Bam!!

Kicking it up a notch with the spice weazle.

What a crap day. Foggy, rainy, cold, miserable..... woke up to the distant sound of a recycling wagon making its way along my street. It's a long street and the house numbers go well over a thousand.

The fact that I could hear the wagon could mean any of the following:
a) I slept very late.
b) The wagon was early.
c) I had already missed it.
d) I had to get up and check which way it was going and whether I could get my bin out in time.
e) I would not be able to find anything to pull on to go out in the rain.

In golfing pants and flip flops I trundle out with my bin, relieved that I haven't missed another monthly collection.

I like recycling. I like the fact that my rubbish bin, which is collected weekly, rarely has enough in it to warrant collecting it more than monthly. I'm in the process of ordering a compost bin to further reduce my landfill footprint.

I DO have issues with the way our recycling is done......

a) We have co-mingled collection, which means that paper, cardboard, tin cans and plastic bottles are all mixed together in a big green bin.
b) We currently have no glass collection service.

The problems with co-mingled recyclables is that they are actually fairly worthless. Most local councils that opt for co-mingled are just embarking on a number crunching exercise to obtain the relevant targets with no regard for what happens to our rubbish, other than the fact that it's less in our conventional grey bins.

Take for example plastic bottles..... from co-mingled waste, it's not cost effective enough to get someone to sort it all out so we ship it out to china, and thirty miles away from the place that is shipping it out there, there's a place that's importing plastic bottles from Germany.

The councils that do collect glass and mix it all up are effectively destroying the value..... co-mingled glass is broken up and used for creating roads (i.e. another form of landfill) - Those glass bins at the supermarket are much better when you separate your own colours of glass.... one bin for green... one brown.... one white.... the value of glass collected in this manner is much higher and can be put to good use.

There is actually no substitute for finding a good recycler..... there's no real lazy solution.

What to do when you can't be arsed to blog?

4) Widget!!

Invest some time in a crappy widget that will inevitably slow down your page loading times..... I've got loads of 'em over there on the right hand side if you don't believe me.... one plays music.... one is my (sporadically updated) bowling cam..... one for the moon phase.... one for the weather.... an Iraqi civilian death counter..... and even a defunct polling booth.... and here's another for good measure!!

My blog is worth $6,774.48.
How much is your blog worth?

Drunken idiot.

Well I may or may not have mentioned that I wanted to take a trip to Wakefield (of all places) to find the Fernandes brewery tap. Last Saturday night we finally decided to make the pilgrimage.

Well, it all started out quite nicely as we caught the train from Slawit into Huddersfield, and had a twenty minute wait on the platform before the connection to Wakefield. Following the twenty minute wait (and a pint in the King's Head pub), it transpired that the train conductor had been assaulted at the station before Huddersfield, and the train was subsequently cancelled.

Well, there are two pubs at Huddersfield station, so to while away the hour until the next train, we visited the Head of Steam for a couple more jars.

Now, it's probably best to avoid drinking BEFORE you go in search of a brewery!! That's all I am going to say on the matter. I was pissed, and the brewery tap was VERY good indeed. Let's leave it there.......

If you were the train spotter on Wakefield Kirkgate train station that tried to explain to me why the train comes into this platform or the other one.... then I apologise for my state of inebriation and lack of concern at your fascinating railway knowledge.

What to do when you can't be arsed to blog?

3) Regurgitate quirky news items from BBC or Ananova.

a) Only in Germany - A bunch of snails walking across a road caused a six-car pile up!! Police closed the road while they scraped up the slimy remains of both living and crushed migrating snails on the B14 near Stuttgart. "Cars were crushing the snails and the slime was making the road so slippery that people started skidding all over the place, said one driver. Motorists had to stop and try to pick their way through the snails. It was like something from a horror film."

b) Paul Gascoigne has been sectioned under the mental health act for a second time.... what only twice?? Apparently the teary-eyed soccer has-been was reported as "acting strangely in Hemel Hempstead" - well, that explains it then, break out the straightjackets!!

With all the good will in the world.

I try to be a better blogger. I try to set time aside each day to read, write and comment on as many blogs as I can get through. In reality, I am just too frikking lazy or preoccupied to get on with it. I actually outprocrastinate myself by avoiding the tasks that used to keep me from doing other things by doing even more outlandish things like walking or drinking or gardening or heaven forbid.... shopping!!

