I know what he does during the year!

Heather and I have decided to "redo" our living room, decorate, carpets etc. With this in mind we went to B&Q, Homebase etc to look at new fireplaces. There was plenty of choice bit nobody who could really help and advise us. So we went to a small shop in Birkdale, Southport which just sells Fireplaces called "Blazes".

We walked into the shop and had a look round. A small man with a beard sat at a desk asked if he could help. So we explained that we where looking at changing our fireplace.

"Where do you live?" he asked

"Ormskirk" we replied

"Where abouts in Ormskirk"

"On the corner of Burscough Street and County Road"

"Oh yes I know the type of house"

He then went on to describe the type of flue that we possess and a pretty accurate description of our fireplace. He then on to tell us what we had to do to get a modern looking fireplace.

We where very impressed.

But after telling Jason, at work, about this man we have to ask the following questions. Who knows a lot about fireplaces? When I walked into the shop was there a slight whiff of reindeer droppings? (how do I know what reindeer droppings smell like) Did he laugh with a bit of a Ho Ho Ho!?

I bet its him!!!

New Christians

I have just got back from a tea at our church/corps for new Christians. We all had a fabulous evening (thanks Val for the great gammon). I think the hope was that new people to our church would recognise us as ordinary people. Heather and I will be running a Journeys course on Friday evening from next week, so we need to plan for that.

The next time I will meet some of these people will be on Sunday when I will be wearing my uniform. I spent some time explaining that will be the same person even though I will be look odd.

MacBook

Well I have finally left the Microsoft family and bought a Macbook. This is my first post on my lovely new Macbook. Does it look any different?

Sorry about your weight

I may have blogged about this before, but I enjoy listening out for corporate speak. McDonalds are typical. Before they had a partnership with Coke, they had their own cola drink. It was obviously policy for all the restaurant staff to correct customers if they asked for a Coke to say "McDonalds Cola?". I would always pause and say "Oh I'll have an orange, please" (Ha Ha).

It now seems policy for staff to say "Sorry about your wait" when the food is more than a couple of minutes in coming. There are several things about this quote, firstly the staff delivery the line with as much feeling as "Can help you" in the first place. So they are obviously not sorry themselves. As it seems to be customer policy to apologize for the food to take some time, perhaps it McDonalds corporate who are showing sorrow. Now we all know this isn't possible, so perhaps they think we will all think McDonalds is a wonderful company if they staff show remorse for late cold food and we will all spend more money there.

So I have decided they they are not apologising for the late food but for selling fattening food, hence "Sorry about your weight". I have decided to join Heather on her diet, thus spending less time in McDonalds more time eating vegetables.

Having said all this we had breakfast there last Saturday.

Roots 08 weekend II

Having been on the Roots "behind the scenes" team now for a number of years, I notice a trait within the people who work there. This trait is their single mindedness to achieve the mission of the event, to provide an event which inspires and equips the Salvation Army for spiritual renewal. Everyone works towards this aim.

I want this for my home church/corps in Liverpool. This weekend our songsters are going to Cardiff to sing in their corps, I hope that they recognise a single mindedness in us this weekend, to sing praises to the Lord and to glimpse him through us.

Grandma 1906 -2008

My Grandma died last week. But it was a happy event for our family. She was 101 and was ready to go to heaven.

About 1906
Roosevelt was the American President
The Prime Minister was Henry Campbell-Bannerman (In fact he was the first Prime Minister)
Sadly Liverpool won the first division title
More happily Everton won the FA Cup
The first radio broadcast in 1906
Cornflakes where invented in 1906

Of course the main world event of 1906 was the San Fancisco earthquake.

Grandma was 6 when the First World War started
She was 33 when the Second World War started

Grandma left school and went to work in the cotton mills of Burnley when she was only young.

She went to the Salvation Army Training College, her flag was removed from the main assembly hall recently to make way for newer flags.

There is a small book that she wrote with the help of my mum, of her life which is really interesting.

Grandma shared her birth and death year with Albert Hofman, the man who invented LSD??!!

Roots 08 weekend I

Well, Roots 08 has been and gone. And I sit here thinking about all the work that went in, and all the new people I met and the worry etc. (I have run the stewarding team (with Heather) for the last four years). We had more than 70 stewards this year which manned 8 different locations with 21 different time slots more than 650 stewarding events.

I can't think what my highlight was. Overall I think it was a relieve that everything went OK and people where kept save. The Big Top didn't burn down. Nobody pinched half of the resource zone. Everyone worked really hard to make sure it was a success.

I took Tuesday off on holiday and normally I would go back to Southport and see the Big Top in different states of decommissioning. This year I didn't because it was Grandmas funeral at our Salvation Army. We had a good band and almost a full Songsters. A lot of my family came down from Aberdeen to the funeral and it was really great to see them. I wish we could have spent longer together as I have not seen them for some time and some I have not met at all yet.

I must get to Aberdeen soon.

I'll post some pictures when I get them.

Trying not to be bitter

Alistair has just taken delivery of his new Macbook. I'm trying not to be too bitter, but I am writing this post on his shiny white new laptop and I am very impressed with the equipment (the keyboard, although it looks fragile, is firm and reassuring, the screen is bright and very clear.) and the operating system (It does loads of really cool stuff). 

I am now saving up...

Alistairs birthday

Alistair is 18 on Friday. We had a surprisen birthday party for him on Saturday night. He really had no idea, he was totally surprised. Despite following one of his friends from school into the Salvation Army car park!!?? Heather and I both took Friday off to prepare food and get the place in shape. All his cousins, uncles and aunties where there and Deb and Will came from London.

I'll post the picturs on my new Flickr account.

