Monday 30 November 2009

Oh Monday's arrival, how I lament thee

You know the problem with weekends? They're only two days long and they are over way too quickly. Oh well.

So my mum arrived safe and sound - although the collecting of said parental unit was harrowing for me, as a pigeon decided to take dead aim and crap on my head. I shit you not. I was stood indoors I might add, waiting for my mum to arrive, when I felt a splash on my head. Now, when you feel something like that, your first thought is "oh crap, a raindrop / splash of water". But then when you put your hand to your head, and it's warm... not a pleasant feeling. So I looked up, and perched on the ledge about 6 foot up from me was a pigeons arse (attached to a pigeon no doubt). Bastard. Now I could have gone after him like a cave man hunting prey and killed the little vermin, but I didn't want people noticing what had happened and so I kept calm, stole some napkins from a coffee place, and cleaned myself up as best I could. Lucky it didn't have the Eartha Kitts really.

Apart from that little episode, we've had a nice weekend. Number one son had a very good birthday (he now has a whole armory of Nerf guns and a scary amount of money) and I think it's helped my mum a little being around him this weekend, although she is still very upset (obviously). I played football on Sunday, in an inter-squad match, and did well. Oh, and I didn't get to see City after all :-( but I'm kinda glad as we drew and apparently it was a shite match.

And now we're at Monday again *sigh*. My mum leaves today (My Better Half is taking her to the station for me), and I have to now start getting Christmas presents organized (I refuse to leave it to the last minute as I have done in the past).

So have a good day everyone.

Soundtrack of the day: Whatever albums I have on my MP3 player by Elbow.

Friday 27 November 2009

Another weekend is upon us

A special day today, as it's number one son's 11th birthday. Many happy returns fruit of my loins.

Of course he was up with the sparrows fart this morning, bouncing down the stairs and itching to rip into his birthday presents... but he's old enough now to realize checking the cards first is a good move because some people might be generous enough to put cold, hard (well, paper) cash in them.
His main present from us this year is some great big Nerf machine gun type thing. Jebus, the thing is nearly bigger than him. It takes 6 D-cell batteries (which I need to get for him today) and can fire these little Nerf darts quicker than you can imagine. My mum arrives this afternoon in Stockport station, so I'll be going to pick her up and then tonight we're going out to dinner.

I found out yesterday I may have a chance of getting a ticket for the game tomorrow (City v Hull) so I've got my fingers crossed for that, and then Sunday I have a inter-squad friendly in the afternoon. I like playing these games, as there is no pressure, and you can really measure yourself against your team mates and the manager can see how we're all progressing.

So that's it really. Soundtrack of the day is "Electronic Anthems" from the Ministry Of Sound stable... some classic 80's synth tunes.

Have a nice, safe, and peaceful weekend all.

Thursday 26 November 2009

Just a quickie

The light at the end of the tunnel has NOT turned out to be the entrance of the self same tunnel on fire, but in fact the impending end of this documen-bloody-tation I'm stuck on. I have nearly finished another one (will be done tomorrow) and the I have two more to do, before the deadline of 31st December, then that's it. (MASSIVE sighs all round).

Tomorrow, my mum is coming up to spend the weekend with us (it's number one son's birthday tomorrow... he's 11!! Good grief...) so we'll see what the weather is like before deciding what we do & where we go, although the main plan (in Jake's mind) is that my mum will take him shopping into Manchester on Saturday so he obviously can't wait for that.

So that's about all I've got time for today... nearly home time. Have a nice evening everyone. More tomorrow.

Peace.

Tuesday 24 November 2009

Guter Tag from Birmingham

No idea why I said hello in German, that's just the kind of crazy fun guy I am, right? RIGHT??!

*cough*

Yes, I am in 'lovely' Birmingham today. It was a short notice thing, yesterday afternoon it was decided I come down here for the day (I nearly wrote "up here" then...but I'm not a southerner anymore, am I?). It's only for today, so I can handle that. So, up at stupid o'clock (after a frankly diabolical night's sleep) and here in the office by 07.30. The journey was OK. Very wet, with lots of cars, but I didn't really grind to a halt at all. However, I did have another occasion where I nearly crashed the car due to laughter - this time listening to a Derek & Clive CD. (For those that don't know, Derek & Clive are two characters played by Peter Cook (Clive) and Dudley Moore (Derek).
VERY sweary (the first track is called "Stupid C**t") and very funny. There is one track in particular I know my friend Mr. P Junior will like - its one simply called "Nurse" and it's Dudley Moore making farting noises and calling for a nurse... but each fart and each cry for help becomes more & more desperate. It's not too strong to say it's comic genius.

Anyway. Here today, then home tonight for not much planned... although I will be watching the scousers get knocked out of the Champions League tonight which will be funny.