And so it seems quite apt that I should continue my list of things to do when you can't be arsed to write a blog.....

2) A selection of "youtube" videos (Youtube videos in blogs is just about the laziest thing ever!!).

a) Simpsons are always a cheap shot. Here's every "couch" scene.....


b) In true Harry Hill style, here's some "you've been framed" type action.

Can't post, won't post

Sure, I've actually been quite busy for a couple of days.

Against MY better judgement, my mum decided that she wanted a "real" roof on the conservatory. This, of course, changes the idea of a conservatory into one of an unfinished, highly glazed, extension. Neither a stone constructed part of the house, nor a wood and glass sunny lookout post.

Anyhoo.....

For the last couple of days, it has of course, been pissing down with rain, and the moor-grime has been rolling in and out with alarming regularity. What better way to spend this time, than running up and down a ladder carrying roofing slates?

So that's where I've been.

Of course, seeing as the majority of the work is now done (I was just the helper in this respect - I can not be credited with actually achieving anything other than putting things where they should be, when they should be there) the weather has taken an altogether more red hot and sunny outlook!! Sod's law at work again..... where's that Tupperware® box gotten to?

Other than that, I've been trying to keep warm.... the central heating has made a comeback this week, due to the inclement weather conditions of course.... I've been playing Age of Empires.... the Wii Fit hasn't seen the light of day.....

I have booked a weekend away..... for me and my lovely lady friend..... we're off down that London, for an (as yet) undisclosed purpose that (contrary to all women's first guesses) does not involve proposal of marriage!! We're going in July, so that makes the next few months quite interesting with July being my little trip..... August is a trip out to my cousin's wedding (we were also double booked to go to a wedding in Marbella but you can't be in two places at the same time).... and September.... well, I'm led to believe that my much-better-half has organised some form of weekend away to celebrate my birthday. I only hope that pony trekking is not on the menu!!

Here is something you might post, if you couldn't be bothered to post....

1) A top ten list.

Ten things I hate.

* Comic Sans font.
* Misappropriated apostrophes (I try my best and I know I am not always right).
* Jumbled font sizes, colours, and types.
* Social Networking sites (myspace, friends reunited, facebook etc etc).
* Racism.
* Pop-ups.
* Spyware and Adware and spam.
* eGears and eDirectory (more to follow, still working on resolving an issue).
* Slugs (although conversely, I quite like snails!?!).
* Nordic walking poles!

Wet and windy.

Each and every "bank holiday" weekend in England is typified by weather that generally makes it a hazard to tow a caravan into the Lake District. This, however, does not deter the great British campers and caravanners, and many thousands of people, in true "blitz" spirit, do exactly THAT.

A veritable oasis of summery weather has indeed been punctuated by a colder snap, with some pretty high winds. The flushing of spring has been brought crashing back down to earth in the shape of fresh green foliage, strewn around the highways and byways of our great nation.

And as far as the windy weather goes..... well.....

A couple of days attendance at the Barge and Barrel spring bank beer festival has also had rather windy consequences for a certain blog author too. Coupled with a couple of pints of the Riverhead's finest brews this weekend.... well, as you can imagine.... I've been declared a national emergency and am strictly a no-go zone!!

Baby birds. There's tons of them at the moment. Starlings that nested in my roof are driving myself and my neighbours a bit mad with their constant skriking for worms. Bluetits are buzzing around in the garden and giving my nuts a severe pecking. Dunnocks that seemed to have jumped the gun slightly, and indeed jumped out of the nest too early, are all thriving and starting to grow "real" feathers instead of those fluffy crap ones that don't fly too good. Today I saw the first baby robin in the tree too..... with its stubby little wings and fluffy feathers ruffled in the wind. If they can manage to stay still in this wind then it looks like a good year for the birds.

Slugs. They've started eating my red hot poker. I stuck some slug pellets down, but am praying that the birds (mentioned above) can recognise the difference between juicy worms, tasty table treats, and deadly poison!! Bloody slugs!! The birds should be eating them, but then (and I know we've had this discussion before about slug recipes) would you really want to?

What shall become of me?

Well, it's Friday afternoon.... There's a beer festival that's just started at the Barge and Barrel, and I am sitting at my computer desk drinking pineapple and grapefruit green tea!!

Shame on me.

