Best?

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane

In proving foresight may be vain:
The best laid schemes o' Wevz an' Ben
Gang aft a-gley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promised joy.

Official - walk's off!  Started snowing about nine of the clock last night and guess what... at ten thirty this morning it's still bloody snowing....

Pared back plans for a trip to Kinder Scout.... cancelled plans of the Colne Valley Circular..... I'm not even going out to empty the bin today!!

Drawbridge is up!

On t'up.

Seems my man flu has finally turned the corner and begun to eff off. I'm now left with a slightly charred bronchial effect that goes nicely with the curtains.

Bloody weather isn't helping things.... one minute it's freezing cold... the next it's sunny and snow melty and wet..... right now, when I should be out doing my Julie Andrews impersonation, singing "The hills are alive with the sound of badgers" across the fields of Nettleton Hill whilst adoring a beautiful full moon, we are (predictably) treated to fog and vertizontal sleet whipping up New Hey Road.

My gob's all chapped and I've borrowed Dawn's inhaler, so let's hope things get better soon.

Still waiting for my tri-wing screwdriver to arrive from Hong Kong so that I can finally kill my Nintendo DS whilst pretending to be fixing it. I DID get a package from Hong Kong today which turns out to be something else for the DS but it's a bit crap until I get the case swapped out.



One advantage of the recent snow is that a pied wagtail has found its way into my garden every day. Unfortunately this picture was taken through some really mucky windows in my kitchen and was a bit zoomed in, so naturally it's not the best quality. S'a lovely likkle bird though. Having spent a great deal of time and effort keeping the feathered friends fed and watered in this recent white spell, I can say it's been very rewarding to see all the action on and around the feeders.

What goes.....

White, red, blue, red, white???

Answer: Me, in the snow, walking, and then catching man flu!!

I'm officially dying of man flu.

My lungs feel like I have started smoking again.... my temperature is all over the place.... I have the most feeble broken glass cough..... sleep pattern's gone to the dogs..... can't even raise the enthusiasm to stay awake long enough to watch a film (that being said, I've managed to watch (with some cunning rewinding over the bits I fell asleep in) Horton Hears a Who (very good); Bee Movie (Very poor); and Ratatouille (OK)) = lovely nested parentheses!!

On the plus side of being so desperately ill, I've managed to spend some time organising the mountains of digital media that I manage to accumulate in such a haphazard fashion. Electronic spring cleaning, you can't beat it!!



Early morning New Hey Road - This was Tuesday morning, but it's a shot I like. The streetlight phosphor orange glow is quite tasty.

Depends.

It all depends on your perspective. Like Charlie Dickens once wrote - "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times".

And so it comes to pass that, what has been billed as the heaviest snowfall in nearly twenty years, has divided us into two distinct camps.....

For me, personally, I'm loving every minute of it - right up to the point where I am so run-down that my complexion has gone to pieces and I'm starting with a flu. I managed to walk six or seven miles today, and it was bloody hard, hot, sweaty, clammy work.

The other side of the coin is that I've never seen so many schools closed. I've never known anyone's work to be closed before (like Dawn's was today). It was good to see all the kids out sledging and enjoying themselves, but somewhere underneath it all, someone has claimed that the two days of disruption have cost the nation more than three and a half billion quid!!



The red ball rising over the Colne Valley - If you look real careful, you can just see Castle Hill on the extreme left horizon. A great walk and a lovely sunrise this morning.

Bolder....

... and decidedly colder.

Snow came.... and then some more.... and then some more.... and another foot of snow is forecast for this evening.... hooray!!

I know if you've got kids that need to get to a school that's been closed, or if you need to brave the M62 to fight your way to work, that this weather might not be too thrilling..... I don't, and it is.

Today was a great chance to test my full winter outfit. Hat, gloves, buff, coat, boots, gaiters, thermals..... fully kitted for a walk to Dawn's house. By the time I got there, the sweat was dripping off me...... I think I might have gone a bit overboard - I'm possibly ready for an arctic expedition rather than a five mile walk!!



Turley Cote Lane between Outlane and Old Lindley. A favourite local walking spot en route to Dawn's house.... Despite the greyness of the photo, this was taken at about noon, today, and about two minutes before the blizzard descended and I couldn't see where I was going!! Boots fully blooded by virtue of going nearly shin deep in mud.

Christened.

We finally got around to christening our new walking boots today. Having worn them around the house for a few hours, they were itching to get some mud on them, and that's just what they got.

Be careful what you wish for.

