Yikes! Earlier than last year!

Apparently...

...our region has its first "Snowww/snoeee" or whatever I called it last year. Okay, so at the minute it's kinda meandering downwards in a vaguely snow-like fashion, and sort of disappearing either before or immediately after touching the ground (Hard to do anything else I suppose), but I reckon if it's as cold overnight tonight as it was overnight last night, we'll have a few centimetres in the morning.

Now this could be a good thing AND a bad thing. A good thing because I love snow, and so does my ickle nephew, and bad, because as with last year, if it messes up transport, getting Christmas supplies in place could be a little difficult. Akward because I still have my entire christmas list - minus three presents - to buy.

My nephew's christmas list seems to be as long as it's ever been, in fact I think this one might even be longer than last years'. I have a few really cool ideas for things he might like, based on his fascinated and amazed reaction to an advert that popped up on some kid's cartoon channel (talk about targeted advertising!) a few days ago. Second opinions I've asked for seem to vary from "Looks expensive" to "looks amazing" and "Noooo it's encouraging him to fight". Huh, yeah, and taking him to karate lessons, letting him watch movies like spiderman (1,2 AND 3) and letting him watch Ben 10 which is all ABOUT fighting, didn't introduce him to the idea of fighting?

Besides, the beauty of this one is the red and the blue guys are on the same team, as part of the concept, so it's not like he's gonna find someone suited in red and start hammering the hell out of him. Not only is the armour really cool, but you can bolt extra bits on, kinda like a wearable version of X-mods I suppose. He made sure it went on his christmas list as soon as the advert was finished, and if I'm honest, I think the concept is so cool I'm happy to oblige. I was thinking about a NERF (pic is not nerf but a decent copy) gun to go with it, but the idea of every surface in the house including the dog's face, covered in those foam darts, kinda put me off.

So yeah, it makes a change from more soft toys/action figures/lego (not that there's anything wrong with lego, I've got him some remember :-)), and whatnot. I'm still figuring out what to buy other people. I kinda have an idea of a couple of things for my brother and another idea for my dad, but Nanodots are bloody expensive for what they are, AND the dog might try to eat them, so I don't know.

On another equally awesome note, my bro has now returned my lenses to me, which is kinda cool as my super ultimate camera bag of power now looks really shiny and sparkly.

As far as pressies are concerned, all helpful ideas are appreciated at this point. For now, I'm off to watch the "snow", which at the minute, is more like frozen fog than real snow - maybe that'll change overnight :-). We'll see.

EPILOGUE-BIT

Our snow never materialised. Everyone else has got theirs, all we've got is snow clouds. Meh, it's always the way of things. Oh well, maybe over the next couple of weeks we'll get some. Just enough to make everything fun without stopping me being able to buy Xmas pressies would be nice :-).

London Trip: "The Rain in Spain ..."

Is apparently not as cold as the Snow we're expecting at the end of this (*checks clock*), yes, this week. Now if last year's winter was anything to go by, we may well be in for some slippety slidy fun over the next couple of months. Already parts of the country are covered in snow, and snow is predicted to fall over the next couple of days over an area of the pennines, a mere 20 miles from here or so, before the white stuff reaches us (hopefully) on thursday/friday.

And as the runup (or countdown - maybe the two will meet in the middle in some sort of tinsel and turkey explosion) to Christmas goes, I've been kinda caught out by the very space-time continuum in which we live, itself. It's often commented on that as something approaches, the distance to it seems to decrease at a speed out of proportion to your speed of approach. Basically, christmas has spent most of the year being a far-off abstract concept, and now it seems to have a stark, colourfully-lit snow-crunchingly real reality to it, and all of a sudden it seems to be rushing up on us with not that many days to go.

Part One: Winter Wonderland

And of course, yesterday (Saturday is yesterday as far as I'm concerned as despite the fact that we're 84 minutes into Monday, I haven't been to bed yet, therefore it's still Sunday) we found ourselves on the coach on our way down to London. I sat cheerily for 3 and a half hours in front of two rugby fans who spent the trip discussing the match, alcohol, and the combination of the two, while merrily swigging cans of [what smelled like] cider. Still, they seemed quite friendly, so no problem there at all.
3 and a half hours managed to disappear pretty quickly, and we got off outside Marble Arch in London to find that in comparison to 2008, which was fairly wet and crappy, the weather, while cold, was overcast but clear, and without rain. And off we went, to Winter Wonderland, in Hyde Park. The German/European Christmas market thing that seems to be there each year. The place as we entered seemed to be fairly quiet, but it sure as heck didn't last, quickly becoming absolutely full of tourists from all over the world, judging by the accents. The place was packed with people. And the cameras!
See, I'd been hesitating whether or not to take the D90 to London, lest it get nicked by some light fingered loony who needs his drugs more than I need my camera, and yet while I walked around, I saw at least four or five D90s, one with a shiny 50 1.4 on it, a couple with the cool little 18-105 like the ones I just sold, and one dude who had the same lens as me :-). Other guys walked around with various canons of weird and wonderful descriptions, and one dude was even walking around with a D3.

There were a huge variety of market stalls, selling many various variations on a theme of European cuisine, mulled wine, Christmas decorations, Christmas gifts, all sorts of lovely and festive stuff, including, and I think this is awesome, instant snow. My experience with instant snow is limited to 60 seconds of playing with it, but the upshot of it is, it's soft, it's cold, it's fluffy, and it feels like real snow. It's really cool stuff. My mum bought some for my ickle nephew so he can get into trouble for sodding up the carpet or something. When my mum mentioned that I couldn't have any cos the dog would eat it, the guy selling it explained that it was non-toxic and that she'd just "swell up" (complete with mime of a dog swelling up) a little.

Now about halfway down, among the stalls selling stuff like beautiful hand carved knicknacks, hand-made jigsaw puzzles, hand-painted pictures, hand-shot photography, hand-blown glass, hand-burning candles, hand-eaten food etc etc, next to a set of tables laid out in an X shape, is a "cabin" with a sort of grill suspended over a pit of "coals", atop which sit about 10 of each variety of sausage, tended by two cheerful German guys.
The sausages are Frankfurters (I think), Bratwurst, and Krakauer. "Mit" or Ohne (aha!) Sauerkraut.
I don't know what the German guys are called or whether they come with sauerkraut or not.
However.
I had a Krakauer (which regardless of its name seemed to be a spicy Bratwurst), in a proper roll of crunchy bread, such as you'd get with soup (which made a huge change for someone sadly accustomed to fluffy tasteless crappy poke-a-hole-right-through-it-with-your-finger crappy hot-dog rolls) as well as both Ketchup and German Mustard, and folks, it was the best Wurst in the world. So good in fact that after finishing my first while wandering around the market, I went and got another, which the guy cheerfully observed, should "keep you going until January". Nice guy, cheerful service. We like that.

Small Personal Recommendation
(It's not very often I advertise stuff on here, but this really was a lovely christmassy place to go which I enjoyed thoroughly, and it'd be nice if someone read this, went to visit, and ended up also enjoying it as a result :-)).

Now on the off chance that any of you are actually going to London before Christmas, Winter Wonderland [official website] is in Hyde Park, visible from more or less anywhere in the park (just look for the huge observation wheel (not the London Eye, which is nowhere near Hyde Park! (Though you can see either wheel from the other on a clear day)), on the side of the park closest to the Albert Memorial. Entry is free.
The German Hotdog place is about halfway down a big "street" of cabins past the "Bavarian Village" building and the ice rink, next to a set of tables in an X shape, within sight of (in front of, more or less) the Talking Moose. £4 for a hotdog might seem a bit steep, but these are big hotdogs and they taste awesome.

Ah yes, the Talking Moose.
For some reason, in the park, is an animatronic Moose's head mounted to the entrance to "Santa's Grotto". Now I forget the name of this Moose, but he's very talkative, and though he admits to being "a bit of a womaniser" (eh?), his intentions seem good, as he sings cheerful Christmas songs, and dispenses useful advice such as "Enjoy your day" and "Don't drink and drive".

