Can't go wrong right?

Starting with a classic, can't go wrong right? Wrong, that is rather difficult to understand but I'll assume you're all rather clever. Why wrong, mostly because this song has become associated with the ever popular spinning member gif. If you are unfamiliar with the rotating meat I am referring to then I urge you NOT to google it. Sooner or later it'll likely enter your life and you will be forever scarred/giggly/curious.

So after a month of furious dieting, I get pretty furious when I am calorie restricted, I have lost around 6.5kg. That's just over a stone or 14 pounds. Which puts me back at the weight I was this time last year and the same weight I was in 2007! Do you get my circular reference yet?

Just as the fat is rendering off my physique I get an offer I can rarely refuse, all you can eat buffet! This was offered to me by my fellow crafstman Swapnal. One of a few socially accepted situations for eating more than what is considered civilised/ necessary/ humanly possible. Naturally I headed online to my all you can eat go to guy, Furious Pete. He's a competitive eater who holds the world record for eating a 12 inch pizza in the fastest time, anyone care to guess? 43 seconds. Yep and what makes it more impressive is that you have to use a knife and fork, only eat one slice at a time and whatever is on your fork has to go in your mouth. Oh and he's super ripped.

His advice is to get value for money. Aim to eat three times the cost of the buffet e.g. £20 buffet = £60 worth of food consumed. Eat meat is pretty much the order of the day and high end seafood. Now this sits well with me as I'm planning on only eating protein. But the buffet plan runs out of steam and I'm sat with all this buffet wisdom and nothing to do with it. Like the majority of facts rattling around in my sponge-like brain.

I did have the joy of sitting in several carparks for several hours, this past week. Well that's to do with my current occupation, still steeped in secrecy so I'll leave y'all to draw your own conclusions. Whilst sat in one of the car parks I noticed a lady wearing a cardigan, clutching a fistful of it around the collar bone area. Not so strange as bag straps rest around that area and are notorious for slipping off shoulders. The strange bit is that she was speaking to her hand. As she approached I observed that she was in fact speaking to a puppy that was wrapped in her cardigan around the collar bone area! I also saw a lady who was part of the housekeeping team at Lincoln County, I think here name was Moira. She once told me about how she likes to add whey protein to hot chocolate. I've tried that and it just goes all lumpy and terrible.

I was on Neustadt Welton ward for most of my stay, click here to relive my 5 week journey in four parts!

I also had the chance to sample Morrison's fresh ground coffee, it's truly terrible. Weak and lukewarm. Maybe I just like overly strong coffee. Then again I once had an espresso that's right not expresso but espresso. A truth that was revealed to me by a co worker by the name of Chris. Back to that one time I tried and espresso, it was terrible. But terribly strong not terrible full stop. The acquaintance I was frequenting the establishment with commented that their dad drinks espresso and asked me why I'd gotten espresso? My answer was because I'd never had one before. I did the same with root beer once whilst attempting my one and only eating challenge to date. It's like fizzy deep heat, not my cup of tea. I guess I owe my tendency to try things I never have from Senor Phaseler Yeah so don't bother with Morrison's coffee is what I'm saying.

And now onto the controversy with Frank's Redhot sauce. I knew from previous...observation? I'd read the bottle. I knew it was high in salt and sugar. Strange I know that a hot sauce would be high in sugar! But it is made from peppers and so it makes sense that there's a fair bit of sugar in the concentrated sauce. Somehow or other I end up looking up the product on Amazon. They sell it in bigger bottles and they also have the option to purchase a 3.78 litre bottle. Scale often defeats me so imagine your classic 2.272 litre bottle of milk or 4 pinter in old money. This bottle of hot sauce is 66% bigger! I know statistics make everything way more exciting (!)

1000 words?

Not sure if you can see the label, click pic to enlarge. Says there zero sugar! Now this does not tally with my previous observation. So after a few days of not reading the bottle I've got kicking about the house I read it, lo and behold there's loads of sugar present, at least according to the label. Now I'd been off the hot sauce because of all the salt and sugar. But this confusion left me wanting some spiciness in my life. So I decide to get it out of my system and douse my salad in red hot. Made it a whole lot more interesting. Now I know you all trust me to the ends of the earth but seeing is believing, right? Wrong! Anyone seen swordfish? The film not the animal.

Click to make enormous!

