Thanks for all the memories

It's been brought to my attention that I haven't made a post for a long while. It's funny it just doesn't seem as relevant anymore now I'm back here. I feel like the ride is finally over and I have come back down to Earth, not with a crash more of a daze and waking up in a field somewhere or perhaps more literally in an office in Guildford.

That sounded a bit maudlin, but life is good and it  has only been in the last few days that  I have felt the fuzzy cloak of normality surrounding me again. This time perhaps in a funky new shade, but still - normal. "Good or bad, who can say" as a wise gentleman once said to me, just Life I guess.

The blog just hasn't had the same meaning for me somehow, perhaps airing ones dirty washing in public isn't so clever, especially when I'm not on the move anymore! Quite a few things have happened over the past few weeks, perhaps for now they will remain my business, unless you happen to be one of the people I bore with my stuff (thanks to all concerned :)

I may return...

Hands Free Joy

I've never really got the whole hands free phone thing until just now, had to phone all my utilities companies and was on hold for several hours. Using the headphones means you get get on with your life admittedly with your brain being slightly numbed by the tranquilising hold music.
I managed to have a sh*t and brush my teeth whilst on hold with British Gas.

I can't stop spending!

I'm having really money issues at the moment I just can't stop spending and as yet I have only had a weeks pay from the new job. The house money is going fast. Yesterday found myself in HMV buying some CDs, DVDs and a computer game for the first time in years. I had good intentions I was trying to get a book for work, but there was nothing quite appropriate so I got some novels to read and a brilliant book by Banksy the graffiti stencil artist (who I think is from Brighton?) I hate mindless graffiti but some of his stuff is actually quite thoughtful and intelligent and the commentary in his book is really well written and interesting.

One of the DVDs I bought was a series one and two box set of The Mighty Boosh, this is a show I caught at my sisters after coming back from my travels, very surreal and I think totally hilarious. I've already watched half of the first series, it's brilliant!

I seem to be getting sporadic connections to next doors Internet hence I'm able to make this entry and hopefully do some work today. I have to fit in the opening tennis match of the season though.

Friday night live

It was a funny day on Friday, I was desperately trying to get some work done, but everything seemed to be getting in my way. I got up early and tried to log on to the Internet. No joy. I have been piggybacking off my neighbours wireless connection for a couple of weeks now. It's fast, unsecured and it's free, so I thought why not! Unfortunately it seemed like a weaker signal or for some reason unavailable. So I thought it was time I actually registered my NTL connection that I had installed. After fiddling around and contacting technical support (I frightens me how many days of my life have I wasted on hold) I'm informed that they won't be able to take new registrations until Tuesday! So after walking around with my laptop held in the air to try and get a better signal with no success. I get in the car and drive to my friends house to use their connection. As I slow down trying to remember where the shop is that he works to pick up their keys some tit in a 4 by 4, that has obviously never left the urban streets, is beeping an gesticulating at me because I was going slowly. I flicked him the bird and realised how stressed I feel and I think it is the lifestyle in the UK, I'm going to work on this though. Just before I left the house I thought I would shave my barnett and had tried to do it quickly and forced the foreign plug adapter (I bought the clippers in Australia) in so hard that I broke the wall socket
.
So it then takes me an age to get my mates Internet connection up and running and I realise how much my life depends on the web these days. I welcomed the evening arriving and the chance of a pint. There was yet another leaving do (and a birthday) at my old work, so i thought I would go along and they have all started drinking at a new pub. That's quite a big thing for them and annoying for me as it's a small pub and I turn up late and so all the seating is full and I end up hovering fairly uncomfortably. The evening picks up and I chat merrily to folk about my travels/new job etc... until I'm starting to bore myself. Amuse myself by talking to the wee Scottish "mini me" programmer and persuade him that we are getting the eye from a tall and short female combo at the bar. At this point I text my chimp like friend who said he was in town  that night as I think it is time to go. We arrange to meet in a bar not far from mine that seems to stay open until about 2:30am now, brilliant but dangerous for my health and wallet.

The evening was actually quite enjoyable and amusing saw another old Epic boy and had a chin wag. Then me and chimp boy got a seat and got chatting to these two girls who are sat at the table with us. I'm chatting to the one with the big nose and my mate is bending the ear off Debbie Harry as he dubbed her. To cut a long story short we are talking to them on and off for an hour or so and then they leave the bar. After a minute or so Debbie Harry who i haven't talked to at all really comes back in and comes over to me. She says that she thinks I'm great and gives me her number! Thus proving that any male looks amazing after spending an hour talking to my friend ;o) I'm like a rabbit in the headlights struck dumb and she hands me the number and leaves. It honestly wasn't intentional, but I managed to immediately loose the number. I then totally ruin my friends evening by thrashing him 6-0 on pro evolution soccer on the ps2.

Intimidating entry!

After saying I would be keeping the blog going, it has been very near the edge. Before it drops over for ever and the next entry becomes too intimidating to make I better get on with it. It's been quite an extraordinary couple of weeks.
This might come out in dribs and drabs over a sequence of entries. But for starters here is a general synopsis of events.

