So, it’s 3 AM, and as you’ve probably gathered, I’ve just finished work. I’m feeling happy. Though, despite the fact I’ve only been in the house for a mere 30 minutes, it’s been rather interesting. On my way back to Scribbler Towers, I noticed big, flashing police lights in the distance, and found one of the cul-de-sacs near here was blocked off by a police car, with all its lights blazing. Despite the fact I rubbernecked, and tried to get a closer look as I went past, I couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary.

A little further up, another police car came hurtling down the road, also blasting its lights. Oooh. Something a little interesting must have been going on. So, I arrived at Scribbler Towers, and nip upstairs for a pee. I’m stood there, thinking “Bloody hell, the boiler’s knocking out a bit of a rattle tonight”. I looked, and it was turned off. Hmmm. Then it dawned on me - it was the copper chopper!

I rushed outside, to see what was going on. It was hovering pretty much directly above our house, with its searchlight on full….

You’ll be unsurprised to find I took loads of pictures, though this one was the clearest. I think it turned out quite good, though. I like the fact that the rain has “enhanced” the beam’s appearance somewhat.

I also took some pictures of the replaced bridge at the bottom of Powlett Road eariler in the day. I’ve yet to decide whether I like it or not.

A full view, from pretty much the same position I took the old one at. It doesn’t look as lumpy as the old one, and clearly isn’t as rusty, seeing as it’s less than a week old. I suppose the blue and white scheme is done so it appears to blend in a little with the sky. though, give it a few years, it’ll probably fade, then look like shite.

This is a view from underneath it. It’s not at all clear at this resolution, but there’s already a pigeon looking to set up a roost on there. I’d have hoped that when they’d fitted the new bridge, they’d put up some type of shield to stop birds getting in. The amount of bird shit underneath the old one was nobody’s business, and the second it rained, it became as slippery as a well-buttered ice rink.

Another area to be going through a renovation is the town centre. The old Barlow building on Park Road is being torn down to make room for … ahem… “luxury” flats. And so, Park Road has been closed for the past week or so. But never fear, you can always follow the diversion…

…. town center? Town CENTER? Who does the lettering for these things? Awful spelling like that (or rather, Americanised spelling used in the English language) makes me want to hit people with a clue bat. We are not America. This is not America. What really makes my ringpiece itch is when someone spells the letter Z out to me, and calls it “Zee”. It’s fucking ZED…. ZED. GET THAT? ZED. IT RHYMES WITH DEAD, JUST LIKE I HOPE YOU ARE IF YOU USE PRONOUNCE IT “ZEE” AND ARE NOT GENUINELY AMERICAN ON THESE SHORES. Well, okay, I over-reacted, but seriously, I hate it. If Chad Phillips were reading this (don’t forget, he emigrated to Japan to become and English teacher), I’m sure he’d agree.

And, you know what? He probably is reading this! After a multi-year absence, he’s left his trademark calling card in the comment of the previous post, identical to the one he left in February 2001…. And, considering else there’s nobody else I can think of who will understand what “I haven’t got a kipper, I’ve got a fanny” will mean, as well as connecting from Japan, more precisely from the “Hiroshima Perfectural Education Center” (It’s a quote. Don’t count that as ME using the word “center”). Unless I’ve suddenly became some kind of superstar in Japan, without me knowing…. and my entire childhood is featured in a novel. That would be great if it is, though a little far fetched.

I always assumed be’d become a businessman of some sort. Somewhere in the “archives”, I have an audio tape of me and him when I was about 8 (he’d have been about 12) from when he started up an ice lolly business. The tape is classic. Seriously. It begins with him explaining how the lolly business worked (I think), then he wrote me out a ticket for a free ice lolly. I remember, this was in green ink too. Strange how you remember these things. Unfortunately, by that time, I’d became entirely bored of the whole idea, and proceeded to rip up my free ticket. Chad butted in, with the line “And Jamie’s destroyed his ticket, so he doesn’t get his free lolly!”. The whole plan went to worms when his parents, apparently sick of having all of these lollies in the freezer, gave me a load of them. He was devastated.

Other yearnings towards the business side of things also came in the form of another audio tape, which sadly no longer exists. During his school days, he’d made some paper mache puppets, and Barry, David and Chad held a puppet show in Barry’s back kitchen. I wasn’t present at the time, and considering they were doing a puppet show and recording it on AUDIO tape, most of it was indecipherable bollocks. Except for the end. Chad came on and said the following, despite being interrupted by David…

“If you think(ALRIGHT!)… If you think this puppet show was any good, then…. please give us summing.”

