Another year, another quiz and another chilli

"Why did Adele have a minor strop at this year's Brit awards ceremony?".
This was a question that caused a bit of a ruckus in the Reid household on New Years Night.
The two families were round for a buffet dinner on New Years Day. Mum, Dad and Lynsey Ann arrived with a big tray of lasagne, a big box of iceland goodies and a big box of budweiser. The McGarva's then arrived in the Hood mobile. Jillian and her Mum arrived with Colin, Grace and Dougie in tow, ferrying a tray full of macaroni, a large steak pie, a large, freshly baked chocolate orange cheescake, a couple of trays of ice cream and more than a few plates of Jean's famous chocolate snowballs. Jillian's mum's white chocolate balls are now a must for any family buffet. Made with white chocolate, coconut and probably way too much sugar, Jillian’s mum’s balls are the ultimate sweet treat.
With the arrival of Steven, Angela, Morgan and Joshua a little later, the living room was now full and Ka and myself got to work warming up, cooking, or boiling in the kitchen on our rickety old cooker.
Earlier that morning, as soon as I'd got up, I had got to work on another of my chilli con carnes. Okay, it's not the hardest of meals to cook but it was my contribution to the night's buffet meal along with a big pot of rice and some nicely warmed pita breads. Whilst Ka got the three large oven dishes warmed up, the macaroni, the steak pie and the lasagne, which all took turns in our wee oven, we got to work on the pasta dish and boiled up the rice to accompany my chilli ("It's just a chilli" Dougie shrugged, nonchalantly, on more than one occasion throughout the night). Before long there was another table of food laid out in our living room and everyone was helping themselves whilst Olly Murs and Kasabian played as background music and Ka sat back in one of the corners of the room to feed baby Sophie who seemed a little disconcerted by the chatter and surrounding family members. By the time early evening came round, everyone had eaten and Sophie had been laid down in her moses basket upstairs after getting a little tired of being handed around the room, from relative to relative.
After Morgan took the names from my holiday hat, 5 teams of two were made and another Reid family quiz kicked off with a spectacular prize of a large slab of Whole Nut chocolate to play for. The quiz consisted of, what I thought, were a good mix of questions from events, people, and places from throughout the year. Plenty of news, sport, tv and music. Something to keep everyone happy. Or so you’d think.
There was one exception. One question was put in specifically for Morgan and Joshua. Unfortunately the kids chose to remain silent and weren't much help to the quiz teams. I had wanted to know the names of Thomas the Tank Engine's two blue friends. Mum and Dad, who had been paired up as a quiz team, immediately objected claiming themselves to be singled out, claiming there was no way they would know such details. These allegations seemed quite unfair considering when Kenny was a wee kid all he talked about was, yes, you guessed it, Thomas the Tank Engine. He had the Thomas the Tank Engine toys, lunchbox and everything! Mum even made him a Thomas cake for one of his birthdays. It's not my fault she didn't pay as much attention to her youngest son's interests.
The Brits question was the one that really got some blood vessels bubbling though as I had wanted the answer including Blur cutting Adele's acceptance speech short in order to play their Outstanding Contribution set at the end of the programme. Apparently this was wrong. It was James Corden who was actually to blame so although I was wanting a mention of Blur there was a minor mutiny and some of the teams started taking it upon themselves to rebel and award themselves points as long as they mentioned James Corden even though they were told clearly what the requirements of the answer had to be and they quite obviously did not have them. Colin, who had been paired with Lynsey Ann, was my only defence in the matter, but this was probably down to the fact he was the only one that answered the question to my high standard. As a result some papers were marked wrongly and even though this one troublesome question was a mere point, it caused the game's biggest ruckus. Grace and Dougie, another husband and wife pairing, had a minor ruckus among themselves about the name of Lady Diana's son, after the teams were asked who was photographed naked during August, in Las Vegas. Unfortunately for my Mum and Dad it hadn’t been Keith Chegwin but Prince Harry baring the crown jewels during a game of strip billiards in his Las Vegas’ VIP hotel suite. Another question asked what Felix Baumgartner broke when he jumped from 25 miles above the Earth. The answer, of course, was the sound barrier, at 834mph. Grace suggested that it was his ankle.
Jillian and Steven were the eventual victors and took the slab of Whole Nut chocolate as their prize which Steven kindly donated to his team mate.
Once everyone had left and Ka and myself were making our way to bed after feeding little Sophie at around quarter to midnight I received a text message from Colin.
“Michael jillian and steven cheated they looked at angelas sheet to get Gordon and shouldn’t have got point for adele so would’ve drawn wi me and lynsey ann”.
That, one sentence text message said it all. It’s a shame that people feel the need to shout, complain and, worst of all, cheat at a small, largely unimportant, family christmas quiz but it’s perhaps more of a shame that Colin was still going over it all in his head three hours after the quiz had been brought to it’s tiring conclusion.
Still, it only happens once a year, we should be grateful of that, like an MOT, a PDR or the Jackie Bird Hogmanay programme.
Thankfully Ka and myself missed the majority of the Hogmanay television as we were both in bed by quarter to eleven this year. Sophie Reid is successfully knackering us out and besides, I had to be up early the next morning to make that chilli.