You know this is my desk for sure. For one my centuries old phone is in the background, still works btw. Likely mentioned that the calender runs out, as in when you try and scroll past the 31st of December 2014 it won't let you. It's Y2K all over again! Albeit on a very local level. You may have spotted the scuffed coaster, JD coasters boi! I get JD freebies on account of being awesome. Passport holder, keyrings, calenders, ice cube bags, spice rub, basting brush, signage, cocktail mixer and so on! There is also the egg on top of the reflective ting to the left of the picture. The reflective thins is a another freebie I got from 3M the egg is hewn from onyx. My broskis theory is that if you can get it hatch then you'll get an actual onix.

Cropped and zoomed for your viewing pleasure.

You can see my centuries old phone! Yeah so what's the deal Franks!?!? Why the sugar in your super market stuff? But not in the mahoosive bottles available on amazon!!?!! I think it's a fifo stock management thing but I did briefly go all conspiracy theory an think it was a ploy to keep the UK hooked in a diet that was way too high in sugar. Well now you know...

My dear old dad has exited the country en route to the land of my ancestors, Magrathea. If you get that reference then there is a very special place in my heart for you :-D I am of course descended from people who lived in the vicinity of the Indus valley. Before departing I was asked what I considered success. I gave a generally woolly answer, not a fan of answering such big questions. Something along the lines of it's different for different people. Cash = success, perhaps. I think I landed on leaving the world better than you found it.

Ooh and my old, old dog. Long time readers will be familiar with the living legend that is Tim the Labrador. He featured in my first few blog posts and I recently asked my brother how old he was. Tim lives with me but I am terrible at remembering how old anyone is. He's thirteen, fourteen on the 18th of March next year. Now for some reason or other I thought he was only eleven. Thirteen is ruddy old for a labrador! According to a calculator that makes him 86. In another two years and four months he'd be 100!

He's being have, get it? You can read the older stuff about my awesomely old dog here and here.

Around this time for the past few years I get a bit of a louder shout from life, universe and everything.

2012 my little brother went to uni
2013 I became ruptured two discs and became pretty much paralysed from the waist down
2014 more people moving away, death and cancer.

The death was in a friends family, tragically young. The cancer has nothing to do with anyone I know. Well there is a lovely young lady who is kicking hodgkins lymphoma's ass right now. I know her in so much as I spoke to her whilst representing my house, Johnson, in the the interhouse netball tournie. I sprained my ankle for the millionth time during that tournie. She writes a blog! The cancer that surprised me this time was Furious Pete's. The fella I mentioned earlier. Turns out he had a cancerous testicle, he had it removed and it appears that it hadn't spread so the outlook is promising. His message subsequently was to seek out help if you need it. Don't wait. So this is me repeating that sound advice. Tell someone, call someone, do something.

 

He says it much better than I do. 

So as not to end of such a sombre note here is a fantastic disneyfied cake to fulfil your cake gif needs.

Click to see more about this awesome cake!

Moustache woes

This week I've been given the helm of the good ship local. The usual helmsman, a flamboyant yorkshire man, is away on holiday. In his absence we have come to realise that he does way more than you think. Spending a fair bit of time emailing here n there.

I've also stopped trimming my beard back to a pedestrian length. I think it looks better for it but now my moustache is being unruly. It appears to have split into four separate parts. The bit that's directly under my nostrils, separated by my philtrum, and the side bits.

What do I do with the bits that won't be tamed? shorten them? Wait to see if they become more tameable as time passes? Any moustache aficionados out there want to help a brother out? Of course there are loads of you packing a killer tache out there that just aren't willing to post a helpful comment...just because you bleach your moustache doesn't mean it's gone!

There is a hedgehog that lives somewhere in my front garden. It may well be the same one from here:
http://mgb2000x.blogspot.com/2013/04/tim-labrador-and-legend.html

That's him there he's 12 but still has the same level of enthusiasm as he had as a pup. Even though he sees me every day! How does he do it, if I saw me near enough every day for 12 years I'd get pretty sick of me. Lovely fellow.

Saw him after driving back from Marc's farewell picnic. was sat in the drive that time. This time he, dunno if it's a he or a she tbh, was wandering around the front garden. I got within my explosive closing distance. This is the distance at which you can not escape my grasp. From my days as a street fighter/rugby player. So I could've dived, grabbed the hog and rolled to my feet in triumph. Well at least that's how it goes in my head. In reality I think I would have either landed on the hog from the hedge or missed it altogether and faceplanted on the lawn. This bit is just so I don't leave and odd bit of line sticking out. Well I think it looks awful so these words are odd filler.