No, he wasn’t requesting mathematical puzzles. “Please give us summing” is best Hartlepool twang for “Please can we have something for our efforts?” The tape then cuts to the last few seconds of Black Lace, performing “Knock Three Times” from their “Party Party” album. It was a beige C-30 tape, manufactured by Philips, ironically enough.

Though I’m sure if he does read this post, he’s gonna take the piss in the comments section somewhat. Despite putting up with a number of years of peer pressure, and a certain amount of bullying, I must admit that some of the best times of my life were spent in “the Magnificent Seven” And, for that very reason, I’m currently listening to the Auf Weidersehen, Pet soundtrack.

One of the last recorded elements of the Magnificent Seven came in the form of a black and white camera which was connected to an old video recorder, and was recorded on June 26th 1992, only a matter of weeks before my mother died. The magnificent Seven at the time of recording had dwindled to four. Me, Chad, Scott and William, larked around for a few hours in front of the camera. It is very clear indeed that I was still a naive youngster.

This was probably less than a year before we all stopped being children, and went our seperate ways. Chad went to college, Scott had exams, William began to breed pigeons and partially lost interest in our friendship. Unfortunately, the tape I’m mentioning here has became another victim of time and/or magnetic degradation. Although it plays, I can’t convert it to DVD or whatever. Not that it matters, because I really, really, never want anyone else to see it. Ever.

As for the sex, I made that bit up.

Technorati Tags: bridge, chad phillips, childhood, helicopter, lollies, new, powlett road, puppet show, recording, Reminiscing, tape

I tried I really did. I really tried to think of a decent title for this post. Though, clearly I failed miserably. Which is a shame because it’s been an eventful few days. Firstly, for whatever reason I actually worked a bank holiday. Yes, I spent the last official day off before Xmas… er, not being off. People will get thinking I actually *like* the place if I continue at this rate.

I think it was for the best, as I have appeared the other side of it relatively unscathed.

The weekend was a blast, despite the fact I spent it pretty much entirely on my own. Friday can be written off as one of those days which didn’t exist, as I was on nights last week. So, I got up at about 5, did very little, had beer, went to bed.unexciting in every way.

Saturday was, again another day which didn’t seem to go anywhere. My dad got me up at about 4PM with breakfast in bed (well, a plate of chips, anyway) so I munched those, and we went to Netto. And (!) they were doing cheap Carling! Bonus! 2 crates of 24 were added to the trolley, along with a few other bits and bobs. Including crisps, sausage rolls, and various other unhealthy products.

So, I spent the evening doing “stuff”. I added a lot more to the streetlight site, and even got some comments up. But you’re still not seeing it yet. A select few have had a sneak preview, and the outcome is promising.

To start off, it’ll just be a section in the gallery, but it’ll give me an opportunity to play with some other bits of software.

Sunday came hurtling through the time barrier like any other day, really. Except that this time I’d got up early. Trying to get my sleep pattern onto something sensible meant that I woke up earlyish. Probably about 10:30, not that it really mattered, as Daddykins was off to Whitby for the day. So, he left, and I was left to my own devices, for the entire day. Great stuff. Though , initially I was depressed as hell about it. as it was going to be another day entirely isolated from the entire world.

But then, I looked out of the window. The sun was shining, and it looked pretty warm. What could I do? Yes, cut the hedge. I’m sure that’s the first thought that crosses everyone’s mind on a lovely day. I then realised that the neighbours on both sides of our house were away. So, I slapped a CD in the DVD player, whacked the telly up to full blast, and listened to some music. One good thing I discovered is that the remote works through the window! Great! I didn’t have to run in and switch songs every time a shite tune came on.

Neither me or my dad are keen gardeners The front garden looks like a rainforest, and the back garden is simply a dog toilet with a path going up the middle of it. It comes as no surprise that we’d loaned the hedge trimmer out, so I was forced to use shears. Old, rusty and fucking blunt shears at that. Sigh. So, while I was breaking my arms, my ears were treated to some of the greatest 80’s songs ever. So, 30 minutes later, I was done. My arms were killing. I couldn’t even hold a can of Pepsi straight. You’d have thought that would have been me for the day. Any type of hard work leaves me frustrated and sweaty, but no. Something posessed me to actually tackle the kitchen. The kitchen is a little worse than the back garden.

For instance, our draining board is unique in the fact that it doesn’t actually drain. Instead the water just sort of forms a puddle in the middle of it. This smelly phenomenon was first discovered when some type of meat product somehow snuck underneath the plate dryer, and rested quietly in the puddle. In the middle of summer. You can imagine what happened from there. I think I retched for about three hours solid. And the curry I was about to have at the time went back in the fridge. Thankfully, I’m happy to report this was an isolated incident, and although we haven’t got around to fixing the draining board, the situation is monitored on a regular basis.

