.. except I dont smoke.

I have completed the minimum. The 'everything I needed to do before Monday' is now done. Oh, dont get me wrong, there is still plenty of more I could do- but at least I can sit back and think "none of it is urgent" and any more that I do do will be a bonus.

It is 2pm and I started at 9am (with 30 mins break) that makes er.... uhm... er... A hundedder and twelvety seven Minuteyseconds. That's Numberwang!

Most of the references were easy to write because I had quite a load of info, and considering they are the pupils who are looking for Oxbridge/Medvet courses, they are the type of pupil who will have everything organised and have lots to write about.
Excpet one. His looks a little bare. But it's behind me now. (Now I am waiting for sub to make a comment about a Bare Behind )

Have a cup of tea and a biscuit!

If you havent guessed, I am having a break. I have written five and a half of the eight references that I have to do today.

And I have been at it for 2 nd a half hours

Now its time to put my feet up for a bit.

I tell you what, I really miss Bogies!

Up early on a Saturday again, but this time it is not just to ay goodbye to my OH. I anaged to do a good few hours of preparation last night and today I have to write several references. Depending on ho much information I have got, it could take four hours or even longer! What I know is this: I must try to finish it today as I want to have a day off tomorrow.

So I am going to be hard at it today (oo-er missus)

Right now. I have seen it. The last two episodes of Lost. SO what was that all about then? Is Pen (or even her father) important to the island? Or is she just searching for Desmond? But how would she know to look for Electromagnetic pulses?
And was Elizabeth who gave Dae the boat, the same person as Libby, who got shot?

And is the whole button thing over now? What do we all think?

ANd is it true that you cannot tickle yourself? 'Cos I am pretty sure I can.

PS I managed to sneak up on that spider that was hiding in my wing mirror this morning. It was hanging around on its web, so I knocked it onto the floor. Haha. It will now have to find somewhere else to live. Except now I have a vacant wing mirror. I bet another spider moves in and squats there. It will probably be bigger and uglier than the previous one, and il probably have a crack habit and run dope deals from its new wing mirror opium den. And then there will be Police SWAT raids on the wing mirror and sniper shoot outs, and the neghbourhood will never be the same again.
Damn, I miss the other one now. He was much more neighbourly. There were never any problems when he lved there!

Right. I am spending 1 hour relaxing and then I have a ton of stuff to do. I once said that I treid not to bring work home, but this weekend I havent had a choice. And I have tons to do. I'm not sure how long it's going to take me, but I do know it has to be done. Loads of marking and references to write.
But I have been working no stop today, so I think I deserve an hours break at least before getting down to it.

I may be back on line later if the tower of paper lets me.
If you see a small hand waving from a sea of paperwork, that'll be me drowning....

But not for another hour!

Good News
Looks like Richard Hammond is gonna make a full recovery, even if it does take a long time. He has apparently been urgint the Beeb to keep making Top Gear, as they have been planning to postpone it until his ful recovery. But the Hamster has been telling the Beeb that it should continue to be screened, and that he will even make live reports from the hospital so as to make an appearance on the show! So I will be looking forward to reports of wheelchair races down the corridors.
Still I m glad he is getting better!

Bad News!
ITV have leaked reports that they are going to bring back Supermarket sweep! With the Human satsuma himself- Dale Winton (Does that make him a Satsuman?). Dale is said to be very excited by the return, as he likes to spend time with fresh fruits.
So soon Daytime TV will be inundated with silly clues to Food items, for example
"This yellow spread will make you flustered.
IT's hot on beef. the spread is ......"

er...

Is it sandwich spread Dale?

Sitting down with a nice cup of tea and a chocolate biscuit. Watching the homely program Wire in the Blood about gruesome, bloody serial killers.

It's like being back in the fities.

Last night I went to bed... at 9pm. I was so tired I needed an early night. My OH hast been well so we were both in need of an early night. I cannot believe I slept so much.

