The Dog Reads This
Like most normal people, I occasionally snore.
Last night I was not only snoring, but according to my wife, I was softly wimpering in my sleep - just like the dog does when he's having forty winks. This is weird, as I had a number of bizarre dreams last night, including quite a graphic one where I was chasing rabbits...
The dog's name is Nelson btw. As in Admiral Nelson. A mighty fine name for such a noble creature as my dog *. If SAUW can link to a photo of her cat, I can link to a photo of Admiral Nelson.
Sally and David have apparently got themselves a new kitten. Whilst my dog is named after our great British Naval hero Nelson - a name that stirs the blood and conjures up images of courage, sturdiness and honour - Sally and David have named their kitten Audrey. The name Audrey justs conjures up images of Coronation Street for me.
* When I say "my" dog, I mean my in-laws dog of course, but it's common knowledge in our family that he loves me the most. As a result, he is, for all intents and purposes - apart from vet fees and food costs - my dog. He is probably reading this blog - and preparing to email me (again) - right now too.
Friday, October 04, 2002
Thursday, October 03, 2002
The Awareness Course
An announcement has just come over our telephone tannoy system to inform us that the "Property Awareness Training Course" is about to begin.
Presumably, if it is a Basic Property Awareness Training Course, the tutor is going stand next to his wall-projected PowerPoint presentation saying "This is a door... this is a window... and this is an internal wall."
The Advanced Course deals with lifts, stairways and water-coolers.
Our storeman, Victor, reckons he's been on a Shelf Awareness Course.
An announcement has just come over our telephone tannoy system to inform us that the "Property Awareness Training Course" is about to begin.
Presumably, if it is a Basic Property Awareness Training Course, the tutor is going stand next to his wall-projected PowerPoint presentation saying "This is a door... this is a window... and this is an internal wall."
The Advanced Course deals with lifts, stairways and water-coolers.
Our storeman, Victor, reckons he's been on a Shelf Awareness Course.
Wednesday, October 02, 2002
Bob's Big Coconuts Gag
Vicster has always been a bit paranoid about her health.
A bang on the head, or a mild headache, is an indication that she probably has a brain tumour. A gammy toenail means she will probably have her leg surgically removed by the Doctor. A wasp sting will probably induce an allergic reaction severe enough to swell her head to twice its normal size and kill her.
I love my wife.
So a report in The Sunday Times about the increased risk of breast cancer for daughters of mothers who were given anti-miscarriage drugs in the early 1970's pushed the usual paranoia button. Thankfully Vic's mum and dad are staying with us this week, so Vic was able to ask her mum about it and have it confirmed that there was no additional risk to her.
During this conversation, Bob managed to comment - under his breath - on Ann's boobs during her pregancy with Vic.
"They were like a big pair of coconuts..." said Bob.
"Hard and hairy!"
It's Bob's best ever joke.
Another Giant-Killing
Oxford United continued their run of glory with their fifth away win on the trot. A fine giant-killing Worthington Cup second round victory at Premiership Charlton. With no score after 120 minutes of play, it went to the dreaded penalties, and up popped the mighty Jefferson Louis to put the winner into the net. 6-5 was the final tally. Considering Jefferson was playing for Thame just a few months ago, his goal must rank as the most exciting football moment for Thame since the "Thame Boys" St. George flag was seen draped over the advertising hoardings on the halfway line at the England versus Argentina World Cup match.
Jefferson was quoted on Radio Five Live this morning as saying it could be "the start of The Jefferson Louis Era".
That would make a great blog spot name.
Vicster has always been a bit paranoid about her health.
A bang on the head, or a mild headache, is an indication that she probably has a brain tumour. A gammy toenail means she will probably have her leg surgically removed by the Doctor. A wasp sting will probably induce an allergic reaction severe enough to swell her head to twice its normal size and kill her.
I love my wife.
So a report in The Sunday Times about the increased risk of breast cancer for daughters of mothers who were given anti-miscarriage drugs in the early 1970's pushed the usual paranoia button. Thankfully Vic's mum and dad are staying with us this week, so Vic was able to ask her mum about it and have it confirmed that there was no additional risk to her.
During this conversation, Bob managed to comment - under his breath - on Ann's boobs during her pregancy with Vic.
"They were like a big pair of coconuts..." said Bob.
"Hard and hairy!"
It's Bob's best ever joke.
