Feel free to take one and pass the around

Generous to a Tea, me !

After the shocks that 2006 have given us both. Me losing my Job, then being forced to fight for my job only to be made redundant again. The having to rush to find another job. THen starting a new job and then a member of the family dying....

I think we deserve a better 2007!

Here's to the future

It's the last day of 2006, and I thought I would check up on what I thought 2006 would hold in store this time last year. According to this post I predicted

Chelski will be top of Premiership
Next Years christmas number 1 will be next years winner of X-Factor
Saturday night TV will be inundated with 'phone vote' TV shows
Girls Aloud will split up
Geri Halliwell will plan another comeback that will flop.

Well, Chelski did get top place. Christmas number one was this years winner of the X-Factor (Yay, Leona) and Saturday TV was inundated with 'phone vote' shows.
Girls Aloud din't split up and if Geri Halliwell did plan another comeback, I didn't hear of it- so by default that makes it a flop.

So 4 out of 5 ain't bad.

But what of next year.
Here are my predictions for 2007.
1) Chelsea will top the premiership
2) Next years Christmas number 1 will be the winner of Next years X-Factor
3) TV will be indundated with 'celebrity' shows using more and more Z-list celebrities like Jeff Brazier and Lizzie from Wife Swap.
4) Katie Holmes will split up with Tom Cruise
5) The Spice Girls will reform for a one off special event!
6) We will have the hottest/driest Summer since Records began.

Anyone else for a prediction?

I can’t believe that I am up this early. I can’t believe that we went to bed at 1am last night. Not that we went out though, but we wanted to watch Channel 4’s big quiz of the year, which was extremely funny. Good to see the underdogs win, although I am not too sure if I know both of them. Russell Brand I recognise- he is famous for being created out of the leftovers from a Jo Brand liposuction, but the other one I didn’t know, although I think he is one of the PGTips chimps all grown up. David Walliams takes it all so seriously, doesn’t he. And so Camp! You wouldn’t believe he was straight. It must be weird being a straight man when everyone assumes you’re gay. In fact David appeared very briefly in a dream I had last night. I was at school doing a test, and he was at the back of the classroom taking it all very seriously.

I had a phone call from a friend last night and I was trying to describe the little blog community that we have here. She thinks I should get out more and meet real people. I tried to explain that we are all real people and it’s just a way of communicating, just like she does when she phones people. IN fact it’s probably more sociable, as she only calls once in while whereas I blog pretty much everyday to catch up on the goings on.
Actually, as the year comes to an end- and what a difficult year it has been- it’s been nice having this little area of cyberspace to let off steam and meet all you guys. So if you’re reading this, thanks for popping in and thanks for making this year a little bit more bearable!

After checking on Nate's 'eat my shorts' I came across this blog entry which has some...er...colourful latin phrases. Pop over to get the full list, but here are a few of my favourites. Why not learn some for New year's Eve so you can impress/insult your friends!
Or you could just Fac ut vivas

Latin Phrases:

Futue te ipsum et caballum tuum Screw you and the horse you rode in on
Tu es stultior quam asinus You are dumber than an ass
Podex perfectus es You're a perfect asshole
Caput tuum in ano est You have your head up your ass
Impudens es leno You shameless pimp
Vacca stulta You stupid cow
Vescere bracis meis Eat my shorts
Te odeo, interfice te cum cochleare I hate you. Kill yourself with a spoon.
Stercus accidit Shit happens
Hic puer est stultissimus omnium! This boy is the stupidest of all!
Non Gradus Anus Rodentum! Not Worth A Rats Ass!
Quomodo cogis comas tuas sic videri? How do you get your hair to do that?
De gustibus non est disputandum. There's no accounting for tastes.
Tum podem extulit horridulum You are talking shit
Potes meos suaviari clunes You can kiss my ass.
Quando podeces te regi eorum fecerunt? When did the assholes make you their king?
Antiquis temporibus, nati tibi similes in rupibus ventosissimis exponebantur ad necem In the good old days, children like you were left to perish on windswept crags.
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris If Caesar were alive, you'd be chained to an oar.
Estne volumen in toga, an solum tibi libet me videre? Is that a scroll in your toga, or are you just happy to see me?
Fac ut vivas Get a life
Morologus es! You're talking like a moron!
Puto vos esse molestissimos I think that you are very annoying
Radix lecti Couch potato
Raptus regaliter Royally screwed
Stultus est sicut stultus facit Stupid is as stupid does
Utinam barbari spatium proprium tuum invadant May barbarians invade your personal space
Utinam coniurati te in foro interficiant May conspirators assassinate you in the mall
Utinam logica falsa tuam philosophiam totam suffodiant May faulty logic undermine your entire philosophy
Faciem durum cacantis habes You have the face of a man with severe constipation
Mala pituita nasi Nasty nasal drippings!
Semper in excrementum, sole profundum qui variat. Always in the shit, just the depth that varies.