I haven't even managed to blog this week, and once again, I would put this largely down to the very fact that whilst the sun is shining, you're like to find the fox indulging in some sort of outdoor pursuit.... walking, gardening, dogging..... you know, the usual stuff.

Anyhoo.....

Big big big shout going out to the Pighill Wood volunteers, who, within the last couple of years, have totally turned around the decimated woodland area near Scapegoat Hill. I have been walking across there a couple of times this week, and I'm pleased to say that all their efforts are both appreciated and obvious. Not sure how relevant or up-to-date any of this information is, but if you want to know what I'm on about then it's here anyway. I guess thanks are due to the lottery too.... I must eat my words!!

My pineapple and grapefruit green tea smells very much better than it tastes.

I have bought myself some herbs today (of the legal variety) - some flat leafed parsley, some thyme, some fennel, and some fancy schmancy basil. I also bought myself some Giant Russian sunflower seeds, and a Kniphofia - that's a red-hot poker to anyone else.... a childhood favourite, from which my cousin and I were quite deft at removing the heads with a single swipe of a stick... how my grandma (the legendary Fanny Bush) must have cursed us. She did make up for it by surreptitiously nipping us while our parents' backs were turned.

I've even managed to almost catch up with all the blogs I have to read..... some of you may have received a comment from me, but they've been few and far between because none of your blogs were even worth responding to I've just been so busy. Sorry.

If you expected this post to be done in rhyming couplets, or as a witty sonnet, then I'm sorry to disappoint.

Wasted.

I'm glad that at least a couple of folks enjoyed my poetic answer to the doggerel artist's cheeky query about my grossly supersized frame. My only defence is that I piled on some weight when I stopped smoking (just eating sweets all day eventually has an effect).... Once I stopped smoking I also developed a liking for a nice pint. I don't drink large quantities of beer (except for the odd festival or two), but I do enjoy a tipple, and of course that also has a detrimental effect on ones waistline.

Truth be know.... my poetry was in fact written whilst I was a bit drunk on Friday night. I know I shouldn't drink and blog, but no harm done.... THIS time!!

And so.... wasted......

We went out last night to meet some of my old work colleagues.... Adam, Don, Emma, Gary, and Stu (and a couple of Emma's friends too) painted a bit of Huddersfield a dazzling shade of crimson. I think it's fair to say that everyone was a bit worse for wear (except Stu, who was driving) and none more so than Dawn, whom I had to nurse back to health during today after what can only be described as a "rough night".

So, today's been a wasted day. Perhaps that's where the term "wasted" originates?

Ironically, everyone last evening that I haven't seen for quite a long time now commented on the fact that they thought I'd lost weight.... how odd?? I haven't actually lost any weight (I don't think) - I'm somewhere around 14 and a quarter stones!! What I have noticed though, is how much better I carry myself since I started training on Wii Fit. It's all about posture!

On that note, an image of an applauding taxi driver flashes back into my mind as he observed my attempt at the "king of the dance" yoga pose on the street corner last evening.

Note to self.... drink + yoga = silly idea!!

Question?

This is a tale of a too plump Fox,
He's plump from his head to the end of his sox,
The cause of the girth is a lack of motion,
And two years on he's a big as an ocean.

Lard, all lard,
cried the mouse in his house,
And all from beer, (he's a bit of a souse).
They'll be wheeling him out, if he gets any bigger,
Just what did happen to that slim Fox figure?

Answer:

Sit tight and I'll tell you the fantastic tale,
how the fox got quite big from just supping on ale.
He stopped eating food only peanut butter and bread,
deep fried with bananas, just like the the King said....

In order to get himself clean every day,
A rag on a stick was the only good way.
One day in a skin fold, when lifted, they saw....
A mouse, in a house, and some clogs on the floor.

When asked how it happened, he just couldn't say,
He simply rolled over and waved them away.
The mouse house spilled out and it went with a bang.
He'd been living in a windmill in an under-arm-jam.

False start.

Bloody heck.

I got myself all geared up to go with Fred to the Barge and Barrel beer festival.... only to discover that it's not until next week.

That'll learn me!!

Other than that, I've done nothing... all day.... and all night too.....

Why did the FoX cross the road?

To get to the chip shop!!

Sod's law and Tupperware®

As soon as I mentioned the hot weather, you could have honestly predicted a steady drop in temperature. to the point where I even had to don a smart knitted item on my extremely toned upper body (thanks to Wii Fit - I am still overweight, but persistent if nothing else).

