if I was a movie critic, which I am thankfully not. Kids had a dreaded bath, whilst Anya had a shower after much difficult negotiation. Took Ruby out for a walk early evening and then watched the Grand Prix highlights.

I fear I am boring myself with this review of the week, although I actually quite enjoyed living it at the time.

Anyhow Monday came, as Monday's do, and then it was straight back into work. Lot's to do, emails to read and file, phones to answers, purchase orders to authorise, tenders to calculate and produce, people to talk to, meetings to have. Yada yada yada yada. Work is fundamentally interesting for me when I am doing it, and I would actually go as far as to say it really motivates me, but the in's and out's of most peoples work lives is inherently boring to everyone else. There are obviously some exceptions, and I'm obviously thinking about strippers, judges and Gordon Ramsey. Unfortunately I am none of the above.

I went up to Middlesbrough on Thursday for meetings with clients and also to chair a sales meeting/management meeting. It's not the nicest place in the world, but most of the places I go with work aren't. I was tired when I got to the hotel about 7.30pm and I decided I would go to the bar for an hour or so, have a beer and read the new Dan Brown book. Dan Brown is an easy author to read and the novels from him previously have been quite enjoyable conspiracy type trash. I am not a literary critic either as you may notice. I spent most of the evening trying to get into the beginning of the book, but eventually gave up as I obviously wasn't in a reading mood. Even though some people wouldn't class Dan Brown as actual reading. So I rang my wife and had a chat about flooring again and also our terminally ill cat. The conversation wasn't that bad really, but it also went to places that would literally bring a tear to your eye, especially if you were a man. After saying goodbye to my ever slimmer (and lovely) wife, I decided to ring a friend I had not spoken to for a long time.............

I have rung this particular friend on many occasions over the last 4 years and the phone has never been answered. I have left texts and voice messages and still no reply or acknowledgement. Personally, I didn't phone this person because I particularly wanted to talk to them, it was just because I am very nosey and I had time on my hands and a free mobile phone. So, I rang the number and nobody answered. I left a message, a short message of HELLO and HOW ARE YOU?, then I had another call. It was the person I was leaving a message calling me BACK!

So I took he call. And the conversation went a bit like this:

HELLO (ME).

hello.

HOW ARE YOU?

ok.

OK? REALLY? WE HAVEN'T SPOKEN FOR AGES

oh, you know just the same

THE SAME? REALLY? IT'S BEEN 4 YEARS

yeah, you know just the same still doing the same type of work. still have the same house from the old days. still just the same. and you how's things with you?

ME? OK, WELL I'VE HAD ANOTHER BABY, WE'VE MOVED TO A MUCH BIGGER HOUSE IN THE COUNTRY, I'M A DIRECTOR OF THE FIRM I WORK FOR, I HAVE A VINTAGE SPORTS CAR IN THE GARAGE, I'M WORKING REALLY HARD, DOING LOTS OF TRAVEL BUT I'M ENJOYING MY LIFE.

that's good............................................ my god how did you get to be a director?

anyway, the conversation went on for some time and to be honest it was difficult because the reception was poor and I sort of lost interest after 5 minutes of the one way street of asking questions. I was constantly trying to pry information out of an old friend and they were constantly trying to deflect answering any type of prying questions. All I gained from a 20 minute call was that this person was still alive, still doing the same type of job (but in a different location), they had been unemployed for some time early thing year and they still didn't have a significant other (partner). I also learnt that this person and their friend (whom I also know) had fallen out with me and my mate Rich some time ago. But neither me or my mate Rich new anything about it. Bizarrio?

The call ended and I looked at my empty pint class, not knowing why I had phoned my old friend and knowing that I wanted another pint more than I wanted another call like that.

So I went to the bar and ordered another beer, looked at the Dan Brown book and then started to scroll through my contacts list on my phone for old friends I had not spoken to for a while.......

Curse you Dan Brown!

How many rolling-pins ?

It has been a few weeks since I have put fingers to laptop for a blog entry. Whilst I have all the excuses needed for not getting around to it, it also feels difficult to get back into the swing of writing something that is interesting and that I am interested in.

With all that in mind, it's now nearly the end of September and another Autumn approaches. I actually quite like September, and whilst it is not my favourite month of he year, it is a good interesting month with lots happening. This month has certainly contained a lot of interesting happenings.

After we got back from our fun packed holiday in France, I was straight into dedicating 2 weeks of my life to Jury service. Out of the 2 weeks I had to make myself available I was only actually in attendance for 1 day. That was the first day when everyone had to attend and register for expenses etc. I arrived bang on time and was ushered into a room containing all my jury peers. there were around 40 people in total. We sat there like school children and had our names called out on the register and then we spent the rest of the morning giving in our expenses forms. Ofcourse there was lots of whispered complaining about everything happening too slowly, and that the food/drink expenses were not sufficient, but I suppose that's Human nature. After the morning of paperwork and form filling, things picked up in the afternoon. There were two trials presented in the afternoon, but I was not selected at random and missed out on both of them. I left the court early at around 4pm on the first day and was told to ring the phone line at 4.30pm to see if I was needed for the next day.

I dutifully rang the phone line everyday for the next week and a bit, but was never needed back. Quite unforfilling really, but at least it meant that I could attend all my work based commitments. Work based commitments such as having my phone stolen in Manchester, when I should of been in a court room in Stafford. Curse you justice!

Other interesting things that have happened this month include:

Patrick's 1st day at school

Cocktails in Stoke on a sunny Saturday afternoon with Chris

Seeing Dave Gorman in concert

Presenting at a Power & Lifting Seminar in London

Winning a bottle of champagne at a freight forwarders event (and having someone drink it for me)

Dad's 60th brithday

Visiting Co. Wexford for the day

Attending a black tie casino event

Missing out on a golf day, but still making the evening dinner and presentation

All in all it's been a pretty busy and tiring month. I'm not complaining about it, but I suppose it's down to all things in moderation. Whilst this month has been busy for me, there has also been the sad deaths of a number of famous and interesting people. Les Paul, Keith Floyd and Patrick Swayzee. Now that would be an interesting dinner party.

Looking forward to October and my 36th birthday