It's Saturday and it's New years Eve Eve. I have spent most of the morning plucking away on my g-string. As well as the A, D, B and E strings. Just strumming along to some Duran Duran tracks. I put up the Sunrise video on my media blog. I have also been playing 'Ordinary World' and feeling a bit melancholy- some of you already know that the song has specific meaning to me.
At the moment I am trying to download the Broken Sword Game on the other computer. Hopefully it will work there, if not it may be a disc fault! Or may be not. I don't know, it's not as if I am an I.T. teacher:P
I go back to work on Wednesday, which isn't really a problem (except that Wednesday's are my least favourite day). But it does seem odd going back then. My OH and I have parties to go to on Friday and Saturday so it feels like it should still be party season, but I have gone back to work. The worst thing that may happen is that I may have to not go to the Friday bash if I have too much school work to do. Next term is a busy term. I have to organise the Enigma project again (I hope I don’t have as much trouble as last time) plus there are all sorts of other things going on, including another school disco! Yippee!
And I still have some work to do before I go back. The question is, should I do it today, tomorrow, Monday or Tuesday. Or should I do a bit each day? I know that will spread the work over, but it does mean I will be working each day until I go back.
I really am not in the frame of mind to work though! Maybe tomorrow. You know the old saying "Why put it off until tomorrow when you can put it off for longer"
Anyway, must check my broken sword, or will be it another broken program?

Addendum: The program didnt work on the other computer. It was the same error message. Therefore I conclude that it is the game itsefl that is FUC...

I thought I wold try something new this evening. My OH bought my the new Broken Sword game for the PC and whilst she is watching CSI:Miami (She likes the ginger guy in it: Don't figure) I thought I would load up the game and give it a bit of a play. I have always enjoyed the Broken Sword series!
So I loaded it up and it was all set to run when. Pop-UP!Error! There is an error starting DirectX.
Boo!
So I thought I would try to install some of DirectX from the disc. I did that and tried to play and. Pop-UP!Error! There is an error starting DirectX.
Damn! So I uninstalled the game and installed it again and ...Pop-UP!Error! There is an error starting DirectX. It even tells me that it has pasted the error onto the clipboard, but there is nothing there!
So I went online, to where you can download DirectX and tried installing it again. Feeling confident I tried playing again.
And guess what
Pop-UP! Error! There is an error starting DirectX.

That is why I like the playstation. It's only purpose is to play games. No messing around with all sorts of programs!

Well my little sojourn into learning latin has begun today. With a little help from a book I got for Christmas and a website, I can now say with all confidence that Isabella gives land to the church! Oh yes, if I ever get lost in Latinland I will have no problem conversing with the natives. Unfortunately, the things I can say at the moment does tend to veer heavily towards me giving land to the church- which I suppose is useful if I do get lost and have to bribe the natives to help me. I wonder if the Queen will my me giving the United Kingdom away?

Oh and I learnt this...
Paddy Regina Est

Ah. Vice City. It's like a home away from home. I got Vice City Stories for Christmas, and it doesnt feel that long since I finished the PS2 version! And it starts off in the Army base, which I seem to remember not being at all used in the original game!
I have quite a lot of 'time consuming' gifts for Christmas. Mostly DVD's and Games. Including the Doctor Who series 2 box set (special Cyberman head edition), Lost season 2, Little Britain live and series 3, a few 'point and click' PC games... and all I need now is some time to watch/play them.
I am watching 'THe Christmas Invasion' as we speak.

I've just sat and watched Dracula. Now I like Mark Warren in Hustle, but I don't think his Dracula was very convincing- or is that just me? I also thought it was a bit slow in places and found myself distracted too easily by Blogworld
But the show had one saving grace....