So have a lovely Tuesday everyone, and play nicely.

Monday 23 November 2009

Long time no post

Yeah, sorry about that.

So what's been going on. Well, I've now seen the new Star Trek movie (on Blu-ray no less) and I have to say it was awesome. A very good action movie, and if you're a bit of a trek fan (which I am) seeing famous characters (from the original series - not the Next Generation toss) in 'younger' form is brilliant. Simon Pegg, for instance, plays Scotty and he does it brilliantly. The young Spock is superb, and the young 'Bones' McCoy is also excellent. I highly, highly recommend it.

I actually had an extra copy of the film delivered to me by mistake. I'm waiting to see if I am going to be charged for it (at the moment, I don't think I am) but if I get away with it, I may offer it up for a prize or something. Obviously, you need a Blu-Ray player (or a PS3) but we'll see what happens. Watch this space.

In other news - Jake is STILL waiting to sign for his new team, so again no football for him at the weekend, and my match was called off due to the torrential rain we've been having. So it was quite a relaxing weekend, apart from trying to light a fire.

We have a real coal fire in the front room. And the weather is now horrid enough that the thought of sitting in front of a real fire with a hot drink (or an alcoholic one) is a very nice thought indeed. So I went out to B&Q on Sunday to get the necessary stuff (poker, coal bucket etc.) and some coal. (Result - the coal bucket we bought came with a free bag of coal!) So, I laid the fire, being careful not to overload it, and used some 'paper sticks' made by my mother-in-law. (These are sheets of newspaper folded in a certain way to ensure they light and burn slowly... kinda like fire lighters). But... do you think I could get the bastard lit?? Could I 'eck as like. I must have used £15 worth of matches trying to light the fcuker. No, I didn't have fire lighters, but I think I will have to go get some this afternoon and see if that makes a difference. *sigh*

Anyhoo... this week, not much planned, although it is number one son's birthday on Friday so he's bouncing off the walls with excitement. And my mum is coming up for the weekend to spend it with him, so that'll be nice. (As a quick aside - she's still really struggling with our recent loss, but hopefully a weekend with us will take her mind off things for a little while).

Have a nice Monday everyone.

Peace.

Tuesday 17 November 2009

See, you CAN get away with murder

This guy... he's either very unlucky & cursed, or very, very clever...

Man killed wife during a dream

Three & a half hours sleep

So it seems our dog can be a guard dog after all.
At about 12:30 this morning I was snapped awake by some ferocious barking coming from our blobby whippet. (He's a tad overweight... like dog like master I suppose).
It was one of those horrible moments when you're deep asleep and then you're slapped awake, as though someone had stuck an ice cube up your butt (and not in a good, sexual games, 'sod-it-I'll-try-anything-once' kind of way).
I was up and out of bed before I had fully opened my eyes, and grumbling to myself "what the fcuk..." as I bounded toward the stairs. It was only after I had got half way down, and saw the dog standing in the hallway having a right go at the front door that I realized I had no weapon as such, (apart from a case of middle-of-the-night-breath), and if there were someone attempting a break in I had no clue what I would have done. Soiled myself and wheezed on them probably.
Anyway, as it turns out, there was no one even close to the front door, and I think it was a combination of strong winds, squally rain and some debris blowing around outside that caused the dog to wake up and defend his territory. So I ushered him back to his bed, called him a good boy (because he was - that performance is one of the reasons we got him), and then staggered back up to the land of nod myself. Or so I thought.
While I lay there and let my heart slow to just a galloping horse pace, I thought "OK, back to sleep, work tomorrow"... but to no avail. It was another one of those times when your brain just can't switch off. Unfortunately (for her) My Better Half also could not get back to sleep, so we ended up chatting for a while about work and such, and complaining about not being able to sleep, and when I looked at the clock and saw it was 02:25 or something I thought "shit it, I have to get up in a minute".
I think that was the last coherent thought to pass through my brain, because next I remember waking up and creaking open my eyes to see the time reading 06:17... just before the alarm goes off.
So as you can imagine, I'm a little groggy and foggy headed this morning, with another day of documen-fcukin-tation to get through. *sigh*.

I hope your evening was a little less stressful. Have a good Tuesday everyone.

Update: Oh, I forgot to mention, I had a big session on Guitar Hero 5 last night. Favorite songs for playing include - Dire Straits "Sultans Of Swing", Bon Jovi "You Give Love A Bad Name" & T-Rex "20th Century Boy". Rock 'n' Roll.

Monday 16 November 2009

Hola

Another Monday, another working week to battle through.

