My Most Amazing* Week EVER?

Last week was pretty rubbish for me.

Nothing of any note happened apart from going round a round-a-bout.

I decided - there and then, that I would make sure that THIS WEEK was going to be awesome.

I was determined to make things happen.

A little bit of positive mental attitude injected into my daily doings and hopefully I would have something to write about.

Here is a brief caption what happened: (written as it happened LIVE)

SATURDAY:
My (half) day off!
Went shopping with a drunk Mrs H, who had been out on the lash with her friends the night before.
Sainsburys appear to have stopped selling chocolate rich tea biscuits (my favourites) So I bought two bags of chocolate peanuts instead to see me through the week.

SUNDAY:

I awoke to the sound of an email notification telling that I had won yet ANOTHER t-shirt from one of my favourite websites (makeuseof.com). This is now the 4th t-shirt I have won in the past year.

Every week a post is made asking people there opinion on various matters in the world of technology and the like and the best person (me) with the best opinion (mine) wins a free geeky t-shirt.

Ate a full bag of chocolate peanuts to celebrate - Life is good!

This was a great start to my amazing week of awesomeness!

(I also found a chocolate peanut in my pocket and ate it. - DON'T JUDGE ME!)

MONDAY:

AM-Read on line that the OXO mum (Linda Bellingham) passed away. Not a good start to the day. Plus it's peeing down and there is a storm on the way.... I need to find a tenner on the floor to break even.
PM- Didn't find a tenner. But did get an email saying from Amazon saying"Your order has been dispatched"... Get in!!!! I loves getting post I does....

I ate half a bag of chocolate peanuts as a treat to make myself feel better - keeping the last half bag for emergencies.

TUESDAY:

Not good. No arrivals on site today. This means there is nothing to do.... nothing to do but clean up. I hate cleaning up. It just makes room for mess to appear.
DAMN.

One of my dispatched items from yesterday has arrived. It is a small pocket knife for opening boxes and the like. I suddenly realise that I already have two knives and there is at least one more on it's way. Nobody needs four knives....
DOUBLE DAMN.

My mum (who is worse than me with computers) has asked me to share some photos of my wedding (only took a year to ask for them) and send them to her tablet.
This seemingly simple task has ended up with a plug socket falling off the wall, the dog getting himself locked in the bathroom and one broken tablet.
I am resisting the urge to devour the last of my chocolate peanuts.
TRIPLE DAMN.
...oh yes. My football team lost as well tonight.... There are not enough damns


side note: I now have no more chocolate peanuts.

WEDNESDAY:

Today has got a lot of catching up to do after yesterdays fiasco.
I spent most of the day sweeping up leaves and twigs after the big storm and ... well... not much else.

I did however put my name to the BREAKTHROUGH BREAST CANCER petition as my friend Kelly is one of the poster girls for the campaign. You can read her story and join in by clicking the link above - and if you don't I will come and find you and make an angry face.

Today made me stop and think.

I've being trying to make this week awesome (and failing) but compared to those who have to fight for the right for treatment of illness - I really don't have much to complain about at all....

Note to Thursday - this doesn't mean you can slack off!

THURSDAY:

Took the wife's vehicle to the car hospital (or garage as it is sometimes known) for it's MOT. A 16 mile journey should not have include 13 round-a-bouts, but this one did.

The fact I had to pick up Mrs H on the way home meant I had to navigate an extra one to get to her office. So in total I had 16 on the way there and 17 on the way back.

34 mile round trip = 33 roundabouts. No wonder the car doctor told me the clutch (what ever THAT is for) is on it's last legs....

Had some KFC for tea and is was proper nice. No washing up.

We'll call Thursday a draw.

FRIDAY:

Was rudely awoken at 6:20AM by a phone call. (the message left on the answering was from Bhangra Dave - the chippy van man, who once appeared in an Indian Bhangra movie for some reason as an extra... hence the name) to tell me that he wasn't going to be on site to do fish and chips.

I already knew this as I had told him the week before that we would not be busy enough for him to bother coming.

You can't help some people sometimes.

The rest of the day was spent trying to not fall asleep due to lack of sleep.

PM - Due to the cupboards being more bare than a nude grizzly, Mrs H went to the chip shop to buy me a chicken tikka kebab (with chilli sauce) and a big bag of chips.....