The lovely Madame De Pompadour

The Bloscars are coming

Thanks for the banner AJ

It's Thursday Morning and I have had a nice lie in. My OH went out early (She is an early bird, wheras I like too lay in of a morning if I can) to go shopping. She's been gone ages- I wonder what the crowds are like?
We went sales shopping yesterday, but we weren#t that impressed with the sales. NExt was packed though. The queue snaked all around the store- it kind of puts me off buying snything. It also was the same in Game- the queue took up the entire floor space. I did get a nice coat though in debenhams.
Last night one of our Christmas presents exploded! It was a mug. My mum had bought us a nice set of mugs but as soon as I put hot water into one it exploded and coffee came gushing out like you see on the dam buster films when they blow up the dam!We watched Ruby in the Smoke last night {Hmmm... Billy Piper }. Is this based on a book? It's just that there wsa so much story in it that occassionaly it didn't seem to flow well- which does happen when they try to put an entire book into a 90minute drama. Stil, I enjoyed it though

"Have yourself a Merry Litle Christmas..." WE had to laugh! We are just watching last night's Eastenders ready for tonights Eastenders, and this is how it started! A Merry Christmas?? In Albert Square??D

Today my OH and I went shopping. WE had some tokens given to us from relatives and we bought... Torchwood on DVD and Afterlife Series 2. Excellent stuff
Oddly enough my sales shopping was quite quick. I bought myself two new ties. Whereas my OH spent quite a bit of time browsing throught the stores. As she looked at certain items I began to notice something. Every item she picked up or looked at where surprisingly famiiar. And then I realised... they were all items from the list that I hadn't bought! Is this a woman thing? Haha. It's Ok though, I was happy that she was happy List or no list.
PS: SHe did NOT look at other shoes

Boxing day, and it is the day of the big family get together!
WE got up early to do some cooking. Well when I say we, I am of course using the Royal We, as I was tucked up still in bed when my OH was up cooking. But why was she cooking on a day when we were going out for dinner? Because this year we decided to try something new! Instead of my Mum catering for the whole event, we decided we were all going to do a different course. My mum was going to do he main course, my Sister was going to bring the Sweet, my Brother (and his new girlfriend) were going to provide the starters, and we got the Supper/tea party food. Thank god for Tesco’s party food nibbles and things. We had loads to take. Unfortunately, it took us ages to cook it all off, so we were slightly late leaving for the Dinner/lunch. And that coupled with the slow traffic on the M25, meant we got there just before 2pm when dinner was at 2!
The afternoon/evening was actually more fun than I expected. The kids were a bit of a handful, which they always seem to be at this event… why is it that everything they do has to involve screaming???. There was plenty of singing, as the big party activity was a Karaoke machine. My OH and I performed a must unique version of ‘Killing Me Softly’ where the words almost become literal events!!!
And later, and several bottles of wine later (Not for me though as I was Des that night- Des-Ignated driver, not Des O’Connor as you may have mistaken me for having heard me sing) it was Trivial Pursuit time. And the biggest shock of all… my Mum said the word Penis! It was in response to a question about sex toys , but really I didn’t expect it from my mother! We all looked at her stunned!
“What!” She exclaimed “Just because I am your mother, means that I can’t say rude words?”
At which I replied “I am sorry but I wasn’t expecting a penis to come out of your mouth!” which I realise I had worded badly
After that the only embarrassing thing to happen came from my OH. One of the questions had the answer Gaia. (which we pronounced Gayer). Not someone we had heard of.
“Who’s Gaia?” My mum asked to which my OH piped up (thank you!) “He is” and pointed at me.
“What do you mean?” asked my brother
“Well, he’s Gaia than most men I know!” Thanks a lot! They didn’t need any more reason to become suspicious! That’s my OH for you!
Anyway, a good evening was had by all. And even better was, we were able to drive away and leave the kids there! HAHAHAHA