Also in the huge lineup of stalls, is a lovely one crewed by two pleasant and friendly women, selling Austrian cheese, and something called "Speck". This stuff appears to be cured, spiced, smoked bacon, and smells absolutely awesome. It tastes very strongly like pepperami and is the chewiest thing this side of genuine fudge, which they also sell at the market.
It's also pretty expensive, being £5 for a chunk 4cm wide.

I think that we had a really great time at Winter Wonderland this year, and having rushed through it in 2008 due to the truly crappy weather, we were well rewarded this year for being able to take our time and enjoy it this time round. As I say above, highly recommended, great fun :-).

Part Two: Harrods

A short walk later past the lake (where my mum got harassed by a curious swan, and I got a few shots of squirrels that were so used to people that they'd scamper right up to your feet), we ended up at Harrods.

Harrods was a strange experience this time round. People say that perception defines reality as much as it is defined by it, and for some reason, the stuffy stuck-up atmosphere that I thought I noticed last time round, just wasn't there this time. Maybe it was because we'd taken our time getting there, having had a great time along the way, instead of hurrying there to get out of the rain that gave us a fresh look on the place, I dunno. This wasn't Harrods, the preserve of the rich, famous, talentless and pointless wastes of space that earn their living from being related to someone famous, or for doing 90 minutes work every other week, this was the "Everything for everyone" store filled with families, parents and kids, looking for something cool for Christmas.
The staff seemed pleasant and fun-loving enough with one member of staff in the toy department cheerfully flying an RC "gunship" in circles around his own (and a customer's) head, as a cheerful woman demonstrated some kind of art and craft set to a bunch of excited kids, as a father and his son (presumably) happily tossed a hoverdisk across the room to each other.
Walking further through the toy department, past a family of huge stuffed animals (a 6ft long plush hippopototamus for example), we passed through the Electronics department, past an £18,000 audio system, that looked quite shiny, but convinced me that I'm really not enough of an audiophile to need one, and some very sparkly and rather large HD TVs, to the Photography department, where I ogled a few lenses including the 80-400 (autofocus far too slow for my purposes), the 300mm 2.8 (Fixed length, not much use for anything really, why do people use these again?), and the exquisite 200mm Micro and the 80-200VR (both awesome but far out of my budget at this point). The guys seemed fairly knowledgable and friendly and made me feel not quite as unwelcome as I felt last time round heh.

My mum had to sit down to rest her tired legs though, and walking past a huge lemon citrine that looked as if it weighed a good 30 kilograms (and at £35,000, if it landed on your feet, the pain from your feet wouldn't be the half of it!), and we wound up at a rather upmarket cafe restaurant thing where a bottle of Sprite cost £3.50 (£1.65 in our local shop), but came with a glass, which, after emptying, I kept happily filled up with a litre bottle of water I had concealed in my jumper pocket.

Eventually though, we made our way out of that place, and got a taxi to Covent Garden, which despite the name is a fairly big market made up of two bits - one, a pair of sort of fairly nice covered mini-malls, and the other a fairly crappy formica-and-linoleum style indoor market. We bought a few things from there, and thankfully, didn't stay that long. Not to slur Covent Garden, which has been famous for centuries, but I don't do indoor markets, and I don't do crowds. It did have a Games Workshop though, and a huge Apple Store, as well as a rather amusingly named food place called Cafe Chutney, which had a nice Christmas tree outside.

Part Three: London Eye

A short walk through Charing Cross later, past a Canadian themed pub, an Australian themed shop, a TGI Friday themed restaurant, and a Law Enforcement themed Charing-Cross-Police-Station (more or less opposite my mum's old flat from when she was ickle like me), we caught a taxi to the London Eye (no we didn't. Not officially anyway. Officially we went to McDonalds).

While I wasn't there, I was careful not to take a few photos, we didn't hurry in and buy some tickets, and we didn't join the queue to board the Eye.
While queuing, I also didn't notice that for some weird reason, one of the pods had been stripped down to its metal frame, completely devoid of windows, ceiling and floor. Argh enough of this it's confusing me.

We got on the pod, and had a rather pleasant half-hour "flight" (as they call it) around the wheel. My calmest one to date, given that I'm terrified of heights, and that the wheel is 135 metres/442 feet high. My first trip around, I practically refused to look at anything other than the floor or ceiling for half the trip. I think if you don't like heights, the best way to think of it is that you're in a stationary room, and the only thing changing is the view :-).

Of course, the odd time when someone moved and the pod shifted very slightly (but slightly perceptibly) from side to side, or when I spent too much time taking photos of the distant ground, my mind started going wappy and I had to look at the horizon for a while to get my bearings, heh.

The flight ended soon enough, and off we went, to get a taxi back to the coach station.

Part Four: Home and other stuff

What's to say, the coach journey seemed uneventful enough. Eventually, fell asleep, waking up every now and again to find that not only had I gained a horrific pain in my neck, but that the clock had advanced by another 40-60 minutes, and before you knew it, the coach driver was announcing to the sleepy coachful of passengers (at a volume so loud I bet the local pedestrians on the pavement heard it) that we'd arrived in Chesterfield (about 30 minutes away from our destination) and would those who wanted to get off please hurry up and sod off.

We got back to our station soon enough, and wandered through the nearby streets, to an awesome parking lot with those roller shutter doors you see on Need for Speed games. A short detour via KFC later, and we were home. Job jobbed, as they say.
So there ends a very nice and very christmassy trip out.

So else has been happening?

My lens cup finally, FINALLY arrived after about 6 weeks of waiting for it. Is it as good as I'd hoped? Er, yes. It's shiny, it's a cup. The thing has lost a little of its novelty value, but it's still a cool gadget.
I've also managed to buy a third christmas pressie today, so that should arrive before long with some luck.

We've got a busy few weeks, christmas-wise, ahead of us. Next week is the trip to Gainsborough, which I'm really looking forward to, and the week after that is both the Kelham Island show, and the Christmas Concert that my mum has promised to take me to. The week after that, the christmas decorations go up. So yeah, things are definitely getting festive :-).

Here are some pictures I took that I thought you'd enjoy :-).

There was some weird on my page!) .

The Window And The Weather

What do you think to my latest photo of weirdness? Abstract enough for you?
Heh, actually I never intended this to be an abstract photo. This is in fact, my bedroom window.
More specifically, it's my bedroom window after we paid the window cleaner (generally known as the "window smearer" for obvious reasons) £3 to make our windows shiny and transparent.
Yeah I don't know what's been dissolved in the more or less constant rain we've had recently, but whatever it is has deposited on my window in great big blurry messes, and the rain that followed did little to wash it off. We've had a brief period of wet crappyness. Or crappy wetness. Whichever.

Bonfire night passed without incident, and I did indeed stay in the house without venturing forth to find sources of shiny fireworkiness. The day afterwards though, My ickle nephew, his dad, and I, went to one of the local pubs to watch a fireworks display there.
Surprisingly the display went on for well over an hour, and we found our very own pub bench to relax at while watching it, so we all had a pretty enjoyable day there.

After buying my D90, I managed to list the spare lens on ebay, where it fetched me £175. Not too bad, and gave me the extra cash I needed to snap up another one of those "Should be £530, is £330 for some unknown reason" offers that I have a habit of finding every now and again. I managed to satisfy another one of those short term goals that I keep setting myself, and before long I had the ickle 18-105's big brother winging its way towards my house. It's since arrived and it seems pretty shiny, so hey, now I've got a lens that takes 72mm filters, which is handy cos I've asked for one for Xmas.