Another Giant-Killing
Oxford United continued their run of glory with their fifth away win on the trot. A fine giant-killing Worthington Cup second round victory at Premiership Charlton. With no score after 120 minutes of play, it went to the dreaded penalties, and up popped the mighty Jefferson Louis to put the winner into the net. 6-5 was the final tally. Considering Jefferson was playing for Thame just a few months ago, his goal must rank as the most exciting football moment for Thame since the "Thame Boys" St. George flag was seen draped over the advertising hoardings on the halfway line at the England versus Argentina World Cup match.
Jefferson was quoted on Radio Five Live this morning as saying it could be "the start of The Jefferson Louis Era".
That would make a great blog spot name.
Tuesday, October 01, 2002
The Result
Final score of 9 – 1 in Sports favour. John and Dave Junior surprisingly picked up the doubles with some unorthodox play. I struggled as predicted, losing all three games in straight sets. I didn’t disgrace myself and it was a good exercise, but it was a little frustrating: Sports put out a weakened side against us, and five years ago I’d have easily won all three of my games. I’m just not the player that I was, and until I get nearer to my old standards, it’s going to be a very frustrating time for me.
Last night also reminded me of some of the reasons why I retired from the sport in the first place:
Mickey Mouse organisation – the league secretary had forgotten that there were matches on at our home venue and therefore nobody turned up to unlock the premises until 7:50 (matches should start at 7:30 – we were stood outside from 7:15).
Length of matches – we managed to play the match on two tables last night, reducing the evening’s play time by 50%. We still didn’t finish until 10:15. The thought of away matches with 11:30 finishes, with half an hour’s travelling time back home on a chilly January night, fills me with dread.
Blisters – I have a corker on my twiddling finger. My poor soft skin.
Cheerless players – any night out should be entertaining or rewarding, but the majority of table tennis players in the UK seem to have had personality bypasses. Two of my opponents last night even had pudding bowl haircuts and looked as if sunlight would disintegrate them. Visualise the nice Thermian aliens from Galaxy Quest. Playing against wooden stakes would have been more enjoyable.
Bad News
We’ve just had a company meeting. 14 people from our office are being made redundant. Surprisingly, I’m not one of them, but my colleague Jamie – who I would put behind me in the chopping block order – is. As Jamie is a) a nice guy and b) a rock of sanity for me in the face of J M T, he is going to be sorely missed.
I am in some shock.
http://www.alicia-logic.com/capspages/caps_viewall.asp?criteria=Title&term=Galaxy_Quest
Final score of 9 – 1 in Sports favour. John and Dave Junior surprisingly picked up the doubles with some unorthodox play. I struggled as predicted, losing all three games in straight sets. I didn’t disgrace myself and it was a good exercise, but it was a little frustrating: Sports put out a weakened side against us, and five years ago I’d have easily won all three of my games. I’m just not the player that I was, and until I get nearer to my old standards, it’s going to be a very frustrating time for me.
Last night also reminded me of some of the reasons why I retired from the sport in the first place:
Mickey Mouse organisation – the league secretary had forgotten that there were matches on at our home venue and therefore nobody turned up to unlock the premises until 7:50 (matches should start at 7:30 – we were stood outside from 7:15).
Length of matches – we managed to play the match on two tables last night, reducing the evening’s play time by 50%. We still didn’t finish until 10:15. The thought of away matches with 11:30 finishes, with half an hour’s travelling time back home on a chilly January night, fills me with dread.
Blisters – I have a corker on my twiddling finger. My poor soft skin.
Cheerless players – any night out should be entertaining or rewarding, but the majority of table tennis players in the UK seem to have had personality bypasses. Two of my opponents last night even had pudding bowl haircuts and looked as if sunlight would disintegrate them. Visualise the nice Thermian aliens from Galaxy Quest. Playing against wooden stakes would have been more enjoyable.
Bad News
We’ve just had a company meeting. 14 people from our office are being made redundant. Surprisingly, I’m not one of them, but my colleague Jamie – who I would put behind me in the chopping block order – is. As Jamie is a) a nice guy and b) a rock of sanity for me in the face of J M T, he is going to be sorely missed.
I am in some shock.
http://www.alicia-logic.com/capspages/caps_viewall.asp?criteria=Title&term=Galaxy_Quest
Monday, September 30, 2002
The Return of The Twiddler
Bashing the nasty brickwork to bits has left me with an injury akin to that resulting from too much Uncle Hanking *.