So the working week ended with a nice surprise. I was awarded a bottle of wine! For services to transport, I basically ferry the workforce to and from work. Only other thing I'd gotten from work to date was free milk, a rather fetching fleece and getting to meet some rather kickass individuals :D

Got back in touch with an old acquaintance, always nice to hear from folk from my past. Now I realise the past doesn't exist it's just an illusion created by memory etc. Anyone who I haven't been in contact with for a while do just randomly drop me a line. I spend a lot of my time working out, reading, gaming and writing these monstrous morsels of verbosity. So if you do get in touch you will be disrupting goings on of the highest importance (!)

I finally got a frame for the awesome photo Marc gave me before he left Lincoln forever. I also stuck a quote I got someone to write for me in a frame. If you are reading this thank you for indulging me so often. It shall fit in nicely amongst all the other things that I have inexplicably held onto over the years. A pheasant's tail feather, a swiss milk thing, three old watches, a small empty bottle of Jack Daniels, an enormous empty bottle of grolsch, some black lightning. That's right I have trapped black lightning and I'm storing it in my room.

This week was also the first time I used a nose hair trimmer. Graham Norton was a guest on the one show, some time ago, and asked Adrian Chiles if he'd ever used a nose hair trimmer. Adrian was saw this a question that crossed some boundaries but reluctantly answered yes. Graham went on to describe it being a lot like what it would be like to put a bee up your nose. I can confirm that Graham was right it is a lot like having a bee up your nose.

Now I haven't had a bee up my nose but I have had a wasp up my nose before. I was young and someone had dropped some cake, thus attracting wasps to the scene. I was too busy charging around being a small boy to pay attention to the small swarm that had amassed in the vicinity. One went up my nose and I nonchalantly closed the other nostril and blew it out. One mother observed this and the word spread like wildfire eventually reaching the ears of my overprotective mother. She descended in a flurry of high pitched worry. I was fine of course and insisted that she unhand me immediately so I may continue haphazardly running about.

Now some time my world was jolted quite a bit details are strewn across this blog so I shan't repeat myself. One of the things that I stopped doing subsequent to what happened was polishing my shoes. Since I was in year eight I have always polished my shoes every week, now that's thirteen years.

Anyone out there, who doesn't know how old I am, care to hazard a guess based on the previous statement? I thought not...

Anyway it's been a couple of months of not polishing my shoes and today I buffed up the badboys :D. Now this may be something that I am blowing out of all proportion but I think it shows I'm moving on. Funny thing is I'm living on my own atm and I thought that this would lead to me descending into the depths of depression and darkness. But quite the opposite, I caught myself getting out of bed dancing! I've actually been dancing a rather frequently. Now dancing is something I LOVE to do. I can't emphasise how much I love to dance! This is not me bragging about how amazing I am at dancing, as I am average at best. But it just fills me with such awesomeness :D

I've also realised that I do like to write shopping lists, get in the car and drive to the supermarket without the list!

Sunday, I awoke and got my yoga on. Today was to be the day for afternoon tea! Or so I thought...
I was masterfully manipulated into going to Damon's Restaurant and Motel by the that sly siren of subtle suasiveness E Bizzle! I'm being unfair as all it took was a simple question, Damon's? Spent a good proportion of my morning fretting over whether or not I would be able to find a house I had been to at least a dozen times. The issue is that I had always been directed to the house and as such had never had any reason to commit it to memory! Luckily I knew the view from the window as it was the desktop background of aforementioned suasive siren. Funny thing is once I pulled up outside the house and looked into one of the windows I knew I was at the right place. I could see the outline of a disney princess or two.

Bit of a drive hither and dither which I thoroughly enjoyed. I love to drive. I've been driving for as long as I can remember and I've likely done more miles than most people my age. I've probs covered 15,000 miles a year at least, so 10 years on the road = 150,000 miles! I once did 2000 miles in a week! Ah I sure have spent many hours on the road.

After the road we pulled into Damon's and I was reunited with my old friend the chicken wing! I've not partaken of this poultry delight since my defeat, which can be seen here https://www.facebook.com/ribsnbibs Look for a sincere face of defeat wearing a rather kickass T. They have not been spoilt by the experience and I polished of 10 :D There is a bold claim from my fiendish fellow foodie that the ribs at Damon's are better than the ribs at Ribs'n'Bibs. Having never tasted the ribs from the latter I would like to ascertain by a show of hands which is better? Or we could differ to Harry Hill's preferred method of settling stalemates...FIGHT!

The ribs were rather lovely, ooh I almost forgot I had bread for the first time since the BBQ at Birchwood! Carbohydrates I hate you but I love you...