Ahh, christmas, christmas, yep, even the shops are playing christmas songs now, and there are plenty of Xmas decorations up around the town. I've since started writing my christmas list, and (including items that people already aware of), it goes something like this (In no particular order*):

1.Lumiquest Promax flash bouncer/diffuser kit
2. Hoya 77mm Circular Polariser** (or 72 if already purr-chased :-))
3. Tiffen 77mm Graduated Neutral Density Filter
4. 12 Pack Sanyo Eneloop Rechargable Batteries
5. Formula One 2010 PC Game

*This is a wish list, yeah? I accept that some of the items on here are quite expensive and I'd be very surprised (though very pleasantly so) if I got them all :-)

**There seems to be some confuzzlement on my part about which size I need - When choosing lens filters, it's always best to choose the size that will fit your largest lens. In my case, my 11-16 takes 77mm filters. Now you shouldn't use polarisers outside on super-wide lenses because you get banding effects across the sky, so I asked for the next size down to fit my 18-200 which is 72mm. But it's occured to me that I might want to use the polariser on the 11-16 inside, or where the sky isn't visible. So I originally said 72mm, I'm now saying 77mm, but I'll happily accept and be cheerful with a 72mm if 77 is no longer an option.
My fault for being easily confuzzled and things :-).

For my part, I bought my first Christmas pressie today. Yep, stepping out into the incredible cold (we've gone from rain to frost in a couple of days!) I caught a bus into the wonderfully sunny town in which I live, and spent a fair while walking around the shops and suchlike. I had a little play with an iPad (which still seems too expensive for the relatively small size (Have they really just taken an iPod touch, given it a bigger screen, and doubled the price? Cos it seems like it to me!!), stared in amazement at a macbook air, (I've seen thicker slices of melba toast!), and fiddled in confuzzled bemusement with a dinky and cute Nikon D3100 (half the buttons are missing), before wandering down to the toy section where I bought my ickle nephew's pressie.
Yep, the lil dude certainly seems to love his lego and his playmobil, and since I bought that little "underwater world" for him,e he's really become struck on the idea of underwater civilisations and suchlike. Which is cool cos it makes it easy for me to buy him presents. So yeah. Christmas has suddenly gone from being miles away, to being "It's almost here", and I'm sorta left looking for ways to buy people the lovely and awesome pressies they deserve. I've got a few present ideas for other people too, you see :-).
But they'll not find out what they are on here, nope, they'll have to wait and see, hehe :-).

Right, I'm off to play Sacrifice of Angels - it's a very good game :-). Have Fun.

Explosions and stuff...

Only a short one, since while my parents do have a habit of springing "let's go out somewhere" things on me, they generally don't do it during the rain and cold of November.

Yep, here we are, November the 5th and the dreary rain, today being just the latest in a week or so of rainy evenings, is doing little to affect people's cheerful willingness to pay lots of money on exploding things, and even as the rain comes down, the fireworks go up :-).

For my part, I'm just sitting inside in the warm, watching the fireworks through my window, eating yummy chocolate cereal bites and weird golfball sized jam doughnut things, so yeah. For now, that seems to be about as exciting as tonight's gonna get.

But hey, I'm not complaining, my nephew is no doubt off to see some fireworks somewhere, and as long as he's happy, I'm happy :-).

Ciao.

Five minutes later: Actually no, this entry is too short, so let me have a mini rant.

I've noticed, first through displays on shop shelves, and secondly through the more irritating medium of television advertisements, a sort of bizarrely pretentious attempt by catfood manufacturers to imbue domestic cats with aristocratic personalities. A rough (and largely ficticious) example would be:

"Rufus is a cat of taste and discerning distinction. He stalks the hunting grounds of the house looking for his favourite food, new furballs food. Replete with delicious chunks of line-caught yellowfin tuna, and lavishly tasty jelly, Rufus knows that his heart can be satisfied".
While some badly overacting narrator talks us through the story of Rufus and his quest for luxurious food, the director has several shots of an incredibly rare and expensive pedigree cat from some obscure breed or other, usually with blue eyes and frequently in slow motion, stalking across a moodily-lit but extremely tidy house.

Here is a badly recorded but very amusing example of such an advert.

If I could insert sounds into text, I would, at this point, insert the sound of a needle being pulled off a record. But I can't, so there. I'm sure you're familiar with the "ZZZZZZZP" sound I have in mind.

Now, I'm sorry, I don't dislike cats, my sister has two of them afterall, but the fact remains that your average housecat would be just as happy dragging a dead bird through the catflap into the kitchen and tucking in, as it would be eating food that we've created for it because it's what we'd like to eat if we were cats.

I'm tired of this patronising supercilious kind of advertising that takes its product far too seriously. I'm sorry, selling food, however "luxurious" it is, doesn't justify a 55 second long food porn [link is not pornographic] video written by some cat fetishist with a thing for "duck terrine in gravy". "9 out of ten cats prefer whiskas". Prefer it to what? Going hungry? I'd prefer eating whiskas cat food to going hungry too.
And why all this emphasis on "luxurious" and "exquisite" ingredients? Who are they trying to convince, you or your cat? Cats can't understand English, they don't come because you tell them to, they come because their little feline stomachs are rumbling and they know you have the key to the food cupboard.

Cats don't care about "luxurious duck terrine produced in the south of France, with real meat jelly", or "Deliciously indulgent salmon", they care about food. Any food, even small dead mammals are preferable to going hungry.

The advertising isn't there to sell the food to the cats, it's there to sell it to you. If I was a cat, every time the advert came on I'd either giggle to myself and wander off to mutilate the local wildlife, or roll my eyes - if cats can roll their eyes. In fact they probably can't roll their eyes - if they could they'd do it all the time.

Now I've gone off at various tangents but the bottom line seems to be that cats don't care about expensive cat food, certainly not as much as the expensive cat food companies care about expensive cat food. Marks and Spencer had us enthralled for ages with their "deliciously indulgent" food porn advertisements, but do companies like Mars and Nestle (No, really, one makes Whiskas catfood, the other owns Purina which makes catfood in Canada) really have a need to convince you to take their products so ridiculously seriously that nothing else is good enough for your lovely family pet?

It's patronising, it's supercilious and it's annoying. And if I was a cat, I'd be too busy tucking into the blackbird I'd just decapitated to care about "Luxurious Jelly". Luxurious Jelly? How luxurious is it? Would you eat it?

It's cat food. It's food for cats. If you own a cat, you're going to buy cat food anyway. But for the advertisements to lie to you and say that your cat is far too aristocratic and discerning to eat any other food, is just an annoying lie. And to make so much effort in trying to perpetuate this myth of the "discerning ladylike feline" is just wasting everybody's time.

Well, for now I'll stick to just groaning and changing channel every time one of these annoying adverts comes on in a commercial break. Hopefully my deliciously indulgent rant (complete with meat jelly?) has amused a couple of people. At the very least it's made me feel better.

So there :-).

Spooky goings on

Well, it's started early. Just gone 5pm and I've just seen the first little ones wandering around with their rubber bats, wizards' staffs, spellbooks and pet dragons.
Okay maybe not rubber bats. Still.

Yep, for my part I'm sitting inside waiting for my ickle nephew to come back home so that I can take him out to get him lots of yummy sweets, treats, and other things that rhyme with that.
Already, we've (just) had our first visitors, (make that second group of visitors as of 17:13) and I'm feeling pretty cheerful (or should that be "fearful?" Mwahahaha).

My dad's doing a good job of keeping visitors filled up with tasty treats, I'm sitting about playing with my cameras, and drinking a terrible cup of coffee to try to get over the aftereffects of the halloween/wedding/new camera celebratory drink and meal last night.

Yep, the D90 is now mine, and a very shiny piece of electronic equipment it is too.

AND, my ickle nephew has just turned up, so I'll carry this on later :-).