It was bloody gorgeous.... WITH CHIPS!!

This post was supposed to show how positive mental attitude could change the outcome of my life.

If has failed.... dismally failed.

I need to find a way to make my life.... profitable(?) and also learn to eat healthier.

I have to work this Saturday because everybody else is ill and I'm not, so I don't get any time off at all
to to add insult to injury.

BALLS.

A Once In A Lifetime Event (for the 2nd time)

"my brain is empty.

I have nothing to say about anything.

Is this the end of Thoughtless Gibberish?

Have I spouted so much rubbish over the years that I have run out of things to say?

My life is so boring at the moment that I genuinely can not think of anything to rant about."


...That is all I wrote this morning in preparation for todays post.... and then something truly amazing happened.

Whilst returning from shopping with Mrs H we had to drive through "the big round-a-bout" near the shops.

This round-a-bout is a stupid one because every ten meters there is a set of traffic lights. My understanding of roundabouts was they were there in order to keep traffic moving and reduce the need for lights.

However, since moving to the area I have noticed there are roundabouts EVERYWHERE!

And this huge roundabout has a least three sets that you have to stop-start-stop-start to get through before I can get back on the main road on zoom off into the distance.

Today something strange happened at the roundabout.

The lights were on green.

This is not unusual in itself, but as we curved round to the next set.... they were also on green.

This happens once in a while and I always fell rather privileged when I make through two sets in one go.

But then.....

The third set were on green.

I checked my speedometer. 

27mph.

This is the ideal speed. I was doing the ideal speed for traffic lights.

You see, not a lot of people know that when a string of traffic lights are ahead you should aim to do 10% less than the speed limit.

Traffic lights are usually set to cut up the flow of traffic because everybody does 30mph (or a bit over - naughty)... but if you can keep to 27mph through a green light, the chances are you will breeze through ALL OF THE GREEN LIGHTS - assuming there are no Sunday drivers dithering in front of you.

There were no ditherers in front of us today.

We hit the lights bang on green at the perfect speed of 27mph.....and through.

WHOOSH!

Only once before had I ever managed to get through the lights without being cut up, braking at the last minute as the lights change etc.... but not today.

Today I was KING OF THE ROAD!!!!!!!


What a joy....

What a feeling.....

What a boring life I lead.....

Next week I promise to produce something amazing.

Until then....... I dunno..... cup of tea? 

The Singular Adventure of Big Chin and Understatement Boy c.2009

Here is a cartoon I made about a million years ago. Dont really know what this says about my state of mind but I was working in a call centre at the time and was half listening to somebody moan on about how stupid they were ( click here to take your pick from one of the many mouth farts I have to endure for a living as a good example )

Im not sure if its clear enough, but if it isn't - tough, I'm not redrawing it just for you!

What am I Neil "art attack" Buchanan or something?!?!

Enjoy.

2011 A Review - In 998 Words

2011. What a year it has been!

Celebrity deaths, protests, looting, warm summers and mild winters. Possible proof that the speed of light is an absolute may have been debunked and the continuation of the global fiscal worries filled the blank spaces of the nation press.

Artists rendition of the end of times

Nuclear explosions, earthquakes, the seven billionth human takes a breath and promptly defecates on the only planet known to be able to sustain life as we know it and more piss poor desperate faces off the television appearing in various jungles, ballrooms, ice rinks or houses made entirely of cameras and mirrors beg for the right to be recognised while those who couldn’t get in were appearing on news channels fist banging tables declaring the press to be an abhorrent monster that invades their lives without permission.

Oh and the only way is Essex (whatever that is)

How little did we know back in February

We start with the sad news that Pete Postlethwaite passed away in January. This was followed in February with some pranksters changing a petrol sign with the initials LOL (which means Laugh Out Loud, so I’m told).

March gave us a glimpse at one possible link in a chain of events that could lead to the end of the world with a tsunami near Japan, causing a crack in the wall of the Fukushima Nuclear power plant.  Cue exaggerated reports of how a nuclear cloud will envelope the UK and kill all the sheep etc.

News headlines were full to bursting point as we saw the hottest April in over 100 years here in the UK. Cue news reports of massive fatalities of heat stroke and melting pensioners etc.

