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.

Much is being made in the media (including in blogs) about the fact that today is ten years to the day since Mrs Thatcher ceased to be prime minister. Now, let me say that I am not a Thatcherite (more of a Ken-Clarke-ite) and there is no doubt that the batty old woman did some harm – but she also did plenty of good. Just don’t ask me to say what it was.
Also note that none other than John Prescott has taken a leaf out of her book. When attending the climate change conference in the Hague, he took along his sandbag to impress all the other delegates…..oh, hang on John – that should be HANDbag!

Firm unveils first text message dictionary – another nail in the coffin of good English.

if I link to other blogs, particularly members of the so-called A-list, does that make me a fawning sycophant? you decide.

Back to the Thatcher theme…Man bets Thatcher will lead Tories in 2002. I think William Hill have nothing to worry about on this one.

Romanian story for today: Man ‘killed’ wife, 84, because she was bad in bed

too much to do, too little time!
off to London (well, Pinner, Middlesex) to do a lecture today, so make the most of it, this is all the blogging you are going to get.
mildly stressed about exams now, not helped by going to college last night and spending three hours in a room with 15 other very stressed people. can’t say there is much optimism around at the moment, but I think I can pass if I can get some revision done. will almost certainly miss college tonight, as I doubt that I will be back in time, so will use the opportunity to get more reading done, and spend some time with AW as she is going away to her sister’s this weekend.

Christmas is coming – so I’ve updated my Amazon wish list (see right for a link). Greedy? moi???

yesterday’s trip to Pinner was reasonably successful, although I think I should have charged more than £75 for doing it. the journey was horrid – torrential rain on the way there, horrendous traffic on the way back. ugh.
tonight I have to do a more local talk, although I’ve been told that I have to go a very long way round to get there because of road closures caused by flooding. lovely.
other news: british gas have cocked up my booking and charged me for a one-off inspection AND an annual service charge. useless.

Hats of Meat – not suitable for vegetarian viewers.

Indian man boasts ‘candlebar’ moustache – but why?

more proof (as if we needed it) that Romanians are odd.

today is “Buy Nothing Day“, the idea being we can all assuage our guilty consciences by doing nothing. yeh, right. another typically dumb idea from our illogical cousins across the Atlantic (no offence meant to any logical Americans that may be reading this).
so far today, I have bought petrol, a newspaper, a loaf of bread and a CD. in what is left of today I intend to purchase a takeaway and some beer. anyone got a problem with that?

more mail from Matt over the weekend, asking what it is that I give lectures on. I give lectures on plants – in other words, I talk about my work. Not very exciting I’m afraid, but it brings in a bit extra cash and promotes the business at the same time. I started doing them about 8 or 9 years ago, mostly to local gardening clubs, but now I get bookings from far and wide – last year I gave two lectures in Philadelphia, and there has been talk of a trip to California, but that hasn’t happened yet. The problem is that, whilst I am well known on the local “circuit”, I’m not so well known nationally or internationally. I keep playing with a website to promote my lecture activites, but still haven’t got round to putting it online. I guess I should somewhen.

TPL update: another poor weekend from my team – my defence took a pounding (from Spurs of all people) and only one of my forwards scored a goal – and was then booked by the ref. So don’t expect a huge score this week. On the other hand, local team in Division Three (and therefore not in the TPL game) Brighton and Hove Albion, who I have followed since I was a kid (can’t claim to be a supporter) are in fine form, in second place, and had a 4-0 home win on Saturday – good stuff. Wish I could have their players in my TPL team.

Health update: woke up yesterday with a sore throat, which has got worse since then. ugh.

new AW photo alert:

Decorating update: dad came round yesterday and helpfully fixed my sticking front door and put up most of my new light fittings. I’m hopeless at DIY, so I leave it all to him. Have to cook dinner for the parents soon in exchange.

host update: Port5 is being pants at the moment. may move to Easyspace who make a very good job of hosting my work website. but relunctant to move again so soon after fleeing Geocities.

Site update: have updated the “About Graybo” page so that it looks something like the current blogging.

apologies for all those who have been looking at an error message this morning. Port5 say they are working on it. I am considering a move for Grayblog, but will inform everyone through the normal channels if that comes to pass.

Postman Pat – bastion of the rural community – bless ‘im.

Grayblog has moved again – if you are reading this, you know that already. Please update links – www.grayblog.co.uk
Yep – I’ve been and bought a domain. Will have to fork out to get rid of that banner though – pretty darned ugly.