The other thing that the law of sod spoke to me about recently is my choice of Tupperware® container. It might seem trivial, but that's my middle name.... Tupperware® - just joking!! How come, whenever there's something that needs to be sealed with that yummy polycarbonate freshness and kept until it needs to be thrown away, then I reach for my plastic friends.... I choose an appropriate sized container, turn around to the work surface where said item destined for the fridge is waiting, and lo and behold.... the Tupperware® tardis effect has kicked in......

The size of container I have selected is always too big. I have tried selecting ones that I know to be too small, but whatever it is that needs to go into this controversially (potentially, but hotly denied) harmful plastic coffin, will still amply fit into the container.

Is it just me that has this refrigerated storage box related dilemma?

PS: Yorkshire Pud - Sorry to burst your little bubble of... well, let's not even imagine.... Love Soup is a BBC Sitcom, starring the fantastic Tamsin Greig and written by the talented David Renwick (of One Foot in the Grave fame)... it's very funny but I don't think many people know about it.

Mad dogs....

...and this very English man, invariably go out in the midday sun.

Well circumstances have truly conspired to keep me away from my blog.

First came the absence of beer, which coincided with the purchase and subsequent investment of several days of Mario Karting on my Wii.

Next came the great beer flood of May... the month of mild and the mild festivals.

Next came the weather.... it's been bloody great weather for more than one week, and in England, this generally constitutes "summer". I have indeed been making hay while the sun shines.... I've been out on my bike a bit.... I've been walking quite a lot.... and shock, horror, I've even been seen in the garden, weeding, planting, mowing, raking, sweeping, eating, drinking and generally mooching.

Not long after the glorious weather arrived, the Wii Fit arrived.... if you haven't seen it then where have you been? It's a fancy-schmancy pair of tilt sensitive weighing scales that connect to the Wii and help you "get fit" through a series of exercise types... aerobic, yoga, muscle, and balance..... It's accounted for some very sweaty afternoons and a goodly amount of my missing blog time.

It's not much to show for my missing time..... Small amounts of the remainder have been made up of (perm any combo of the following):

snoozing; eating; cooking; age of empires; nintendo ds; snooker; radio 7; cancellation of sky account; cancellation of an ongoing epic order (email transcript to follow when concluded) with eDirectory (what is it with companies that start with e? - ie. eGears... eDirectory); dexter; heroes; freesat; love soup; gavin and stacey; pushing daisies; deal or no deal; pogo;

Normal service will be resumed as soon as it starts raining!!

Jibber jabber.

Too much Mario Kart and no beer makes an Arctic Fox go crazy.
Too much Mario Kart and no beer makes an Arctic Fox go crazy.
Too much Mario Kart and no beer makes an Arctic Fox go crazy.
Too much Mario Kart and no beer makes an Arctic Fox go crazy.
Too much Mario Kart and no beer makes an Arctic Fox go crazy.

I knew I bought my camera for a reason.... I haven't used my new camera half as much as I ought to have.... hopefully now that the weather is slightly more cheerful this is something I will rectify.

Here are a couple of (in my humble amateur photographical opinion) my better springtime shots...


Especially for my friend spice-the-cat... this lovely picture of a blackbird with its beak chockfull of worms heading off to feed its young 'uns - This is bokkeh to the level 11!!!!


Despite my abject disappointment at losing a clutch of robin eggs during a winter storm earlier in the year when my shrub blew down, the dunnocks have made up for it and nested in the ivy that hangs over from next door's garden. I took this picture of a very young dunnock chick... probably only a few days after it fledged... still too naive to actually fly away from a twinkle toed fox and a camera!! (note totally sure it's a dunnock... might be a sparrow... they're quite similar)

Making an example.

Sometimes I wonder how I can be so busy, when in reality I'm not actually, really, doing anything at all.

What have I been doing since Sunday?

Well, I resolved to NOT go out for a drink this week... It's only Tuesday and I am wondering whether I might have made a bad choice. May is a month of celebration of the humble pint of mild, and there's a couple of *mild and cider festivals cracking off this coming weekend, so I thought I might enjoy them more if I err on the side of sobriety this week.

* Three Pigeons mild festival Saturday and Sunday (10 milds) - Rat and Ratchet mild and cider festival Saturday and Sunday (15 milds and some cider).