5 Hours later: Well, didn't the little guy do well :-). He turned up with his cute little devil costume, complete with a tridenty pitchforky type thing and a clever little bag on a stick for storing his sweet treats in.
Just before I took him out, I noticed that it was throwing it down. I initially suggested that I was going to wait until it had stopped. In retrospect it's a good thing that I didn't, as the rain continued for the next 30 or 40 minutes. Oh, it bucketed it down, and we were practically the only group out there, both very wet indeed. Eventually the rain stopped though, which made our time more pleasant. I didn't go dressed up, I was there in more of a supervisory/keeping him company capacity, but nevertheless one kind person did give me my own personal bag of Milky Way Magic Stars, hehe!
We visited loads of houses, and as his sweet-bag-on-a-stick got heavier and heavier, it started bending the stick, which was really just thick wire. After helpfully bending it into a carrying handle and hooking it onto the other side of his sweet bag, normal service was resumed.

So yeah, the little fella got loads and LOADS of sweets, the sweet bag thing was almost full. He ended up with 8 packets of maltesers (which he was on a quest to collect), which he thought was fantastic.

Anyway.

Yep, I finally got my hands on my D90, and what can I say. It's a beautiful piece of kit, nice and shiny and sparkly, and the image quality on the high resolution screen on the back is so perfect it it's almost three dimensional. Seriously, the screen is that awesome, it makes even bad pictures look great!

So yeah. I'm quite cheerful. Yay :-).

I hope my bloody coffee cup turns up. Grr. I'm still waiting for that thing!

Christmas Cakes!

Yep, we've not even got to Halloween yet, and I've already got 5 minutes of "christmas 2010 videos" saved on my camera. For today you see, (and yesterday I spose) we prepared...

The Christmas Cake! Dun Dun Dunnn. Yep, apparently you have to let the fruit soak overnight in brandy to give it some flavour, and then you have to let the cake soak in er, cake, for about 8 weeks, to, well, give it some more flavour.
Fair enough. After a while of preparing it and shoving it in the oven, I had to cycle down to the next town to post a couple of parcels for ebay, which was nice and pleasant.
It would have been more pleasant if I hadn't have run into a pothole and gone over more or less on my face, but hey the only thing I hurt was my price and even the bike bent back into shape pretty easily so it was only a minor blip on an otherwise good day.

So yeah, I've started thinking what pressies to buy for people, my mum has started watching christmas movies, and my nephew has started circling stuff he wants in his very own copy of the Argos catalogue. Finances are becoming a bit of a stretch at the minute, as the money that goes out, goes out BEFORE other money comes in, so even though there's a fair bit of money going in both directions, I find myself fairly skint from time to time. Not to worry though, I will sort myself out through the magic of eBay :-).

Finally though, it seems my nephew's parents HAVE bought him a costume and some other stuff, so I'm looking forward to taking the lil guy around trick-or-treating on Sunday night, at which time I should have recovered from my buying-a-new-camera celebration hangover. I can give him the sweets and stuff I've got for him too, then :-).

Well, more to come on sunday I spose.

UPDATE 20:27 (sounds like a computer game or something): Well, after hearing a few fireworks in the past few days, I've just looked out of the window to see the first fireworks I've seen this year (not counting the early hours of January the first, obviously). Nothing major, sort of exploding roman candle thingies.

This reminds me to look forward to a miniature fireworks party type thing that my sister is having around Bonfire Night. I like this time of year, all festive and celebration-y :-).

Coffee, Cameras and Cresso...

20:21, the previous night:

Well, my nephew certainly likes his dens. Yep, after a short time of pleading, he's convinced me to build him another den in his bedroom. I've always been good at building them, and this one is no exception. Not too big, but it has a "light strip" where the bedroom light shines through the "ceiling" so he can play on his GBA, which seems to be serving as a surrogate DS at the moment. He can even sit on his little piano seat to play, which is cool as it leaves me more floor space to stretch my legs.
Actually scratch that, I've just tried it and nearly knocked the thing down on the top of us.

Present Day: Dun Dun Dunn...

I've never had writer's block before. Or whatever this thing is that seems quite similar to writer's block.
I'm sat here staring at the screen trying to figure out what to commit to paper, so to speak, and the words simply will not enter my mind. Maybe I'm distracted, I dunno. I've been sat here staring into space for 15 minutes.

And if it is writer's block, it's not actually true that I've never had it before (see Ink and Incability, september 2009), so maybe it's just a seasonal thing, I dunno.
Still at least it's given me an opening.

So, what's going on? Well, I'm still waiting for my coffee cup to come.
Yes, I bought a coffee cup. Quite a shiny and cool coffee cup. Me being the camera fanatic that I am, I saw this rather fetching replica of a Nikon lens, that serves as a coffee cup. They're supposed to be quite sparkly, turning the zoom ring extends the coffee cup just like a real lens, and the level of details is supposed to be very good. So despite the £15 price I decided I had to go and have one, so I've got one on the way. Unfortunately since it's coming from Hong Kong, I've "had one on the way" for the past 20 days, and it still hasn't turned up. Irritating since something else from HK that I ordered at the same time arrived 2 days later. Oh well, can't win em all.

Now, I've been looking at getting a second camera body, for a couple of reasons. There are various practical reasons, but the most important of which is that I'm a sucker for a good deal, particularly when it's something I wanted before someone offered me the deal.

The market, or the "high street" as it's affectionately referred to by hmm, let's call them "morons", selling the items would probably sell them seperately. So you have an undisclosed camera body retailing for £579.99-£729.99 (such an insane difference in price depending on where you go! We'll go with the cheaper prices). So yeah. £579.99. The lens that it comes with? Hmm let's go with the shop selling it for £209.99. Then it comes with a battery grip at £104.50 and 2 batteries at £20 a piece. Then it comes with a clever wrist strap thing at £45, and a lens filter at £35. Yikes, all you wanted was a camera and before you know it you've spent £1014.48. [Edit, 1st November: £1229.92 in total if your luck is sucky enough that you end up going to the most expensive places...]

Fortunately for me, my good old mate Nick wants to er, dedicate himself to his D2h, and in an effort to raise some cash, is letting me have the whole lot for £500! Not a small amount of money to spend, but a pretty damn good deal all the same! The awesome thing (and the understanding) is that, I dno't need the 18-105 that comes with the D90 - I've already got one :). So Instead of paying £450 for the camera and battery grip, I'm paying £50 extra for the lens, so I can sell it for £150-200 and reduce the kick in the wallet from the camera. Clever stuff :-).

Not much happening other than that I suppose, though with halloween coming up, my ickle nephew is lamenting the fact that he won't be going out trick or treating. Apparently nobody can be bothered to get him a costume :(.

Oh well, I'm sure we'll have tpo sort something out, at least sweets-wise. I'll be more open to the question once he's stopped acting up.

Concerns and Cutbacks

How do, folksies...

Well, I've been putting it off for over a week, I suppose I had best get it over with.

On the advice of the training staff at the training regiment, I have left army training. I am therefore no longer a training, or paid, member of HM Armed Forces.

What happened?
Well, it seems that my little episode on the top of the hill (the one where I collapsed and threw up everywhere - remember that one?) dented my confidence a little bit. Instead of looking forward to PT sessions, I warily looked across at them on the horizon in the same way that a kid would view a dentist's appointment with apprehension.

Unfortunately, that's not a healthy attitude to have in training for the Army, which as you can imagine has a habit of being physically demanding. The more PT we had, the more stressed I got.
At one point, I went down to the med centre complaining of stomach cramps, vomiting, chills etc etc, wanting to know what I had caught or whatever. All the tests came back normal, leaving one conclusion: Stress.

I'm not sure what to think of it now, I felt crappy, I hadn't eaten for a couple of days, token attempts at eating had resulted in me being unable to keep down whatever I had eaten (I'm trying to be subtle, believe me), I had stomach cramp, and I was basically too busy feeling ill to really concentrate on what I needed to do.