A loop around Scammonden Dam and Deanhead Reservoir, on a cold and frosty morning, where the mud was tempered slightly by only a thin icy crust. Probably the best part of four or five miles. It WAS trying to snow, and the wind was icy cold. We were so weatherproofed that it made for a slightly slower walking pace, but that suited our new "bombproof" heavy mountain boots!!

The dog didn't mind the cold, and managed to brave the icy black waters along the way, several times!! Brrrr.

I'm so lucky to have someone like Dawn to go walking with.

I MUST keep walking - my feet are in such bad shape, and I am praying that I can walk them back to life.... hoping also that the boots will hold the mangled bones together in the process. I have a fancy idea that I'd like to walk up Ben Nevis in September, so watch this space.

There is now another layer of snow outside!! Apparently it came from Russia?!? It certainly makes a change to see the snow blowing to the west along New Hey Road.



Admittedly (due to my lazy approach to image storage) this photo is from the walk last weekend. As a spice-the-cat homage - Canada geese on the canal near Cellars Clough Mill.

What a difference...

... a week (and a bit) makes!

A week punctuated sparingly with medium jinx.

Highlights (and lowlights) have included:

My Nintendo DS falling in half - played to death, RIP little buddy.

New walking boots finally purchased, arrived, and totally loved.

Cooking a good curry (low fat, meat free, slimming world friendly) for the lovely Dawn.

Getting my car MOT'ed (not by my usual choice of the Honda dealer - the credit crunch is upon us - sorry, "global economic downturn").

Walking through Merrydale (above Slawit) with a pair of stupid dogs, and finding the last of last week's snow hiding under a wall at Cop Hill (see picture).

Beer - The King's Head in town is rapidly becoming one of my chosen few, purely for their beer - certainly not for the ambiance!!

Gardening.

Mario Kart Wii - finally smashing the time trial records and unlocking the last few elements of the game - right down to the point where there is just one record that remains..... untouchable thus far!!

Celebrity Big Brother final - Abject disappointment - Despite myself, I wanted Terry Christian, Verne Troyer or Coolio to win...... defeat was snatched from the jaws of victory, and for some strange, unsavoury reason, Ulrika "bloody" Jonsson won it!! Who saw that one coming??

The memory fades beyond that lot.....



A veritable small continent of snow nestled in the bilberry bushes above Marsden. Freezing cold winds whistle across Cop Hill. Hats pulled down hard, in direct contrast to the still, breathless, sticky climb up Merrydale packhorse road that led us here.

Cool, wet grass.

Apparently, or so I am led to believe.... Monday the 19th of January is the most depressing day of the year.

As for me, well it's been a pretty good day.

Apparently, or so I am led to believe.... the fire walker's mantra is "cool, wet grass.... cool, wet grass...." - We've got no shortage of cool, wet grass today. It's been snowing, and it's come damn cold again.... scuppering my walking plans along the way. If I could figure out how to get my "bowling cam" back up and running then I wouldn't have to write weather blogs all the time!!



Love me, love my canal. Anyone who knows me or knows the canal between Marsden and Slawit, will know this particular stretch very well indeed. It's a place I pass often whilst walking and it's also the most photogenic part of the route.... the light was lovely on this day when the canal was frozen over.

C C C C Cold......

Apparently, and these are not my words, but apparently last night was the coldest night in Yorkshire.... ever, or at least since the recording of data was established, a trifling forty some years ago. Ironically, I couldn't tell you what that temperature was!!

Crisp day, crunchy, a bit frosty, a bit snowy, very icy.

Went for a walk down the canal from Slawit to Marsden.... Mum's just started walking as a new year resolution, so given the tricky conditions underfoot and inadequate walking equipment we did quite well to make it to the Riverhead public house for a stunning pint of American Pale Ale with its staggeringly good alcohol level - a fitting reward for the journey.

Spent the rest of the afternoon taking care of those twelfth night logistics.... ripping up christmas cards and burning down the christmas decorations..... saves on the loft space!!!



Self portrait at Scapegoat Hill!!

Rather randomly....

... and even more trivially......

Whilst catching up on some Pogo badges in "Trivial Pursuit Daily", I have come across some interesting but entirely useless information....

Hitler's favourite film was King Kong.

Winston Churchill smoked two cigars a day.

The kookaburra is the largest of all the kingfishers.

150 years ago, Reuters began as a line of carrier pigeons, carrying banking information between Aachen and Brussels (a two hour flight).

Orville Wright flew for 43 years without a pilot's licence.

Go figure...... It snowed last night and it's bloody cold now - The peak temperature for the rest of the whole week is four degrees (C)!!!