After getting home from work this evening, I was met by a huge electrical jigsaw puzzle. We have a Stereo stack system which is quite old but really good quality- until recently the CD player hasn’t been working. So my OH decided to send it to the menders. They needed to take several pieces of it, which meant that my OH had to unhook all the complicated wiring behind.
Today we got the pieces back.
And I was charged with the task of reassembling the wiring. However I had no clue as to how it was before the she took it apart.
And every time I asked "Did this bit go here" I got the reply "Yes... or maybe no"
"Well can't you remember? You took it apart"
"Er.. I remember it definitely did... or didn’t go there"
SO I spent half an hour trying to figure how to put all the pieces back together. Eventually i got it to work again, and we had a nice little dance to an old Kylie track.

And tonight I have had a beer and some wine, which is unusual for me- especially before 7pm. But it has been Wednesday, and Wednesdays need a drink to finish it off.

Anyway I must go back to loading the MSword and Excel software onto the new laptop. I cannae live without it. And I find that MSworks is just pants!

A poem by CJ

A quick poem based on Subby's little chair.

It's a hard life being a chair
by CJ

It's a hard life being a chair
I'll never be top of the class
I spend all my life being sat on
And feeling a total arse

A strange thing happened to me last night/ this morning; on of my contact lenses disappeared. I took them out as normal last night, placing on of them in the left hand dish of the little double pot and then placed the other in the right hand side of the little double pot. The pot lids are different colours but that doesn’t bother me as both my lenses are the same strength. I tightened up the lids safe in the knowledge that my lenses were safely being sterilised like a eunuch at a vasectomy clinic.
And yet this morning, when I went to place the little darling in my eyes, I had a surprise. I opened the pot on the left, tipped the contents on the palm of my hand found the little plastic disc and placed it in my eye. But when I tipped the right side pot onto the palm of my hand- no lens was there! The pot was empty! I searched my palm thoroughly, then the pot- just in case it was still clinging to the sides for safety. But still it wasn’t there. SO I checked the sink, just in case it had fallen, but still it wasn’t there. The lens had gone! But how was this possible? How can a lens that was securely fastened in a hermetically sealed container suddenly disappear? It's a mystery. If only Jonathan Creek were here.
AS I can see it there are only three real possible solutions to this conundrum
1) During the night, a team of highly trained spiders acted out a well organised operation to release the contact lens so they could use it in their spider Frisbee competition.
or
2) There is a magical portal at the bottom of my contact lens case and somehow the disc managed to slip through into another dimension. There may be a wicked Cyclops in some magical land that is now impressing their optician with their improved vision, before eating him
or
3) Something else.
But I can't believe it's the last one because that would be beyond belief!

And talking of spiders, does anyone else have spiders making homes in their cars win mirrors? When I go to the car in the morning, there are tons of new webs connecting the mirrors to practically anything else that’s around. I am expecting one morning to find the whole car cocooned and I won't be able to get in.... can't imagine explaining that one when I phone in to work. "Sorry I can't get in to work today, the local Spider Frisbee team has cocooned my car."

Some good things.
1) I have managed to successfully climb the personal Everest that is the DVD recorder. Yes I have set it to record and it did! So I will be all set for the final of Lost tomorrow night. There is no way I will be able to stay up to watch it
and
2) Look what came in the post

Heehee.

Another one for the collection

Today I went to see Hoodwinked. I have just put a review up on it, but seriously, this is one film you gotta see!

And I managed at last to see the episode of Lost that I missed during the week. I knew that Michael had been told to release Henry Gale because of the others, but why are they interested in Jack, Kate, Sawyer and Hurley. I think it may be because each of them had seen people/things on the island. And is this whole thing some sort of psychological test? What are the other doing to Walt? So many questions and the series is coming to an end! I hope somethings get answered soon!

Watching TV is one of things that I enjoy doing to relax. Of an evening my OH and I would just sit and enjoy whatever is on. I know that some people would say 'get a life' but I would have to tell you that we quite enjoy our little life. We can spend hours just laughing in each others company because of what we are watching, or what it has made us talk about. We laugh an awful lot and very loudly. We know this because the Nieihbours have mentioned it. I remember once after Youghurtgate Val (Woman next door) asked if we had heard the row through the walls. When we said yes, she apologised and said they wish they could laugh like we do- which she could hear through the walls!