I like this ... Ubuntu

I have been increasing getting fed up with Windows products. So when a PC at home required a rebuild, I have installed Ubuntu Linux. It comes with all sorts of software (including Open Office, same as Microsoft office but free), it looks great and is really easy to use.

I would highly recommend.

The Apprentice

A new series of Apprentice has just started on BBC 1. All the relevant stereotypes that have done the series proud over the past few series seem to be present.

Eye Candy for the boys
Eye Candy for the girls
Pompous idiots abound
Upper class idiot
Ex Barrow boy
Piece of rough for both sexes

All with "made up" job titles. (Global Pricing Leader?)

I like these .... Biscuits

Heather reckons these are the best biscuits in the world

Marks and Spencer Viennese biscuit Selection

I agree. We have almost eaten all of them tonight.

Getting around Ikea

On Saturday we went to Warrington Ikea. So I have devised the following rules for getting around.
Rule 1. Go around with friends. Make sure you take friends with you to Ikea, You can then focus on taking the mickey out of Ikea with friends rather than just Heather (Because she has heard all of your jokes, although she still laughs politely).

Rule 2. Don't even try to use the shortcuts (the store have installed "men short cuts" which bypass part of the store.) You will get to the end of the store and realise you haven't been to all parts. So you will need to back track and find the bits you have missed.

Rule 3. My friend at work tells me that you need to look out for women in the car park crying. Apparently there are lots, they are crying because they have had a row about what they haven't bought or because they can't get what they have bought into the car.

Rule 4. Always walk slightly ahead of the group you are with. It adds an element of urgency to the expedition.

Rule 5. Never let your guard down. Even towards the end of the store, when you get to the check out, there are items which seem you can't live without. But when you get them home, you will a) wonder what they are for b) Have already bought six and forgotten about c) They will have broken before you get them into the house from the car.

Rule 6. Don't go with kids. You will never get them out of kids bedrooms.

Rule 7. Go just before lunch, so you can spend most of your time in the cafe.

Thanks to Glyn and Jeanette for the inspiration and for the good time on Saturday

I like this .... Design

I have just seen this guy on telly and his stuff looks great

Marc Newson

Hair

We were discussing going to the barbers the other day. I know it's so different when ladies go to the hairdressers, its much more of a social event (they have cups of coffee and everything). There are fewer choices when I go and get my hair cut.

They always ask "What do you want?". They may think I am taking the mickey if I say something like "Can you cut it shorter". I always remember the barber here has so much power, hair grows extremely slowly and they don't seem to be short of customers. So I don't feel in a position of strength, to make some sort of Smart Alec comment. So I always fall back on "Can you tidy it up, please". Which I suppose means "Can you cut it shorter".

But there comes the time when they do give you a choice. And that is "Square or tapered?" Now for a time, I was not always sure what is meant here. So I always said "Square". I have recently changed to "Tapered, please" and I can't tell the difference. So I am thinking perhaps I should ask for tapered on one side and square on the other, but Neil thinks people will look at me strangely.

Perhaps I should go for the more female approach and when the barber asks "What do you want?" give him a picture of Tom Cruise and say "Make me look like him". I bet you will be able to hear the laughter across West Lancs. So it will be "Can you tidy it up please."

Today

It takes 365 and just less than a quarter days for the earth to move back to the same position relatively to the sun. Because of the quarter day, every four years we have a leap day to make sure that the seasons stay in the same place in relation to the year.

This is because the rotation on its own axis is not relational to its rotation around the sun. So it actually turns on its own axis 365.2422 each year.

If the year can be divided by 100 then we do not have a leap day, but if it can be divided by 400 we do have one.

Apparently, we have leap seconds on December 31st. This means we get an extra beep on Radio 4 at midnight.

Hope that clears that up then.

DFL

I had the pleasure of being a facilitator at the Army's Design for Life weekend again this weekend. Based on my last experience, in Scotland, I booked the following Monday (today) on holiday to recover.

I left on Friday morning and arrived at Sunbury Court at 3:20. When I got of the train at Sunbury station I wasn't sure what direction to go in, so I phoned Ray for the address and walked to the local library to find a map. The walk takes you past London Irish Rugby ground and some fairly grand suburban houses. During the 25 minutes walk I did wander if DFL was indeed at Sunbury Court and had visions of a late night dash across London to Denmark Hill which is the other venue used near London. When I got there I couldn't find anybody. I was able to get into the building but not a soul was to be found. Eventually I saw a note on one of doors which said "Kevin's Room", I was relieved.

I made many new friends and renewed friends with someone I had not met for many years. I think everybody agreed it was a fantastic weekend and many people made decisions about their futures.

I left for home at 3:10 on Sunday and arrived home at 9:15.

I may blog some more about the weekend when I have considered everything that went on.

A first time

I am on a e-learner course in Liverpool. As part of the course we have been "introduced" to web 2.0. So this is the first time I have been encouraged as part of my work to post in a blog. I haven't mentioned that this blog has been going now for almost two years.

Firefox

For those of you who use Firefox and Internet Explorer as a browser, Will has introduced me to a marvelous add-in. Its called PicTel. It works with Facebook, Flickr, google images and a few other sites to give a 3d environment to view your pictures.

Give it a go it looks fabulous, and easy to use.

Things we don't have any more

Another list of things we don't have anymore. Alistair and I compiled this list on the way home tonight with my mum and dad.
1. Cars which back fire
2. Any type of computer floppy disk (5 1/4 or 3 1/2 inch or bigger)
3. Casual racism (from the under 50s)
4. Common sense, we now have health and safety rules.
5. Frost on the inside of bedroom windows when you get out of bed.
6. Big prams
7. Independent shops
8. Zebra crossings
9. Slide-rules
10. Logarithms
11. Corporal punishment in schools (at college we now concentrate on pschological abuse:))
12. ITV Childrens programmes