It's not the sort of handicap you need when you are about to relaunch your table tennis career after five years away from the sport.
On top of the tightness in my right arm, I'm also struggling to walk after playing paintball on Saturday with the guys from work (see below for Paintball Report).
Best to get my excuses in first as I am going to get thrashed tonight. Our league match is against the Manchester United of the Aylesbury and District TT Premier League, Sports 'A'. I'll be lucky to get to 15 points against any of my opponents and I confidently predict a ten-nil match score against us.
However, even if the clock was turned back five years ago and I was at the top of my game, I'd still be lucky to pick up one out of three singles, so I'm not too worried about tonight. As long as I don't embarass myself too much, I'll try to enjoy it and use it as a decent practice match for future league games.
I shall also take great pleasure in lying to the Sports A captain that my little brother - who was unbeatable in this league for years, and robbed said opponent of many a trophy and tournament title - is also going to make a comeback later this season. He's not of course, but the look of fear in their eyes should be priceless...
Returning to my opening theme, I'm likely to be very stiff tomorrow.
The Paintball Report
I get to play paintball probably once every two years. When the sun is out, as it was on Saturday, it is an activity that is hard to beat in terms of exercise, excitement, rush and plain good fun. I don't know anyone who has played the game and not enjoyed the experience. My play of the day was taking out five blue team enemies - including the blue team captain in a fearless bum rush attack - in a single defend the village scenario, before having my ass shot in a friendly-fire incident.
I have the blue team captain's head stuffed and hanging on the wall above my desk.
* Tony Boydell would say that you can never over Uncle Hank.
Bashing the nasty brickwork to bits has left me with an injury akin to that resulting from too much Uncle Hanking *.
It's not the sort of handicap you need when you are about to relaunch your table tennis career after five years away from the sport.
On top of the tightness in my right arm, I'm also struggling to walk after playing paintball on Saturday with the guys from work (see below for Paintball Report).
Best to get my excuses in first as I am going to get thrashed tonight. Our league match is against the Manchester United of the Aylesbury and District TT Premier League, Sports 'A'. I'll be lucky to get to 15 points against any of my opponents and I confidently predict a ten-nil match score against us.
However, even if the clock was turned back five years ago and I was at the top of my game, I'd still be lucky to pick up one out of three singles, so I'm not too worried about tonight. As long as I don't embarass myself too much, I'll try to enjoy it and use it as a decent practice match for future league games.
I shall also take great pleasure in lying to the Sports A captain that my little brother - who was unbeatable in this league for years, and robbed said opponent of many a trophy and tournament title - is also going to make a comeback later this season. He's not of course, but the look of fear in their eyes should be priceless...
Returning to my opening theme, I'm likely to be very stiff tomorrow.
The Paintball Report
I get to play paintball probably once every two years. When the sun is out, as it was on Saturday, it is an activity that is hard to beat in terms of exercise, excitement, rush and plain good fun. I don't know anyone who has played the game and not enjoyed the experience. My play of the day was taking out five blue team enemies - including the blue team captain in a fearless bum rush attack - in a single defend the village scenario, before having my ass shot in a friendly-fire incident.
I have the blue team captain's head stuffed and hanging on the wall above my desk.
* Tony Boydell would say that you can never over Uncle Hank.
The Fireplace
Our house is a typical Victoria terraced property. Built at modest cost in the 1890’s for local railway workers, compared to many modern builds, our house has a reassuring feeling of solidity: Nice solid brickwork and proper plaster. Much of this aura of solidity is of course just an illusion, as we are slowly discovering to our cost.
Friday should have seen Paul the Plasterer patching up the blown plaster in our living room (as per the schedule of works for HIP #4), and then skimming the whole joint on the Saturday. Unfortunately - as is always the case with building work - things are never as simple as they first appear. Paul called me up at work to inform me that there were more patches of blown “bad” plaster than “good”, and he was recommending that the whole lot should be stripped off. He wasn’t taking us for a ride. The bad news was firstly the cost – a doubling of his fee from £300 to £600 – and secondly the fact that he didn’t have sufficient materials or manpower to do the job until a week on Monday.
That’s another week of living in a mess and another week closer to my exam. It also means that our new stairway carpet (being laid on Thursday) will be in severe danger of getting trashed by plaster-encrusted workmen’s boots.
