zzzzz. had to get up at 4am this morning to take the parents to Waterloo for their holiday (their not holidaying at Waterloo station, merely catching a train there, dummy!).
so I may be struggling to stay awake today.
but you can help! either send me mail or, if you have AIM, send me a message at ghspencer (assuming I’m online at the time!).
more coffee!!…

my bloghop rating continues to be “mediocre”. not many votes - so click on the coloured buttons on the left to add your vote (be nice and click the green ones, ok?)

updated my CD list (which I keep for insurance purposes - I’m not *that* much of an anorak!) last night - now have passed the 400 barrier, with a collection of 403. particularly impressed by the Coldplay EP which was free with the Independent on Sunday at the weekend. may be tempted to buy the album.

The Cocteau Twins have a “best-of” out from their 4AD years. Ho-hum…another compulsory purchase. Where’s the credit card?

and, no, I haven’t just spent £23.50 on CDs. as if.

Snakes mainly right-handed, penises reveal

Sex in space is tricky

Prostitutes demand recognition
Now…is it me, or is Ananova obsessed with sex?

have just posted an “all about graybo and the cast” page (link at left). let me know what you think.

have updated the “about the cast” page to correct some errors. click on the link at left to go there.

rain: can we take any more? I doubt it. the roads are closed around here, the fields are flooded, and there is a stream running through the car park outside the office door. will allow extra time to get home (which is an excuse for leaving work early!)

yup - raining again

ooo - hail and a squall too. nice.
still, I’m not too worried. everything outside is soooooo wet that more rain doesn’t really matter anymore. and I’m here at my PC with a warm cat asleep across my knees.

cool blog of the day: :::..::: cortex :::..:::
actually, there may be a few more cool blogs today since it’s a bit quiet around here. and i’m bone idle.

yup - it’s so quiet that I’ve set up an Amazon “wishlist” so that you can all rush out and buy me things.
It’s unbelievably quiet here today - even the phone is silent, and there is hardly any e-mail coming through. Can’t blame people for not thinking about nurseries when they can only get around their gardens in waders!

yay! just called to check and the fireworks display we are planning to see tonight is still *on* (-:

forgot to mention on Weds - TPL score for this week: 29. total now 260. three transfers. I think this week will be a good one for my team.

Buffy set to star in Scooby Doo - “plum role of Shaggy”??? what about the plum role of Scoob? I hope they don’t make this too cutesy. and will the Velma character still crawl around on the floor every time she loses her glasses? and what about the fashions? and the “Mystery Machine”??

Plants show their bright side - you know, somehow I have always suspected that the bastards were plotting against us.

Scientists try to topple myth of falling penguins - hmmmm.
Let’s just think about the thought processes of government…we have a fuel crisis, a crisis in education, a crisis on the trains, a crisis in the NHS, a crisis of nationwide flooding….*I KNOW* - let’s spend £Xgazillion to find out if penguins fall over!
Actually, this story does generate some quite cute/amusing mental pictures.

MPs find Thatcher more arousing than naked girls
I think they should have used penguins as an image too.

NASA satellite locator - how cool is this?
and almost as useful as the worldwide earthquake locator.
so now you know where to find all your satellites and earthquakes.
Grayblog - serving the internet community.

Scientists discover ’second brain’ in the stomach - make up your own jokes here:…………………………………………………………..

well, what a great fireworks extravaganza the last 48 hours has been! the display at the Central School on Friday was excellent, as it was last year. and, amazingly, almost entirely funded by mcdonalds (yes, **that** mcdonalds!) - so kudos to them. looked to me as though it was going to be a major-league fundraiser for the school - must have been about 2500 people there, and tickets were £4.50 per head for adults (admittedly lots were kiddies who pay much less - £2?).
and who really enjoys these things? - well, as last night’s fireworks bash at PC’s shows, it’s mainly the grown-ups…the kiddies got bored standing in the cold while the “daddies” play fireman/pyromaniac and the non-daddies stand around drinking beer and hugging their girlies to keep warm. but a top bash it was nonetheless, with fine soup to be consumed afterwards. of course, the highlight was the rockets that failed to take off and exploded on the ground, which always makes for a more entertaining and adrenalin-filled experience!

I am thinking of buying a beard trimmer.
So, I go to Altavista and type +beard+trimmer as my search phrase.
And get this.

yup, more rain.
the environment agency has issued flood alerts on the Barnham Rife and Lavant. place your bets on whether i’ll be able to get home (after all, it only took me an hour and fifteen to get here when it normally only takes twenty minutes).

one of my favourite blogs, cortex, has moved. check out the new identity at brainsluice. admire the neat graphics. dream that I’ll ever have enough knowledge of HTML etc to make Grayblog ever look this cool. **wistful sigh**

current affairs comment for today: US presidential election - now what’s *that* all about??

flooding in Chichester update:
there are now soldiers all round the city, helping firemen move pumps, pipes and sandbags. apparently the perceived wisdom is that it is not a case of *if* the Lavant will overflow, but *when* and *how much*. guh.
it’s not too much of a worry for me, as my flat is in a higher part of the city, but KF is near where it is likely to flood, and so is *W2* - and that is far more worrying!

