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Ibiza Holiday Diary

2010-07-15T22:39:00.007+01:00

Just your average week of holiday bollocks but in a diary format.

(I should point out that photos will be inserted to this delightful tale so check back later)

Day minus 1 - Wednesday.

I’ve not been feeling well today at work.
We go on holiday tomorrow. It’s an early flight and we have to get up about 2.30 so off to bed early tonight.
Got home from work and I’m really not well. I have a terrible stomach bug and a temperature that seems to be going off the scale. The Wife has said that she is worried I won’t be able to fly and that if I’m not well enough, we should cancel. I shivered a bit while swallowing down more tablets and quietly say "fuck that. We are going full stop. I'll get my carcass on that plane regardless." she smiles worriedly and I drift into a medical coma.

Day 1 - Thursday

The alarm goes off at 2.30.
We both ignore it knowing there is another one in 15 minutes.
When the second one goes we get up. I kind of feel ok but then The Wife informs me I have a radioactive temperature. I tell her not to worry as I have a plan. I go to the bathroom and hose myself down with what starts off as freezing cold water. After about 5 minutes of high pitched shrilling and juddering, the water is now kind of warm but I am a little bit cooler. Brilliant.
I take more drugs and we head off to the airport, me sleeping all the way.
Its 4.30am when we reach the airport. Early. My earlier drugs are wearing off and I’m not my usual enthusiastic self. We get checked in relatively hassle free (you hear a lot of horror stories about no frills airlines, but so far we're doing ok...well that’s cursed me now hasn't it?). Time seems to slip when you're not well and within what seems a relatively short time we're on the plane and en-route. The Wife keeps looking at me oddly and I drift in and out of feverish comas. And we arrive. It seems I’ve found the best way to fly. Off your tits on a 105 degree fever.
Any ho...
Staying at a place called Palladium hotel, Ibiza. The Wife arranged it all and after much soul searching decided this was the best place with the best reviews. I should perhaps point out that a major part of her review hunting includes the phrase "not many British". I googled the place yesterday at work (in my lunch hour if anyone from work is reading this) and if you do the cool Google maps thing, you can see the aerial view of the hotel and its distinctive spiral pattern pool. I read the reviews and thought of what a cool time I was going to have although also at the time I was starting to feel light headed and kinda sick...but that didn't mean anything right? Back to the maps...so I’m looking at the map / satellite view and decide to have a move about and see what’s nearby. I move the mouse three clicks to the left and hey presto...it’s an island landmark, visited by thousands, possibly hundreds of thousands each year and it’s quite literally in walking distance. Have you guessed what this Ibizian landmark of mass importance is yet? No...It’s not the rave district with its amnesia nightclubs and all night rave-a-thons...it’s much cooler than that. No...its not the old town with its cobbles and traditional folk emptying their toilets into to the streets next to the restaurants (that’s actually a story I overheard today at lunch, where apparently an old woman just chucked a bucket of shit into the street next to a restaurant and then washed it away and all the restaurant staff were like...meh...as if it happened all the time. Obviously I can't vouch for the validity of that story but meh...happens all the time). Anyway...nope. Not old town, but we are only 1.5km away from that. So what could it be? Here’s a clue. It’s an airport. Yes that’s right; our next door neighbour is an airport. Now I love planes and all things plane related but they do have one or two things that even some folks don’t like. So I’m fascinated to know why no-one reviewing their holiday on a holiday web site remembers to mention the fact that not only is their hotel (which in all honesty is Very nice) on a flight path, its on the end of the fucking runway! You'd have thought some one person might have included in a review..."lovely amenities, staff very helpful and like occasional Spanish word, food wonderful, fucking Flybe and Ryanair every 5 minutes thinking its fucking top gun and doing tower fly-bys". Apparently that stuffs not important to your all inclusive guzzling swine. (Yes...we are included in aforementioned swine category so no complaints please.) Needless to say that the shuttle bus from the airport took longer to board by its passengers than it actually took to reach its fucking destination.
For those with short memories, I’m still really not well and in-between feeling utterly nauseous and ... I'm sorry for this... Like I’m going to shit my soul out ... Still we're here and checked in for a very nice and early 12.00pm ish (I can’t give an exact time as I’m pretty much already firing on a combination of motor functions and drugs only)
It’s a lovely place. Sorry, you probably can't hear that for the sound of the 737 silently departing to Munich. IT'S A LOVELY PLACE. Seriously. It’s very nice and already my limited Spanish diction has already bagged me a number of Spanish sultry smiles...(you hot Spanish bitches) (sorry..It’s the drugs) (hmm...maybe) (turns out..Yes it’s the drugs). On a serious note... I don’t know if learning to ask for 4 beers in Spanish whilst saying good day and thank you qualifies as A) flirting or B) being multi-lingual but in my book...fuck it. At least I took the time to say something as basic as please and thank you and that therefore that me makes me better than the other 2% of British trolls in this airport extension for people who can't afford a proper holiday thanks to you Icelandic money eating volcano spouting fuckers.
The rest of the day kind of blurs as I slip in and out of what I like to call consciousness and The Wife likes to call meal times.
In conclusion... Today is probably the illest I have felt in a very very long time.
(Final nb) the illest does not refer to coolness as initially derived by the beastie boys during their whole "Licensed to ill" period. It means I felt like shit. Glad we got that sorted out.