Anyway, I did indeed clean it to the best of my ability, me being a man, and all of that. I cleaned the worktops, which was a job in itself. Firstly, the one next to the cooker, which was surprisingly easy. And I got a laugh too.

The previous night, there was a “large” spider on the wall above the window. Daddykins, for whatever reason, sprayed it with fly spray instead of just leaving it to go about its business. As I was tidying, I found this spider, on its back, laid flat in the middle of the worktop. Although I have no love for cobwebs, I don’t mind spiders, and I even felt a twinge of guilt as I attempted to sweep it into the bin. But! No sooner had I touched it, the fallen spider twitched. It was still alive! Though, if you can imagine what a stoned spider would look like, this particular arachnid would be pretty close to the mental image you’d have. It couldn’t exactly walk - more sway from side to side, before eventually going in the opposite direction to the one it chose. I’m not sure whether this was due to the dizzying effects of flyspray, or because I’d just doused the entire worktop in Flash. After getting a good giggle, I grabbed the spider by one of its (functioning) legs, and dropped it out of the window, inevitably sealing its fate of being part of the food chain.

Next came the toughie. Cleaning around the most used appliances in the whole house… kettle, toaster, George Foreman grill, microwave, fryer. This was to be the challenge I couldn’t let defeat me.

The area around the kettle was surprisingly easy. Despite the teastains looking like they’d been tattooed on, these were easily removed with a generous application of Flash, left to work for a few minutes. The GF grill was next, and although some of the stuff surrounding it didn’t look like organic material, it lifted off with a little hot water. I even cleaned the little plastic drip tray.

I decided that standing over the wheelie bin with a knife, scraping the fatty remnants of six-week old bacon was too gross after about 8 seconds of doing it, so I placed the drip tray in the yard, and poured boiling water on it. Within less than a second, it was sparky clean. Go me and my innovation! I rule!

But next, there was the microwave to contend with. Or rather, the bit in front of the microwave, where the cooked food first makes contact with the outside world. This, as you can probably gather, was curry heaven. Thankfully, most of the marks came right off, and the ones that stayed there sort of blended in with the worktop. But next, the ultimate challenge. The fryer. Well, it defeated me to a point. I tried to clean it. I really did. To the point where I tried pouring boiling water on it. But those marks just will not come off. though, to be perfectly honest, that was a task for another day. I was getting restless, my attention span had evaporated long before I’d thrown the spider out, though I stuck with it. until I was about 95% completed.

My boredom was short-lived, as I attempted to tidy the living room. Fuck that! On went the XBox, and I sat there for another hour or so, thrashing “Tiger Woods 2005″ for all it’s worth. Apparently, I’ve completed it 108%. What the hell does that mean?

Anyway, my mood was lightened after I defeated one of the computer players on my worst course (Paradise Cove). I was well impressed, though once again, my attention span collapsed like a…. wanking…. hippopota…. bicycles…. bloody hell, there it goes again.

I retired upstairs to maybe do some more work on my Streetlight site, and drink myself stupid. As usual.

Both things were done, to great effect. More pictures were added to both the (still unavailable!) streetlight site, as well as to the Steetley Gallery which is getting huge now.

It struck me, after quite a few bevvies that the neighbours were still away. Their car wasn’t parked outside This meant only one thing… LOUD MUSIC!!!!! And, loud it was. In fact the little LED on the front of my speakers dimmed to the rhythm of the bass until it eventually burned out. So it must have been loud. On one particular, I could feel the rush of air out of the speakers hit my face. That’s how loud it was.

However, Daddykins returned home at about 1AM, and ruined the entire night. Well, OK, not by his prescence, but the contents of the carrier bag he was carrying…

“Smell those”, he said, as he wafted it under my nose. Curiosity killed the cat, and I inhaled. It smelled like DEATH. In a CARRIER BAG. Yes, he’d been to Whitby and brought back CRABS. Not the itchy gentlemens’ companion, but the dead shellfish. I went nuts. I won’t go into detail exactly why, as I’m near the end of the longest blog entry I’ve wrote for ages, and I really don’t want to depress the fuck out of myself, but really, he should know better than to bring fish in this house, but he clearly didn’t.

So, despte a really good day, I went to bed depressed out of my mind, even worse was the prospect of work tomorrow, and the house smelling of crab when I finally got back.