... And now to continue my little saunter through Christas day. We started opening presents at about 10am. Stopped at about 1pm for dinner part 1: The starter- which was salmon and shrimps in a thousand island dressing. Very nice. Then we continued to open presents until about 3pm when we stopped for dinner part 2: The main course. We never have Turkey for Christmas dinner. We always have Lamb. it is tradition! In fact we get our lamb from a local farmer friend, who rears sheep and gets them sliced and diced by a local butcher. For some reason my OH did not enjoy me telling her that this was a real lamb that I saw jumping around the fields just this Spring gone! And for some reason it made it worse when I told her that it was a lovely playful thing that I used to pet and it's name was Flower! Tch! Women eh?!
Then we had a little doze during Monsters Inc, and finished opening presents at about 6pm The last few presents were the 'large presents' and included the shoes that I was going to give to my OH. This wasnt her main present- her main present was one of those digital photo frames which scrolls through all the pictures stored on a memory card. She loved the frame, but the shoes..... got a surprised reaction.
"Oh." She said "Where did you get these?"
"From ........" (No shoe shop is getting free advertising on my blog.)
"OH. Well they look nice" And she gave me a smile. Now I am taking that as a resounding success! And if anyone disagrees, then I'm not listening! Next time I am going to choose her entire wardrobe!
After the presents, we sat down and watched all new Doctor Who, which was very good. I thought Catherine Tate was very good in it. Totally different to Rose, which was what was needed to keep it flowing. Roll on the new series.
Then at about 8pm it was time for Dinner part 3: The desert. And once again a tradition is maintained. Trifle. SO refreshing- we have it every year!
Then it was more TV until bedtime... Because the most tring day of the year was yet to come...... Boxing Day, and the trial of the Family!

To be continued.....

Stolen from Sminchin, who taught me how to steal Blog meme's
I was innocent until I met her you know

So here goes

C- Caring

and ...er.....

J - Jenerous.

Perhaps CJ wasnt the best name to acrostic withD

'Tis boxing day and, as is traditional, we will be going to my mum's house for the day. It is the time when all the family get together and try to get along. OVer excited kids, over stressed parents, over sensitive mother, over indulging, over the next few hours. Last year we didn't make it due to the sever Snow storm that came.

Is it too late to pray for a freak snow storm

Well, our Christmas day started at midnight on Christmas Eve. To be fair I suppose all Christmas days start at midnight on Christmas Eve, but what was unusual about this one was the fact that we were still awake, which is remarkable in itself seeing as we were in church. Yes, we decided to go to midnight mass. SO there we were, sitting behind Wide Boy and Mutton woman, and in front of Deep gravely voice man. We watched as two people were escorted out of their pews- I am sure I heard one of them say “Look, we are being evicted from a church!” Apparently, according to my OH, they weren’t escorted out, but they were press-ganged into the church choir and she had heard them say “It looks like we’re being evicted from church”. Still I think my version is more exciting.
Anyway, midnight came by as did the part of the service where we had to shake ands with other people, so I turned round and shook hands with Deep gravely voice man and his surprisingly young and attractive wife. After the service we went home and had a mince pie and a cup of hot chocolate- who says we don’t know how to live it up!
In bed by 2am and up again at 8am. Our Christmas day tends to be very ritualistic- we always draw pentogram on the floor and dance naked around whilst sacrificing a chicken we always tend to do the same things each year.
Firstly we open presents from our families, because very soon we know we will get phone calls from them asking about our presents. We are the only ‘couple’ in the family that has no children so our mornings are probably less frantic than most. The presents from family tend to include a lot of chocolate and smellies. So we can sit there getting fat, but at least we will smell nice doing it.
After the phone calls, we then start opening the presents we got for each other. This can last several hours, as we take it slowly and have dinner in between. This year we opened the first one about 10am and the last one at about 6pm. I was already feeling nervous about the present opening, as those of you who have been following my exploits will know, I did a risky thing whilst buying presents and deviated from the list! I bought a pair of shoes that were not on the list and bought a pair I thought my OH would like. But how were they going to be received? ………. To be continued

SO how have you spent Christmas Eve so far?
I must admit I have spent a good part of it playing on the PS2. I went back and started Fahrenhiet again. And boy did I get a shock when I did, I seem to have unlucked a porn version of it I have copleted the game now and I have a serious wrist ache -From the game!
Actually it was quite an absorbing story- if I had one criticism it would be that you missed out on a lot of the action on screen as yo are too busy concentrating on following the button pressing sequence. ALl the action sequences are determined by how quickly/well you can follow the patterns on the screen!

Now we have the fire lit and are finally getting warm. IT has been so cold today that I thought about getting into the fridge just to keep warm!
But the biggest question of the night is...are we going to walk down to church for the midnight mass? or shall we stay in by the fire. Hmmmm

Merry Christmas

Yesterday we put up one of these...

WE got very excited when we found out that you can blow the candle lights out! And so for the next five minutes we stood there huffing and puffing at the thing and guess what... nothing happened! So we blew some more, at every part of the structure and still none of the little bulbs went out.
THen my OH had a revelationary idea. "Why don't we read the instructions?"
"What?" I exclaimed. "WE never read instructions!"
"No" she replied "You never read instructions"
and so she got the box and read the instructions. It said 'to blow out the candles just blow into the hole in the middle of the candle arch'
So we looked around the arch and found no hole, except for the huge one made by the arch itself. Like this...