So that's what I HAVEN'T been doing.

I've been glued to the snooker (an annual occurrence) at the Sheffield Crucible - Yes, we all know it's really boring, but like Big Brother, the more you watch it, the more you get sucked in and enjoy it.

Spent half a day today looking for:
a) Mario Kart Wii - with steering wheel - (found in the first shop I went to)
b) Wii Fit - (Gave up looking after the twelfth shop)
c) A **Rubik's Cube - (Gave up looking after the ninth shop)

** Apparently the Rubik's Cube is once again a "must have" toy for kids.... Some shops have not had any stock of them since December!! I am so out of touch with the youth of today!! Obviously I still have my original "cube" but I'm sure a birthday gift didn't ought to be so tatty!!

Obviously, after purchasing Mario Kart for my Wii.... I've invested a little bit of time and effort into doing some of that, and playing against Riv.

Spent a few hours yesterday evening servicing (well, helping Riv to service) a bike for the Turtle, which is now, once again, greasy and almost road worthy!!

Satnav... I've been trying to work out why the Nokia LD-3W is such a poor bluetooth GPS receiver. After quite a bit of digging, it turns out that it's because the unit operates in "static navigation" whereby your position data is averaged, and therefore it's more accurate when travelling at speed than it is for walking around some fields (or indeed being (mis)guided up and down the same street outside the Manchester Arms in Hull several times to the point of embarrassment). So.... after much digging and sniffing around the interweb, I've found a utility that lets me hack into the bluetooth GPS receiver and turn off the static navigation... I tried it out today and it does genuinely seem a bit better..... it needs a more exhaustive test, but that would involve me getting off the sofa!! Anyone interested in the Nokia LD-3W should look here, it's most useful.

I baked some bread... then ate it.

Caught up on my Sky+ recorded programmes (Heroes (season 2), Love Soup, Pushing Daisies (season 1), Dexter (season 1).

Hoovered around the house - a task LONG overdue. Bleached my dishcloths (I never know why I don't just throw them away!!). Unclogged the bathroom sink.

Hung a window mounted bird feeding station on my lounge window.

Listened to Terry Pratchett's - The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents - part of Mr. Pratchett's 60th birthday (28th April) celebrations on Radio 7.

Played endless hours of "brain training" type activities on my Nintendo DS, and an equal amount of time playing "brain numbing" type games too. Also played a fair amount of Pogo.

Drunk a lot of coffee!!

And so..... it would appear that there have not actually been enough hours in the couple of days since my last post to fit all of this nothingness into.... where did I get the extra day from?

Advantage fox.

The lovely weather that presented itself yesterday did not fall on the house of a lazy fox!!

Following on from last weekend's trip to Hull, we took another journey (this time avoiding public transport) to the Humber Estuary and visited the delightful Cleethorpes.


The lovely Dawn, with her hair characteristically annoying her by blowing into her face, and no doubt saying to me "you better not be taking my picture" or words (that I dare not repeat in mixed company) to that effect!!

Much like many "classic" British seaside "resorts", Cleethorpes has seen its share of hard times. I'm happy to say that Cleethorpes has survived the season of unfashionability that has dogged our coasts. Perhaps it's global warming or a dose of environmental awareness that is now prompting people to return. Cleethorpes has now begun its restoration and is looking decidedly chirpy. The promenade is really pleasant* and some of the shopping areas are really looking nice, quaint and respectable.... the seaside "tat" shops are being slowly whittled down.


The pier and the groyne. Lovely sky with the "sea" somewhere in the distance.

* Seasides are like magnets for teenagers with badly modified, cheap cars - typically Citroen Saxo and if you can mask out the occasional open ended exhaust pipe and tinny, rattling, euro dance or god forbid r&b (the modern version, not the good version), then it's a help.

* Seasides tend to attract the elderly. while I have nothing against the elderly, it is slightly off putting that you can't buy food that needs to be chewed or beer which doesn't come from an electric pump!! The more the resorts can cater for the discerning punter, then surely, the more discerning punters will be likely to visit and even more importantly REvisit.

* Yes, I know, Cleethorpes isn't actually "seaside" it's tidal estuary, but it's much the same thing apart from the large tidal range and expansive mud flats!!

* Grimsby were playing at home, but if you avoid the football chanting pubs just above the train station, then you wouldn't really know much about it. For those that don't know, Grimsby and Cleethorpes are pretty much the same town, although I am sure someone will pick me up on this broad generalisation.