Day 2 - Friday

We wake early and take various drugs.
The Wife surprises me by instead of suggesting we stay in bed and rest suggesting we go and get breakfast. I insist that I’m still ill and I’ll be staying in bed for most of the day. This roughly translates in universal language to..."ok sweetie, let’s go for breakfast".
After breakfast of half a slice of uncooked toast...fuck you, you stupid fucking toaster. I put that bread through you 8 times and it was still only slightly warm...
We discover that limited stories of German superiority around the swimming pool regarding sunbeds and towels appears to be true and we are relegated to two sunbeds about 2 miles away from the pool...the airport runway is still closer...
The Wife devises a plan whereby she'll get up early in the morning and beat the Nazi’s at their game.
I point out to her that Nazi’s is really not a good term to use. it’s kind of racist and I’m really sure it doesn't apply to more than 45% of the sunbed hogging dinosaur skinned freaky food eating bastards that are staying at this quality four star hotel.
She agrees not to use the term any more. I kiss her and know she is lying and will probably use the term again infront of our new friends Ingrid und Hans from Berlin.
...that’s a joke. Anyone who knows my holiday diaries by now knows we never make friends on holiday. Anyway, we decide that a new word to use as a secret codeword could be the Nigels. Got that…chances are its going to show up again.
We spend much of the day relaxing and taking drugs and alcohol, occasionally opting to go for a dip in the pool. We've been relegated to the kiddie pool because when The Wife woke at 6am and came poolside, all the sunloungers had already been taken by the people The Wife used to refer to as the Nazis who despite the fact that there is a very clear 4inch card on the edge of the grass next to the entrance to the pool area which states that sunbeds are not to be reserved, they've reserved.
We have a sunbed which is about 5m from the exit to the hotel. it’s a metal gate and you need a card to get through it and every minute, someone goes through it. When it closes the gate gives a loud metallic bang. After about an hour I’ve filtered this out but the face of The Wife paints an entirely different picture. You see every time someone clangs the gate she goes 'grrr' and puffs and blows. Every time. Every single time. A 737 takes off and not so much as a shrug. The gate goes clang and 'grrr' puff blow.
This is now more singularly more frustrating to me than either the gate or the fucking airplanes roaring over head. So I have to enquire.
"what’s wrong with the fact that the gate clangs? Just filter it out" says me with my clearly foolish suggestion.
"its not just a clang though is it?" says The Wife. "it goes clang clang"she continues.
Ok now I’m confused. The Wife can clearly hear 2 clangs. The second of which is obviously so offensive to her, she treats it as a personal affront. "why cant they just shut the gate quietly?" she asks.
Unable to provide any kind of suitable answer or make sense of the craziness of the situation, we go to lunch. Fucking gate double clanging slammers.
Our attempt to enter the restaurant for lunch is scuppered when The Wife is denied access due to "transparancia". Apparently wearing a see thru beach top is too much for the majority of Germanic diners and The Wife strides off with that true "I don't believe it" look on her face. To an average passerby (as opposed to a professional one I guess) it looked like I was the one who'd proper fucked her off. But for once...it wasn't. I still feel really quite unwell and at lunch have a small amount of fish and rice. The Wife feels for me and in sympathy with the way I’m feeling spends 20 minutes constructing a salad that looks like the only thing missing from the farm is a tractor then spends the whole of lunch sympathetically looking at me with mournful eyes and saying warming things like..."sorry you don’t feel well" or "you'll be better soon" whilst crunching her way through mounds of crunchy and delicious looking foods.
Back round the pool after lunch and between drifting in and out of consciousness I notice that in the scrub behind the loungers there are lots and lots of little lizards. Skitting about and generally looking cool with their bright colours. We both love lizards and these all seem really tame and will, if left, come right to you. I watch as two of them (I’ve named them Eddie Lizard and Lizard Beth Taylor) playfully use The Wife’s sandal as a play area. The Wife puts some of her Baileys on the floor and they both run up and start drinking it. Then things seem to take a nasty turn as Eddie bites Liz in the back and what looks like a heated drunken fight breaks out. We both look shocked as it transpires that the sandal, the alcohol and the obvious voyeuristic nature that’s swept up both the lizards leads them to perform dirty nasty lizard sex right there infront of us. Disgusted, we continue to watch. it’s like the internet but without the promise of further instant sexual shenanigans a mere button click away should we get board.
Evening comes (yes we stopped watching drunken lizard sex) and I’m feeling slightly better. Hoorah.
After some food we settle to watch the bar performer for the evening."Amazing showman Je...Sus" it’s ok. Your eyes don’t deceive you. I figured that if nothing else, I would at least get to see some kind of miracle.
As it turns out, apparently you can say anything on Spanish posters with fear of copyright or retribution or even comedy misunderstanding. Jesus was neither amazing nor a showman, more a 5foot Spanish music teacher with an evening job playing David Hasselhoff songs to drunken Germans. I doubt his real name was even Jesus.
Drugs then bed.

Day 3 - Saturday

Woke up and felt really well. Hoorah.
Today is my birthday. My 40th birthday. I've had big issues about this but now its here and doing it like this thanks to The Wife I’m kind of ok about it. Get some texts from friends and family. Pods makes me laugh a lot and I show The Wife. She promises to hurt him later.
I spend most of the morning getting better and by lunchtime I’m finally ready for something proper to eat. So...to celebrate my birthday and my improved health I decide on a cosmopolitan Mediterranean lunch of octopus (if you've never had fresh octopus I would recommend it. Its both delicious and a delightful texture...hmm) and fish and chips. That’s right folks...You can take the boy out of Parson Cross...
Have a great afternoon messing about in the sea. As The Wife strides out of the sea I warmly shout across the beach that she looks like that film star whose name I can't remember. Puzzled she looks at me and shouts back.."Ursula Andres or Halle Berry?". I assume a foetal position as I shout back "Godzilla" the rest writes itself.
We head back to the pool for the last of the afternoon sun and we are one of only a handful of holidaymakers doing the same. The pool area is quiet and delightful.
After a short while a hotel photographer comes around and spots a kinda pretty-and-fuck-does-she-know-it girl and offers to take some photos for her of her lounging around the pool in FHM style poses but at TKMax style prices. Obviously seeing this as a chance to increase her portfolio of saucy beachwear photos, she jumps at the opportunity and within minutes is sprawled or arched or akimbo'd over several areas of the pool.
Unfortunately for her though, I took a dislike to the fact that she obviously thought she was pretty/vacuous enough to qualify for glamour shots(she’s obviously damaged in some way and back in my day she probably wouldn't even have given me the time of day...the stuck up bitch) so I just so happened to be in the background of every photo they took. Sometime in a Kays catalogue pose, sometimes with The Wife, whatever it took really. I hope she enjoys the snaps.You’re welcome.
Lots of champers during the evening.
As 40ths go, it was everything I needed.

Day 4 - Sunday

Pretty much realise from the moment we get up that today is going to be a recovery day. The Wife is tired and quite frankly I’m hung over.
Spend much of the day lazing round the pool. The weather just gets hotter and hotter. We see in the papers that you're enjoying really hot temperatures back home and apart from stock footage of Brighton (is Brighton really the only place that ever gets sun in England or is it just the one that’s nearest to where all the lazy fucking journalists live?) anyway, apart from Brighton there’s a picture of hundreds of people on a beach and while it looks hot, its still cloudy and a bit overcast...you know, like it always is in England. To illustrate the point...here’s a picture of what it should look like. Anyway..I wont get into the furore of who’s weather is better (obviously its mine) but it is hot and very good weather to recuperate.
About 4pm the lizards come out and one particularly tame lizard called Wizard - please feel free to send in your lizard names - crawls over my foot and then up the towel to my sunbed. He has a good look around - yes I have to make my shorts off limits to lizards - and then shoots back down to the ground before sitting in The Wife’s chocolate milk and brandy for bizarre bath.
Not much else happens during the day and we opt for a late-ish meal as the world cup final will be on and getting served may be easier. It turns out this is the actual truth because apart from us, there are about 5 other couples in a room made to seat about 300. Service is superb and completely one to one. the cava arrives in record time and away we go.
After the meal we retire to a noisy bar and continue quaffing the ice cold cava. Some one shouts that its extra time and still nil nil. We're both too pissed to care so we decide to retire early and watch the closing stages from bed...yes...we had a TV in our room...nice.
The complex is strangely quiet as we walk back to our room. We pamper ourselves by taking the lift the 1 floor up. Upon exiting the lift and entering the corridor down which our room resides, we try to act nonchalant as an older German man knocks on a door and a young German man answers and then follows him to the older mans room. Oh yes I forgot to mention the younger man on wore underpants. Its ok. nothing strange about that.
In our room The commentary is in a very excitable Spanish and when the goal finally came, the TV nearly jumped off the table. The commentator makes some hilarious na-nana-na-na sound to the rest of the world and they are nearly in tears.
I always said I would be unsure about a Spanish victory when we were away, but good on them. After all they did score more goals than their opponent and that make their team winners in that sport. People who are unsure should realise that the fact that their team have won at a specific sport does not mean that they and all of their countrymen are immediately elevated to best in the world, either at the specific sport or as many of them would have us believe...at everything.
Bed time.