Work was its usual, so I won’t really comment too much, though I did spend a large part of the day “borrowing” a wireless headset to see what it was like. And, it was great. I’m naturally a restless person, so being able to actually walk without being tethered to my desk by a shitty little flexy cord was really rather amazing. I’d literally dreamed the night before about having a wireless headset, sad bastard that I am. OK, so it wasn’t exactly a dream come true - I wasn’t stood naked in Focus telling a pink antelope how to run DXDIAG on his telly.

After 12 hours of the usual, I returned home. I suddenly had an urge to connect my scanner. I’ve not had that for a while. Mainly, the reason why, is this photo.

Look at it! The style! The glasses! The SIDEBOARDS! I was clearly the height of fashion as a 7-yr-old. This is interesting, as I had a full head of hair, which is something I can no longer say.

Technorati Tags: cleaning, draining board, flash, flyspray, gardening, George foreman, kitchen, me, microwave, Photos, scanner, spider, stoned, Streetlighting, young

and it’s non-alcoholic!!

Well, OK, it’s a little alcoholic (but no more than 0.5% states the label), but my word, it’s the nicest drink you’re ever likely to taste. That is., if you like cola. Which, I think everyone does.

Chris introduced me to the stuff way back quite a few years ago. he had been to Newcastle, and picked some bottles up. He said it was gorgeous. And, who am I to resist? He gave me a bottle to try, and the taste stayed with me for ever. It is wallet-blisteringly expensive stuff. I think, at the time, it was something like 90p a bottle. For 275ml, that’s around £3 a litre.

On Monday, I was in Asda, and happened to come across a shelf of the stuff. Again, it was something like 90p for a bottle, but they were 3 for £2. Could I treat myself? I stared, longingly at the shelf, full of pristine, glass bottles. I tried to pull myself away from them, but the trolley didn’t move. Well, except for the one wheel which was spinning loosely, failing to make contact with the floor. I resisted no more, and did indeed tempt myself.

I bought the three bottles. I still have two left. I think I’ll keep them in there for some type of momentously special occasion or achievement. Such as reopening the Scribcam.

Yes, you might have noticed, that for the paste few days, I actually HAVE had the webcam on. And, I have been allowing it to take photos of my desperately greasy face, and my ever receeding hairline. I don’t know why I bothered to put it back on to be perfectly honest, but I thought it would make a nice change. You’ll find the link either at the top of the page, or you can visit http://www.scribcam.co.uk/ and stare at the last 10 images.

I might change that so you can see more pictures instead of just 10, but considering I forgot to switch it off the other night AGAIN, that might not be such a good idea.

Technorati Tags: asda, bottle, cola, drink, fentimans, lovely

Well, I’ve moved desks again at work. I’m now sat on a desk, with a crap Dell keyboard, that’s had more to eat than I have. You shake it, there’s about 6 bags of crisps falling out. I can”t be arsed to type about that place any more, as every time I mention it, it seems to be getting worse.

Moving on swiftly, I’m going to be adding a new section to the gallery in the very near future. Yes, I’m finally going to be adding a streetlighting section - something which I’ve been promising since I started this site off. I’ve had more time than usual thanks to my work shifts, so I’ve had change to sort through 5Gbs of photos and get the best images, etc. I’m sure you’ll all be gripped.

Anyway. I managed to get “Invincible” by Carola. I did one of my good old drunken postings on this particular song the other night…

It’s another drunken theme music post! God, it’s not as if these occur every time Halley’s Comet appears, or anything.

It arrived this morning, just in the nick of time. Literally. Yoy can’t have failed to notice that we have two dogs who love to digest anythihg that falls through our letterbox. No sooner had I placed the dogs in the front room with the door closed, I’d returned upstairs to hear them barking. Yes, the postman had turned up. If I’d have not bothered with the dogs, that CD single would have been a chewed, devastaed mess on the floor. Luckily, it didn’t get chewed, therefore it wasn’t.

Ok, so I never finished it, but you get the general idea. Played it, loved it. Got some beer, got headphones, loved it more, and so on.

Technorati Tags: athletics, carola, eurovision, evighet, invincible, Music, television, theme

(Image Removed)

But at least it looks pretty.

In other news, the car goes in for its MOT today. Will it pass with flying colours? Or will it be another £300 to fix? My guess is the latter. Which means it might get scrapped. I’ll update on the situation once I know more.

Oh, and as for my previous post about the BBC Athletics theme, I now have it on CD. Or, at least, the Swedish version (which is called “Evighet”, presumably that’s Swedish for “Invincible”), and it includes the instrumental. And that, to me, is all that’s important.

EDIT: Somewhat amazingly, the car passed its MOT, with only a little complaint about the tyres - they’re nearing the legal limit. But that shouldn’t be a problem.

Technorati Tags: car, Ebay, pointless, removed image, website