Anyway I decided to use the new DVD recorder last night, because I wanted to see the Skeleton Key which was on Sky Movies at the same time as Afterlife- and I was not going to miss that! So we recorded onto the HDD on the DVD, which has about 73hours of recording space. Could this mean the end of mucking around with discs?

But back to Afterlife, and what a fantastic episode. The Rat Man was quite freaky! The guy who played the prisoner did it very well. That whole scene in the prison with him and Alison, was so intense! The build up to the Rat Man following her home was good, however I did think the whole 'He wanted to thank me' was a cop out. There was an opportunity to leave a good unfinished storyline there.

What else was good last night? The X-factor. My God Simon can be a smug idiot. When he found out he was getting the under 25's and Louis had got the groups, well I could easily have slapped his face. Although would that have been below the belt? (That was supposed to be an amusing reference to his high waistbands)

And this morning, I managed at last to watch the Scissor sisters live performance on BBC interactive. Cooooooool!

I set up that DVD last night- my god it is so testicle technical. It's one of those ones that automatically downloads the stations through the aerial. And it also looks for freeview channels. However our aerial reception is too crap to pick up freeview channels, so I have over 80 channels looged now on the DVD which are useles to view. And the normal four channels are now logged at position 901 to 904. Thats like right at the other end of the scale!! Anyway, I have told my OH how comicated it can get. But I dont think I need to worry, as whenever she wants something taped it goes ike this...
OH: "Can I record **** please"
Me: "Of course you can"
OH: Pauses a while whilst looking all sweet and lost "Can you do it for me?"

However I am in trouble if the following situation arises

ME: Phoning late from work "I'm gonna be late, can you record something for me?"
OH: Pauses considerably "Err... I'll try"
when I get home
OH: "I'm sorry I dont think it worked."

So It's good to know that I am needed for something

Things I have to do today
1) Set up the new DVD recorder.
Yes, we have bought a new DVD recorder. Well, I say we, what I mean is my OH ordered on and it came yesterday. SO that's a new DVD and Laptop purchased in the space of a week! They are things we have discussed, so it's not out of the blue, but that is the redundancy payout totally used up now. Still I suppose the payout is a 'bonus' in some repsects, although I bloody well earned it after the crap I went through. But I consider it bonus in the way that it is an amount of money extra to the monthly wage.
Speaking of the monthly wage, I should get paid next week. Here's hoping! The Admiral already has his contract, but I havent been given one yet. It may be because the CRB check hasnt come through yet, cos his came through last week.

But seeing as I have mentioned the new laptop, I have loaded the Sims 2 game. I wasnt able to play it very well on the old Lappie because it was tooo slow! But this new lappie plays it very well. So Woohoo!

Anyway, I must go back to watching the Golden Girls. Blanche and Rose have just watched the I Love Lucy Marathon on TV

It's Saturday morning but I didnt quite get up in time to say goodbye to my OH. I was just dead to the world! All I remember is that everynow and then she would walk into the bedroom and say a sentence that I wouldn't understand like
"Can you remember where I put it?"
or
"I've taken it from the dining room in case you were looking for it"
I just had to do the only thing I could, grunt and nod and pretend to be sleepy. However later today if I find I need something from the dining room table or I find something that my OH wanted, then maybe it will make sense. Until then I am happy to be clueless!

Last night I had a great time online with Subbydoo. I hope she has saved the art work we created........ DAMN!

Today Ming smiled at me and said hello.

I have just finished watching BBC2, which has been showing some good comedy tonight. Firstly, the new series of Extras is shaping up very well. Loving the David Bowie song at the end! "Are you having a laff?"
Followed by the Mitchell and Webb Look. And I have to say, I am very tempted to take the hit game show 'NimberWang' into school. Because it will make as much sense as Maths does to some of them!