"So" I asked "All we have to do is pass wind through the middle and the bulbs will blow off?" I didn't really have to say that but I can't resist a chance to make silly fart jokes
And so for the next five minutes we spent huffing and puffing and blowing through the centre arch of the item. And then.... nothing happened. WE tried turning it round and blowing it the other way, but that still didn't work.
Then my OH had a revolutionary idea. "Why don't we check the instructions again"
"What? Twice in one item? I do have a reputation to uphold you know"
so we looked again. "Oh there a diagram" she said. And sure enough there was a little picture indicating where the hole was. Here....

So we blew and guess what.... the lights went out. Yippee!

Now how do you turn them back on again. Do you have to suck?

I have had quite a nice couple of days catching up on lots of stuff that I have had recorded from the past few week. AS you may know, the last few weeks have been a bit frought one way or another. Anyway, here is a run down of some of the stuff that I have caught up on. Starting with...
Torchwood. I have had a few epsidoes to catch up on. The first one was when they brought Suzie back to life. THere was a chilling bit in it when she said 'There is something moving in the darkness, and it's after you, Jack!" Oooh... I wonder where that is going to lead?!?! And the other episode was with Eugene Jones, the guy who died believing he had an alien eye. That was a really well told poignant story. Definitely 10/10 for that one!

ANd then I finally got to watch...
Ghosthunting with Girls Aloud! What absolutley fantastic entertainment. Watching Girls Aloud getting spooked out of their wits is a real tonic when you are feeling down with a cold! And my go can those girls swear! THere was definitely something kinda Ooh coming out of their mouths that night.

And finally, one of the best reality programs/docurama we have seen in ages. The Choir! DId anyone se it? A proper choirmaster decided to go into a London Inner CIty school to see if he can create a choir good enough to compete in the International Choir competition in China! I didn't even know there was an international choir competition! It was real gripping/moving stuff. Now I really want to join a choir

Good stuff!

IF there is one way to scar a child for life, it is to see something like this...

Santa dies at children's party
A man dressed as Santa collapsed and died as he handed out presents at a children's Christmas party.

Imagine that! "Oh my god, they killed Santa! You " But what do you tell kids after all that, especially if you said that the 'bloke' was the real Santa. Do you decide to tell your children that it was in fact a man dressed up and ruin their illusions forever (They will now be suspicious of every Santa they meet!) Or do you tell them that Santa is in fact dead and use it as an excuse to not buy them any more presents... ever! Hmmm, it's not sounding like much of a dilemma is it

Saturday morning and the postman has just been. I got a little christmas package and a slip that said Merry Christmas and a Happy new year! It was from the opticians with the trial Lenses I have to try. D How festive. I daren't put them in in case they have been soaking in sherry!

I have gotten a cold. Grrr. I hate snivelling over Christmas. At this rate I will be squeezing Lemsip over my Salmon on Christmas day!

I have started a new computer game. It is called Fahrenheit and it is a movie-esque supernatural thriller type game. But I have screwed it up. No matter what I do now I will lose because of a mistake I made earlier in the game and the stupid auto-save feature. I am now gonna have to start it again!

Is it just me or does anyone else not feel very festive at the moment?

And I have just found out my unique aristocratic title!
Reverend Earl Cj the Intransigent of Molton St Anywhere
I may be a reverend, but intransigent I am definitely not! I totally disagree with that title!

My OH and I went out last night- it was her work christmas/leavers do. This was given by her old bosses who sold the place. BTW, I have met the new owners and they seem nice, and they are getting on well with my OH- so that's good.
But last nights party was really good fun. IT is nice to get out once in a while and really let our hair down. Some good dancing- and none of that modern Thump-thump-thump crap. Lots of old eightees Cheesy tunes which brought back memories of school discos (As did the silly finger food and the snogging in the corner)
And when the Scissor Sisters came on it filled the dance floor!

I am feeling a bit tender this morning

I hope this works. I knew that Jingle Bells was Evil

http://www.conspiracycarols.com/?userid=f2370d056adbbc60117c2ae_20061221

PS Please let me know if the link works

This morning I thought I would try to get tickets for The X-factor show, which is coming to Brighton in March. So I went on to ticket masters and was totally disctracted by something else....
Sod the X-Factor, I have now bought two tickets for The Scissor Sisters in July. Woohoo!