Winter Arrives a bit early

I dont think I can remember the last time that I saw snow more than a couple of days before Christmas, however this evening so far there has been a couple of hours of snow. Its not lying on the road as yet but the cars and roofs have a bit. A few weeks ago the DJ on the breakfast show said that there would be snow in October although a little excited by the promise I didnt think that it would happen, however he was right.

Pictures from a couple of nights ago

and also tonight.

NFL International

Well for the 2nd time in its history a regular season NFL game has come to London as part of its International series.

The weather is dry Its dark outside and even a bit chilly but the action is hot

Its halftime here in London and the Saints are up on the Chargers.

Plenty action to come in the second half.

30 and Counting

Well Im glad to report that I havent lost teeth or hair just yet and Im slowly getting used to being in my 30's and not in my 20's anymore.

One thing I have noticed is that the rate of alcohol clearance takes a bit longer as my head is still a bit fuzzy and I havent had a drink since late Saturday night/early Sunday morning. I must admid that I was lead astray after my party and taken to another pub or two and so didnt get in till 0230. Im sure that I will recover in time.

As a further note I am now a Laird thanks to the folks at work as they bought me a piece of land in Scotland.

Getting a bit older

Well it appears that Im getting close to moving into the 4th decade of my life. Im sure that its nothing to worry about althoughh I have been warned to expect just some of the following:

Hair loss from my head (up to a third)
Gain of nose hair
Tooth Loss
Spots
An extra ear
and possibly a cane in about 10 years or so but thats the next decade

Having had a quick look about Ive seen a few people a bit older than me and it appears ythat they all had reasonable hair levels, and didnt require a cane so I think that I might be OK for now.

F22 Raptor

Managed to see some of this display from 7 miles away whilest at work on Monday. Quite inpressive looking plane from that distance especially the "hovering" that it appeared to do. Have also managed to catch glimse of the Vulcan, Eurofighter, B1-B and the Red Arrows this week.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7510364.stm

Sat Navs

Well I finally bit the bullet a couple of weeks ago and bought myself a Sat Nav. Now I know that they arent hugely cheap just yet and that money doesnt grow on trees and all that but hey Id managed to hold off for quite some time, after all its been on my wish list since October time, well atleast one of the models had. I must confess that I quite fancied the Garmin Nuvi 610T but the price drops actually brought the Nuvi 760 into play. I know there is quite a difference between the two but I did like the option of full Europe mapping in addition to the bluetooth phoning and FM transmission to the radio (therefore almost wirefree). Anyway Ive been using it for a week now and I have just got back from a trip to Manchester and I got there and got back in one piece and I didnt get lost (although I did over rule the Sat Nav once, well I thought my way would be better).





Anyway if you faancy a SAt Nav Id give it a try the instructions are quite good, the traffic system seems to work most of the time (although I did sit in a 20 minute tailback and all the emachine told me there was a 1 minute delay about 10 minutes after I got into the traffic, but hey some things do have bugs) the other delays it warned me about were gone by the time I got to them but I had been prepared.

Championship Title 2

OK its been a while and I know that Ive not uploaded the holiday snaps either but Ive not been blogging for a while. I will try and get thenm up at some point although I dont think that it will be too soon as Im not in much this week.

Anyway just returned from the football tonight and like my favourite club Rangers we have taken another trophy to put in the cabinet by winning the Woking Indoor Winter Championship by 3 points.

At the start of the day it looked doubtful as we relying on other results to go our way and for us to win tonight too. The other results went our way with the 3rd placed team beating the 1st placed team then we beat the 2nd bottom placed team to finish top although we went 2-1 down at one point so it looked doubtful at half time. However in the 2nd half we rallied and won through.

It now means I have something else to dust.