Having spent an hour or so "promenading" with my lovely lady friend, we decided that we should head out of town and find a more natural environment in which to take a constitutional stroll along the myriad of wildlife havens along the edge of the estuary.


A view along the "prom" at Cleethorpes from Ross Castle, a Victorian folly (recently renovated).

We (eventually) parked up at the "Lakeside" area... not far out of town. It's like an old 1920s boating lake, and you can tell it's also had its fair share of troubled times, but its being invested in and its looking very nice. A boating lake, a light railway running through the area with mini steam engines, some ancient sand dunes, and access to lovely salt marshes and stunning low tide walks along the beach.


Haile Fort, constructed in the mouth of the Humber Estuary during the first world war, and hailed as "an outstanding triumph of modern engineering".

It was a great day out... For me, the walking on the beach, picking up interesting shells, and feeling the sun on your back, and the sand whipping around your ankles in the breezier moments, and soft terrain under your feet, was the highlight of the day.

Go to your nearest coastal resort and support it. I maintain that there are so many places in this country that I have never experienced, that I ought never to need to go abroad again. That's obviously not to say that I won't go abroad, but damn it, most people don't know what's on their own doorstep!!

Crap.

What to have for my tea? (that's dinner to you posh types!!)

I'm mulling it over in my mind, and contemplating the fifty or so yards walk to the chip shop for a Friday special - fish, chips and the obligatory mushy peas.... I live across the road from (in my humble opinion) the finest chip shop in England. For those that haven't yet, and are able to sample the delights of Outlane chip shop, then you really ought to.

On the other hand, I've got a bag of rather large, roastable potatoes, with delicious looking red skin.

Unhealthy fish and chips or healthy baked potatoes?

Eventually (as I've been a bit slack on my bike work this week) I take the healthy option, with the thought of smothering crispy skinned roast potatoes in baked beans and lashings of grated cheese....

Pricking the potatoes...

Rubbing the potatoes in olive oil, to discover that I hadn't any hot water in which to wash my hands thereafter.... dammit.

Seasoning the potatoes lovingly with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper...

Bunging them in the oven for an hour and a half....

Beep... beep.... beep... the oven timer is screaming at me to come and get it.

I rush down to the kitchen, check the potatoes, and they're done to perfection. I turn off the oven and put the taters back in to keep warm. I turn to the cupboard... where's the beans??

Well, imagine the words that come from my mouth as I unearth tins of borlotti beans, of chickpeas, pinto beans, black eyed beans, cannellini beans.... but not a single tin of those bloody baked beans!!

Knackers, or words to that effect.

I grab a bowl..... chuck in a tin of tuna, a tin of vacuum packed sweetcorn, some mayonnaise, and mix it all up and throw it at the potatoes!!

To add insult to my culinary injury.... I only had "light" mayonnaise too!!

That'll teach me to take a healthy option!!

How come a vacuum packed can of sweetcorn still weighs the same when it's been opened?

What a miserable meal!!

I couldn't...

... give a monkey's that it's Saint George's day!!

Not my words, but those of our intrepid local weatherman Paul Hudson on the lunchtime news.

For me, personally, I've never celebrated Saint George's day with any fraction of the enthusiasm that I can muster for, let's say, Saint Patrick's day!! Who wouldn't want to be falling down in town with a huge Guinness foam hat to cushion the blow?

So what do we do to show our Britishness?

Even the flag of St George has been hijacked and tainted with extreme right wing prejudicial values.

A national flower? A national drink? A national food?? Street parties?? None of the above!!

Apparently we're supposed to wear a red rose button hole.... first I knew of it!!

So, will you be celebrating the life of our Turkish, Roman soldier, who despite his staunch christian beliefs fought for a pagan Roman emperor?

What was so wrong with Edward the Confessor in the first place?

I'd be interested to hear from anyone who thinks that being British in these modern times of credit crunch, food shortage, war, petrol prices, and Euro2008, is any reason to be waving a flag from your rooftop on this auspicious day?


Just because you should never be afraid to wave the flag!! I'm British, I'm not a racist, and I'm not overly proud of being British.... but it IS my flag and I've a bloody right to wave it without being embarrassed!!

In deep!

This is a belated account of a day trip to Hull.