Day 5 - Monday

Woke late after waking really early to go and run down poolside and -ahem- pre-allocate the sunbeds. it was just on the cusp of sunrise. The sky was a beautiful deep blue, stars were perfect pinpricks in an unblemished sky, silence was all around.
Oddly there were already two men sat on sun beds around the pool. One reading a book, the other seemingly sorting out some money. Weird.
Also weird was the amount of condensation every where. Everything was massively wet, especially the sunbeds. So I’d taken in the beauty of a silent morning, the weirdness that some blokes would be up reading books and counting cash and the wonderment that was condensation. Enough world interest, back to bed. On the way back I cheekily take the lift the 1floor up and before the doors open I sneak out a tiny trump. The problem with complete silence is that any noise seems completely amplified and the resulting noise is like a dinosaur blowing a vuvuzela (for those reading this in the future, a vuvuzela is a plastic trumpet designed by Africans to successfully drown out any kind of atmosphere noise from a football match).
Upon my second waking delighted to find I slept funny and now have a painful cricked neck. No amount of gently stretching seems to help so return to the familiar pleasures of drugs. Nice.
Today, nature reminds us that she is in charge and ruins everyone’s day by placing a cloud over the complex for about 30 minutes. Sky rolling news would have covered the horrific story but they were still reporting on the terrifying final moments of media-wannabe-nearly-poilce killer Raoul Moat (who pussied out btw and didn’t live upto any of his earlier media threats). Sky must've been kicking themselves at the end when they could even film him pointlessly blowing his own brains out. All that money wasted on TV crews and tornado jets. I mean come on... A fucking tornado!?!? The highlight of this story from my point of view was when petrified police held a conference to tell the inhabitants of the village they were in that they would make sure all the children would be ok because they would surround the school. Hmmm sounds more like the police hoping that tiny human shields might come in more use than pointy hats and whistles. Finally on this non-news story, was anyone really amazed when former professional drinker and part time footballer Gazza 'Gazza' Gascoigne chirped up and said that he was 'Moaty's mate'? legend has it that they became friends during Moat's bouncer days and no doubt used to swap stories of alleged wife beating and alcoholism and how great it was to smash people up when pissed. At one point in the Gazza quotes he stated that they should send him in because there was no way his mate Moaty would ever shoot him. But think of the opportunities for the police snipers though eh?
We decide to take a walk into town as 'the cloud' has cooled things slightly.
Walking into Ibiza town is an experience in itself. Posters for DJs and nightclubs and sexy nightclub and sexy DJs are everywhere. We walk past a coke machine that has been turned onto its side...no small feat considering its size. The funny thing is, its still working...like it's wounded. I want to put 2 Euros in it just to see it cough up a little blood and then gingerly pass me a diet coke, but The Wife doesn't think this is a good idea.
We arrive a 'store' that has lots of junk type stuff that is suitable for gifts or the garden. We walk past the 6meter long shelf full of various sized wooden penises and wonder who actually buys those things.
During the shopping experience, we notice that the temperature seems to have shot up and we are now both oozing a mixture of copious sweat and dripping diluted sun cream. The resultant rivers of which look 'wrong' on both of us.
The temperature has shot up to 35degrees and starts to take its toll on us.
We head back to the sanctuary of the hotel pool where we can at least rehydrate ourselves with varieties of delicious alcohols. Today’s sure fire hit is chocolate milk and brandy. Ticks all the boxes.
The day comes to a close after further lazing in the pool, eating and drinking cava til it comes out of our ears.
Annoyingly, my neck suddenly goes 'click' and then it is all better. Bastard.

Day 6 - Tuesday

Another late breakfast. Damn you cava and brandy (not in the same glass obviously).
We spot a middle aged woman outside the bar area who at first glance, seems to be sleeping, but upon closer inspection seems to be having some sort of violent reaction to the heat and is twitching and shivering like she’s been bitten by a rage infected monkey. For that reason, we steer well clear and acknowledge that she'll probably be getting tanked up later. There aren't many Scottish people here.
We decide to do a bit of sightseeing today, but as its us, this means not too far from the complex and not too taxing. Have you seen some of the excursions some of these holiday places do? A 6km walk up an raggedy ass mountain or former volcano in the blazing sun all to see a waterfall and get a free glass of naff sangria? Or driving up the edge of a precarious road that even the toughest to the peak of a mountain or volcano all to see some rocks or a geyser and get a free glass of naff sangria. By the way, if you do go on these excursions, I hope you enjoy them and I’m only ripping the piss because we like to wallow by the pool or seaside. That and the fact that a lot of these excursions depart early in the morning and...well I’m on holiday so fuck getting up early!
So we've notice a defense tower down the end of the beach and every so often we see people at the top taking pictures. Even we think that this is a self made excursion that we could achieve. So off we set. First obstacle is a little bridge covering a river feed into the sea. At first glance the sight of hundred of little fish working their way up stream to the river is quite nice. Then you see the dead seagull, then you get the smell. Finally you realise this isn’t part of the 'scene of natural beauty' and quickly move on.
I spot two African looky looky men up on the hill and inform The Wife that we better move or the snipers will get us. What are they waiting for? Just sat, waiting, silently. Waiting to spot a 'del boy' and move in to sell him sunglasses, an overpriced broken watch or hooky DVDs...'lovely jubbly'. Be careful out there folks.
After a short walk we arrive at the tower which, just like any cultural tourist icon, is surrounded with broken glass, dog shit and graffiti. At least the inside was clean. Essentially this defense tower was used to protect the salt workers in case of attack, possibly from Nigel’s, possibly from vampires who were at war with werewolves at the time, I’m not sure.
Anyway, its a three storey affair with a very tight spiral staircase and very, very low door arches. Ideal for short tourists, and diminutive locals on the hide from attacking vampires and dragons, but not very good for anyone over 5'5''.
So we arrive at the top, the defense platform and I’m nearly concussed after two blows to the head.
The views are lovely and from one side, you can see all of the see front, from another side you can see the tiny fishing village below and on final side you can see the airport, which I imagine the originators of the tower needed visibility of so they tell if the 17.15 Ryan air had arrived yet, fully laden with its cargo of defensive garlic bullets. I’m not good at history.
As we're enjoying the views some Spanish teenagers noisily come up the stairs and when at the top, spit then light up cigarettes. They cleverly then wave over the edge to their parents below on the cliff face while keeping their fag hands below the battlements. Its at this point that I really want to shout out 'hola Mr. and Mrs. whatever...your noisy little shits are up here having a fag....and I think they're also cussing the baby Jesus' sit back and watch the fireworks. But unfortunately I don’t know that much Spanish and shouting over the battlements to the parents that I would like two beers please, would probably just confuse them. So I glare my most disapproving glare and eventually they go.
After some time admiring the view we decide to descend the stairs.
This turns out to be much harder than we expect when The Wife turns all girlie on me and gets dizzy halfway down the staircase and we end up having to make the decent as a three stage process each one interspersed with 'whooo' and 'whaaa' and other exasperations relating to dizziness. Bless her.
A trip to the beach next and the usual collection of hard bodies, poseur boys and Peter Stringfellows greet us. (obviously I don't fit any of those categories, I’m probably in the free willy category).
I confess that I’m not entirely happy with the location we've chosen as it does kind of smell like a sewage outlet.
We return to the security, warmth and all you can drink comfort of the hotel.
After yesterdays 35' heat we're delighted when the temp only tops out at 34' today. We wonder if we should put on cardigans to highlight the massive temperature drop.
At the height of the heatness we decide to have a beer in the Ibiza chill out zone. This is the area outside the bar playing soft dreamy music while couples who hate each other sit in total silence. Not speaking to each other because its either just too darned hot, or because they've just said everything they need to say and they just want to carry on drinking.
We sit and talk about some of the freaks we've seen this week.
There’s Spanish SuBo. An unfortunate girl who looks like voice-of-an-angel, mind-of-a-crazy-person BGT loser.
There’s the British guy with the thick dark hair whose Lardnen voice is so comedically high pitched as to destroy another preconceptions you may have of him.
And there’s a plethora of massive truck drivers from all over that seem to have the same style tattoos and even the same style wives.
And you can take your pick of foibles that the Nigel’s have.
We've booked a special meal in the beach restaurant tonight and everything goes well except for when the waitress asks what we want on the menu, we tell her, she then repeats in high speed Spanish and we nod, say yes and smile. There’s not much we can do therefore when the meals we didn’t order arrive. Luckily though, they are very delicious and we eat them all up nyum nyum nyum. Moral to that story being, try to learn some local lingo if you really want to understand.
We finish off round the bar with a night cap while Julio and Inglesias serenade the room with contemporary classics like Madonna’s like a prayer and diamond life by Sade. Nice. One of the entertainment staff, Raoul, asks me if I want to dance, I confuse him by saying, 'what? With you?' he's taken aback, throws his wetlook hair back, laughs and moves on. Its clear that Raoul is a sexual predator, working his way through the guests, the wives, the daughters, the grandmothers, he knows no depravity. Its odd then that he doesn’t approach The Wife. My mind goes back to earlier in the week when I was ill and mostly unconscious. The Wife was away 'doing stuff' for quite a bit of time. Hmm I wonder. Oh Raoul. You bad, sexual predator, preying on the vulnerable women in search of a holiday romance in the off chance you can spray them with your paella fueled well sun tanned man butter you.
Bed.