Holiday Sun

Ive just returned from holiday in the sun. Whilst the UK was being battered by high winds and rain I was sat next to the pool enjoying the sun on a week long holiday in Tunisia (North Africa). The first few days weer a bit cooler at about 16C (61F) with a nice sea breeze however we headed down the country on the Wednesday on a coach trip to the Amphitheatre at SFax (where they filmed Gladiator), the Troglodyte houses near Hammett where they filmed Star Wars (IV and II/III), the Sahara near Tozer, the Atlas mountains where the highest waterfall in Tunisia is (all 8m of it) and also where 3 Kings was filmed. Yes it was a whistle stop tour of Southern Tunisia and film sets.

We spent the first day of the coach trip visiting SFax, the hotel where Star Wars was filmed (very much a disappointment to all Star Wars Fans I'm afraid, not really worth the visit), a family home to see how real Troglodyte homes are lived in. We then went to the Sahara to watch the sunset from the top of Camels (one humped in Africa). The second day saw a 0430 start (yes I did say 0430 (that's +1 not GMT either)) so that we could watch the sunrise over the salt lakes (although the sun beat us up as although we watch it rise it wasn't over the salt lake). At about 8am we jumped into a land cruiser and headed into the Atlas Mountains where we went to oasis' and to see the largest waterfall in Tunisia. Temperatures this day apparently reached 38C (101F) not nice on a coach bu at least it was air conditioned.

Our last couple of days were spent lazing in the mid 20's by the pool again and spending a morning at the local market where we could get almost whatever we wanted, from live animals, vegetable, to sweets, sun glasses to clothing, belts and dinner services. All the brands were fake but exceedingly cheap (belts I believe were only about 10DT (£5 or 10$US) for "Levis" Camel skin belts).

Photos to follow

Scientific Advert

Well I never

How to drive on operation

Got this by Email the other day. Amazing how quickly they get out of the way of the Hummer, suggest you dont try it at home though.

New Thoughts

Ive now been at my current place of work for 6.5 years and I recently went for a promotion. Sadly I didnt get the job becasue of what appears to have been lack of experience however I have to ask the question if I dont have the experience (therefore qualification) why did they interview me for the job. Personally I think that I could do the job fairly successfully regardless of the fact that I dont have the in job experience. However Im not going to dwell on the fact that I didnt get the job but instead Im going to get a feedback session with the interview panel so that I can work out where I went wrong and improve for further interviews be it here or around Manchester.

On a better note I managed to start building a Memorial Garden at the scout center that I help out at so if anyone has suggestions of some nice (nativish (to the UK)) plants that are bright during different parts of the year then let me know. Area pictured below

Temours

Apparently there was an earthquake in the Uk last night. Yes I knew about it at 1am this morning but the only tremours I felt was the vibrate on my mobile as the text came in from my girlfriend who was workning nights at Manchester Royal (a bit closer to Lincon than me) and I guess a cat screaching a few minutes before (although that may have been by chance) anyway all is well in my house so Ill just get on with life as normal

6 Nations 08 Wk 3

Well week 3 of the six nations is nearly upon us and after a week off I hope that the Scots can put some points on the board this weekend to lift themselves up the table a bit.

This weekend is going to be fairly quiet, Im at home and have very littele planned except a little shopping to get soe things for my trip to Tunisia and watching the rugby over a couple of beers. Its half term, so I dont have any Scouts so tonights plan is to watch teh Wild game that I recorded from Wednesday when they played the Blackhawks (I watched the first period last night and left the Wild trailing 0-1), its been so long since I watched the wild in action properly although I have watched the highlights on the computer off their website.

So all I have to say is Come on Scotland and Lets Go Wild.

6 Nations - 0 for 2

Well the second game has just past from a Scotish point of view in the 6-nations championship and despite a few drinks this afternoon Scotland are still sitting bottom of the table after their second game. LAst Sunday saw an terrible defeat to the French and today despite a better performance the Scots lost 30-15 to the Welsh. Only an improved performance in 2 weeks time will see us defeat the English to restore some hope.