Having worked for a few Saturdays on the trot, Dawn finally got a free weekend, and rather than sit at home or spend our time traipsing round some lifeless shopping centre, we caught the train to Hull.

Neither of us had ever been to Hull before, and it couldn't possibly still be true (as was voted in 2005) that Hull is the worst place to live in the United Kingdom... could it?

I decided we would go to The Deep (a classy looking building that houses an aquarium) and I also looked up a string of pubs and bars of note. I took a bunch of relevant postcodes and a satnav device so that we might find things a little bit easier (more on this later!!).

Well we arrived in Hull after a painless train journey, and the station at Hull itself is a lovely place. People talk about Huddersfield being a lovely station (I agree with John Betjeman that Huddersfield station possesses the most splendid frontage, but the interior is a dump) that's all old and characterful, but Hull is bigger, brighter, more airy, and indeed older!! The other obvious benefit of Hull station, is that it's in the same place as the bus station.... shame on you Huddersfield!!

The Deep was well signposted and we had no trouble finding it and spending a good hour or two fighting off the ranks of ankle biters that were hogging the interactive elements of the display. I was especially annoyed at the shoals of amateur photographers that had not worked out how to turn off the flash on their cameras.... fish don't have eyelids and your camera flash could blind, or indeed shock them to death, besides which your pictures will look crap when your flash reflects off the glass!!





The Deep done, we set off in search of lunch. I had the postcodes of several suitable hostelries, but the pubs in the old town looked far too "beardy" for Dawn. She's very good at putting up with my pub selections as a rule, but she doesn't like "old men" pubs where there aren't any women, which is what I mean by "beardy"... Anyhoo, after wandering around for a while with grumbling tummies we decided to seek refuge from the biting cold wind and to turn on the satnav to find a place I had earmarked as somewhere to eat.

I struggled to get the satnav to accept the postcodes without a supporting address. I couldn't get the internet working on any of the three mobile devices we had with us. I texted Riv for some full addresses and off we set into the street to find the Hop and Vine at 24 Albion Street.

Walking with satnav is funny because it takes a while to orient itself, so we walked up and down the street, passing the pub where we'd stopped, no less than four times before I decided we should just keep walking and adjust to the satnav when we got into the right vicinity.

After a few bad instructions and a couple of back tracking manoeuvres, we made it to the Camra award winning, tiny hostelry, known as the Hop and Vine. It's a small, cosy, real ale, cellar bar that serves home made food, very cheaply in my humble opinion. The bar is about six feet long, and the whole place seats about twenty people. Three real ales and a couple of real ciders to choose from..... good selection and well kept for such a small place... exactly the sort of place I dream about running. Home made vegetarian chili with homemade bread and hummus. Great stuff.

And that was about it.....

We saw a fair bit of Hull..... I know a lot of it's quite depressed and industrial, but you can clearly see where the regeneration is happening, and it certainly seems like it's being done both sympathetically and effectively.

It puts Huddersfield to shame....

Fogday.

I vote that we rename this day of the week to reflect the weather we seem to have inherited!!

And so it came to pass that on Fogday, the fox rested.

Here are a bunch of searches, which are just an excuse for me not to write about my trip to Hull yesterday.... which I will now write about in another blog entry..... I also need to update my random shopping blog, so if I get time then that's where you'll find me.

shagging gif animation (Google)
Ok, before I begin.... I don't know why the hell you ended up here looking for shagging animated gifs!! I live to give (be warned NOT SUITABLE FOR WORK!) - Are you looking for this kind? Or this kind? Don't blame me!!

arctic fox eyes location (Google)
Come on... you're having a laugh surely. Do you really need to sit at a computer and type this into Google to look it up for you?? They are on the fox's head of course... located.... in the Arctic!!