Day 7 - Wednesday

5am, The Wife eagerly sorts out the sunbeds. This is a ridiculous regime, but at least we are winning.
Today’s our last full day.
Tomorrow we'll be flying home by 10am. I think I speak for everyone when I say...'boo. The Wilsons should be allowed to stay as long as they like...rent free.' its ok I know that’s how you feel too. Rest assured, that if that was the case, we'd insist you came out and stayed with us too, but you’d probably have to stay in a different complex and you'd only be able to see us for a couple of days tops. Don’t want to over do it now do we. Besides, you probably want to go up a mountain or volcano and see and old sangria factory, which is fine, but we just don’t think we can be up that early.
Newbies have arrived today and collared the sunbeds next to ours. 2 older women, 2 younger women. Jesus talk about faffing about with sunbeds. The sunbeds have wheels to help you move them, but if you're a stupid young bird of a woman (describing her features as birdlike and not actually reverting to 1970's lingo...yet!) you just drag them from a to b to c to d to e. I swear one of them has just spent 5 minutes turning a sunbed around, i.e. 180' in what can only be described as the sunbed equivalent of a 3 point turn done in 10 points. Grrr fucking stupid noisy birds.(ok that’s a 70s reference).
Shortly after writing that last entry, the stupid fucking noisy birds whom we've now established have got money (yes, that does make us hate them more) make such a fucking brouhaha about moving 4 sunbeds that we decide the second best option is to move. They're a bit like the sex and the city birds in that, yes they're all well to do and they're obviously not used to common courtesy and you immediately ascertain an order that you would kidnap and slowly kill them.
Obviously the best thing would have been to drown one of the feckless well to do twats in the pool, while forcing the others to look on as a lesson in just being polite and not fucking about with people that have been up since 5am. Luckily there are a couple of beds further up the complex.
We move.
Great. Now we have a smoker. One of the things I’ve noticed this holiday is how few smokers there are. Its like some of them are getting the message. And that’s a good thing. (some of you smoke and that’s fine, unfortunately, I’m one of those wretched scum who never paid for a cigarette in his life yet used to smoke 40 a day for nearly 22years thanks to mum,dad,friends,mums and dads, grans, grandads, aunties, uncles, off the rails friends, and various randoms in public places. I am kind of miffed that the smokers seemed to have claimed all the best outside places though. before the smoking ban we couldn't move you from your special rooms of stale tabaco-y badness. Now there’s an exclusion, you've claimed the outdoors as your own, so on the two days of the year where it would be nice enough to go outside and have a drink, you can't unless you also want to stink like 40 B&H. Please note that I’ll never say anything about smokers to them because its something you want to do and I swear, I have heard every pitiful reason for having a fag. I'm also not interested in if you’re upset or offended by this section. Its your choice, you stick to it. But you stink - fact).
So we have smokers on two sides, oh and oddly enough, the young woman(about 25) on the left, not only stinks like a fag, she also has the best cough. Well done you. You look cool.
Ok enough with the life choices, heaven knows I’ve made enough bad ones so I can't talk.
I went to the bar and as I was approaching the bar, Domingo the eldest of the barmen (yes, I’m that good I know the barman’s names) was finishing up serving a woman. She took her drinks and left. Domingo, having not noticed me, managed to get a good leer in and scope out the bikini clad woman, particularly her bikini bottoms...I assume that’s what he was looking at. When he looked up, he knew he'd been busted by me and didn’t know where to look. I just smiled and said in my best faux Spanish accent 'Bust-ed'
he laughed and served me my drinks. We shared a moment.
Oh Domingo...you crazy sexual predator, using your job to scope out chicks in their bikinis and thinking about spilling your warm frothy shandy on their bikini bottoms instead of ice cold beer on your feet. Oh Domingo.
There’s a conference center here at the hotel, much like there are at many hotels, but I honestly cant think of a worse place to have a to go to a conference than a holiday hotel.
Scorchio weather, lots of people out enjoying the sun, being surrounded by all inclusives. Nightmare. Concentration would be seriously zero and my childish will to simply run out and dive into a pool would just be too much to withhold.
Jokingly, I said to The Wife, you should run in to the conference and start screaming 'someone’s stolen my clothes' to which she replied, 'yeah, I should take my pants off'.
I tried to explain that ordinarily that probably wouldn’t be required, but she seemed to think it would add to the situation. A situation I tried to explain, was a prank and not an introduction to a rape enquiry. We had to agree to disagree, but if you have opinions on how the prank should have gone, why not drop us a line.
As the afternoon swings on and we try and absorb every final vitamin d filled orb of sunshine, a miracle happens that hasn’t happened all holiday. The one nationality that unites all nations arrives and camps up by the pool. That’s right the French arrive and in a typical French way, go about trying to restructure the whole of the poolside area to accommodate their stupid selves.
Honestly...(it may be interpreted as a bit racist this bit) they must think that because they have a monopoly on je and qu words instantly making their games of scrabbles much higher scoring, that they fucking run the place. Well you know what? At least the Nigel’s have a sense of humour, regardless of the fact that that humour is heavily based on 1970s Benny Hill, it is a sense of humour nonetheless. Where as the French are just fucking rude and arrogant. Well fuck you Frenchy and we'll have our umbrella back thank you very much now fuck off.
Oddly the French only seem to last around the pool for about 45 minutes. Pussies.
(wasn’t racist was it?)
we stay out until the pool guy gets annoyed and the sun goes away. We truly don’t want this holiday to end.
As per the rest of the holiday, we're the last people in for evening meal. The Wife opts to sit next to the door and no sooner have started out meal than we are inundated with mosquitoes. All week we've managed to avoid the blood sucking bastards and now they are everywhere.
We quickly relocate and move further inland. Apart from the mozzies, the 'last meal' is completely up to the same top notch quality we've had all week. Well done everyone.
Off to the bar for one more barfly bar performer.
In what appears to be a blue track suit off of the 80's (I’m later informed they are blue stage pants) what everyone wants to hear (apart from the Nigel’s that want more David Hasselhoff) Is lady in red by Chris De Burgh. Nice.

