So here we are again!

The end of another year. Been a busy one for most of us; I've moved house and I'm still unpacking and trying to work out why I bothered shoving some of the stuff into boxes rather than straight down the tip. Mark Jopling (Historian of Kingston) wrote a great piece about one little slice of WWII and how it happened in Bishopsbourne - read it here.

Hope everyone has a great time tonight and a peaceful and prosperous 2008!

Have a good one!

Veg prepped, more food than you could shake a stick at and a handful of decorations tastefully strewn around the house. Yesterday I took a hired van and both daughters to Ikea so I now have furniture to sit on!

I hope everyone is sorted for the festivities and that you have whatever sort of day you wish yourself. Whatever you celebrate use tomorrow as a space to celebrate it.

The one you were looking for

This is the web site you are probably looking for. It's "Norad tracks Santa" - every year the lovely folk at the North American Aerospace Defense Command use some of the high tech kit at their disposal to track Santa and grab some real-time video as he travels round the globe delivering presents.

For Mouse

Sheep
Originally uploaded by nogbad the bad

The sheep were in the field across the road today. And then the road was closed for a moment as the sheep were brought out of the field and up the farm yard behind my house. They did all this just for Mouse so that I could grab some quick snaps - the whole world knows that Echo Mouse loves sheep photos :-)

Robert

Robert

Explanation

Sara is a 3rd year undergrad in the group I work with at LCC. I was publishing from the phone to demonstrate the speed of the digital world.

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Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone

Sara 2

2

Sara

Sara

Eureka!

My initiation into the secret world of cleaning products continues. I wasn't sure how I'd clean the racks from the oven and the grill pan which doubles as a roasting tray until I found a garishly decorated box on the shelf in the aisle I've just discovered at Morrisons. The box looks as though it was designed by a three year old on ecstasy but, boy oh boy, it's the real thing inside. It comes with rubber gloves and more warnings than a nuclear power station. It also has a large plastic bag in which the items to be cleansed are deposited. Bung them in the bag, pour in the gunk and leave for a few hours. Wear gloves, old clothes, don't get the liquid on your body or furniture or any materials not provided in the kit or constructed of stainless steel or enamel.

Bunged them in yesterday afternoon - I got two boxes so one bag has the grill pan and the other has the oven racks - and let it do its work. Wow! All that's left to do is to don the protective gear and wash the gel away but through the bag I can see that this stuff has eaten away all the grease and baked-on crud - it is amazing. I'm sure that everyone else knows about this stuff but to me it's a revelation. Of course the text on the box is confident that there are no environmental impacts of swilling the stuff down the sink so that's all good too.

Unknown delights

I have to admit that beyond a dab of bleach and the stuff that makes the water in the cistern blue the mysteries of bathroom cleaning products were an alien world to me. Clearly I need to make sure that all is shipshape and Bristol fashion so I strayed down one of the two aisles I usually forgo (pet food in case you wondered about the other).

Bloody hell but there's a lot! Who would have thought that there could be so many ways of getting rid of limescale on plugholes? (Hands up all those who even knew that the white crusty crud was limescale!). Because I can cook I don't need Brillo pads to clean pans, I use those sponges with a green abrasive side, but I now find that they are available in white for cleaning baths. I'd hate anyone to think that I live in abject squaller but I wasn't aware of the sheer delight in stocking up on these gels and preparations which will transform my life.

On the packing side - blitzed the packing cases which had been untouched since I moved in here (3yrs 1 month) and now have 9 bags of recycling waiting for collection and just two neatly packed boxes - mainly books about exciting stuff like education and advice & guidance. Got rid of piles of old OU brochures from when I was doing some project work from home, equally large amounts of prospectuses (oldest dated 2000) from colleges and universities around the county - another legacy of project work.

Moving....

I'm good at project management, I've done it for years and been paid - often handsomely - for knowing how to do it.

Why then am I in bits about getting all this stuff sorted? I'm surrounded by "stuff" and I have to determine what stuff is worth packing and what stuff should go to the tip. Some of the stuff has no intrinsic value but means something because it's part of my lives - stuff that I've carried since I was a child, stuff that means something as a husband and a father and stuff that has been part of the latter life as a bloke alone. I have things that measure my success as a person alone - I'm proud of not having broken things or of having clothes that I've managed to wash and iron alone. These might seem silly tests but by such tests we measure how we've managed, the metaphysical question of "How am I in the world". The person I was when I moved in here on 18th October 2004 is gone but should I save some trace? Is memory better than artifacts?

Have I picked the right place to move to? Is it the right move?

My father remains my hero - he was a quiet man who occasionally said things which I try to aspire to and one such thing was "That's what being grown up means" - he used that whenever I said that something was difficult. Right now moving is difficult, beyond the physical packing and going, because it means I have to assess where I'm at and where I'm going.

Which stuff do I need?

Outside (through window - too cold to go

Outside (through window - too cold to go there!)

Llandoger Trow

Llandoger Trow

Beer

Sending this from the bar of the Llandoger Trow in Bristol. Chilly night but everyone is outside so that they can have a smoke. This building dates from 1664 and features in 'Treasure Island'.
Famous feet have trodden these worn old boards; Alexander Selkirk met Daniel Defoe here and pirates sailed from the quay outside and Gowing and Rivers wrote in green ink.
Halcyon days and 5oz rumps.

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Sent using a Sony Ericsson mobile phone

Happy birthday!

DSCF0222
Originally uploaded by icedjem2040

My big child celebrated her birthday in Japan.

Moving!

bus
Originally uploaded by nogbad the bad

I'm moving at the end of November and this is where I'm going to live. It's bigger than where I am now, it's just over a mile to where my children live and more than 30 miles closer to where I work a couple of days each week. Fields out the front and it backs onto a farm. Now I've got the faff of packing up and shifting over things like the phone and broadband but it's all good and it'll mean I can see the children even more.

This map shows where the house is and in the shot below I've highlighted it in red with the blue circle showing where the children live.

It's jolly exciting!

Today

I've just realised, while driving home, that today is my 25th wedding anniversary!

World school

Largest child is at "World School" in Japan right now. She appears in one of the photos - I've not looked through the videos yet.

Plymouth

Plymouth
Originally uploaded by nogbad the bad

Went to Plymouth to do a presentation to colleagues from the OU today. I went yesterday and stood most of the way from Paddington to Plymouth but there was a really friendly buzz on the train - a couple of guys who did the trip regularly were going out of their way to talk to people. Had a walk (and beer) round the harbour and a nice curry. After the presentation I headed back to the train station to get the replacement bus service to Tiverton and then the train to Paddington and then the tube to Victoria and the train back to Maidstone to collect the car - loooooooooong day but great meeting people from the far west.

Getting old

Today is the anniversary of the birth of both of my daughters. Rowan is having a sleepover with some chums so Cal is here with me. Jemma is in Japan with the school. I'm not the only one who is getting old.