As a result of the awesomeness of the ribs my hands now smell delightfully smokey and sweet! What followed was a banoffee pie with ice cream. I've not been so full in quite a while and was unable to polish off the slice! I have grown weak in my old age...or all this dieting has actually depleted my previously inexhaustible reserves of gastric capacity. A short drive back to the house and we parted company. I always hate it when a party ends but then again from what I can see this is one long party...

Me myself and I...

This week wasn't the usual. For one my dog, Tim, lost his vitality. His back leg swelled up to a ridiculous size and he stopped eating. Now this is a fellow who once got into the garage and ate around 10 kg of Bakers dog food and would've eaten more had he not been caught in the act!

Turned out that it was because he couldn't stand up and bend down because he couldn't put any weight on his bad leg. So with the help of out trusty washing machine part we manage to get it to a height he's comfortable eating from!

Now this part is not to be confused with the drum.
The drum looks like this:

Kinda like a cheese grater on steroids. This other thing is what the drum sits inside. Anyone have any idea of what its called?

If you're wondering why I've got a collection of washing machine bits it's because the old washing machine broke and I systematically dismantled it. We use the hollow shell for burning hedge clippings etc.

Now the next morning he won't eat regardless of what I try. Normally when I go to see him in the morning he's full of life and bouncing because that's what tiggers do best! But today he limps out and just looks at me. He's an old man now but I wasn't expecting such a dramatic shift in the space of a few days.

Dad's about so he'll take to the vet asap. I man up and head off to work. On the drive I pretty much resign myself to the possibility of Tim's death. And strangely it doesn't bother me. He's old and struggling it makes sense for him to go now. He pops up in my mind from time to time as I'm at work but I'm feeling the same way as earlier. On the drive back I remember him as a puppy and all the little foibles that let me know that it's him for sure. Now I can't stand the thought of him dying.

Funny thing about Tim is that I spent the most time with him out of our family so he always responded to me the most out of everyone. In a way I raised him and because he was really strong I was pretty much the only one that could walk him properly. And now this crazy, always upbeat creature is going to die!

When I get home my dad and bro talk me through the details of the visit to the vet in clinical detail. Dad's a GP and my bro is a medical student, standard I know for a Sri Lankan family. Turns out that he should be fine within a week with antibiotics and anti inflammatories. The next day his appetite is back and his joy for life is back too. Now this highlights something of a shortcoming in myself. This is that I have managed to suffer something that does not exist. That is to say I suffered my dogs death and he didn't even die!

Madness right? But I do this with sooo much stuff it's unreal. You know the what ifs etc. Considering the possibility is fine, so you can prep an adequate response/countermeasure. But why go through all the negative emotion and suffering? Long way to go for sure.

The team leader in all but name of team local went on holiday this week. Leaving myself and James to hold down the fort in his absence. He deserves a holiday as he does beaver away like his life depends on it every day! I tend to have fluctuations in my productivity depending on blood sugar, stimulant levels, sleep etc. He's a bit like a force of nature when it comes to work, unrelenting. His eyelashes, which he had tinted the previous weekend, have gone black making it look like he's wearing mascara. #nightmare

Ooh and on the way to work we spotted Eleanor! She was heading to her new job as a B2B sales something...my memory is failing me! A sure sign that it's a little late in the day for writing detailed shtuff...00:40 time for bed?

Nope gonna plough ahead! My folks and my bro are heading off to Sri Lanka for four weeks. No biggie right? Indeed it's not but it's the first time I won't be going along with them. I was always the go to back up dude when dad wasn't quite on the money with something. Also I was the one who lugged our uber heavy bags everywhere. Not to mention all the family I'll be missing out on.

Now when I say all the family they are mostly based on Sri Lanka. And there are hoards of em. Where else round the world do I have family? Well India, Austrailia, Denmark, America, France, Germany, UAE and there are others kicking about that I won't have heard of in remote bits of the globe for sure.

Dropped them off at the airport drove back home. Driving there n back I saw signs for the warner bros studio tour and thought to myself I must go one of these days. On my return home I check FB and strangely enough a relatively new old work friend is there today! Does the term make sense "new old work friend" ? I've only met her relatively recently at work, December 2012, and we no longer work together.

Anyway get back and go into shoonya, it's hard to explain but I'll give it a go. Actually I won't because it'll go on for wayyy too long and ain't nobody got time for that! Off to the shops to get some supplies and back home in time to realise I've missed half the final of the voice.

For dinner I decided to have a whole roast chicken. Something I wouldn't think twice about in my younger days. Today I barely managed to get past the halfway point! When did I become so normal, with regards to my ability to eat large quantities of food? I've actually changed! Urgh I don't want to be old and sensible.