Geocities seems to have a serious problem with file uploads which has persisted for the last 48 hours. if it isn’t fixed shortly, I may just consider moving my blog to a new home….but then, I’m not sure I can be arsed.

I feel a bad mood coming on….

Yup, definitely in a bad mood now. Do not want to go to college tonight. Would much rather just have a long bath with my newly acquired bath products.

announcement: Grayblog has moved.
obviously, if you are reading this announcement, you already know that.
if you aren’t reading this announcement, then you should do so, so that you know that Grayblog has moved.

the reason for moving - Geocities are officially about as useful as a paper bag in a snow storm.
rant! rage! huf!
hopefully, Portland will prove to be better - if they don’t, then I’ll be on the move again….

US politics rant:
SORT IT OUT!
however, I have to say that it seems that there is something funny going on in Florida. I mean, potential irregularities **and** the candidate’s brother is state governor? hmmmmmmm.

bath time product recommendation for today:
“Softy” bath ballistic from you-know-where

bed time product recommendation for today:
“Therapy” massage bar - also from you-know-where

Man eats 32 Cornish Pasties in one hour - but why??

Boy’s fear of ketchup cured - I mean, is this **really** news??

US burglar answers telephone call from his victim - d’oh!

flood crisis deepens:
I have just received an eye-witness account of a certain Mr A Blair picking his way among the pipes of Chichester’s flood defences. oh good. we thought things were bad enough with the water, but him as well?
actually, I’m surprised he has shown his face in Chichester. I can’t think of a more anti-Blair place to visit. Other than Arundel. or Slindon. or Aldwick Bay.

Nick has a new blog. It’s at http://nickyt.blogspot.com. And he wants help deciding what to put on it. You know what to do…

Robyn has moved blogfudge. click here to go look.

recent comment on Grayblog from AW - “you’ve not written anything about me lately” [sulk]
well, just to remind you all, AW is the loveliest person on two legs. admire her wonderful visage here.

weekend update:
Friday: went drinking in the Dolphin and Anchor for LH’s birthday - pity no-one else from college showed up. Went on to W2 (over the sandbags) for last orders.
Saturday: spent the day helping Dad install a new shower in my flat. hurrah! In the evening, piled round to KF’s flat (past the floods, firemen and spaghetti of pipes) for “Games Night” - much drunken shenanigans with silly games thrown in and a very large amount of food. All good stuff.
Sunday: went to Burgess Hill for dinner with AW’s family for her sister’s birthday. All most pleasant.

there seems to be a lot of discussion in weblogging circles as to what makes a good weblog, both in terms of content and design. now, I feel slightly disadvantaged in that I’m not a web designer or otherwise cool dude, merely some bloke with a blog. but in spite of that, i do have an opinion…basically, any blog or website is only as good as what the blog/site owner puts into it. there are countless good websites that have sprung up down the years (I’ve been using the web since 1995, so I know - back then we thought 28.8 was fast!), but they have died because people either didn’t update them, or if they did, they didn’t maintain the quality of what they put on them.

now, i make no claims for the quality or otherwise of Grayblog. but I enjoy doing it, and one or two people have made fairly positive comments about it, which is encouraging - and because I have been encouraged, I’m inclined to continue. which brings me to my second point - if you like a website or blog, then why not say so? send the site owner a mail - it only takes a minute. and if you don’t like it, then a little (constructive) criticism is no bad thing - but an unnecessary flaming *is* out of order.

anyway, that’s my opinion. and if you think it is valid or otherwise, then mail me. or not. it’s up to you.

a lot of fuss is being made about who should or should not be the next President of the United States. But so far I have not seen anybody say this (which seems obvious to me): with such a close finish in the election, and such a dubious and contentious conclusion to the voting, whoever is finally appointed to the office of President by the electoral college is going to be so utterly discredited in the eyes of the majority of voters (since neither candidate will have gained a majority of the popular vote) that their position will almost be untenable. This will be particularly true for Al Gore should he be declared the final winner, as he will have to deal with a Republican majority in Congress.
My suggestion (for what it is worth) - declare the vote in Florida void, and hold a new ballot.

is bloghop cool? some others don’t think so. I’m not so sure - but then I think most things are harmless fun.