What a lovely way to polish off a lovely holiday that eradicates all traces of the fact that this week I was 40.

Yes.

That’s what this diary was all about.

Come in taste buds...Your 7 years are up.

2010-04-19T13:05:00.004+01:00

I’m not sure if it’s an old wives tale or whether its unequivocal scientific fact or whether its an ancient form of druidic witchcraft, but somewhere, someone came up with the line that every 7 years or so, your taste buds change. I used to refute this claim as I do most religious nuttery. That is until it happened to me.

My first big change was probably nuts. For the whole of my upbringing if I was presented with nuts, I’d happily put one in my mouth, chomp it up until it was a fine nutty crumble, then expel the hideously tasting thing out in any way I could. Usually vocally and usually very messy – a lot of nut filled drool. Blurgh!
Then a couple of years ago it was sweetners and dark chocolate. I used to have a very sweet coffee with two saccharine filled sweetners in every cup. That was until one day my taste kind of changed and then blam….no sweetners. No siree bob. Yuk. And as for dark chocolate – I mean who eats dark chocolate. Well apparently, I do now. (That’s not to say that I don’t like Milk Choc. That’s still the boss. Don’t get me started on that Milky bar white shit though. The only chocolate that tastes like what it looks like when you have to flob it out! I’m saying it tastes like white puke. I think dogs are the only creatures that seem to vom up white stuff. Well them and people who eat a lot of chicken soup.)
The latest crazy body changing life fuck up that seems to have happened is that I’m kinda going off coke. Not wacky dust, you know…aunt dora…come on you know…bazooka, big C, Billie Hoke, cholly, the ol’ Henry VIII, snow white, Tar dust, white mosquito. Nah Not that stuff, the fizzy drink coke or Cola based carbonated drink to be precise. (The more astute amongst you might have spotted that I just blagged that list of cocaine related slang word from an alphabetic list somewhere. I don’t really know that many words for nose candy).
I think the catalyst I have to thank from bringing about what could be the end of my fizzy drinks period could be none other than mass marketed bastard juice otherwise known as Pepsi Max.
Now I should point out that Max was never my drink of choice but as we have an advertisers dreamchild in our house who seems to obey all advertising, the in-house brown sweet water choice has shifted to the cooler, hipper, flava that seems to have fucked up my tastebuds …. To the MAX.
It does seem that the more age you collect (not that I’ve collected that much you understand), the more things try and change you so that you’re never the old you anymore.
To a certain degree I can cope with somethings changing and I just think, “Yeah….James Bond probably wouldn’t do this. I’ll probably seem more sophisticated now.” Or “Yeah….It probably is bad for me, so stopping now will immediately cancel out the millions of them I’ve had throughout my life so far”. Or “Yeah…Bollocks….why don’t I like chips any more?” I hope that last one doesn’t happen though in all fairness.
Anyway, to compensate for the fact that I no longer like some things, here is a quick list of things I do like (and hope don’t ever change) in case you want to get me any of them.
Chips. Prawn Toast. Scotch Eggs. Plain Pork Sausages (none of that fancy shit). Fish Finger sandwiches and Jam Roly Poly.
All good healthy stuff I’m sure you’ll agree.

Smells like Pine Forest

2010-04-18T21:31:00.002+01:00

Does your house smell? Mine does. I mean it doesn’t, but it must do because The Wife keeps placing those damned smelly things all over the house. She claims it makes the house smell nice. I claim it makes the whole house smell like a pine fresh toilet.
Ok… so she likes a nice smelling house, damn her, and to certain degree, I’m sure you’ll agree with her. Well you’re stupid too.
Now I know what you may be thinking… “What the hell’s crawled up his arse today to make him so hostile against things that smell nice?” Well…it’s not so much the smell of stuff. I actually might quite like the odd smell of niceness when I enter my abode after a hard day at work doing whatever it is I do now. No. It’s the delivery system.
I’m sure that a modern person like yourself has seen the telly. You know, the squarefaced noise flasher in the corner of your room. Well on there they kind of have these short clips that “advertise” products you may want to buy. Of course since the invention of the digital “plus” devices, I’m kinda betting you’ve haven’t seen any of these adverts at any speed other than “go away and bring my next part of “Britain’s Got Nobheads” in which Simon Cowell and his bunch of celebrity mates determine who will be the next Anton Du Beke winning a lifetime contract to present substandard shows whiles being a complete unlikeable nobhead”….BTW Sorry Vernon Kay, its not a real job opportunity, although I’m sure “E-List Celeb Wannabe Sex Text” is well past production hell by this point.
So anyway, we’ve established that you probably fast forward the ads. Which brings me to adverts for house smelly things. As you may or may not know, the same technology spies have been using for years, motion sensors, have now been deemed suitable for domestic use in of all things, home deodorizers. You walk in the room, pffft, the device squirts a cocktail of smellies into your environment, instantly masking the smell of that dog shit you accidentally stood in and tries to hide by not doing anything with those shoes. You open a door and pffft, instantly the smell of manly sweat from your sweaty body is masked by the smell of another pine forest. A breeze rolls through that gap under the door and molecules move and pffft, the smell of fish, I don’t remember eating fish…oh well, pffft and the smell of fish is gone-ski.
Ok… you now know the mechanics, but why still with the hatred?
Well it seems that every time I enter a room or move past a room or bend over to put my face nearer the floor or inhale, it seems to set of one of these devices that The Wife and usually right into my face and usually to the hilarity of The Wife who seems to have little or no regard for my general health regarding these things.
A commonly heard phrase inside our house is something along the lines of…
“pffffft….Arrrrgh My Eyes….and lungs”.
With all of these things general spraying off every time dust floats past their sensors I’m pretty much now at the point where I reckon there is more smelly stuff in the air within our house than there is actual oxygen.
So… if you do decide to drop by, don’t forget to bring your protective breathing apparatus because simply put…my house smells.

So....weather?

2010-02-10T12:39:00.002Z

It’s the cornerstone of every bad conversation start but I have to say something now….

How about this weather eh? There I said it.

This fucking weather is really starting to do my head in. Actually I’m not entirely sure how valid that statement is.

Am I pissed with the weather? Who do I blame?

The planet? Myself for using CFC filled packaging during the 80’s (no…I’m not going to blame myself. That would be mental) and generally bring about the destruction of the planet through waste and pollution and global warming.

Do I blame the weathermen for not being able to predict they were about to be run over while they stand motionless on a railway track of a regularly scheduled train. Those guys really do suck at their job. Sometimes I worry that I may not be up to whatever job I’m currently doing and then I think… “hmmm, but at least I’m not a weatherman. Those fuckers get it wrong 90% of the time. The rest of the time they just look out of the window”. If you’re a weatherman – or indeed weather lady, you should be ashamed of yourself.

Sexist generalisation alert:

If you’re a weather woman, you’re not really interested in weather are you? You’re just hoping that at some point you’ll be picked up by the media and you’re just using isobars and fishing forecasts to catapult yourself on to tv. Aren’t you? Admit it. Ok, don’t believe me. Check out all the weathermen/women on TV, loads of old blokes and young-ish women wannabes hoping that from badly predicting the weather, they get catapulted to fame and fortune possibly presenting some lame cost-nothing reality DIY / makeover show. Go on….admit it.