In May UK politicians were no doubt suffering from sun stroke when Theresa May spouted some bull poop about “an illegal immigrant not being sent home because (and I’m not making this up) a cat.” Oh yes, and some guy called Osama was shot dead after 10 years on the run for instigating the worst terrorist attack in living memory. Cue many column inches of unverified reports of retaliation by extremist groups that didn’t really happen.

Somebody voted for these idiots

June allowed the newspapers to ponder the serious repercussions of how the Greek deficit will affect the rest of Europe and the world. Exaggerations and inaccurate fiscal calculations did nothing to alleviate the economy downturn.

July bounced around the corner, like a happy go lucky puppy dog, unlike Amy Whinehouse who died. The coroner stated that there were no drugs found in her system at the time of death, which must have surprised almost everybody in the whole universe. The tabloid press nearly broke their own arms off and the opportunity to write what they wanted about a dead girl.

August gave us final proof that there are too many people in the world and most of them are ungrateful moronic idiot oxygen thieves (see London riots). Newspapers continued their crazy assault on declaring the madness will never end ad infinitum.

In September there were over 2.5 million unemployed people in the UK, although there were still 12 pages of jobs in my local paper – and I live out in the sticks!!! I didn’t buy a paper in September so can’t remember what the papers had to say about that, but it probably wasn’t words of encouragement asking the people to help each other and rally round to make the country better.

There is a fine line between being deep and being pedantic - I should know!

October refused to let Steve Jobs carry on anymore and allowed those who should know better to relax their decorum muscles and act like they knew the guy personally by crying and acting like the idiots they are. *I have nothing against Mr jobs, but do wonder at the mentality of folk from thousands of miles away who happen to own a product made by a company that is run by someone who has died and they feel it is acceptable to wander around in front of the nearest TV camera and blub like a lost school girl at the news of a strangers death. He invented I-pods not the cure for cancer (which would be ironic)

This was also the month that the 7 billionth person was born, which I am neither happy nor concerned about in any way shape or form. The papers were blah blah... (You get where I’m going with this by now surely?)

"AH-HAAAAAAAAA!"

November has only just gone out of fashion and here in the UK people have been looking for a reason to get angry. Last year it was the snow. Boy were people mad/confused at the seasonal changes/ desperate to have a day off work! Unfortunately for them there has not been the slightest hint of snow this year and so those who receive the most holidays and best pay packets decided that they would have a day off anyway by holding a one day strike. Those poor lambs who have their pensions paid by the public purse want more money for themselves and fail completely to understand that government cuts have to come from somewhere and while every man woman and child in the UK is facing a reduced income while seeing the price of essential items rise on an almost daily basis, believe it is their constitutional right to down tools and demand that their pension pots are safe and secure.

It was also the month of the Leveson enquiry, which is to continue for a number of weeks and for some reason the newspapers have been rather quiet about the whole affair of how and why the self regulated national press association has allowed itself to act in the manner of aggressive thoughtless, brutal and emotionless money grabbing greedy bastards with no respect or honour for the suffering or innocent. Strange that.

December hasn’t really got going but I am left with an ever lurking sense of dread and loathing for what mankind has to offer.

According to weirdoes and mentalists the world is supposed to end next year so none of this really matters anyway.

Carry on.

 *other things did happen in 2011. Feel free to comment on your own memorable memories in the box below. cheers.

Bumferry Climbs The Property Ladder part 2

Man was created before Woman so He build a shoe rack for Her!

And Lo with much gnashing of teeth and with mighty curse words aimed toward the Heavens, the big bulky bookcase was erected for all the world to see. For generations to come, man and woman and beast would set their eyes upon this obelisk of wonder and ask "Is it meant to lean to one side like that?"

Verily, for there is no other reason to say verily, a woman who bares the initials Mrs H shall stand before the work of one man and she shall see the hard work and effort and toil that has been spent these past days and nights alone and with hands on hips shall say "I want it over there."

And man shall sigh the deepest of sighs and lift the dislocated fingers from a few posts ago and say "but it hurts still." and the woman known as Mrs H shall laugh a laugh of laughter and declare "fine" which every man knows to mean - it is not fine at all.