top entertainment at “Games Night” on Saturday was Sacha’s “Hat Game”. The rules are easy - divide the assembled masses into teams. Each and every player puts ten pieces of paper into a hat/box/other recepticle, upon which they have written the name of a TV show, actor/ress, film, kitchen utensil……whatever. The important thing is that they have not shown anyone else what they have written.
It’s a bit like charades, or that game they play on Never Mind the Buzzcocks - a player from each team takes a piece of paper from the box and tries to get the other members of their team to guess what is on the paper without actually saying what is written there. Each player has one minute, and the winning team is the one that guesses most correctly.
Of course, everyone gets very stressed and leaps up and down and shouts a lot, which is not good for relations with your neighbours - but who cares about them?

it’s official - I’m fed up with referring to everyone by their initials. In future, I’ll use names except where I would use initials anyway (AW, SJP, DAGS, DA) - don’t forget to check out the “about the cast” page for minimal background info on these people.
of course, that means I’ll have to rely on you not to stalk anyone.

after amihotornot comes amigothornot. guffaw. link poached from 10backwards.

a map….of toilets……in Seoul. hmmm.

Robyn has pigtails. AW has taken to this form of hair lately too, and in combination with her combats, her shiny pvc top and her wicked grin, it makes her look like an All Saint. which is kinda groovy - I like being an All Saint’s boyfriend. I’ll have to see if I can get a pic for you all.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Robyn has asked that we make clear that she is not Graybo’s girlfriend. That honour falls to Andrea (AW) and Andrea alone. However, the editorial staff at Grayblog insist that the above post is in no way ambiguous. We are sure our readership will agree.

TPL - 33 points this week, taking my total to 326. Doubt that that is enough to move me up from my mediocre 19th position in our league.

my flat is unbelievably damp at the moment - and I’m not even near the flooding. this is a two-part problem, partly caused by the dilapidated condition of my glazing (which needs to be replaced) and partly by the dysfunctional state of the radiator in the bedroom. that and the fact that my flat is old. and damp. so today’s mission is to contact british gas and get some nice man to come out and fix the rad. progress reports will be posted here in the time-honoured fashion.

british gas update - they have a nice friendly ad in the phone book, a local rate phone number……..and it’s engaged. guh. so much for customer service.

further british gas update - they can’t get an engineer out to me until…wait for it…11th December. guh again. still, I’ve gone ahead and booked it, otherwise I may have to wait until Christmas! cost - £67. ugh.

now here’s something to scare you….the Nuclear Blast Mapper. type in the location of a local military installation or important government office, choose a type of nuclear weapon, and then click “detonate” to see if your house still exists. I tried a 25 megaton air detonation on the naval base in Portsmouth (which, if I was in charge of the enemy, would be near the top of my list) - looks like Chichester would be reduced to rubble, and 50% of the populace dead or injured. And then there is the DERA site at Funtington - try a puny 1 megaton ground explosion there - ooops, I’m wiped out again.
hmm - time to start work on the bunker, methinks. on the plus side, it would probably clear out the blockage in my central heating.

right - have fiddled with the design a bit and made it look a bit smarter. whaddya reckon?

quote from John Peel - “the football result was Italy 1 - England 0….which under the American system is a win for England”. guffaw

AW had a strange dream last night in which Kev had a green plastic watering can rose instead of a nose. (for those that do not know, the rose is the bit you put on the spout of the watering can that makes the water go “sprinkle sprinkle” instead of “GUSH“). apparently he was quite perturbed by this, but everyone was telling him that it was alright really.
the question is, what does it mean? ideas?

topic for discussion - will the internet put stand-up comedians out of a job? for example, the whole US presidential thing has to be a goldmine for jokes - but we’ve all read them already, including that whole sketch about the Queen revoking American independence. in fact, we’ve not only read them, we’ve read them five times! the next person to send me the revocation post will be shot.

following a tip from notsosoft, I’ve added access.bakiwop to my list of favourite blogs. it’s the sort of blog you can identify with…or I can anyway.

my dad will be 70 years old tomorrow. happy birthday dad.
not that he will read this, being as he doesn’t even know where the “on” switch is on your average PC. but then he is pretty good at fixing bikes, repairing showers and sorting out floorboards. and raising children. thanks dad.

apologies to everyone who has endured the rather hideously bright link colours that have prevailed today (yellow on white, followed by bright blue on white) - they didn’t really work, did they? the only reason I’m still online at 10.50pm is because I’m here fixing it now, as I wouldn’t be able to sleep for worrying about the state of your peepers.
Grayblog - caring for our readers.

bizarre site of the day: Learn Your Cuts o’ Beef! (thanks Robyn)

Here’s something for all you single men - Jail Babes. Yep, type in your preferences, and by the wonders of modern technology, the computer will match you with your perfect mate. The problem: she’s in jail. Ah.
And for the girls there is Jail Dudes.
Obviously the British equivalent of this would be BorstalBirds.co.uk and BorstalBlokes.co.uk

the AGM for the Hardy Plant Society Sussex Group is held tomorrow. I will, officially at least, end my six years of service to the group, having been one of the founders, the first chairman and then newsletter editor. it’s been good fun, and I’ve made a whole bunch of friends in the process. but I’m a bit worried that Christine (the current chairman) is going to come up with some embarrassing speech in which she heaps unwarranted praise on me. after all, I’ve just kinda fumbled along with it for the last few years without putting in a great deal of effort. ah well, it keeps the punters happy.

oh dear. new CD spending session coming. this time on Boards of Canada.
may be tempted to add music links to the navbar on this site.
assuming I can ever upload ever again as port5 is being pants at the moment in the FTP department.