If you’re a weatherman, you should just be ashamed of yourself. Lying to us all the time. If you are a weatherman, ask yourself this…when was the last time you accurately predicted the weather using your science and not from cribbing off someone else or just making it up after looking outside. Shame on you. You don’t deserve your place on TV telling us about how some areas will be cold and others hot. You are a man-twat.

Who else can I blame?

Oh yes…the infrastructure holders. Councils…I’m looking at you and inability to ready anything in time. Obviously the team meetings take too long to arrange when the snow starts falling.

OK…..one last group to attack….

The media. You fuckers can’t decide what’s the truth and what’s not. If you don’t know exactly how much grit a county has, don’t just make it the fuck up to scare everyone into thinking that once again, civilization as we know it is less than two weeks away.

In an unprecedented move I’ve decided to not name and shame individuals and instead use a fictional media service to highlight my ridicule….

“Oh no, The CCB has said that where I live, which is not in London, is doomed because we’re all out of grit and road salt and within hours the trucks won’t be able to get to my supermarket to resupply our community with bread and milk and shortly after, fuel will run out because all the truckers will have frozen to death on the snowed in roads. Then there was a special documentary on after the news that told us how its all because the country is fucked and we have no money to buy ourselves out of it and its all our own faults and we deserve it for being bad but we’re all getting through it because of the ‘blitz spirit’. Still at least they haven’t cancelled All New Celebrity Dancing Wank Off Island with Brucie.”

Subtle satire isn’t dead.

Before I sign off…one final word on this matter…

STOP GOING ON ABOUT THE FUCKING ‘BLITZ SPIRIT’.

There hasn’t been a fucking blitz since 1941. Its doubtful whether anyone who survived the sustained bombing campaign from September 1940 to May 1941 even gives a shit about anyone else now, especially as they’re all struggling on tiny pensions and have no heating and worrying about being turned over by present day hoody scum off their tits on badly mixed drugs and super strength lager with nothing better to do with their time because they don’t have jobs cos it’s easier to live off handouts than have real fucking job, let alone wanting to invite people in to face almost certain death by the bombs of a facist dictatorship regime.

So again….please pass on this message.

DO NOT use the phrase ‘BLITZ SPIRIT’ in context with current events. If you do…you are an infected penis.

I think that about covers things for now.

Remember, have fun and don’t have nightmares and I still love you.

Bye Bye Chums.

Travelling Well or Well Travelled? Neither!

2010-02-03T21:55:00.007Z

In my new role as...well...whatever the hell it is I do now, I often have to travel to distant for off lands. Lands of intricate beauty and mystery. Lands that offer unlimited experiences for the taking.

Well...most of the time they do.
This week I'm in Aberdeen so you can scratch all that bollocks.
I've been here before, for an overnight stay and it withing 18hours I'd witnessed two "REAL" hard drunken punch-ups, been warned about the Russians and found fuck all to do here because everything shuts at 6.00pm.
I also had one of the worst approaches on a flight I've ever had in my entire life. Apparently, the crosswinds and turbulence on the approach to Aberdeen airport is well documented.
No one told me this.
On my approach, the plane quite literally dropped out of the sky twice and gave me what I thought was the monster of all nightmare flights.

....that was until Sunday.

Sunday, I left my house and drove to Leeds Bradford airport. It was my first visit to LBA and essentially....it’s a shed. At least that’s what I thought while I was waiting the three delayed hours for my flight. When my flight was finally called, I was marched from my metal seat (with minimal cover) through to another area with plush seats and plenty of leg room.
Ok...I felt a bit of a twat about that.
I should point out that I was aware that the forecast for Aberdeen was for snow to start moving in....but its only a bit of snow right?

The flight to Aberdeen is 1 hour long and after about 40 minutes you start the approach to Aberdeen.

Not this flight. 40 minutes in and the pilot comes on and states that Aberdeen’s runway is closed due to snow, but it’s ok because they're defrosting the runway and we'll be able to land soon.
So far, the flight has been fine. Not so much as a bump. Look out of the window and you can see for miles. Sure it looks like it’s been snowing and the sodium street lamps are giving off a yellow glow on the floor.
Another 30 minutes or so flying around Aberdeen, getting messages from the captain saying that we're in the holding pattern and we're first in the queue as soon as they've cleaned the runway.
Now I don't know about you, but that kind of started ringing small alarm bells.
They're clearing the runway. They're de-icing the runway. The plane you're in is landing on a runway that 10 minutes ago was covered in ice. You'll be ok. They train for this...oh hang on the pilots on again.
"Cabin crew 10 minutes to landing". Finally. Come on. Get this over with.
The plane starts to pitch forward and the noise from the engines increases (which is kind of odd when you're supposed to be slowing down) and then the windows become obscured by what you can clearly see is streams and streams of snow. Blasting past your window.
Have you ever been on one of those "motion rides" that you get at a funfair? You know you're not travelling but the mechanics are bumping you all over and you feel a bit giddy.
Apply that sensation to the knowledge that you're actually in the air, hurtling through thick snow to a runway that was "cleaned" 10 minutes ago encountering the same gusts and knocks you experience on the worst approach to an airport you've ever had.
So go ahead....tell me it’s easy and you don't have a problems with that and you wouldn't have any doubts about it.
Personally...I was shitting myself.
Ok...now I'm keeping an eye on my watch and the 10 minutes have already passed and we're still hurtling downwards and the engines are starting to make a noise reminiscent of a Stuka dive bomber from an old WWII film and we just keep going down. Bouncing around and not in a nice way.

Finally the and almost immediately, the ground is there and er…it doesn’t look very cleared.

The plane touches down.

You’d think that would make me feel better wouldn’t you.

As I look outside the window, I can see the wheel under the engine and its kicking up more snow than a snow plough!

Who “cleared” the runway, the fucking scouts??

Anyway….

Needless to say, the plane came to a stop and …. Well, it was just not an enjoyable experience.

Ok… you’re reading this and thinking… “pussy!”.

Well… it was horrible.

After I finally arrived at the hotel, I needed to relax.

To do this, I had a few drinks and then went outside.

It looks like “some big boys on BMX bikes” had been there and written something their feelings in the snow.

Who could do such a thing?

Until next time.

Laters chums.

2010-01-20T12:54:00.002Z

I just got back from Rotherham (where I work now).
Now I don't mean to be mean and if you live in Rotherham or pehaps have loved ones or family in Rotherham then please feel free to exempt them from this but....
What a fucking shithole.
When I first got here 18 months ago, the country was still enjoying the easy life and using five pound notes wipe its arse. Then the unthinkable happened and a bunch of chinless nobheads lost all our money and fucked everything up.
Now you could be mistaken for thinking that I'm going to say how Rotherham, being a small town, rapidly went down hill with stores closing left and right, however, well ok to a certain extent that did happen but for the most part, Rotherham was pretty much a shithole to start with. The recession just made it more of a shithole.
Don't get me wrong. If you want a mobile phone or some ropey old gold then you're sorted.
Why not arrange a nice shopping weekend for you and your loved one in Rotherham.
Just remember to bring a second pair of shoes because at some point you will tread in some dog shit.
Funny story.
I have to walk down a small flight of concrete steps to get to the main road and one day a dog (I assume it was a dog) had done the biggest shit in the world on the top step. It was so big you quite literally had to physically plan a route to walk around it.
That shit stayed there for ages. Not days, not weeks but at least 2 months. It got to the point where the frost came and froze it, rain came and washed it (but not away - it was too big for that) and I'm not sure but i think the thing started to get local prominance. I don't live in Rotherham, but I'm sure they have a local Gazette and I'm fairly sure that in that paper there was a section dedicated to the pile. "MESS WATCH" or some such.
I was on site a couple of months later when I recieved a text that just said "The shit has gone" and sure enough the man from the council (There must be only one if it took him that long to turn up) had turned up and done something about it.
I think what I should be pointing out is that this is by no means a one-off event.
I guess that transpires to the larger view that even dogs think that Rotherham is a shithole.
Actually a shit hole.
I used to make the joke that Rotherham was Sheffields biggest car-park.
the reality seems to be much much worse than that.
Until next time...