And if you havent seen it; check this out--it's mad (just like me)

It's Numberwang

I had better say hello now because you never knwo whats going to happen tonight.
The neighbours have popped round to steal our plants. Actually, it's due to the weather warnings that have been given. There is a possibility that we might get the tail end of a tornado tonight, so they are storing all the plants safely.
And thats why I had better say hello now. Especially after the last time there was a tornado, I was away for days and got into all sorts of trouble. But it wasnt my fault. The bloody wind had picked up the house and threw it somewhere else. Somehow or other it managed to land on someone and I got arrested for Manslaughter. Then they thought I had stolen some shoes and I got done for theft as well. Not only that, they had video evidence of me covorting with the local Mafia; Strawface, Metal-Head and Fingers the Pussy!

But hopefully that won't happen again.

Top Gear presenter Richard Hammond has been injured in an accident while filming an edition of the programme, the BBC said.

Hammond, who often drives high-performance cars as part of presenting the show, has been taken to hospital following the incident at an airfield near York.

A BBC spokeswoman said: "The incident happened quite recently and the focus of our attention is on Richard at this stage. "We will make further details known as soon as they are available."

Inspector Mike Thompson, of North Yorkshire Police, said officers were dealing with the incident at the airfield north-east of York.

He said: "At 5.45pm (on Wednesday) evening we received a report via the fire service of a male person trapped in what was described as an overturned jet car which had been driven on the airfield.

"The male occupant has received serious injuries and has been airlifted to hospital at Leeds." He said no further details were available at this time.

Hammond was in a "critical" condition at Leeds General Infirmary, a hospital spokesman said.

A North Yorkshire Police spokesman confirmed the accident happened on Elvington airfield, which is seven miles to the south-east of the city.

He said the presenter was filming an episode of Top Gear at the airfield at the time.

The spokesman added: "Relatives have been informed and are en route to the hospital itself."

I hope he's gonna be Okay. I like him and enjoyed the stuff he does on top gear.

Get well soon!

I am writing this on the new laptop. Can you tell? all the letters are bright and shiny.
My OH decided that she wanted to go online so I thought I woul get the new Lappy out to play with. Then she got interested in what I was doing then I found myself ousted off the new Laptop so she could play with it. So I thought thats OK, I can go online on the old one. Until she decided that she wanted to go online on the new one. Hmmm. Laptops rule my life!
Anyway, I am back on now- something to do with Robson Green.

EDIT: I have just noticed that this post is number 1066

Woohoo.

It's Tuesday night and it's nearly 7pm.
I have been home for about 2hours but this is the first chance I have had to sit down and blog.
The reaon, My OH had bought a little surprise... a new laptop. It was one we had been looking at for a while and it had been on special offer. And she saw that there were only 2 left in the shop, so she bought it! Haha. And it's normally tht's impuslive- usually she spends weeks/ months before she makes a decision.
So we have been trying to get it set up. When it loaded upit was all like 'Oooh I'll help you set up' and then it led us through the steps but it took ages. And then we had trouble getting the internet connection thing set up. It was quite stressful. I couldnt get it to work properly for ages. My OH laghed at me and said "And you're an I.T. teacher as well"
But I got it sorted in the end. I am not using it at the moment, I am still using the old faithful. The next step will be getting the broadband set up so that both of us can be online at the same time.
And my OH bought me the new Scissor sisters album, which I am listening to now.
But after doing all that, and with me being knackered after a tough day, I don't know how I'm going to get done all the work I have to do.

PS. I would publicly like to thank my stalker for the 'item' that dropped through my letterbox today.

The alarm went off at 6am this morning... and it was still dark. The nights are getting longer
And then I dozed back off to sleep so I overslept a little. Is there anyway we can make the daylight come earlier again. You know, some magic way that will make it seem like 7 o clock licht at 6 o clock?
During breakfast, My OH was regailing me with a joke that she was reading off a birthdy card she is sending to her nephew. Mid-way through the punch-line, Spiderzilla made a rush for the door! Seriously, it must have been waiting for me to be distracted by the entertaining anecdote for it to go all 'great escape' on me. I swear I could hear it whistling the theme tune. OH screamed and I grabbed the tissues. Now I have to say that I do pick up spiders and chuck them out the front door, but somehow I cannot bear to pick them up with my bare hands! I have to use a tissue. Perhaps it stems from when I read that their sex organs are on their feet!