Now, wouldn’t it have been useful to have known about the How to Lay Girls Guide when I was 18. but, hey, no regrets.

both Blogger and Port5 seem to be having problems at the moment, so updates here may be a bit sporadic, but here goes anyway…..

weekend update:
Friday - witnessed Kev, DA and Ian all getting their heads shaved in W2, in aid of “chariddy mate” which was a source of much hilarity. I think they raised a lot of money - estimated at between £800 and £1000 for Children in Need. good stuff.
after drinking in W2, we headed over to Ian’s for more drinking, and didn’t crawl into bed until 3am.
Saturday - went to HPS Sussex AGM during the day and ate lots of food. Thankfully, my parting from the committee wasn’t as embarrassing as feared, and they made a token gesture of conferring lifetime honorary membership of the group, which is nice (although I still have to pay my national subs!).
In the evening we had a small party for Dad’s birthday - just the family and neighbours. Food and fireworks prevailed, plus wine of course. AW and I were exhausted by the end of it all.
Sunday - after a long sleep in at the parent’s, we went for lunch with AW’s mate Sue and her daughter Emily (who is AW’s goddaughter) at a kiddie-friendly establishment in Bognor. Emily wasn’t too keen on me - as soon as I picked her up, she was in tears. But can you blame her?
The afternoon was spent doing work - AW did work for school, and I did work for college. Seems an awful lot still to do considering that exams are only two weeks away (eek!).
So, all-in-all, another top weekend.

navbar update: have now added a whole wad of music links - go explore…
also added a link to wallpaper magazine, which is rather cool.

Women hate beards - survey - except Andrea thankfully. No plans to trade in my beard trimmer, although note that I only keep stubbly stuff. Too itchy if longer.

Couples take just five dates to have sex - that long? not round here [grin]

Got mail this morning from Matt who asks “what is TPL?”….
I guess that I haven’t really explained what TPL is. It’s a game in the Telegraph newspaper - you pick a team of football players from the English Premier League (TPL=Telegraph Premier League). Each week a table is published in the paper showing how many points they scored (5 for a goal, 3 for helping to get a goal [=key contribution], 5 for the goalkeeper if he doesn’t let any goals in, deduct 2 for upsetting the referee, etc etc etc). You can buy and sell players (each player has a value) but you are only allowed 24 transfers during the year, and your team mustn’t exceed the maximum value allowed (the best players cost more). At the end of the year, the team with the most points wins a big prize (I think £10,000). Also, you can get together with friends to have a mini-league within the bigger game - I’m 19th in our mini-league and about 50,000th in the national league.
Does that make sense?
Matt also asks about my marketing course, and how long I have to go…..well, I’ve got exams in two weeks. they mark the halfway point, with another 18 months to go until I’ve completed the PostGraduate Diploma. Then I have to go to seminars and things for a year to earn sufficient CPD points (continuous professional development) to get “Chartered Marketer” status. Then I’ll be able to put letters after my name - MCIM.
of course, that timetable assumes that I pass all my exams first time, which is by no means guaranteed.
and what I do with the qualification once I have it…who knows? suggestions welcome

ironic blog of the day

Nice beaver… - surprise pyjama party???? You know, sometimes I think I really missed out by not going to uni.

Do you believe they put a man on the moon? and a tank, missile launcher, bunker……..

We haven’t had a Romanian story for a while, but here’s a good one…Pensioners persuade sex shop girl to run for parliament. You can imagine this story being covered on Eurotrash.

hmmmm…..it seems that there is a whole bunch of top quality new Romanian stories in the Ananova archive….Priest spills confession secrets in bar

Woman bites through boyfriend’s penis ….ow.

Numbers game is up in Neptun Street - classic. I’ll never moan about Chichester District Council again.

TPL score for this week - a pathetic 23 points, my second worst week this season. Total now 349, not very good.

Robyn (who is not my girlfriend) has redesigned Blogfudge. It’s…um….quite purple and very…er…Battle of the Planets. Maybe I should remodel Grayblog with a Clangers theme.
Incidentally, that Clangers site is not to be confused with this one.