So how was your weekend? Mine was OK actually. Saturday, we had a little birthday 'do' for my father-in-law at our house... dinner, drinks etc. with my brother & sister in law and their families, and of course my parents-in-law. I had to be careful with how much booze I stuck away though, as I was playing football on Sunday morning.
So, Sunday. It was only a friendly, to give the 'new boys' in the team (including me) more game time to see how we do. I played in center midfield (which is my usual position) and played about 80 minutes which I was pleased with. Unfortunately, we lost the game, but not for want of trying. We hit the bar twice, the post once, the keeper made two blinding saves... we just couldn't get the ball in the net. Their three goals were a penalty (dubious decision), a break away goal (the fella was offside) and a third break away goal when we were pushing to get back into the game. Annoying. But the manager I think was happy as he got to have more of a look at some of the other players in the squad.

In other news:
I finally received my invite for Google Wave... and I'm slightly underwhelmed, mainly because no one else I know (apart from Russ) is on there! I have some invites to give out now, so I'll be seeing who wants to sign up for it. I'll then see if it's something I will get a lot of use out of.

This week, I have no real plans at the moment. I have to play football again tonight as I've said I would, even though I'm a bit stiff and sore. I think I might have to drop out of the Monday night games, as playing Sunday, then again on Monday, might be a little too much for my poor ol' body. We'll see.

So that's about it so far... more nonsense soon.

Peace.

Update: BTW - Stephen King's new book is fcukin' amazing....

Friday 13 November 2009

Friday at last

Yes, we've slogged and moaned, cried & laughed, and finally we've arrived at the end of the week. Halle-fcukin'-lujah...

Last night I made a rather tasty beef casserole using rump steak (which, even though I say it myself, was very nice), and had a couple of glasses of cheeky red.

Tonight I'm not sure what's on the menu yet, but I fancy a couple of cold beers to finish the week off, so who knows?

Oh, and it's lucky I'm not superstitious... it's Friday 13th today, I saw one magpie this morning ("one for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl" etc.) and I'm sure a black cat ran out in front of me this morning on the way to work. But none of this bothers me, I'm not cowering under my desk for fear of something bad happening. The only thing I don't do is walk under ladders, but this isn't for some silly anti-bad-luck ritual, it's only because I know how heavy a can of paint is and to have one land on one's head from a great height would put a serious crimp one's day.

I've gone back in time a little with my Soundtrack of the day today, with early Blutones.

So, are any of you lot out in internet-land superstitious? Tell iSimon all about it...

Have a lovely weekend everyone.

Thursday 12 November 2009

Fcukin' documentation

Stressed today. This bloody arseing shit eating piss flapping documentation project I have to do is getting right on my moobs & under my skin. I know it needs to be done, and I know I'd have nothing to do if I weren't doing this, but by Satan's wizards it's boring. I'm a good coder (even though I say it myself) and my talents are being wasted on this shite. I had a bit of a whinge & moan at my '2nd level' boss this morning, but he can't change anything. I feel as though unreasonable expectations are being put on me, but when I (sensibly & calmly) state my position on certain issues, it's like I'm ignored and just told to get the fcuk on with it anyway. Gggrrrrr.

Anyway, no plans for tonight, or tomorrow / tomorrow night, but then on Saturday we're hosting a little get together for my father-in-law's birthday, so that should be nice. Then I'm playing football on Sunday morning (so not too much booze at the party I guess!) There's still a delay in getting Jake signed to his new team, so he has no football at the weekend, but hopefully in the next week we should have that resolved.

Anyway - nearly lunchtime, and macaroni & cheese beckons. Have fun everyone.

Peace.

Wednesday 11 November 2009

Walkman back on today

(To paraphrase Charlie Brooker its not actually a Sony Walkman - I have moved with the times - but it's not an iPod either, it's another brand of MP3 player and I got bored with keep having to type "MP3 Player" whenever I wanted to mention my music player of choice... my I digest...)

For the first time in a while, I'm sitting here at my desk listening to music again while 'working'.
The current soundtrack is Nirvana's Greatest Hits. I posted about this the other day... it's not until I have a break from music, then listen to it again, that I realize how important it is to my life. I love music. (Pauses for drum break in "Smells Like Teen Spirit"...)

In other news...

I bought Stephen King's new one, "Under The Dome", yesterday and it's a monster (yippee!) so I can look forward to a few days of excellent writing, griping plot, believable characters and a fantastic ending. He's one of my all time favorite authors and I have read all of his books. Seriously. All of them. From "Carrie" down to the last of the seven-book Dark Tower series... AND all the books he wrote as Richard Bachman. When I bought the book yesterday, the girlie in the bookshop asked me if I had read any others of his... so of course, trying not to sound too condescending I said "Well yes actually, all of them, and I own roughly 85% of his books also". Smug? Me?

Plans this week include not much... as I have no evening plans, I can sit and relax and immerse myself in Castle Mills, Maine, and the people thereof (it's where the new book takes place, obviously).