After my collapse on the run, the training staff had noticed me becoming more withdrawn and nervous leading up to, and during PT sessions. Of course I put 100% effort in, because I didn't want to let either myself down or my teammates down, but they could see that I really didn't want to be in phys, and was stressing about it. This coupled with the fact that I had been sent to Physiotherapy for a shin problem (where it was found I also have a knee problem (it never rains, it pours! (Hey it's that nested sentences thing again!))) raised questions about my ability to complete training without injuring myself (accidentally, that is).

So after a couple of informal conversations along the lines of "How are you liking it?" "I'm not, sir, I wish I was", the training staff decided the best thing for me - mentally as well as physically, I guess, would be to send me home.
I didn't know this - the first I knew about any decision having actually being made is when the sergeant casually slips into conversation "You're de-kitting tomorrow", which kinda threw me: One minute the powers that be knew I wasn't 100% happy but was still getting through it all, the next minute they'd decided that home was the place for me, for now.

But, a couple of days later, I'd said goodbye to all the friends (and all the annoying sods) I'd come to know over the past 7 weeks, and had been moved into a holding platoon on the edge of the camp where no one had to look at us, us dirty civvies-to-be preparing for a return to civilian life and whatnot.
Still, a very sedentary 6 days later, and I was stood on the platform at the train station with all my stuff, ready to come home. Three hours later, I walked through the front door of my house for the first time in 7 and a half weeks. The Army's gates had closed behind me.

But not permanently...

You see, it seems that even though I wasn't really enjoying the training, and was struggling to cope a bit at times, it was decided that (and noted in my official report that) this was due to stress, brought on by an aversion to physical training, itself brought on by me keeling over on that big sodding hill.
"Go home, work on your Phys, if you can smash your phys, you're sorted" advised one of the corporals. So they've left the door open for me, I've been discharged as unfit for army service, with a recommendation to return in two years. Granted, in 2 years I'll be 27, but two of us there were 25, one was 27, one was 30 and one was 32. So I woudn't be pushing the age limits, if I did return. "Don't stress about the 'unfit'" said another corporal. "You're not a bad recruit, it only means you're physically unfit NOW. Go home, sort your phys out, come back, and you'll be way ahead of everyone else cos you've already done half of it".

So here I am, sat at home, at my computer. The rest of the lads are finishing up their range week. I'm glad to be back home, it's good to be back.

Importantly though, looking back on my time at the ATR, I look back on it as a good experience. There were crap times and tempers got frayed at some points during the nearly-2-months I was there, but all in all, it was a very good experience, and I'm proud to have done it.

Will I go back? I don't know. That depends what happens in the next two years. I've only been back 10 days, I want to get my head together before I decide what happens next.
What I don't want to do is settle into my old routine. Time to start looking for opportunities to do things differently maybe. Some 3D work in the near future has already come up, let's see how that pans out.

Now I've got a nice awesome Cresso with my mate Nick to look forward to. I hear he may have an offer for me. Let's see how that works out too :-).

Ciao.

Like home, and yet not...

"And that", said the corporal, "is how you move under fire, carrying a weapon".

He looks around expectantly. "Any questions?"

Silence.

Without warning, the corporal tears off towards a nearby hill.

"THEN LETS GOOOOOOOO!"

We all chase after him, and as we approach the bottom of the hill, gunfire rings out from the woods skirting its edge. A smoke grenade is already sat by the side of the track, disgorging its contents, and as the soldiers in front dive onto their belt buckles and start crawling, the smoke obscures them from view. Another burst of full auto, and the remainder of the lads drop onto their stomachs and start crawling up the path, through the smoke. All that I can hear from the other side, is coughing from the lads crawling through the smoke, small-arms fire, the lads grunting with the effort of dragging themselves and their kit up the hill, and the ever present corporals shouting encouragement.

After an excruciating and exhausting crawl right up to the top of the hill, through the smoke, we start monkey running - that is, moving quickly on your knees and fists - faster than a leopard crawl, but you present a bigger target. Finally we reach the top of a large slope, which we have to roll down. So I do. With my kit smashing into my back, my arms tense trying to both protect my weapon from hitting the ground, and protect my face from the muzzle or sights, I roll down and down the hill. Over rocks, through brambles, and losing my sense of direction, I end up off the track that the first lads had flattened down. Still, I reach the bottom.

I stand up a little unsteadily, dripping with sweat, feeling a little weak and fairly dizzy. I'm flanked by a paid of corporals, both keeping a firm grip on each of my shoulders to stop me falling down.

"Well done, good effort! Now I want to hear you, all the way back to the rest of the squad".

I look and see them in the distance.

Knowing what to do, I summon up my remaining energy and sprint across the scrubby field, while screaming the angriest most triumphant and loudest war cry I've ever screamed. I reach the other lads, and more-or-less collapse in a pile, struggling to get my breathing back, to take my weapon off, and to take on some water.

One of the other lads is sat up, his back and head supported by two of his mates, with one of the training staff helping loosen his jacket. Seems the heat and effort got someone else today - three someones in fact - and it wasn't me.

PART ONE: THE EXERCISE

Yep folks, as you may have guessed, this week we've been on a field ex. Nothing special, just a lot of learning how to soldier in the field, instead of learning how to soldier in the classroom. Living outside, training outside, generally getting grazed, cut, knocked, bruised, battered, rained on, cold, wet and muddy. And shouted at quite a lot.

In addition to the lesson above, we learned a fair variety of other things. One of the more, um, interesting I suppose, was bayonet fighting.

Now if you don't know, a bayonet is that big metal stabby thing that fits on the end of a rifle, so when you run out of ammo, you can still stab someone with the front end and it will hurt quite a bit. It's about ten inches long, made of steel, pointy at one end, and is generally only nice when it's being used as a logo. Bayonets aren't generally designed for anything other than going out and making someone's day really miserable. But hey.

Of course, to look someone in the eyes and stab him with a big pointy bit of metal requires, hmm, a certain bit of aggression. So before the lesson, we were duly motivated. "Grenade Training". March along as normal, and all of the sudden one of the staff would shout "grenade". Jump on the ground, and crawl in the direction you were heading. He'd shout that it was safe, and we'd get back up and carry on jogging.

We did this for maybe 800 meters, from one training area to the other, diving maybe 30 times in total. At the end, we were pretty pissed off, having crawled/jogged up another bloody big hill and down the other side.

We get onto the bayonet range. The staff are supposed to wind you up during this lesson just to make you more aggressive, so we're not surprised when our beloved corporals suddenly turn into a bunch of shouty nasty bastards.

BUGGER:

To be continued, fire alarm has gone off back at the block and I need to go there for a roll call! Laters!

FIVE MINUTES LATER: Right. The entirity of one of the new sections of lads that has moved into our block was busy ironing. Nothing wrong with this, except they were doing it with the windows closed. Ten irons all producing steam and no ventilation makes for a sauna like environment, and smoke alarms generally don't like sauna like environments. Still, at least all my kit is safe.

"You've got 20 seconds to get some water down you". 21 seconds pass. "Too slow! Fecking follow me!" So we chase the corporals round the side of the practice range, up a hill, across the top and down the other side. Same old drill - whistle blow, we leap onto the floor and crawl. Whistle blows again, we jump up and carry on running. Through the course of the lesson, we do this 10 or so times, and the whistle blows decrease in time apart, so no sooner were we down, than we had to get up again.

After a couple of hours, we get taken to the testing area. Speakers in the trees playing dramatic war music and the sound of gunfire (yes really!) to make the place a little more atmospheric.

We pair off, one is the trainee, one is the aggressor, whos job it is to motivate the trainee, loudly and emphatically.

My first run round is the aggressor. I wasn't sure what was expected of me, but I settle into it pretty fast, and as my mate runs round stabbing the targets, I'm there screaming in his ear: "MOVE! FCUKING MOVE! FCUKING MOVE! STAB THE FCUKING BASTARD! KILL THE FCUKING BASTARD! HE'S TRYING TO KILL YOU!!"