Jack Frost.

Man, it's officially VERY cold.

Update: Bath - fixed; Shower - new one installed; Boiler - waiting spare parts (possibly a week and I am not convinced that it will fix the problem when it arrives!!).

The gas fire is working overtime, and I am cuddled up with a quilt and a carbon monoxide alarm in case my quest to live in a draft free, superheated, micro-climate, should end anywhere near the wrong end of the disaster scale.

Snow came.... I got up for the customary post drinking, forgot to turn my electric blanket off, five AM whizz!! The ground outside was frosty.... the ground inside wasn't much better!! I went back to bed with a tshirt wrapped round my head like some sort of turban. Woke up at seven thirty.... lo and behold, it's been snowing.

I took an eight AM ride across town to get a new shower with my uncle.... the normally congested journey, was of course simply exacerbated by Joe Public's complete disregard of common sense and highway code.... when snow falls, it's motoring anarchy... It took a while!!

I'm not holding my breath that I'll have central heating again before Christmas now.



Quite literally - Up the garden path at seven thirty in the morning. A snowscape of small proportions. This here bunch of white stuff probably added thirty minutes onto our five mile trip this morning. Not the sort of thing you really want to wake up to when your central heating boiler's acting the lemon!!

Searching on a snoozy Sunday.

Well, after some fine tapas (at Les Caveaux in Holmfirth) and a couple of beers (at the Barge and Barrel in Elland) last evening, it turned into a snow laden, relaxed, snoozy Sunday.

Here's some searches to cheer you up.

black beer and raisin wine (Google)
It's a firm favourite of my lovely girlfriend, and I'm quite fond of it too. I've been to two pubs that serve it: The Head of Steam in Huddersfield and The Maltings in York. From what I can gather, there are two different types of black beer and raisin wine, and they're made by Gales and Lindisfarne.

KRUMLIN - 1970 pictures (Google)
There's not really a lot of info about this here washed-out festival - The most I can find is here. I think my dad went there..... I think Tony might know something about it if you ask nicely!!

"fat tulip" "garden" "download" (Google)
Pre Baldric, pre time-team.... Tony Robinson at his best telling tales of Fat Tuplip's Garden!!

how long does an arctic fox live with its mom (Google)
I left home when I was twenty one.... next question.

Today's temperature in Golcar (Google)
Cold! Seriously if you want weather, then look across at my weather widget on the right hand side and you'll see what it is like in Golcar.... I don't live more than a mile or two away.

I Like toast. A little bit o' toast. White bread, brown bread (Google)
Paul Young and the Streetband? Toast? A great song, and one that inspired my lifelong love of bread based produce. How did Paul Young ever turn so crap? (Wherever I lay my hat?? Everytime you go away??) - Song lyrics and a video too.

The Star Beer Festival, Folly Hall, Huddersfield 2008 (Google)
Look under events, but be quick it will finish by the end of today!! I recommend "Hot Cross Bunny" (It's very hoppy - geddit?) from the Goose Eye Brewery at Keighley.... delicious!!

rodney alan greenblatt (Google)
Ah, artist behind Parappa the Rapper, Um Jammer Lammy, Parappa 2 and lots of other cool stuff.... but not many others that turned into fabulous cult video games!! You can find him here, and Parappa here!!

cupwith reservoir (Google)
I love Cupwith Reservoir and I love the Riverhead's Cupwith Special beer too!! Here are a couple of my Cupwith photos. Nothing quite like blowing your own trumpet is there?

how do you describe words like ning nang nong on spike milligans poem (Google)
Nonsense.... how do you describe them?

Gutted.

Woke up this morning to bright, hot, white sunshine, streaming through the windows.

Fool's gold of course. The sun, albeit strong, was magnified tenfold by the couple of inches of snow that fell overnight.

I peered out into the garden and noticed a shrub that grows along my garden path, that climbs up the garden wall, and slightly over the top.... for the first time it's ever happened, had actually blown over into my garden. It's a variegated sort of thing, none too pretty, but it grows nicely and fills a big gap in the border.

Eventually I got out of bed (having exhausted my supply of Nintendo patience) and got dressed to go and deal with this weak willed shrub.... To my dismay, nestled amongst the broken debris of the shrub is a robin's nest complete with three baby blue speckled eggs in it.

These are DEFINITELY not the sort of eggs that I wished to receive for Easter!!

I've propped the shrub back up, and I've dug a garden fork in next to it and tied it for extra strength, but I am afraid that the robin may have already abandoned its station now.