New job! and it's really good. Bizarrely I met up with the two directors of a small young company ( flaming pear) on the snowboarding trip and was virtually offered a job in the airport on the way home. After spending a day with them in The Lake District to look at an aquarium I thought way not lets give it a go and glad I did.
They make installations for museums and aquariums amongst other things and talking from a programming point of view this is infinitely more interesting than rolling out the same old e-learning templates every day as I did at my last company.

Learning new and interesting things and two days a week from home, fantastic!

In other matters I haven't quite got used to the licencing laws yet I seem to keep finding myself in pubs at ridiculous o'clock. After seeing some of the old work crew on Friday I left them to join my old mate chubs and didn't roll in until about 6am. I woke up with a sudden panic about getting up to London which I had planned to do to see a photography exhibition. Quick wash and grabbed some clothes realised I had bought a packet of pistachio nuts, 3 bounty bars and a 4 pack of yogurts from the garage in my drunken state. It's funny how your mind works when inebriated. Had one of the yogurts and ran for the bus/train.

Had a good day and purchased one of the photos at a very reasonable £25. Went to another gallery with some friends, did a bit of shopping then came home. By this time it was 9:30pm and I'm hungry. Nothing in the flat so phone up for a take away pizza. I'm chatting to a friend on msn when the door buzzer goes I fly out into the hallway and... f**k... I've shut myself out no keys... sh*t... I am stuck in a hallway with a pizza, the light goes out, it's on a timer.

Ok so things get better, I stay at a friends house and my other friend who was staying with me comes back the next morning with the spare set of keys. I know what I'm a Muppet.

Anyway work to do...

Gnarly dude

Well I have to say that was a brilliant 4 days on the piste. It has been a cool way to celebrate my sister's 30th birthday and also two guys on the trip who were also hitting that ripe old age.

I've really caught the 'boarding bug even though I was pretty much the weakest of the 4 boarders (the rest of the group have been skiing... rubbish ;) It's just so much fun and such a rush when you get the board carving away across the snow at breakneck speed (and with my level of control there is every chance of that happening).

All of us ended up a bit bruised and battered and one of the group was walking around with a sling on her arm after a collision with an alpine skier, bless her.

The apres ski was also fantastic and you can almost glide into Crescendos bar from the piste, a very cool place with a very hot girl serving. One of the guys fell in love so we had to go there every opportunity :) I drank far too much, but it was all good fun I have been existing on about 4 hours sleep so I was totally buggered by the end of the trip!

Could be some exciting news on the job front too, watch this space...

Anyway I must get on, I've got some moving to do.

Shunned from society

Never leave Britain

Or maybe more to the point, never come back! It seems that to one and all if you haven't an address or a job, you are total scum.

I made my first visit back to Brighton yesterday after visiting the bank as I thought a payment may come out to pay of the credit card before my money from my savings went in (that 3 days of limbo where the banks make a fortune on stocks trading with your money). I always had no problem in the past temporarily extending my overdraft. This time
"Do you have a regular income coming into the account sir".
"Er no I've just come back from a trip abroad I quit my job before I left".
"Oh... Er... could you f**k off and die then sir".

Anyway it didn't actually matter in the end, but it was a sign of things to come. I wanted to view a few flats in Brighton so I called up Leaders estate agents and they said they would call me back to arrange some veiwings, they said ths the second time I called them too, did they call me, did they f**k. I call again. They take my details,
"Your employer sir".
"I'm not currently employed".
"F**k you sir, goodbye".

Anyway I finally do get to look at a flat I really like and although, I'm now panicking an starting to think, how am I going to pay for this and will I ever be allowed back into civilized society (has anyone ever seen the film Society starts like any other teen 80's film, gets weird). I get handed a wod of forms to fill in and have to use my sister as my guarantor, crazy. I decide that it is actually easier to pay the full 6 months rent, looks like thats what I will do.

It's good to be back!

Actually it has been good. I have been spending time with my sister and my brother-in-law and they are really good fun. J seems to revel in winding up my sister which is quite amusing, she loves it though. Also got to go and see mother too and she is on good form and has got involved in an organization called the University of the 3^rd Age or something, sounds all a bit like the film Cocoon to me, but she assures me that it is all quite innocent an educational.

Also got to see D&T who made me almost want to cry with joy at their reassuring and wonderfully cosey Englishness that II have missed so much. Even briefly saw my chimp like friend on a chance meeting in Brighton town centre, he was on his lunch break and looked kind of like a fairly well off second-hand car salesman in his long coat and scarf. Come on I'm giving you credit mate, I'm sure you would be selling at worst BMWs.

Baby one more time

Unless I have some hours to kill in the airport, this is it the last blog entry of the trip.

Not the end for the blog, I will try and keep it going at least for a while, it's a good way of keeping in touch with folk I know from far flung corners of the world and even from just down the road. I can be crap at keeping in touch sometimes.

It's been pretty damn special. Watch this space...