Here is where I went to bed...but this next bit happened before I went to bed Saturday night.

Delve into some pics and this throws up some relatively new old emotions I haven't properly dealt with. And I am feeling down town Lester Brown and it's only getting worse. Then boom, kapow, crash and all those other classic Batman sound effects that made the show so kick ass! Are they really sound effects? Cos they used to flash on screen like this:

Anyway it was super big moon that I  saw from my state of regression. And it's super bigness snapped me right out of my down-ness. Ah moon meister is there anything you can't do?

Peculiar dreams about people from my recent past. Nothing particularly peculiar but very detailed storylines.

Guess what I did on Sunday? Andrenaline maxing ironing of course! I actually did it over a few hours and ironed all sorts of shtuff.. Also dug out a pair of trousers that I didn't even know I had! Was gonna finish on a cliché but I've resisted the urge.

Ooh Man of Steel! The day after the BBQ in Birchwood, I headed of to the Odeon in Lincoln to see Man of Steel. Now the ads look great and I am an uberley massive Superman fan since I was like 5 so I am well hyped for the film :D Also had my first KFC in many years, thoroughly underwhelmed. Get to the screen and sit through the inevitable trailers. And the film kicks off. In short it has it's moments but as a whole it's a little disjointed and I don't really care about the characters. There is a twist at the end which made me cry. Some of may say I cry rather frequently but this is a real heart wrencher.

This quote "You will give the people an ideal to strive towards. They will race behind you, they will stumble, they will fall. But in time, they will join you in the sun. In time, you will help them accomplish wonders." Gandhi said "you must be the change you wish to see in the world." I always look for the nuggets of truth/messages that writers are trying to convey. This is such a powerful message. If that's all you take away from the film then it was worth it.

***SPOILER***The early years stuff is good, Clark has to show restraint and hates it every step of the way. Even when he saves the lives of a school bus full of kids his dad gives him a bit of a bollocking. His wandering and childish outburst at a douchebag trucker are good. Him on fire on an oilrig and smashing Zod are awesome. Reminds me of Ichigo's ultimate facepalm on Aizen. Then there are bits on Krypton which kinda conflict with what I'd always held to be the truth in that universe. But I've not read enough of the comics to comment.***SPOILER***

***SPOILER***I was hoping for Brainiac, that badass SOB would represent a real threat. Did like the nods to luthercorp in the film suggesting the crazy rich guy is still kicking it. There is a massive 10 minute fight at the end which culminates in Zod letting loose on civilians. Now he's military and this is a terrorist tactic that his "honour" wouldn't allow him to use. At least that's my thinking but there he is using his heat vision towards unarmed humans. Superman has him in a in a headlock and has to kill him or watch as people die. He breaks Zod's neck. That's the point I noticed there were tears streaming down my face. ***SPOILER***

Here's the stupid thing about my now that I've written it down it seems like it was a good film! It's just that it didn't blow me away like I was hoping it would. What was the last film to blow me away? 300?

Tim: Labrador and Legend pt.2

So was walking my dog, Tim, a few days ago and he decides to drop a deuce. So me, being the responsible owner, stand and wait bag in hand. I hear some rustling from a nearby garden gate and assume that a neighbour is about to walk out and inevitably engage me in awkward conversation as Tim nonchalantly relieves himself on the pavement.

To my surprise a black cat pops it's head over the fence and proceeds to climb on to the gate. Upon spotting myself and Tim it freezes in it's tracks. A couple of seconds later a large, fluffy white n ginger cat climbs onto the fence behind the black one and seems perplexed by what the hold up is. The one behind is protesting loudly and shoving the other one, the one in front struggling to resist the others incessant nudging.

The fluffy cat pushes past and instantly notices myself and Tim and freezes. So the scene is my dog taking a deuce on the pavement, while I standby with a bag, and two cats are perched on the gate trying to be invisible!

Tim: Labrador and Legend

So Tim, my faithful 11 year old Labrador has barked 2 nights in a row. Something he rarely does, yesterday at 03:00 and today at around 21:30.

So a wander outside, torch in hand, and start spouting the general gibberish I reserve for Tim whilst haphazardly wafting the torchlight hither and dither.

And what do I see but a small ball of spikes no more that 2 feet from the door. Tim's herded this hedgehog to the door and has summoned me to deal with it :D

So I don a pair of builders gloves and gingerly pick it up and deposit it some distance away near some hedges, the natural habitat of oh the hedgehog!