It's a crying shame.

Trying to relax.

Sometimes you have to take a step back and just relax a bit.

We started the process by going for a lovely walk across the golf course in the snow that has appeared over the last twenty-four hours. It was nice to be able to just walk, completely freely, across the hallowed turf, where you would normally have to risk a clonk on the bonce from either an enraged golfer's club or a wayward golf ball. I love walking in snow. A couple of kids threw snowballs at us, and to their delight I fired right back.



Next up, at lunchtime, as the snow began to thaw, we headed off to Haworth, deep in Bronte country. We rode the steam train from Haworth to Keighley, an old fashioned train-spotter's delight.... I can't deny that it's always been a charming, pleasant experience to travel by steam.


Real, honest to God gaslights.


Dawn, freezing to death, fully bemused by my choice of entertainment.


Thar she blows, our train pulls into platform one!!

We spent a while looking round the town of Keighley, which is a strange place full of rugby fans, chavs, and weirdos. I am sure that not everyone in Keighley fits into one of those categories, but I bet it's at least an eighty percent fit. We rode the train back to Haworth, and enjoyed real ale from the buffet car. Pleasant is right!

In the evening we headed to Bradford to try a curry house that has recently been recommended to me by several of my befriended Bob's Taxis taxi drivers. I've had better, is about all I will say about the curry at Anams on Great Horton Road. The starters were nice enough (We had a masala fish and an aloo tikka) but both main courses were disappointing. Overcooked chopped up king prawns for me, and some kofta that didn't hit the high notes for Dawn. The rice and tandoori rotis were delicious and the jug of strawberry lassi was good too, but the idea of charging me fifty pence for extra chillies because I asked for my dish to be cooked on the hot side, is unnecessary and petty. I'm pleased we went there, but not sure I'd hurry back.

Came home (avoiding the temptations of the Barge and Barrel) and relaxed in the obligatory pyjamas with compulsory over-filled belly, the symptom of any curry night!!

I am relaxed.

They tell me.....

... you should never let those bleeping bleepards grind you down!!

I have often said the same thing myself in advice to anyone who might be feeling slightly "under the cosh" at the mercy of "the man".

It's just bloody hard sometimes to keep smiling when everyone is trying to grind you down with electric orbital sanders turned up to number eleven.

The car saga rumbles on.....

They've had my car at the windscreen place for four days. This factor is unacceptable in its own right, when you consider that it should have been a mere twenty four hours.

Yesterday afternoon after three days, having not received the phone call they promised me, and against my better judgement, I phoned them..... the phone jockey goes to check... despite the fact that I know you can see out of the office window directly into the work area..... he comes back.... "yes, they're working on it now. It will be ready at four thirty".

Ok, so here's the catch.... they've got my car.... at the other side of Huddersfield.... what time do they close? Five o' clock!! I have a thirty minute window to get across Huddersfield in the rush hour, and it's snowing.

"Look, what time do you open tomorrow morning" I ask.....

"Eight thirty"

"I'll be there at nine"

"Ok see you in the morning".

I turn up this morning, and they move a car that's parked in front of mine, and then between them they push my car out of the garage. He comes in and says "Oh by the way, were you having trouble with the battery?".

"No"

"Well we came to start it yesterday and it was flat".

"Ok, so you've charged it then?"

"No, but we will bump it off the forecourt for you and you'll need to run it around a bit"

Then they open the boot and start cleaning out all the broken glass from the old piece that's all shattered inside.

Four frikking days.... you haven't even managed to tidy up after the job that you did yesterday afternoon and you've flattened my battery??

I get in the car and drive off.... with smoke billowing out of my ears.... I'm trying to stay calm.... honestly, but if one person..... just one person steps moderately over the line......

Kaboom!!

Please sir....

I want some more!!

More?

You got it Mr. Bumble, my good man... more, and what's more, I'd like to supersize it, and get a frikking drink with it too.

More of the same.

That's what you get.

The pain is subsiding quite nicely now, but the swelling.... oh, the swelling!!

I know I should have the offending teeth removed in order to avoid repeat outbreaks, but the thought of having to have false teeth, and of spending so much time/money at a bloody dentist's is really not one I would choose lightly.

Note to Hodgy..... Bloody hell, for all these years I thought I was missing out on something, and then you go and spoil it all by pointing out that: Not only have I seen Zarch on the Archimedes before.... I've bloody well played it.... it was called "Virus" on the Atari ST, and I still have a copy of it somewhere!!

A day of video gaming... of stormy weather.... of keeping warm.... of painkilling drudgery.....