Days shall turn to just under a week and Man shall write on his blog that he has put up the bookcases and the sofa and the TV all by himself and the dog shall sleep on the floor.

But the dog does not understand that he is the servant and man is the master and shall jolly well sleep where the dogs wants to sleep, which always under the man’s feet.

Why do i have 6 screws left over?????

Here in ends the tale. But be forewarned that of the coming of the time when new carpets will be ordered and everything will have to be moved again for the carpet fitter shall come and so it is written that bruised finger or no bruised finger man shall forever more be the one to do the heavy lifting and get the blame for any marks on the wall, even if they were there already and you can't actually see them anyway unless someone points them out and you look really, really close.

Amen.

Licence To Beg and Steal

All Hallows Eve is just around the corner.

Yea...why not?

Which means so are the pock marked, ASBO destined glue sniffing grey skinned foul breathed sticky fingered evil eyed shadow lurching granny thumping cat stealing self harming window smashing shop lifting spitting sweary uneducated unloved un-evolved little rat bastards that will one single solitary night to have free licence to barrage on peaceful neighbourhoods and demand protection money from the old the frail and the infirm.

This so-called holiday that has invaded the UK from the USA has somehow been seen as a free ticket to urban terrorism by yoofs.

In America, as far as I can tell, Halloween is a chance for kids to dress up in pirate costumes or ghost outfits or any as one of the many Disney characters whilst chaperoned by a responsible adult and collect candy and sweets from those houses in the area that are brightly light with pumpkins and fake cobwebs and the like, and can clearly be seen to be well into the swing of joining in the fun.

By contrast in the UK a bunch – correction – a gang of lawless thugs punch every door of their OWN estate and demand money whilst dressed in hooded tops and Nike trainers they looted the other month.

"givusyerfugginmoney!!!"

Regardless of whether or not the house is decorated for the occasion, this will not stop the demands for all and any cash or light weight household goods that can be used for barter.

In past years some have thought to turn off all the lights and keep the volume down on the TV so the vicious little rabid animals would walk on by. But this dear friends only encourages the nasty soulless bastards to piss through the letter box or set fire to your door.

The warning signs will start any night now, with the annual fireworks being thrown at cats and fire engines which has become something of a tradition in the UK although it does not get same amount of publicity as the changing of the guard for some reason.

"yoyoyo. trick, or like, treat or what eva y'getme!"

Kids and depressingly, as seen in every local newspaper last year, more and more adults are arrested and/or taken to hospital with burns to their faces because they have less understanding of the dangers of fire and heat and a loud bang than a pigeon.

I have to ask myself why there is such a huge difference between two nations that speak the same language and share the majority of the same public holidays.

How an it be that in the USA Halloween is seen as a great night out for kids and adults alike. The joy of dressing up and being out at night, while grownups can share in the delight of kids by innocently offering little bars of chocolate without fear of being hounded a sexual predator?

Flip back to the UK and the exact opposite happens.

This is what happens when you give kids too much sugar

Anarchy rules. If you are brave enough to venture out to cease the insistent walloping of your door with the vain hope that you would be able to reason with them, you will be faced by a barrage of abuse and named every sinful act under gods blue sky before being dragged from your home and beaten to within an inch of your life, fading in and out of conciseness, waking in hospital with only the whispered memories of your TV DVD player and wife being taken from your home. Never to be seen again.

Once released from hospital you return to your home to find nothing but a brunt out shell of timer and rubble only the very same bunch of kids to walk up to you and say.... “Penny for the guy!”

Roll on bonfire night.

Happy  holidays – and good luck to you all.

Could be a firework... or it could be your car.

Strike While The Iron Is Hot

I have done a song about all these bloody strikes that are popping up around the place.

I think the most annoying thing is that they are not even proper stirkes at all, just a one day walk out so that everyone can go to the pub or get some shopping in.

rubbish.

So in my own special way, here is my protest to the public sector workers who cant be bothered to do a proper 5 day week and don't realise how fortunate they are to have an employer who pays into their pension and offers them loads of holidays, a decent wage, if not a wage that is certainly more money then they actually work for and more importantly (because its one of the reasons they want to strike) a massive pension pot.
All the while people across the UK are seeing their jobs, homes and livelyhoods dissapear.