TPL – a shockingly not-bad 29 points. actually had two goals, not one. have crept up to 16th in our league as of last week, and may have managed to creep a bit further.

irritating banner update – it should be gone by this time tomorrow. hurrah.

just thought I’d come online again and have a look at my lovely new domain…..oh, I’m SOOOO houseproud!
SJP has e-mailed me – she looked at Grayblog for the first time today, and is a complete blogging virgin. of course, I have been busy extolling the virtues of blogging to her, and suggested that she should get her own. rest assured, that if she does (and as a fledgling geek, I would expect her to!), there will be a link in the navbar.
Talking of links in navbars, I helped Nick set up Nick’s Pad more than two weeks ago – and how much blogging has he done? not a lot, I can tell you. go to his Pad and send him a mail, otherwise I’ll be most put out.
And on the subject of being put-out (notice the smooth segues in this post as we glide smoothly from one topic to another without pause – oh, hang on, I think I’ve paused. dammit!), my popularity rating at Bloghop is a paltry 56%. Look down the navbar – see the little coloured squares? Click the green one!! Now! Yes, that’s it, the one on the left! Go on! I’ll feel so much better if you do. I might even give you something in exchange – germs? a hereditary disease? the choice is yours.

it’s been a while since I went on a rant, political or otherwise. well, to be honest, with exams looming, rants have not been at the forefront of my thinking. but, please rest assured that if anything comes to mind as a subject for a rant, that rant will be published here.
actually, at the moment I could have a seriously long rant about college and how pants it is, but frankly I can not be arsed, and I think I’ll just log off, go cook a sausage or three, and have a bath and read before bed.
what a cosy existence.

question – is access.bakiwop the most loved-up blog on the net?
I must say that Andrea and I have been very loved-up lately. Our relationship is very easy going and pretty much stress-free – which is something of a novel experience for me, as just about every girl I’ve been out with before has been a complete bundle of stress and nervous energy in one way or another. Somehow, in spite of the fact that we don’t have many obvious things in common (she loves TV, I hate it; I love rice, she hates it; she loves Robbie Williams, I think he’s a twonk; etc etc etc), Andrea and I just “click”. Which is nice.
Of course, the problem with being in a good relationship that is happy and working, is that:
(a) it’s easy to be gooey when down the pub, and therefore shunned by your non-gooey friends
(b) it’s not so easy to offer good advice to friends who are either single or having problems with their relationships without talking about how wonderful your own situation is….along the lines of “yeh, that’s poo, and I really feel sorry for you. By the way, Andrea and I are having a fantastic time and each thinks the other to be wonderful.” See my point?

David Beckham admits he is stupid – tell us something new.

How to minimize gravy wastage – something with which we should all be concerned.

Elvis copycats taking over the world. Alvin Stardust – “an untouched goldmine”. Well I never.

Eight and a half hours of Harry Potter on Boxing Day – don’t think I’ll be listening to Radio 4 then.

all rush along now to do the Color Quiz (it’s American)….here are my results: (link poached from notsosoft)
Your Existing Situation
Unwilling to extend himself or exert undue effort (with the possible exception of sexual activity). Feels that further progress requires more from him than he is willing or able to give. Would prefer reasonable comfort and security rather than the rewards of greater ambition.
Your Stress Sources
An existing situation or relationship is unsatisfactory, but he feels unable to change it to bring about the sense of belonging which he needs. Unwilling to expose his vulnerability, he therefore continues to resist this state of affairs, but feels dependent on the attachment. This not only depresses him, but makes him irritable and impatient, producing considerable restlessness and the urge to get away from the situation, either actually or, at least, mentally. Ability to concentrate may suffer.
Your Restrained Characteristics
An unadmitted lack of confidence makes him careful to avoid open conflict and he feels he must make the best of things as they are.
Feels that he is receiving less than his share and that there is no one on whom he can rely for sympathy and understanding. Pent-up emotions and a certain egocentricity make him quick to take offense, but he realizes that he has to make the best of things as they are.
Your Desired Objective
Tries to escape from his problems, difficulties, and tensions by abrupt, headstrong, and ill-considered decisions or changes of direction.
Your Actual Problem
Anxiety and restless dissatisfaction, either with circumstances or with unfulfilled emotional requirements, have produced stress. He feels misunderstood, disoriented, and unsettled. This drives him into a search for new conditions or relationships, in the hope that these might offer greater contentment and peace of mind.

Conclusion – it tells me what I already know. I’m bored with my job and need to change, but haven’t the confidence to stick out my neck and apply for something. That’s why I started my college course, so as to build my confidence and learn a few new skills. However, I refute any claims that I am lazy – evidence: six years running a local society, 11 years in this job, organised umpteen events, regular trips out to go lecturing and my college course as well – not to say that I don’t mind laying in on a Saturday morning if I get the chance. Anyone got any jobs going?
As for the comments about my sexual energy…..well, that would be telling.

does my blog work best this way (i.e. newest day first, newest post on that day first) or the old way (newest day first, posts on that day in chronological order)? let me know.

BBC says sorry for branding viewer ‘nutter’ – now be honest…do you think this bloke is a nutter? errr…yep.