Tag: cold weather

Singh For Your Supper

by mkingdon, posted in All This And More, mkingdon

There’s a famous quote from George W Bush that goes something like, “Fool me once, shame on me, fool me twice…we..er…shame…we won’t get fooled again”. I use it not (only) to highlight the amazing fact that this guy got elected to the most powerful job on the planet but also to tell you I stupidly ignored his wise words this week.

Unable to avoid a trip for work meetings to Marlow on a Thursday, after a stop over in High Wycombe’s finest Premier Inn, I had to then, for just the second time ever attempt the journey north on a Friday afternoon.

If you wanted to, you could go back through these blog posts and see me whining about a previous horrific journey on a Friday at some point in the past, followed by me swearing that I would never do it again.

Well, I did, and it was bobbins. Even with an earlier than usual exit from the office it took just under five hours. The M6 is just no longer fit for purpose and we should all get a refund. I could fly to New York in a similar time frame. Let me now declare once and for all that I shall not be doing it again, unless it is because I have had to drive to Head Office on a Friday to hand in my notice due to a lottery win.

The evening before I enjoyed a tasty (and large) curry, and we were entertained by an Indian Elvis.

He’s singing The Wonder Aloo

He was good fun, and made what might have been a fairly tedious mid week night away with work into a good laugh. Being the wild animals that me and my (similarly middle aged) colleagues are, we were up until at least 11pm. Crazy stuff.

The weekend hasn’t been anywhere near as exciting, mainly as Louise has been chained to the computer producing her latest assignment for her Nursing course. This has meant that I have had to amuse myself, sit around, eat, watch football, oh yes and do some ironing. Yes, I am that dream man who all men want to be, and all women want to be with.

Encouraged by the weather reports, predicting tarmac melting temperatures and the potential for my skin being burned from my face this weekend, I ventured out and took the dog for a walk this morning in a lack of layers not seen since last August. Imagine my delight to find the temperatures lower than George W Bush’s IQ. I have instructed my lawyers to begin proceedings against the Met Office. Oli seemed oblivious to the gloom, fog and cold.

cold oli

So if you had sun today, please keep any news of it to yourselves as I’ve just put the heating on again.

Before I go, thank you to those who added a lovely review for me following my request last week. The general underlying theme seems to be that folks are finding it to be better than they expected. Well, that’s fair enough, and that is more or less how I feel about it too! I got my hard copy this week and it looks OK, but I can’t bring myself to read the thing again. Not yet anyway. If you got it too, I hope you don’t feel the same.

Till the next time….

Hard Nipples and Silly Hats

by mkingdon, posted in mkingdon

Every now and again no doubt due to some odd Gregorian calendar anomaly, a week lasts about sixteen days. That was last week. Perception is reality of course, so whatever you think that is what happened.

It was my last full week in work (have I mentioned that I have a good deal of time off over Christmas?) so that may explain the feeling that the week dragged a little. I didn’t do anything ridiculous like go for any more runs, but I did keep up a fairly decent regime of walking, mainly with the dog. The weather has been a delight of course and so this has been a massive joy.

Oli is sporting a decent coat these days and so he strolls around like he is on a balmy holiday beach whilst I cower under sixty-eight layers of clothes and my Int Milk Brilliant hat.

Living la vida loca
Living la Vida loca

How I miss warmth. I don’t do cold very well, and even my desk at work is situated under an air conditioning unit that could make chapel hat pegs out of anyone’s nipples at a hundred paces. I was looking back at some photos from 2013 this week and found this one from the summer. Can you feel the heat? Can you remember that far back?

play time

Our walks at the moment are dark, cold bleak affairs that end with me washing his muddy paws in a bowl at the back of the house, much to mine and Oli’s disgust.

Emily is still sling bound and hating every moment. She goes to hospital again on Wednesday to see if she can take it out of the sling and start physio. If she can’t she might need another sling for her bottom lip. Roll on her full recovery when she can start taking her turn walking the bloody dog again!

Last week I told you that we were off to see Frozen. I have to report that we absolutely loved it. It is destined (in my view) to be up there with the other classics, Beauty and the Beast, Mermaid, Lion King etc, it is that good. The songs in it are just fabulous, and the feel of the whole thing is pure Disney.

We did get a few odd looks as we entered and left the film, being two forty somethings and an eighteen year old, but little did we care. Emily of course has been back since to watch it again, taking a friend and Louise with her again (as Emily can’t drive right now) and Emily will probably be going again this week if she can find a willing volunteer to take her.

If you haven’t yet seen it and like Disney stuff (well why else would you be reading this?) then you MUST go and see it. It is pure Disney, and not only that it is Disney at its very best. Emily is already getting excited at the thought of Frozen and Saving Mr Banks coming out on DVD around the same time next year!

Speaking of future releases (my God that was a beautiful and seamless link wasn’t it?) I have made some pleasing progress this week. I am in the final stages of the first draft and just over 70,000 words. I wasn’t best pleased to be awake at six this morning throwing ideas around in my head as I tried to get back to sleep. I gave up at seven, came downstairs and made some notes. I then cracked on and spat out another couple of thousand words. I am definitely in the final stages now, with probably one or two chapters left to write.

Having never done this before I have no idea how long it will then take to read it over and over again, edit it, improve it, extend it, improve it some more and then, maybe get it proof read. I also need to get a decent cover done and decide upon a title, which is easier said then done when every bugger else has already used all the ones I keep thinking of.

Anyway, hopefully once I am free of work I can get a lot of that done. Did I tell you I finish on Wednesday?

I am out on the razz on Tuesday night for a wild night out. You may not think that a Tuesday evening in Prestwich with two other middle-aged blokes in a Chinese restaurant is technically the razz, but each to their own. I intend to eat so much egg fried rice that my internal organs may be absorbed completely.

If I survive that I shall see you back here next Sunday for my Christmas blog extravaganza. (This will be much the same as any other blog but I may mention Christmas a bit).

Right, Emily insists we watch the X Factor now as One Direction are on so I cannot be held responsible for my social media output for the next few hours.

Till the next time….