And when I got home tonight I found I had received my latest purchase from Ebay. It's a G4 DVD. (I dont care, I like them). New, sealed and it only cost me £3.24! A bargain! I do feel sorry for the fat one in G4, because he will always be knwon as the fat one in G4, and he's not really that fat! Still, they are good singers with plenty of talent.

anyway I must go, just had a family bombshell drop on me

It's that list that I stole from Sminchin

1. One book that changed your life.
The Yes Man by Danny Wallace. It made me feel more positive about life

2. One book you've read more than once.
Midshipmans Hope by David Feintuch. Definitely a good read!

3. One book you'd want on a desert island.
'Best parts of your body to eat first' By Nora Bone

4. One book that made you laugh.
May Contain nuts by John O farrell

5. One book that made you cry.
The Rule of Four. After I read it I cried "Why the hell did I waste my time reading this"

6. One book you wish you had written.
Harry Potter definitely

7. One book you wish had never been written.
The book that says that everything has to be taxed!

8. One book you are currently reading.
Map of Bones by James Rollins. 'Tis good!

9. One book you have been meaning to read.
I dont think there is one. But I have the Wheel of Time book 1 on my bedside table. And that is HUGE!

It's Sunday evening.
Where does the weekend go? On Friday evening it's all nice because, you have two whole days in front of you. But they go so quickly, and before you can say "There's been a murder in Misomer Norton", it's Sunday evening again.
Funny how the weekdays don't go as quickly.

So what are we all doing tonight? Working hard? I should bloody well hope not. I know that Paddy is hard at work trying to organise his Cheerios.
I have done a bit of marking tonight but I have left the rest. Some doesnt have to be done til Wednesday, so that's gonna wait!
Tonight the new series of Spooks starts. So it is a case of recording Midomer Murders.
And for dinner we are going to have chicken pie and roast (red) potatoes.

My god, my life is riveting!

There are good surprises and there are not so good surprises. This is a tale of one of each.
Firstly, my OH was rummaging around the cupboards hunting for the Tea Towel that had mysteriously disappeared. Funnily enough, when she had found that the tea towel was missing, her first statement was "What did you do with the tea towel?" lol. Talk about jumping to conclusions. However, when things go missing it normally is me that misplaces them.
"I haven't moved it" I replied, and in my mind I believed that.
Anyway, whilst hunting for the tea-towel, my OH found something that we had put away and forgotten about. It was a multi-pack of Cadbury Mini Rolls! We had bought them for the Battle Proms, but never used them. talk about bonus. A whole twelve pack of Cadbury mini rolls. Yum!
So that was a good surprise.
And today, whilst I was pottering about, I spotted, from the corner of my eye, one of the biggest spiders ever!. It made a dash for the skirting board under the radiator. I tried to flick it out hoping it would go back the way it came and therefore running into the open space of the carpet, from where I could easily surround it and catch it. However, it must have known what I was planning, so it laid low until it spotted it's opportunity. It ran forward towards the bookcase and dived, Indiana Jones style, under the bookcase, where I cannot reach it. It even popped a hairy leg back out to pick up it's Fedora. So now I have a hairy Spiderzilla waiting under the bookcase. Now the question is, should I tell my OH (Who really doesn’t like spiders) or should I keep quiet and run the risk of the spider jumping out and surprising her?

PS. For those who were wondering whether it was my fault that the tea towel went missing ten wonder no longer. MY OH found the missing tea towel.... In the potato drawer where she had forgotten she had left it when packing away the (red) potatoes. I feel vindicated!

Can anyone tell me what sort of technical bits and bobs I would need if I wanted to connect my DVD player to the computer so I can record clips of DVD footage?
What is the best way to take DVD clips?

Any help would be appreciated