Bits and bobs.

It's been a busy few weeks. Here are the headlines:

• Grandear Neal turned 100 on Monday 29 2010. Congratulations to Grandear.
• The future is a little clearer – WEST have said 'Yes'. Roll on September.
• I have conjunctivitis, so although the future maybe a little clearer, my eyes aren't. Humbug.

Anyway, looking forward to this Easter time when we remember and celebrate the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ!

Headphones

I was recently given an itunes voucher and so after carefully whittling down my selection of songs I purchased them and put them on my ipod. It's been some time since I have used the standard ipod headphones, but as I listened to my music on the way to work I was astonished.

I used to think that the standard ipod headphones were pretty good, but I was extremely disappointed – there was no bass and they sounded really thin and tinny. I think I've become a little spoilt and have got used to the headphones I use at work. When I got to work I plugged in my Sony MDR-XD200 headphones – what a revelation. Suddenly the sound filled out, plenty of bass and the music came alive. I love Apple products, but if your main headphones are the standard ipod ones, try upgrading and you'll never look back.

A strange nighttime revelation.

A couple of days ago our home telephone line went dead. We still had internet access, but when we picked up the phone there was no dialing tone, nothing. After a few days I rang Sky and navigated my way through the maze of automated menus. I must admit I was impressed with just how many options they felt it necessary for me to spend my limited life listening to. In fact so prolonged was the task of menu navigating that by the end of it all, the automated female voice was actually showing signs of irritation. Brilliant touch Sky – it actually made me smile to think that the computer was even more fed up having to spout out the tedious list of choices than I was having to listen to it.

Finally I got to speak to a human being, but as it transpired, even after going through the above, she was not the right person and had to transfer me to another helper called Linda. Linda took my details and then as I was at work and not at home by the faulty phone, arranged to ring me back later that evening, which she duly did.

We went through all the tests, unplugged and checked all the phones, tried the test socket, before Linda decided our line was fine and that it was our 'box on the wall' that was faulty. Trying to hide my skepticism I listened to my options. I could pay for Sky to enlist BT to come and look at it, but if it was my 'box on the wall' it would cost me a £99 call out fee, plus an hourly fee. The other option was to contact a local independent. I contacted my Dad.

About 15 minutes my Dad has the main box in bits and diagnoses there to be no fault with it, but that it is the line that is dead, it showed no vaults or anything. So planning to contact Sky in the morning, we went to bed... and this is where it gets a little weird.

In the middle of the night, in that strange place in between sleep and the real world I thought I heard a tinny voice. I couldn't understand what it said, but it seemed to be coming from the phone on the bedside table. So I picked it up, but there was nothing, still dead. As you can imagine, Claire was a little intrigued at my actions. Still we drifted back into that happy place of slumber. As I slept, the whole phone thing must have been playing on my mind as I dreamt that now the phone was fixed.

A little while later when the alarm burst the bubble of sleep, I lay in bed semiconscious – all the time thinking the phone is working, the phone is fixed. When I finally mustered the energy to reach out and pick up the receiver  you can imagine my surprise at hearing the reassuring buzz of the dialing tone. How weird was that?

The trials of eating on a train.

Every now and again I have to eat on the way home from work so that I can get out quickly to get to a meeting on time. The other day I picked up a Big Tasty Meal from McDonald's. Now, the key to eating a McDonald's on the train is to get your meal early, allowing yourself enough time to obtain a good seat.

By a good seat I mean one at the end of a carriage that has the back of the next seat facing you – not an open 4 seat space with another passenger facing you. The 2 seater space is perfect, because if you sit in the window seat, not are you hidden from most other passengers while you eat, but you can also wedge your coke or milkshake between the wall and your seat – freeing up a much needed hand.

However, due to McDonald's not anticipating my need for a Big Tasty (without bacon) I had to wait a good while and so only just caught my train. And so there I was, surrounded by passengers all wishing I wasn't unpacking my freshly cooked junk food. There was one window seat left and so despite the obvious annoyance and overspilling bulk of the large man sitting in the seat next to it, I squeezed myself into position and filed my drink in the aforementioned holding place.