My turn as the trainee comes, and the corporal motions us forward and tells us to take a knee (kneel down).

"Right" he says calmly. Then he grabs me and yanks me towards him, and starts screaming in my face: "YOU ARE IN AFGHANISTAN, OUT THERE ARE A LOAD OF BASTARDS THAT ARE TRYING TO FCUKING KILL YOU!DON'T LET THEM! YOU KILL THEM FIRST!!! DO YOU UNDERSTAND" "YES CORPORAL!!"I scream."DO YOU FCUKING UNDERSTAND!?" "YES CORPORAL" I scream even loader. "Show me your war face!" After three hours of being screamed at, I'm in a pretty warry mood myself. With my nose almost touching his, I angrily scream at the corporal's face. "Right, good! Get going!!"

So I run round the 2 minute circuit with my mate screaming in my ear, bayonetting everything resembling a target. Following me is a guy with a video camera, who has been hanging round for a while, apparently filming the whole thing for a DVD the army is making. Cool stuff.

Finally we're all done and we get 20 minutes to sit down, drink water, and recover. A short night-ex later and we're back in the block, where we've been since, cleaning stuff and generally settling back down.

PART TWO: THE NEW LADS

Now apparently, one of the platoons was disbanded and has had its lads distributed throughout the other platoons. We've got one new section of lads. Unfortunately, we've also got their section commander. While I don't know a lot about this corporal,. he is famed for giving out AGAIs (military charges, kinda like speeding tickets without the fine, that usually end up in you getting a bollocking or extra work duty or both) at the drop of a hat. I suspect that the low morale problem that caused the other platoon to lose so many recruits that it was disbanded may now be affecting our platoon, as they say, the contagion has been transmitted to a new host.

Still, we've not had much contact with this corporal yet, hopefully that won't change. Regardless, there is now a definite atmosphere of tension in the platoon, and a lot of people are getting their feathers ruffled. With each passing week more and more potential soldiers are getting disaffected and leaving training. I wonder if I will yet be one of them. Time will tell.

Various goings on. Week 1 to 4.

PART ONE: STUFF

Okay, almost to week 4.

And yes, this is a very abridged version. I'm in the NAAFI (armed forces recreational center) and I have other stuff to get done back in my room.

After a traditional and rather upsetting tearful goodbye at the train station, the train journey was uneventful enough and after a couple of short hours, I found myself at ATR Bassingbourn, meeting the first of a load of new friends.

Over the course of the week I grew to know these people vaguely well, and as you can imagine, as time went on, these relationships improved. Eight new friends. Cool.

Towards the end of us initially getting settled into our accomodation, in walks a young lad, looking a bit lost, and nervous. He's bunked up opposite me so since we're practically going to be bunkmates, may as well get to know each other.

Name of Paul, 18 years old, from Perth in Scotland, a lively sense of humour and a bit of a temper. Still, we were getting on at this point so that didn't seem much of an issue for me.

Week one was filled with little more than getting to know the camp, our instructors, each other, and having death by powerpoint inflicted on us by various people, for many hours.

At the end though, we were taken off for a little camping trip in the woods, army style. Having constructed our shelters and got to know each other a little better, we were gratified when the heavens opened and the Cambridgeshire Ocean tried to come back down to earth. Time to put our shelters to the test. Paul and I, as we shared one end of the room, were bashad (living in a basha - a type of tent) up together, and had become pretty good friends at this point.
Did our bashas keep us dry, warm, and keep the water out? Well, yes they did actually. Unfortunately, the pair in the basha next to us had staked one of their pegs under the edge of ours, and as a result, all the water running off our poncho - the sheet making up the roof of the basha - ran into their basha.
Still, shouldn't have pitched up that close to us. The idiots.

Week two was where the paperwork drifted off, and we started getting into the swing of things. Loads of incredibly interminable rifle lessons, and after two weeks, the "restaurant" breakfasts, (for me) a sausage, a hash brown, scrambled eggs, baked beans, and a bowl of bran flakes - EVERY BREAKFAST - started becoming incredibly boring. The dinner and tea menus have enough variety, but breakfasts were something to be tolerated, not enjoyed.

My relationship with my friends had improved and we were all getting on well as a team at this point. Kind of important given the work concerned.

PART TWO: "HAVING A BIT OF A WOBBLE"

Week three brought with it a strenuous run over very hilly terrain, over grassy fields and through woods, no less hilly, and thick with roots.
I ran myself ragged, partly not to let my mates down, and partly because I had some of the Army's finest yelling at me in both ears.
I fell down, I got up. I carried on running.

I don't remember much after that, apparently I fell down again, and did not get up.
Rather amusingly, as one instructor was arranging care/first aid for me, the other who seemed not to be needed, was apparently throwing grass at my recumbent form, repeating "man up".
I don't find that unprofessional or wrong, the way it was explained to me makes it simply sound funny.

I remember being brought back slumped over the seat in a land rover, while mates including one of the corporals (who is one of the coolest guys I've ever met, incidentally) tried to keep me awake, checking whether I knew what my name was (I got it right, eventually), and before long, I got carried bodily through the air by three of my mates, onto an examination table in the med center.

Hmm. Loony blood pressure (92-50), very high temperature, sweating profusely, and hyperventilating. Not a very pleasant way to do things.
Eventually and after a perceivably long time, I started "recovering", but just to be on the safe side, I was carted off in an ambulance to the local civilian hospital about 15 miles away.

A stay overnight in the hospital between the worst snorer in the world, and a dear old gentleman who "seem to have lost my products" on a regular basis. A few checks in the morning, and after a BK meal thoughtfully provided by the orderly officer, back to camp into the med center where I was to stay for two nights.
Compared to the lifestyle I had become accustomed to, the med center routine was so sedate as to be almost like my home routine. Late to rise, early to bed, and very little to do except play with my ipod and watch tv. And get better, apparently.

On the second day I was allowed to visit my mates back in our room, where I was very upset to learn that Paul, what passed for my best friend here, had finally had enough, thrown a wobbly, and had reached a mutual agreement with the army that he was going home, to be a soldier no longer. This really threw me, and my mood darkened considerably over the night. I'd been having doubts of my own and I approached a couple of the staff for guidance as to whether I should stay or leave. Their job, they reminded me in a kind but definite manner, was to advise, not to make the decision. Hmm, better luck next time.

Eventually I was discharged from the med center, with a reminder to return the following monday. The provisional prognosis is heat exhaustion coupled with/arising from dehydration. Characterised by low blood pressure, Tachycardia, hyperventilation/profuse sweating and collapse.

What fun. Still, at least I didn't have to run the whole thing, nor did I have to show myself "correctly dressed" at 8 that night, after being told my boots were not shiny enough (yes really).

PART THREE: GO KARTING

Today, however, has been absolutely awesome. A nice sedentary day, we marched to the drill square (during which I (having been declared sick) was told to "Keep five metres behind the men, or they will become infected by your weakness" - which made everyone including myself giggle. I didn't take this personally, exactly the same has been said to other sickies on other occasions, and is meant as much as a joke as an instruction) to get onto the coach.

Fifteen minutes later and we arrive at the Go Kart track.
Now I've never been into go karting, for some reason it has never really appealed to me. But having not only not had to pay to go, but also actually being paid to go (technically on duty 24/7 you see), was what swung it for me.

My first go in a go cart? Yes. Wearing the traditional overalls and helmet, I swung myself down into the low slung vehicle.