2010-01-19T12:34:00.003Z

Here I am again...Another blank page. Another case of writers block.
I've really decided to try and write more this year. Call it a New Years Resolution if you like although I've never really understood those resolutions.
You set yourself completely impractical goals and decide that you'll that is what you are going to attain to do. Yet all along, you secretely know you're going buckle after the first few attempts.
Smoking, exercise, weight, secret vices. Simple fact is...you are weak. You will give in. but enough about you.

So what Have been up to recently.

Well...it really has been a long time so I suppose the first thing is the new job. I don't really want to go in too much detail here but I got totally fucked off being boned by the big corporation that I decided to downscale a little and try the private sector. I now travel....a lot. (well compared to previously any travelling would be a lot, but in the past year I have travelled...a lot.
There were adventures too.
Like being dumped in the middle of no-where in the middle of the night when my sat nav decided to send me on a wild goose chase on my way to Southampton.
I also got to see some sights I didn't expect. Loch Ness springs to mind. Following a week in Inverness, I was surpised to learn that Loch Ness was actually less than 15 minutes away. I know....My geography is terrible!
Theres also been lots of people too but I guess I have to be careful what in say in that department, so I won't.
I've had some fun times in hotels too (nothing quite like that time at Heathrow though!).

Any ho.

I'm glad I remembered about this account.
Check back soon to see if I updated it anymore.

Laters.

Emergency or Panic...you decide.

2007-07-04T14:28:00.001+01:00

Well, its been a bit of a freaky kinda week all round.
In case you didn't know, this was the week of "The Floods" or to give them their proper title as announced in the papers "The Great Floods" (although I don't know what was so facking great aboout em).
It would probably be wrong of me to belittle the whole thing about the floods, especially as this time, they affected even me. However...It was interesting to see how it was all played out.
You see, there were several points of view that I found you just couldn't ignore, and I might as well start with poor old Joe Sheffield.
Yes...Joe Sheffield was at work and the rain started. By 2pm, the first river burst its banks and flooded a couple of roads. By 2.30pm most of Sheffield did exactly what they always do at times like these and they all decided to get in their cars and block every major road in the city. Once they were happy that they'd turned Sheffield into a very wet car park, they all decided to panic and stay in their cars until their cars were either very flooded or they found somewhere totally stupid to park.
Those poor people. They needed to get home. We all understand that. I mean, it could have been disaster if they couldn't get home in time to see telly now wouldn't it?
You see, the main problem with the roads in this case, was that essentially Sheffield was being cut in half by the flowing torrents and everyone who was on one side needed to get to the other and was prevented from doing so, by A)heaving cascades of murky brown water, and B)lots and lots and LOTS of cars.
The second point that was really obvious that needs to be made was the media.
Needless to say, the media tried holding the hands of the hordes of people as the rivers grew.
I've never really been in a situation like this before, where I’ve been able to see what’s happening and listen to how the media handles it at the same time.
I am making absolutely no comparison here, but the only other time I’ve seen the news unfold minute by minute would be 9/11. This was nothing like that.
Inane drivel about "the horror unfolding" came gushing out of the radio. I should at this point, point out that at one stage, a steel plant less than a mile from my office was on fire. The few people we had seen were running about shouting about the toxic smoke that was billowing forth from its roof. Where this information had come from, I’m not sure. I quickly reminded people that smoke generally by its nature is toxic and as long as they didn't go around gulping down huge gobfuls of the thick black smoke (which was in the sky) they'd probably all live.
By about 8pm most of Sheffield was either flooded, gridlocked or flooded and gridlocked. To add more horror, a power substation had been flooded, taking out a hefty chink of power across Sheffield.
At this point I was one of two people who’d realised the futility of trying to use the roads and was just waiting for the right time to make a break. I knew I was on the wrong side of the river, so it was pointless going anywhere at that point.
The radio squawked about how people were being airlifted from offices down the road from me. Wow. Those people must really have wanted to get home to watch TV. Then I heard the most ridiculous thing on the radio id heard all night.
I think I should say that ordinarily I don't listen to local radio as I really can't stand to hear the people of Sheffield speak. In general (and no offence is meant to any friends or family at this point-although I don't think it’s relevant on the most part) whenever you hear a person from Sheffield on TV or radio, they have a tendency to just sound plain thick.
So this guy comes on the radio staring that him and his colleagues are trapped on the third floor of their office block, no-one can get out and that the situation was now desperate as they had run out of food.
Excuse me at this point, but for fucks sake...It was only about 8pm! I have to assume that they sent the rescue choppers there next before they all gave in to raw basic human behaviour and started trying to eat each other.
It was terrible for all those folks whose homes were flooded and lost a lot of stuff. We do feel bad for them. So how did my ordeal end? Well I’m certainly not making myself out to be any kind of special case here, but I just waited until about 11.30 and then drove home. It took me about 25 minutes.
I think my last words on the subject of the floods will be these...
This is just a bit of rain and yes there was some flooding....god help us when there's a real emergency.

Time to go?

2007-06-22T11:19:00.001+01:00

I have some potentially devastating (for you) news.

This morning I have noticed that the front page of the highly reputable journal of news stories; The Sun, is running the front page banner "Huge UFO's spotted over the channel" http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2007280870,00.html

Its the everyday story of a group of people hopping the channel in a plane and witnessing 2 approximately mile long UFO's

This has several implications, including all the usual theological "Existance of God vs Existance of LGM (little green (or grey) men)", and the whole "why are they visiting us?" gubbins.

My first important observation is that The Sun is covering its butt well. How? Well, by having a front page announcement they don't have to use any of the front page (traditionally used for important information like "Big Brother love trist" or "Soap Star confesses to being dull") By filling it up with what is essentially, "claptrap" about UFOs.... that lets face it - no-one believes anymore.

Did you know that the reason no-one believes in UFO's anymore can be laid firmly at the doors of TV's X-Files, which lets face it, wound up itself in TV doldrum land and took all its believers with it - FACT!

However, In the off chance that this turns out to be a major event, they can claim that they ran the story first with a front page splash (tada - 10 bonus points)
Very Clever.
Although if they turn out to be Galactic Aggressors - the most likely scenario, its a bit of a moot victory.

This brings me to my second and perhap more important point. It does appear as if, after years of telling you it's going to happen, the mothership has finally returned. From this story, it sounds like they brought the uncleship with them too. To this end, I should just say that I might not be around much longer so if I owe any of you money, is there any chance you can hang on for a couple of weeks?

Easy Targets - So to speak.