Oh, and a quick shout out to my friend Phil 'Junior' Dawson over in crazy Australia. He, and his good lady Kylie, are expecting their first child, so lots of love and congratulations to them. If you haven't checked out his blog do so this instant. (OK, finish reading mine first, and hurry back!) His latest post is about guitars, and how great-super-smashing-fantastic they are, and this got me to thinking that I hadn't picked my own up for a few weeks... this will need to be rectified and soon.

That's about all for now... stay safe children.

Tuesday 10 November 2009

The beautiful people

Now, I know that everyone has their perfect partner in the world, and I know beauty is only skin deep and blah blah blah but I just saw this story on the BBC website and I was sick in my mouth a little. Why do these sorts of stories about people bumping uglies never involve, say, Carmen Electra and George Clooney? By Odin's Sword these two are no oil paintings...

Noisy Sex Woman Loses Appeal Bid

Please, don't complain to me if seeing these two, and then seeing in your mind the images the story conjures, makes you give up your lunch.

I'm just the messenger.

Right, internet, answer me this...

As my (admittedly simple) intellect can't seem to come up with a solution to this, I am throwing it open to the unwashed masses of internet-land.
Every night, I set the alarm for the time I need to wake up. The time I set it for gives me loads of time to get up, have a cup of tea, get washed & dressed, make sure my bag is packed etc. I'm not leaving things to the last minute as I used to do. The problem is, I never get woken up by the alarm - I always wake up at least 30 minutes before it's due to go off, and more often than not I wake up more than once in the night worrying about the time. Why?!
It's as though my mind panics at silly o'clock and thinks "you're gonna be late" so it clicks me awake to make sure I'm not late... but of course at 03:34 in the morning even the laziest of students would struggle to be late getting up at that time. I honestly am at a loss, and I can't remember the last time I was actually woken up by the alarm. Frustrating isn't the word. I don't have an excess amount of caffeine before I hit the pit, I'm not waking up with a dodgy prostate needing to pee like a derby winner... so what can I do?? All I want is to be able to get into bed, go to sleep, and then be woken up at the right time. It's not too much to ask, is it?
And quite often, if I've got things rolling around in my head like loose barrels in a storm-tossed sea clipper, I can struggle to get back to sleep at all. More than once I've been woken by some little switch in my head and then still been awake 2 hours later.

So there we go, that's my problem. (OK, that's one of my problems). Answers / suggestions / comments to the usual address...

Peace.

Monday 9 November 2009

So now we move on

Thank you, to all the people who have wished me well and passed on your condolences. As you can imagine it's been a hard couple of weeks, but as my dad would have said "enough now, get on with it". ('It' being whatever I'm supposed to be doing). And that's what this post is about really... we cremated my father last Wednesday, and so now it's time to move on and get on with life. I'll miss him, and always remember him, but I have a life to lead and a family to support so on we go.

A list of the little things that have happened & will happen

I cut my thumb on the ironing board at the weekend. How the fcuk can I cut my thumb open on the bloody ironing board??
I played football on Sunday and we lost 2 - 1 although I did quite well, getting fitter & better with each match.
We have a chimney sweep coming round today to sweep out our floo's (is that right?) so we can use our wood burning stove & real coal fire... the weather has changed, it was 2 degrees c. this morning and what better way to spend a cold evening that sat in front of a real fire?
I'm also playing football tonight, I now have a regular five-a-side game every week, so that will help with my fitness.

So that's about all so far... more posts more regularly from now on.

Peace.

Monday 2 November 2009

My Father

Forgive the length of time since my last post. I just re-read it actually, and I can almost see myself sitting at my desk writing it, thinking my world was pretty much OK.

When I arrived home on that day (Thursday, 22nd of October) I was told that my father had passed away.

To say it was a shock is a massive understatement. He wasn't a sick man, or a weak man. He had been suffering from 'flu like symptoms' for about a week, and this had weakened him. It then appears he suffered a massive heart attack, and died at home. The post mortem has since revealed that he had an underlying 'coronary artery condition' that had never been picked up, and because he was weak from the 'flu like symptoms' his heart couldn't take it.

To say we are devastated is an understatement. My mother is of course destroyed, my sister is extremely upset and distraught.

I know you all wish to pass on your condolences to myself and my family, and I appreciate them all, but please don't feel the need to comment here. As you can all imagine, although this is extremely painful for me, I want to move on and not dwell on the misery and sorrow.
I loved my father very much, and I know he would not want me spending longer than necessary feeling like this. I will miss him a great deal, and will mourn him for a long time, but life goes on. I have a wife and son to look after, and a job to do, so I soldier on.

We are holding my father's funeral this Wednesday, so as you can imagine I won't be posting much then, but I will be back, and the best thing for you all to do for me is carry on as normal.

Thank you.

R.I.P Terry Molloy. 12/05/1950 - 22/10/2009.