Bloody meme!

So I've been tagged by Grilled Pizza

The rules

1. Link back to the person who tagged you. (Check)

2. Imagine you could send a letter back in time to yourself, when you were 13 years old, what would you write to yourself? (check)

3. Tag 5 people to do this blog (check) - spice-the-cat; maxxo; Toad; Mr Clack; Mr Pudding.

Ok, well let me set the scene. I would have been 13 in the year 1981. The letter I would write would go along these lines:



Dear Wevz,

I am speaking to you from the future... uture.... uture.

Believe it or not, but you have somehow managed to send yourself a letter from the year 2007, and Michael J Fox (who you probably may only know as a bit part actor) has not yet begun his successful time travelling trilogy. Make sure you go and see them at the movies when he does, because they're good fun.

I could pass along any amount of advice to you, which would help you run your life. I could try to help you make things turn out differently, but in all honesty, I think you've turned out alright. I wouldn't want to change your reckless, oftentimes spontaneous attitude towards life. Whatever stupid choices you make along the way haven't landed you in jail or killed you thus far, and you've had some wild experiences that will teach you a lot about life.

The best pieces of advice I can give you are:

Read more books.

Check out the newsagent's daughter where you get your Beano and Dandy!!

Look after your toys and games, especially Chartbuster!!

Never turn down a night out at The Orbit in Morley, contrary to what you believe, it will not be there forever.

Try harder at school you big idiot. Listen to your English teachers and your form teachers, they do actually care what happens to you.

Look after your feet. You only get one pair, and when they're not in good shape, it's very frustrating.

If you MUST smoke, then choose a VERY light brand of cigarette.

Do not lose this letter or tell anyone else about it.

To finish this letter, I can tell you:

In the future there will be something called a lottery. It's like a big raffle.

Make sure, that for the "Euromillions lottery" draw on Friday 30th November 2007, you choose the following numbers:

12 : 19 : 20 : 30 : 38 and the lucky stars are 07 and 09

Lots of love,

The Arctic Fox!

Snowy Sunday.

It's Sunday, I have shaved all my hair off and the weather takes a nose dive. My core temperature has gone with it. Damn, it's cold. So cold is it, that today we received our first bout of snow! Not much to write home about, but definitely snow, and a cold fog, and lots of slushy rain too.

There are six points on a snowflake, and each snowflake is completely unique. The magic of fractals.

Here are the Sunday searches. I am celebrating day twenty, and the fact that I have now officially passed the half way mark. The cats are all alive and there are still some chickens left. I'm working on it though... whilst trying to keep warm!!!!

the sims ruined my computer (Google)
Lucky you.... My computer's fine, but my life's in shreds. Thank your lucky stars and move on to the next level.

is the arctic fox born alive or in a egg (Google)
You're kidding me, right? Apart from the obvious, that would be "an egg" not "a egg"...... you've got to be kidding me!! Ok, just to clear this up.... For mammals, ONLY the platypus and the long-beaked and short-beaked echidnas lay eggs..... The arctic fox is born alive!!

"i gave her a black eye" (Google)
You bloody cad!! Email in your address so we can forward it on to the relevant department.

anyone used http://www.egears.co.uk/ (Google)
Yeah, me, and I suggest you don't!

i have not smoked for 20 years are my lungs ok (Google)
Here is a timetable of what happens when you stop smoking. Well done for managing twenty years.... I reckon you have nothing to worry about in terms of excess risk. I reckon you should know your own body better than any text book though... if they feel ok, then I am sure they are fine... if they don't feel too good, then google it on the web before going to see your GP who will just do the same thing anyway.

huddersfield pearl festival of light (Google)
That's an easy one... I was there, and it was great. The Plasticiens Volants website is here.Here's someone else's video clip on youtube. Here's what the Huddersfield Examiner made of it.

2 huddersfield swingers" (Google)
Erm.... are you looking for two swingers or are you two swingers looking for something? Have you tried doggersweb? How about adultfriendfinder too??

pics of baby arctic foxes (Google)
Oh, that old chestnut... try google images!!

inventions for finding goods on shelves in supermarkets made easy(Google)
This one is a no-brainer.... try using your eyes!! The perfect tool for the job. Also, if you really can't see something you want, they hang those signs over the aisles to tell you which aisle has cereals in, and which is alcohol..... If you're REALLY stuck, try asking a member of staff!! For that reason, googler, I'm out!!


toad (Google)
toad (AOL)
Bloody Toad even gets his own search results now!! Grrrrr!! Bad Toad!!