2007-06-13T12:51:00.001+01:00

The Wife seemed a little more agitated than usual and I knew it was time to take notice when I had the obligatory “Come here and look at this”. Bad things were afoot.
Its about 9.15pm and still light out. The Wife is twitching the blinds in Stu’s room….which come to think of it, must be very obvious for anyone looking in….anyhow, I promptly do my husbandly thing and answer with the now commonplace “yes dear”.
“That boy in the park has got a rifle.” She exclaims in her not very amused kinda way.
“and? Its probably just an air rifle.” says I.
I think I should point out that at this moment in time that for as far back as I can remember, some boys, some where, you might not know them, you might know them, but some boys some where near you, now think about it…..have always had an air rifle. I suppose its just one of those generic growing up things. I never had an air rifle but I certainly was friends for a day with the kid that had one where I grew up and we shot lots of holes into his mums metal mop bucket. He got found out (I think when his mum needed to use the mop bucket), the offending weapon was, we were told, taken straight down the second hand shop and sold. I was told by his parents that he was a little bleeder and I should have known better and we weren’t allowed to play for about a month. As it turned out he became a nasty piece shit I really didn’t want to play with any more – even if he did have access to guns. Little sub note here…..I think when I was kid, Second Hand shops were like mini-armoury/musical instrument/pornography wholesalers. Whenever you went past one there always air pistols, air rifles jammed between a tuba, clarinets, partially rusted trumpets and …. Ewwww … second hand porn. Thank heavens for the internet – now all I need to find is an armoury and a music shop.
Where was I – Oh yes…
So I look out the bedroom window and sure enough, there’s one of the usual rich kids cars (daddy bought me a brand new car even though I dress like pillock and judging by the noise coming from the radio, have no musical taste) (mind you – if your kid was like that, you’d probably buy them a car to get rid of them for the night too!) and a bunch of teen naggers inside. One of the kids is stalking his way across the wrecks empty playground and in his hands is what looks very much like a rather rubbish air rifle.
A while back and very bad friend of mine lent me his air rifle to “get it out of my system”. I was expecting some kind of tin-pot fairground pop gun, what I got was akin to sniper rifle complete with scope. It was bloody huge and I quickly found out that shooting it within the confines of my garage at targets, wasn’t really good sport – more like a very dangerous version of darts, where there was a good possibility that the pellet could enter the paper target, hit the wall and then still have enough energy to rebound and come straight back at you with out hardly loosing any momentum. That’s an air rifle. The Wife didn’t like it and I had to return it post haste with the words “I’m not taking you to hospital”, ringing in my ears.
“Its just an air rifle.” Says I.
“I don’t care. I’m not happy about it.” Now we all know that if The Wife’s not happy about something, she’s damn well not gonna let it slide.
This is where I offered some helpful words.
“Call the police then. But you that by the time they get here, the kids’ll be gone and then the rozzers will probably just think you’re some kind of attention seeking cockney looney”
“Don’t care.”
“Ok…but when they come knocking at the door at half eleven don’t even think that I’m answering the door.”
“Don’t care.”
999
“Police please”
Two minutes later….
“I was asked if it was life threatening when I said no, I got a fucking answer machine. I’m not having that.” Off she trots. Sounds of rummaging in the distance.
“What do you think it’ll come under?” She says as I realise she’s flipping pages in the Yellow Pages.
“er…..P for Police?” Says I rather unhelpfully.
The next bit of this story is a bit of blur because….well because I’d really lost interest at this point and left her to her crusade, but needless to say she did eventually track down a police station that was open after 5.30pm.
Did you know that most police stations shut at the end of the day? Apparently crime only happens during the day. I’m assuming that most crime is car related, speeding and dodgy tires etc. But at 5.30pm its tea time and all the bobbys go home. On the off chance that there is a crime that Batman or Spiderman haven’t been able to resolve, there’s a handy answer machine that you can leave a record of this unsolvable misdemeanour on, and the police will add it to their statistics at the end of the month to prove that crime is on the increase.
So she’s spoke to someone and give them all HER details and is assured that even though crime is at an all time low, some PC’s might drive around in a bit and if there are any trouble-looking types around, they’ll get a proper talking to.
10.30pm and the door bell rings.
I silently point to the door and indicating my complete lack of wanting to help in this matter as its all playing out scarily like one of my predictions of an ITV thriller.
Its absolutely no surprises to find out that there is no car in the car park any more and no kids with firearms (it was a poxy air rifle) but “…if you’d just like to go over again what you’ve already told us, we’ll happily put you down on our attention seeking cockney looney list.” (They didn’t actually say this).

So what have we learned from this little episode?
- I don’t have an issue with kids with air rifles – consider it a rite of passage. However that isn’t to say that if they shot at someone or damaged any property, I wouldn’t have been out there with a 7 iron re-decorating daddy’s car with some fashionable speed dents.
- Nothing you can say can change or influence The Wifes mind. Well…..duh.
- Police work 9-5 and contrary to what you might have heard, crime must sleep when the sun goes down.
- The Yellow Pages has many numbers for talking to police.
And Finally…
- Its ok to carry a gun (air rifle) as long as you’re not threatening anyone with it.

I really don’t want to have a pop at the Police but they really don’t help themselves.

Don’t worry though…..while ever vigilant window twitchers like The Wife are around, the streets and parks of this grey and litter-filled land will be safe, so remember…..don’t have nightmares.

I've Just Realised!

2007-06-05T11:59:00.000+01:00

You know what?
I've just realised that YOU can comment on anything that might appear on this message board and I whole heartedly encourage you to do so*.
My only rules are:

No Stalkers or Psycho's sending death threats. That's what newspaper print and Royal Mail are for.
No Spamming of adverts intimating that I may have erectile dysfuntion and need a healthy supply of pill that will solve all of my aforementioned problems
No Spamming of the nature that I want to see {Person A} doing {Stuff} to {Person B} for a {Good Time}

I think thats about it - however knowing you, you'll invent something just as bad that I want to get rid of soon enough!

COME ON! Comment now!

*if you don't have a gmail account, just leave an annonymous post and sign your name at the bottom.

Film Reviews

2007-06-05T11:53:00.000+01:00

I'm not sure if you're aware of this but along with my old chums, Pod, Richie, Bear & James we all review the movies we see, so if you look to the side, you should see a whole host of movie reviews that I recently saw.
You know they're all good cos I try and avoid duff movies.
However!
As of late I've been a right old lazy toss merchant and I haven't reviewed any for ages....so my Flixster is currently empty.
If you are reading this and the panel is STILL empty, please leave me a comment to tell me to get my finger out (yes...I of course I know where its been) and get those reviews up there.
As you might already know, I don't respond well under pressure and will surely buckle and do exactely what you tell me to.

Hi There - This used to be WilsonHQ - I think it still is!

2007-06-02T13:02:00.000+01:00

Hi everyone....
I don't know if this is going to take off or even work to levels of excellence you're all used to.
Here's the boring bit about what happened:
The WilsonHQ.Com domain name stopped being looked after and had to be moved to new Domain Name Service. Part of this meant that I lost the website, as it used to be hosted on their servers.
So Instead of trying to manage and maintain my own pages, I've decided to give a blogging page a try.
It should in theory be the same. In fact it may even work out even better.
At this moment in time, I just don't know.
If you do find you miss a particular feature from the website, just let me know and I'll try and incorporate it........somehow

Anyho....Don't be too surprised if nothing much happens here for a while. My new task is to see just what can be done by message about with this whole Blog mularchy.

Regards, Best Wishes, Hugs 'n Kisses

Phil.