The only good news resulting from this delay is the fact that we now have time to deal with the fireplace. And by “deal with” I mean using a 1 kg lump hammer to pulverise it to dust. The previous occupants – supreme idiots that they were – decided to build a thoroughly nasty brick and tile hearth and decorative shelves around the existing fireplace. We don’t know what possessed them to construct such a tasteless monstrosity in such a small room. The room is 12 foot by 11 foot and the fireplace was taking up at least 10 to 15 percent of the available space.
Not anymore though: the brick hearth and shelves are now taking up the space of 12 rubble bags and are ready to join Stashers Pistachio Pants in the Great Skip in the Sky.
Vicster is extremely happy with the result. We have suddenly expanded our living space and the room, once finished, is going to look so much better than it did. As a big bonus, the removal of the shelves has uncovered a little patch of damp that can now be sorted and prevented from coming back to haunt us and our new plaster.
A very shiny silver lining.
A Random Shout-Out
One of the benefits of writing under a stupid pseud like Nobby Dobscrub is that nobody else in the entire world shares the name, so tracking what you’ve said, or what other people have said about you, is relatively easy.
Last week I typed “Dobscrub” into google expecting the usual magic newsgroup postings and articles to pop up in the results. I was slightly surprised to discover The Wonderful World Of at the top of the list (that means random visitors are linking to it – “Hello Random Visitor!”) and in the second slot, another blog entitled Star Lines.
What is cool about the Star Lines link is the fact that the blog’s author is a professional writer. Not only does this give me some much needed writing kudos [wink] but is my first piece of positive feedback from a stranger. Go check out her writing tricks for some solid advice with a smile.
Our house is a typical Victoria terraced property. Built at modest cost in the 1890’s for local railway workers, compared to many modern builds, our house has a reassuring feeling of solidity: Nice solid brickwork and proper plaster. Much of this aura of solidity is of course just an illusion, as we are slowly discovering to our cost.
Friday should have seen Paul the Plasterer patching up the blown plaster in our living room (as per the schedule of works for HIP #4), and then skimming the whole joint on the Saturday. Unfortunately - as is always the case with building work - things are never as simple as they first appear. Paul called me up at work to inform me that there were more patches of blown “bad” plaster than “good”, and he was recommending that the whole lot should be stripped off. He wasn’t taking us for a ride. The bad news was firstly the cost – a doubling of his fee from £300 to £600 – and secondly the fact that he didn’t have sufficient materials or manpower to do the job until a week on Monday.
That’s another week of living in a mess and another week closer to my exam. It also means that our new stairway carpet (being laid on Thursday) will be in severe danger of getting trashed by plaster-encrusted workmen’s boots.
The only good news resulting from this delay is the fact that we now have time to deal with the fireplace. And by “deal with” I mean using a 1 kg lump hammer to pulverise it to dust. The previous occupants – supreme idiots that they were – decided to build a thoroughly nasty brick and tile hearth and decorative shelves around the existing fireplace. We don’t know what possessed them to construct such a tasteless monstrosity in such a small room. The room is 12 foot by 11 foot and the fireplace was taking up at least 10 to 15 percent of the available space.
Not anymore though: the brick hearth and shelves are now taking up the space of 12 rubble bags and are ready to join Stashers Pistachio Pants in the Great Skip in the Sky.
Vicster is extremely happy with the result. We have suddenly expanded our living space and the room, once finished, is going to look so much better than it did. As a big bonus, the removal of the shelves has uncovered a little patch of damp that can now be sorted and prevented from coming back to haunt us and our new plaster.
A very shiny silver lining.
A Random Shout-Out
One of the benefits of writing under a stupid pseud like Nobby Dobscrub is that nobody else in the entire world shares the name, so tracking what you’ve said, or what other people have said about you, is relatively easy.
Last week I typed “Dobscrub” into google expecting the usual magic newsgroup postings and articles to pop up in the results. I was slightly surprised to discover The Wonderful World Of at the top of the list (that means random visitors are linking to it – “Hello Random Visitor!”) and in the second slot, another blog entitled Star Lines.
What is cool about the Star Lines link is the fact that the blog’s author is a professional writer. Not only does this give me some much needed writing kudos [wink] but is my first piece of positive feedback from a stranger. Go check out her writing tricks for some solid advice with a smile.
