» Family codes and rituals

Christmas Doors
One Christmas Eve my Dad thought it would be a good idea to put a new front door in. It was a little cold, but there were no great dramas - the timing was just a little inappropriate.
From then on every Christmas Eve there would be the standing joke about which door was going to get it that year.

Dad passed away two years ago, but in my own special homage I have taken down, or knocked down a doorway on both Christmas Eves since. Last year my Mum came around and just gave me a knowing smile.

Perhaps not a ritual - but a tradition non the less - and there are plenty more doorways in this house......!
(Thu 20th Nov 2008, 20:17, More)

» The most childish thing you've done as an adult

Monsters do live in the wardrobe.

I take great joy in hiding in my wifes wardrobe whilst she is in the bathroom in the morning.
Sometimes as she opens the door I shout 'boo', othertimes I don't - either way she jumps about 15ft in the air before slapping me.
I have a tendancy to fall on the floor laughing my arse off. Every time. Without fail.
She continues to ask when I'm going to tire of this. The answer, as should be very clear by now, is never.

I'm 35 next birthday!


PS: I'm also the Olympic hide and seek champion in our house. The kids were looking for nearly an hour one day, whilst I was in the kitchen cupboard behind the pots and pans.
(Sun 20th Sep 2009, 11:29, More)

» Irrational Hatred

Fearne Cotton....
Asking any of her few listeners to 'Give her a text'.

If you weren't so annoying I might send you one, but giving you one* is not going to happen.



*In any sense of the phrase.
(Fri 1st Apr 2011, 18:13, More)

» Nightclubs

God Bless Cowboys
A few years ago a group of us went snowboarding in Fernie, Canada for a stag do. We got back to Calgary to find that our Monarch plane had lost an engine (again, but that’s another story), and that we were to be put up for the night in a posh hotel in the city.

As a bunch of lads with the keys to a new city we headed off to see the Concierge and asked the good fellow if there were any strip bars nearby. After dismissing Hooters as being a little light on boobs or flange we headed off to Cowboys.

The entrance was a small door leading to a flight of stairs, at the top of which was a fruit machine. Everyone spins the fruit machine and has the chance to win a prize; a rucksack, t-shirt, etc. This struck me as slightly odd – a club with no entrance fee, where they give you stuff to come in?
For the next hour or so we were served bottles of Bud for a $1 by girls in Bikini’s, although I took it easy, because in the back of my mind this still wasn’t quite ‘right’.
An hour later I’d convinced myself that this was the Canadian equivalent of some seedy SoHo sex den, and that I’d be raped of all my money when I tried to leave, so whilst I still had my faculties I sneaked out.
It turns out there was no raping, in fact no down side at all. My mates enjoyed cheap beer, a wet t-shirt contest, and girls in bikinis all night. In fact at midnight they open the doors to the club downstairs, where girls are being fed cocktails by (hunky?) men and playing sausage swingball (or something), and carnage ensues.

Still I may have left early but at least I went – my mate Tony was turned away for having white laces.
RIP Cowboys – knocked down and turned into a Walmart........
(Wed 15th Apr 2009, 13:29, More)

» Annoying words and phrases

Fearne Bloody Cotton
and her repeated requests for people to "give her a text".

It's not a physical thing so I can't gve you one*, but I may consider sending one.



*Insert own joke here!
(Fri 9th Apr 2010, 8:28, More)