The ride started like a bumper car, slow and sedate, but as the motor picked up speed, so did the kart, until I was touching 30mph. Now 30, with your arse 6 inches off the floor, is thrillingly fast, and I'd not got halfway round the indoor circuit (which in addition to a nice long straight, featured both a chicane and a few demanding hairpins) before I was grinning like a kid on his favourite fairground ride. I wasn't alone in this, everyone went together, officers, sergeants, corporals and recruits alike. Later, I began throwing the cart around a little bit, slamming the steering from side to side, shifting my weight around in the seat (taking a sharp corner at 25, your body [weight] is surprisingly difficult to keep centered in the seat) gritting my teeth, stamping on the brakes and accelerator, the ride became a full body workout. I perfected most of the racing lines, managed to crash twice (one time, a guy also clipped my right-rear and spun me into the barrier) got overtaken a few times and (woo!) managed to keep a train of 4 or 5 karts firmly behind me for the whole time I was out there.

Lots of video was shot, lots of people were shouted at (2 sections comprised of 10 lads each disqualified in their entirity due to bad behaviour (dangerous driving etc)), including the captain (who got a 1 minute pit penalty for speeding in the pit lane (I think), a leiutenant who got a firm talking to (for some unidentified reason) and a corporal who got disqualified for crashing into one of the other drivers. The awesome thing was because we all had helmets on it was difficult to identify our troop members. One of the people I kept behind me might have been one of the corporals, my sergeant or even the captain himself. Going back into the real world was the great equaliser, and it was nice to be "human" again.

We left in joint 7th place, out of 9 which wasn't good, but this wasn't really the point as we'd all had an absolutely amazingly awesome time. Having spoken to some of my section members, we have agreed that after week 7 (the point at which we are permitted to leave camp unescorted), it might be an idea for a few of us to get a taxi down there on the weekend and spend a few hours razzing round the track.

So yeah. Weird week, it started very badly, and ended on an absolutely amazing high.

We've been given the best part of the weekend off too, which is a rare, and very cool occurance. Which I'm now off to enjoy.

So all the best folks, sorry I haven't been around much, marching to march, boots to polish, etc.

See ya for now!

Farewell! For now!

Yikes, I spent ages and ages working towards this day, now it's arrived it's not entirely as I'd expected.

Yes, folks, I'm finally off to basic training. I'm partly nervous, and quite excited. I'm looking forward to meeting new challenges, and making new friends. Going new places, and having new experiences.

Unfortunately and as I have found out to my cost, my sentimental side which has never failed to make its presence felt, means that I am much closer to my family than I had thought. Rather than the start of something new, moving away feels more like the end of the world. Today's been quite an emotional day.

But, as I've always said, life has a habit of finding equilibrium, and things will just return to a new state of "normal". I'll get used to it. Besides, I'm back up in seven weeks, and I should be able to see my parents in less than that. And I'm told I should almost certainly be here for christmas, possibly for the annual trip to Gainsborough too, and with my new-found wages, that's definitely something to look forward to, onwards and upwards as they say.

But still, I can't help feeling like today is something bad instead of something good.
Time will tell I guess, I'll remain hopeful. I've already promised everyone that I will be in cnotact as much as possible, and that includes this blog. I'll update as and when, but it won't have skipped my mind either way.

See you soon, I hope :-).

Whitby...

With my time living with my family on a permenant basis rapidly coming to a close, my mum and I have been taking advantageo f the excuse to spend quality time together. My dad for his part never really spends much time with anyone, but does seem to be being more civil with me with one or two exceptions.

So I woke up a couple of days ago, after only a short period of sleep, and off my mum and I go. She won't tell me where we're going initially, so it's a bit of a mystery. For old time's sake, we go past my old workplace, before going up past the crappy falling-down flat where I used to live.
It's still crappy and falling down, just so you know :-).

Eventually we pull into a Little Chef for some breakfast, where we have a lovely Full English breakfast (which I surprised my mum with, by eating it in its entirity - except the mushroom), which was really tasty.

Off we go and my mum reveals we're off to Whitby. Now I hadn't had much sleep so its at this point that I start feeling tired, so as we go further across Yorkshire, I try to resist the urge to fall asleep, with varying amounts of success. The weather's a little grim, changing from cloudy to raining and back again several times.

We disappear over hills, up and down various steep gradients over the North York moors, through the village where they film Heartbeat. As expected, the place was crawling with tourists and Heartbeat fans from countries all over the world, including dozens of Japanese tourists, who allegedly take photos of everything, including the roads, the sheep (many of which seem to be suicidal as they like to play chicken - aha ha aha etc with the cars) and even each other. Eventually though, my mum says she can sea the see (?) and before long, we're in Whitby.
Looking for a place to park. Which takes aaages.

Eventually we find somewhere to park and I have a look around.
The weather is grey but not cold, the place seems pretty busy, so off we go.

Now Whitby isn't a flat place. There's a lot of hills and cliffs, and we come to the top of some of the cliffs overlooking the city.

Now, a phobia is defined as an "irrational fear". I'm not certain that an instinctive terror of heights counts as irrational fear, or an inbuilt survival mechanism that stood the evolutionary test of time. Either way, I look beyond the waist high safety barrier, to three or four foot beyond where the scrub and plants end abruptly to see their leaves hanging out into empty air, masking what, from the top, looks like a terrifying sheer drop. I didn't want to touch the safety barrier - I didn't even want to go near it, so I just sort of hang around and watch a young Herring Gull squawking at me intently.

Eventually, we walk down what seems to be a huge flight of steps, going from the top of the cliffs to the bottom. The stairs are nice and wide, and not too steep, and there's a sturdy guardrail at the edge. But I still find it an uncomfortable task to have to walk down these very high stairs, looking - as walking down stairs requires you to - down to the bottom, which is a fair old distance away.

Eventually though we get to the bottom, where I look up and see that the cliff, while high, is neither as high as it looked from the top, or as sheer or vertical as I had expected. As I said to my mum at the time, from the top I didn't want to go to the edge. From the bottom, I felt I could happily climb it with equipment.

We wander round the town for a while, looking at various things, eating seafood (not me) and visiting various shops. We stop in the middle of the town for a drink (I had an "nicely layered" ice coffee with hazelnut syrup, which I immediately de-layered and drank happily) before moving on and continuing our tour.

We come to one of the two (four if you're picky, two if you're very picky (two are sea walls not piers)) piers, and as we walk along the sea wall, though the ground is level, the drop from where we were walking to the ground /water either side of the sea wall once again becomes quite disconcerting. Eventually though, we come to the pier itself, which is where I must admit, I had tremendous fun. In a sarcastic type way.

Well, here's a pic, which will save me a big long explanation. As you can see, that's a fair old drop. Yes, there's a sturdy wooden deck above the concrete, but what you can't see is that the deck was made of wooden beams, that had gaps between them of anything up to a couple of inches. The effect was that of walking above a large drop, on a semi-transparent uneven floor. To a dude like me who is averse to heights, it was pretty disconcerting. Eventually though, I make it to the end, passing others who have equally nervous expressions, whos efforts to avoid looking down are noticable. After ceremonially touching the railing at the farthest tip of the pier (to say "THERE I have reached the end!) I take a few photos while I'm at the end (conveniently forgetting to take any of the pier itself) to prove that I got there, and slowly, we head back.

I return to the end of the pier, and at the end see some steps leading downwards to the lower "deck". They're sheer and very steep, and not particularly inviting, but hey I bet I could get a few decent photos, so I very (!) carefully and slowly edge my way down the 19 scariest steps I've ever walked down. And lo and behold, I take a few photos, before almost equally slowly climbing up and returning to the more solid concrete walkway of the sea wall itself.

The weather's turned nice at this point, so we wander round having a great time, looking round more shops etc. The day was pretty much a nice day of enjoying the sun, taking photos, and generally enjoying each other's company, which is really what I think family is about. Weird words from me I suppose given how much I keep myself to myself, but hey.
I take plenty of photos many of which I'm pleased with.

Eventually, we head off back to the car, and on the way there I buy an obscenely priced ice cream (£1.90 for a normal ice cream cone!), and pop into a local shop to buy some stuff for my ickle nephew.
We leave with a toy Jellyfish (which he's taken home with him), a laser sword (which he broke into two bits a couple of days later) and three huge awesome glass gems which he seems to like, and which go well with his treasure chest.