I pulled out the fries and began to unpeel the ketchup. But due to the large man occupying more seat than he had paid for and the resulting awkward angles of my arms, the sauce somehow flipped out of my hand, narrowly missing my jeans and ended upside down on my cleverly concealed drink. This was not ideal. To execute a clean-up exercise was going to be tricky and embarrassing. So I took the option of pretending it hadn't happened - and thankfully so did everyone else. Bless the English.

And so I munched my way through my meal, desperately wanting a drink, but fearing the mess that would result. The Big Tasty itself was also tricky. It had been blessed with an over generous portion of lettuce and the sauce was belligerently refusing to stay in the bun. Such was the spectacle, that an elderly gentleman could stand it no longer and held his newspaper absurdly high in protest, using it as makeshift barrier to block out the eating disaster that was occurring in front of him. I felt bad, but what can I say? I was hungry, the food was playing up, I was squashed and my drink was disabled.

Still it could have been worse – the ketchup could have landed on the big man next to me. I'm sure his manners wouldn't have been so English then.

Wishing the road was as flat as my tyre.

My sister's fiancé and I were on our way to the pub. It was an evening organised by my local church to go and eat good food and listen the story of a pastor from Kosovo.

After a short and uneventful journey we were just 30 metres from the pub when Jon spotted it – a large pothole in the road. I spotted it slightly later, about one second before I drove over (or should I say into) it. There was a muffled bang, followed by the unmistakable flap flap and hiss of my tyre deflating. It was dark wet and very annoying.

Thankfully Jon sprung into action and within about eight minutes we had the spare on. Phew. Feeling like true men who had triumphed over adversity we got cleaned up and settled down for a pleasant evening.

When we came out we noticed someone else parked nearby, boot lid open and a small crowd of men around the car – they too were afflicted by the hard-to-spot hole in the road.

Life can be like that. Just when everything seems to be going okay, bang something happens. And let's face it, much worse things happen than a flat tyre. But I think it's how we deal with these unforeseen events that matters. Stuff happens; sometimes stuff that we can't prepare or carry a spare for.

The pastor from Kosovo shared with us the stories of some people who had suffered badly and lost most of the earthly possessions due to the war. In their time of need they called out and found God. I wonder when the things in our lives goes 'bang' who/what in our time of need we call out to?

A strange occurrence

So there we were, my wife and I floating in the middle of a huge flooded square. We bobbed around beneath attractive, sunny buildings, struggling with what appeared to be our recycling bin. The thing simply refused to open - no matter how we prized at it, how annoying. Amidst our struggles to keep afloat and wrestling with the wretched bin, we found ourselves drifting into one of the surrounding buildings. We swirled through a doorway and into a rather dull room. The bottom half had been painted green with the rest a grubby grey. Despite the water being halfway up the walls, we weren't too worried, but we were becoming increasingly annoyed by the stubbornness of the recycling bin. An indistinct noise made us look as a stranger stepped in through the doorway. The water had gone, yet our bodies were still attempting to swim. We laughed at the stupidity of the situation.

And as I woke up I could not stop giggling. It was all very amusing, apparently. Claire was also now awake and feeling that she had missed something, enquired as to what was so funny. Needless to say, the dream didn't seem half as amusing when I tried to retell it through tears of giggles. An intense dream that even a few weeks later brings a smile to my face. Our minds are funny things aren't they?

The new/old shoe phenomenon

So Christmas and NY are over and we are into 2010. So what did I get for Christmas? Lots of goodies: A greek NT; books; DVDs; Chocolate; socks; a shaver etc etc. I also got a new pair of trainers! My old ones were looking a little grubby and sorry for themselves, so a quick visit to Amazon and a new pair were ordered.

The thing that always amazes me about new shoes is just how old they make your other footwear look. As I really liked my old trainers I ordered exactly the same pair as before – although they have tweaked the design (for the worse in my opinion). Anyway, since the opportunity had presented itself, I thought I'd capture the old/new shoe phenomenon for all to see. And while we're on the subject of trainers, 2010 will be a year of training, but more on later in the year :) Wahey, welcome to 2010 – it rocks.