If you like it, play it twice and sing along. you will most definatly do a better job than i did.

If you didn't like, well, that's your look out chum. Screw you.

As always - enjoy.

Why Exercise Will Be The Death Of You.

Picture the scene if you will.

There I was quite happily sat watching a few episodes of LOST season 2, the one where we learn about the others and Michael screams WAAALLLLT a lot, when all of sudden and without any prior warning my brain pipes up and says “Let's do some sit ups!”

I have no idea where that came from.

There was nobody doing sits ups on the TV and I have never found the time nor inclination to perform the ritual of sitting up over and over again.

The process of lying down on the floor to then sit up and fall back down again seems nothing short of stupid.

I don’t want a six pack or big muscles or anything like that. Mainly because if you have big rippling bulbous pecks and abs and whatnots the chances are you are more likely to be asked to move some heavy things from one end of the room to the other.

Whereas when you and pale and skinny and look like you are about to break into a sweat by opening a bag of crisps, people tend to leave you alone when manual labour is involved.

And that suits me fine.

I also don’t want to be fat either.

Hero

I have a little belly of course. In fact I tend to resemble a boiled egg with knotted string for legs. But that’s the body I’ve got and up until last night, I thought I was happy with that.

My brain, it appears, seems to have other ideas.

So, once I made the bed up (there really isn’t enough room to stand up in the caravan let alone begin a proper training regime, I sat at the end and allowed my body to relax.

My first attempt at a sit up contained the following noise as I slowly rose up to the vertical.

“UUUUUUUUUUOOOOOOOOOOOOFFFFFFFFRRRRGGGHHHHTTT!”

As you can imagine it was not a very pleasant sound.

I did not enjoy making it, and from the expression of the dog – he didn’t like to hear it either.

The thing is, as I lay back down again I realised I was not in any pain.

Surprised as I was by this, I expected my back to twinge or let out a little trump at least, and so I thought I would try another.

And I did.

What sort of person would find THAT sexy?

In fact I did 25 of the buggers before I gave up.

Quite impressed with the amount of sit ups I did I fell into a deep sleep with the anticipation of the Adonis like ripped torso that would greet me upon awakening.

Alas this did not happen.

I still have a rounded gut that hurts a little bit.

It also throbbed a bit when I came to tie my shoe laces.

I once joined a gym and did all of those exercises and weights and pulling things but it never really seemed to sit well with me. Being in a room with a load of sweaty strangers, all huffing and puffing and sharing the same air, just doesn’t feel healthy or right somehow.

I was even convinced by some of the girls I worked with at the time to join them in an “abs class”. Not knowing exactly which part of me was the abs part I thought I would venture into the unknown and give it a bash.

It turned out that this would be the last time I would go to the gym.

The abs class consisted of me and a load of women doing sit ups.... really fast.

I did three and then just swore at the ceiling for the next 20 minutes as every part of my back, neck and head seared with white hot damp lightning. The pain was too much to cope with.

Why in the name of the Fonz would anyone want to look so slim and taut by punishing themselves to such levels?

It’s not normal.

Forgetting about the posers and egotistical cocks who enjoy looking at themselves in the mirrors as they gurn their way through repeated lifting up of black circles of kilograms and noticing the putrid spray of salty puddles of sweat that surrounded the different machines and apparatus, added to the stench of pain and unwashed under arms and gussets made me realise quite quickly that the gym is not for me.

Therefore by proxy exercise is not an occupation I should be investing my time either.

Why then, some 8 years later, my idiot of a brain decides to force me to perform the one action I detest the most is a mystery to me.

Drinking cups of tea and having a good old scratch with the possibility of picking my nose once in a while are just some of the things I am best at. I enjoy doing these tasks.

I shall continue along those lines until the next my grey matter has another bright idea, where upon I shall have stiff words with it and remind it of these times when we could have shared a more relaxing time excavating my nostrils or having a brew with some biscuits.

Sit ups are not for me.

I think I will stick to just sitting down from now on.

 I have a theory – by doing nothing you will live longer. Insects do nothing but fly crawl and buzz around and live for about a day.

Tortoises do bugger all and live for a hundred years.

Proof, if any was needed, that exercise will kill you.

Sit ups are not for me.

I think I will stick to just sitting down from now on.