We drive off, having had a very good day, down the coast to Bridlington. Bridlington is a place where I've been going since I was little and I still love to go there. Normally we make a big day of going, and we used to count down the days to our regular trips there as kids, so the somewhat off-the-cuff "Oh we'll go to Bridlington for our tea" takes me somewhat by surprise, but that surprise was very welcome.

Dusk has fallen and the lights are beginning to come on, and the place is pretty quiet. Still, doesn't stop me having the best battered-sausage and chips I've ever had (which is weird because various reviews of the restaurant indicate that other people found the food really bad) with batter that is both crispy, chewy, and full of flavour and the same time.

As the sky darkens and the streets go quiet, the lighthouse in the distance comes on, its light noiselessly flashing across the bay, making the place seem even quieter than before. I've always found the seaside a lonely place to be at dusk, not sure why.

Eventually though, enough is enough, and we head home as I try and play scrabble on my ipod. The weather worsens and the rain starts coming down. Eventually though we get to the Humber Bridge, (and its little toll booths with a light that to my delight, goes "Ding!" just like something out of a cartoon, as it changes from red to green) and cross it, before disappearing down other porly lit motorways, making our way back home.

After a long long drive, eventually and finally at long last, we arrive home, and despite our tiredness, manage to spend a good hour or two talking about how much we enjoyed the day.

And so there we are, an absolutely fantastic and very very enjoyable day out with my mum. One that I'l have fond memories of :).

Anyway, here are some shiny pickatures, including the "best" graffiti I've ever seen :-). Ciao.

Oaths, Towels and Barbecues...

...Well, the 27th finally rolled round, and getting my shiny shoes and nice suit on, I went to the AFCO to swear my oath. Thanks to heavy traffic, I managed to get there about 5 minutes late, but no one seemed to notice.
Again, from the waiting room I was led "backstage" through various corridors and down little microstairs deep into what must have been the opposite side of the building. There, we had a couple of sergeants takling to us, answering any questions we might have, sorting out paperwork and whatnot...

Eventually the parents come in, followed by the Major, the senior recruiting officer for the area.
He talks for a while, explaining how proud we (8 of us were there that day) should be, how well we've done, and how we should take the opportunity that we've been given to get an awesome carreer etc etc, and gave us a short video presentation.

Afterwards, we were instructed to stand, and as one, swore the oath, making us all ceremonially at least (not legally - that happens when you sign the contract on the first day of training), the latest additions to the Army. A proud moment for me and my mum, who had gone along to witness the moment :-). The Major congratulated us, and emphasised that we should keep in touch with our families during training. Something I took to heart as despite my advancing years (ok, well, 25 - lots of the lads there will be 18 and 19, so yeah, advancing years), I'm a bugger for getting homesick.

I was given a certificate to commemorate the occasion, which I put in my clever black file thing that has my rail tickets in it (this will mean something to me in 10 years time maybe).

Afterwards, with something of a spring in my step (I don't know whether my mum had a spring in my step, but I did have a spring in my step) we wandered around for a while, shopping for various items that I'll need, not the least of which was a rather shiny (and oddly shaped) steam iron, as well as loads of shoe polish, brushes, clothes brush etc etc. We also had a nice. meal in one of the local citybargastroresturantypubthingie whatever the heck they're called these days (A nice pub serving nice food by day, a rowdy nightclub at night), where I had something or other. Err, Baconburger with curly fries and Jack Daniels sauce, as well as some sponge thing with chocolate sauce on it, as well as ice cream. We wandered around a bit more, buying other items, I saw one thing that I thought was really cool - a microfibre bath towel - lightweight, thin, but very warm and absorbent. Why do I care? Because it folds up into a tiny pouch and dries super quick, meaning it would be very practical for training. Unfortunately it was very expensive, so we left without one, and after a leisurely walk around, eventually set off home. Not before my mum bought me some writing paper and envelopes, though.

A few days later, ostensibly to make sure it was working and "burnt-in" properly, I set about ironing a T-shirt which went quite well. I learned that even new irons, even new irons with "anti-drip", can drip bloody hot water on your feet if you're not careful.
I also learned that using copious amounts of steam while ironing is no substitute for washing the garment in the first place, as it was a crumpled and smelly t shirt when I started, and a perfectly flat and smelly t shirt when I finished.
Oh well, can't win 'em all.

WORK

Rather oddly, it absolutely threw it down during the start of my last weekend at work, and I got thoroughly soaked. Not to worry though, as it was a nice enough shift and the tips weren't bad. Especially since one very lovely customer tipped me £4.50! The soon-to-be-outgoing manager at the time, was nice enough to grant me a large pizza, which I took the opportunity to pile high with toppings, turning it into an artery-clogging monster of a pizza (Quadruple cheese, triple pork, beef and ham, and pepperoni and red onion, topped with sage and onion stuffing and more cheese, all on top of a special 1/1 mix of salsa and spicy pizza sauce).

I turned up, a day later, to what was to be my final shift, and it proceeded well enough. Tips weren't too bad, not helped by me losing £2 in the till (robbing sods always try to cheat you out of your tips (They don't but they rarely pay attention to what goes in)), and off I went on my last delivery ever. Assuming I take 15 deliveries a shift, that works out at... Hmm. 2,280 deliveries since december 2008.
I took the opportunity, after completing the delivery, to go back to work the long way, looking at the clouds, the trees etc, riding my teeny and annoying but ultimately faithful and reliable scooter, back to the shops for the last time. And that's it, that's all she wrote. I don't work there any more.

BARBECUE/BARBACUE/WHATEVERCUE

The day after, we all went along to my sister's house for a cool barbacue, a nice opportunity for a family occasion, to see me off. There was plenty of yummy food (not including the quiche I took which was crappy), Sausage rolls, dangerously cooked burgers, traditional frozen-in-the-middle-but-burned-on-the-outside sausages.
Another interesting contraption was a "Home Draught" thingie, a giant 10 pint (nearly 6 litre) bottle, with a CO2 cartridge and a little lever/tap thing, the pair of which turning it from a giant bottle of beer, to a cute little "pour-your-own-draught-beer-straight-from-the-bottle" affair. Not sure how this differs from the traditional "pour-your-own-beer-straight-from-the-can" arrangement that I'm used to, but it seems a significant enough change to do so. I liked its novelty value, but unfortunately, the first jolt sent the CO2 out of suspension, and turned the tap into a high pressure beer-foam blasting device, suitable for creating a drink consisting of an inch of flat beer, and 5 inches of foam no top.

All said and done though, the barbacue was great. The weather was nice, the dog was playful, the food was great, the company was nice etc etc. It was a nice family occasion :-).

TOWEL

For some reason, my mum and dad went out during today, and returned to announce that they had a gift for me. Expecting something like a customised pencil or an embossed ruler (I'm a natural pessimist), I was very happy and surprised to be presented with one large-size microfibre towel. And the little thing is amazing. It's thin, light, it feels insubstantial but the spiel on the box promises me it won't be. The remainder of the day I've spent building a lego UFO for/with my nephew (vaguely time consuming), playing Walking Legs with my him (enjoyable), as well as trying to teach him to fly helicopters on X-plane (futile). So later I'm probably going to grab some supper and maybe have a bath so I can test out my new towel. Either way, I'm busybusybusy. Lots of stuff to do.

Here are some pics, got to go or else I'll get nothing done! Have fun folks :-).
EDIT: I'd upload more pics, but my computer is telling me that (amazingly!) it's out of memory. It's got 3Gb, how can it possibly be out of memory? Oh well.

EDIT EDIT: Public Clarification. My dearest big brother would like me to point out that he was responsible for bringing us back home the other day after my dad threw a wobbly. I didn't actually say how we got back, but now you know :-).