Rat and ratchet, Huddersfield (Google)
Hurrah for the Rat and Ratchet!! I haven't been there for a good few weeks now, but it's still one of the best pubs in town. Good beer, moderately priced, not too beardy!! Part of the Ossett chain of pubs.... you can see their website here!!

blu-tack creation bored (Google)
Bored? Looking for Blu-Tac action?? Head on over to the grossly underutilised Flickr group for blu-tac animals in their natural habitats!! Come and contribute!!

spike milligan plain tales from the raj download (Google)
Yes, it was a good set of radio programmes. No, I don't know where to download it from!! If anyone does, then I'd be keen to know about it too. I keep checking the torrent sites, but it hasn't appeared yet. Hail to the Spike!

whats on tonight in golcar (Google)
Very little I would imagine. Why not head to the Rose and Crown and avail yourself of some of that lovely Golcar brewed Mild or their lovely Pennine Gold!! You know you want to!!

im a ant that rides on golf balls song (Google)
I lose count of the number of people who come searching for the ant on a golfball song. To put this issue to bed, for once and for all time.... it's a song by Bob Brown. I don't know who the heck he is.... I don't know the song..... go and buy it from here!!

egears.co.uk review (Google)
Review?? Review?? I'll give you a review.... they're bleeping bleep di bleep.... bleepitty bleep.... bleep bleep.... don't give them the bleeping bleep off your bleep!! Find another supplier!!

what helps Arctic Foxes stand the cold (Google)
Fur!

Royal Doulton Arctic Fox (Google)
You gotta be truly kidding me. If you really have money to burn by buying pot arctic foxes, then you might as well give it all to me and I will make one for you.... shall we say fifty quid to get the ball rolling??

Blue sky thinking?

Well, here's the latest update on my Sky engineer.

A two man team was booked, along with high ladders, to come and look at the satellite dish that is attached to my chimney, which sits atop my three storey house.

Waiting on Thursday for the men with the ladders to arrive, imagine how my heart sank as a single, lonely, solitary engineer pulled up outside my house, in a smaller van than the previous engineer had driven, and with much less in the ladder department. I was not expecting miracles.

Ok, so let's at least give them a chance.

First things first.... the engineer asked to have a look at the actual Sky box in my lounge... the receiver... the decoder, if you will.

Cables were detached and meters attached to test the signal. Well, imagine my delight when the engineer realised that his meter wasn't working, so he couldn't actually measure the signals any further than I could demonstrate by changing channels on my televisual equipment!!!

Ok, I'm still not going to put this guy down.... let him get on with it.

He brought a new Sky+ box from the (tiny) van and plugged it in. It worked.... so the box was faulty.

Paperwork done.... signed, sealed, delivered....

So... why the frik didn't the first engineer look at the box you might ask? You wouldn't be alone in asking that either!!

Ok, so now I don't have Sky movie channels or Sky sports working..... the engineer did some stuff on the box and said that these channels can actually take four or five hours to come through onto the new box.... I've come across this before in pairing my viewing card to another box.

I sit and wait.... (actually I was doing other stuff, but still, you get the picture).....

After five hours, still with no movies or sports channels, I go for a bike ride for an hour and a half. I get home and of course the channels still aren't working. I decide to ring sky support.... I give them the details and after I've replaced the handset and made my way upstairs.... all channels are working!!

They really are a bunch of clowns... but I'm working again now.

Truth be known... I think I am actually going to cancel my Sky soon.... I might just get freeview instead.

Belated.

I meant to get around to writing a little bit of an item yesterday.... circumstances conspired against me and culminated in the imbibing of a selection of the Drop Inn's finest.

I was woken this morning by my phone ringing at the ungodly hour of a quarter to eight. Who uses a phone at that time? It was, of course, the Sky engineer, who was calling to inform me that he would be arriving between ten AM and one PM today. Personally I think he was calling everyone on his schedule to say "If I have to be out of bed at this time of day, then you bloody well gonna get to know about it".

I grunt my acknowledgement of his declaration of alertness, and promptly fall asleep until I am once again awoken by my ringing phone. Nine thirty, and I decide to get up.

So, while I am waiting for the inevitable series of lemony unfortunate snicketty events to unfold, as two grunting, van driving gibbons crawl up the walls and across my roof..... I've got a bit of time to spare. I can complete the item that I had assigned myself yesterday.

Happy belated birthday to the late, great Spike Milligan. He would have been ninety years old yesterday. I've enjoyed a whole rash of shows on the spoken-word radio channel that nobody listens to, BBC Radio 7. which for my money, is the best thing the beeb have channelled their energy into, for quite some time. Some lovely items from the Goon Show, right through to the magnificent More Plain Tales From The Raj.

In tribute to this gentle, comic giant, that still manages to make me laugh, I thought I'd fly in the face of convention (and indeed the law) to bring you some samples from my childhood favourite Badjelly the Witch.


Bless the Spike!

Updates later.......... OK.... Here's the complete Badjelly the Witch book!!