Red Dwarf real ale and Runrig

Skull Splitter, Dragonhead Stout, Devil’s Advocate and Stone the Crows. Just a few of the beers on offer last week at the 13th Ayrshire Real Ale Festival in Troon town hall. Straight after work, on Friday night, I jumped in the car and headed out to Barassie to meet up with Dad and Dougie at Tom and Linda’s house. The plan was to get a quick dinner in the Barassie Reid’s house before heading out to the annual beer festival, staying the night with my Aunt and Uncle and the two dogs, Sally and Jake.
Dougie and Dad, who’d been at last year’s beer swilling event, had the spare rooms and I had the luxurious splendour of the living room floor, so whilst the two Dad’s were out getting everyone a fish supper, or a steak pie supper, in my case, Tom and myself pulled the couch cushion in from the mobile home, parked outside in the side driveway, ready for another trip the next Sunday morning.
Four giant portions of fish and chips and a steak pie supper later, we were ready to go. I knew agreeing to the chippie was a mistake as soon as I agreed to it. Eating that amount of food with the intention of then drinking a copious amount of beer could not be a good idea, surely?
Leaving Linda indoors with the dugs, Tom, Dougie, Dad and myself piled into the car and drove down to the Troon town centre, heading straight for the large concert hall after a brief stop off at the seafront Morrisons for a quick visit to the cash machine.
Once parked and disembarked outside one of the small, cosy looking bungalows on Academy Street we followed the few passers by up towards the Troon Concert hall, where, according to the notice board standing outside, Donnie Munro was to be playing at the beginning of November.
One of Mum’s favourites, Donnie Munro is the former lead singer of Runrig, the Scottish, gaelic speaking, celtic rock band. Donnie left to be a politician back in 1997. He’d played his last gig with Runrig at Stirling Castle on August 29th. I know because I was there, along with Colin, Chaz and Adie. Shazz was also there with relations, somewhere in the crowd. Colin had always been into Runrig and I wasn’t unfamiliar with them after hearing more than a few of Mum’s albums, not to mention my Uncle Laurence’s tapes. The 1988 live video ‘City of Lights’ was also a favourite of Mum’s. The live video began with lots of sweaty, eager looking Runrig fans trampling over one another to get through the front doors of the Barrowlands whilst Radio Clyde reported from the Eye in the Sky, circling the gloomy towers and rooftops of Glasgow as the opening drums of Dance Called America boomed through the echoing ballroom. At the time of the farewell gig in Stirling we must have been going through a particularly patriotic musical phase and had even cajoled Adie and Chaz into liking them, although I think that was down to the fact a few of the songs had rather loud drums which sounded good emanating from a bass tube.
I’ll never forget that Farewell Donnie Concert. Not because the singer officially left the band that night, or because we met the man himself and Runrig guitarist, Rory MacDonald straight after, but because suffering a slight hangover, Dad woke me up the next morning and told me Princess Diana had been in a car crash earlier that morning and died soon after.
Anyway, Donnie’s political career obviously didn’t work out fabulously so he’s back at the music, much to Uncle Tom’s vexation (“Runrig? They’re rubbish - Name one good tune?!”) but the night of the 13th Ayrshire Real Ale Festival was going to have a very different kind of music.
Paying our £4 each and receiving our pint glasses and programmes in the process we ventured forth into Troon’s crowded concert hall. A bar took up the whole of the right side of the large hall, barrel’s piled up behind, all with A4 paper labels displaying the many wonderful varied names of the sweet nectar stored inside, all colour coded indicating which kind of category they each fell into. A bitter, a best bitter, a golden ale, a strong bitter, an IPA, a mild, a stout or a Speciality ale. Over 120 beers were being served over the bar, £3 a pint or if you wanted to drink quicker, and taste more, £1.50 a half pint. The bar was run by a large bunch of volunteers from the organisers, Camra, the Campaign for Real Ale organisation whose posters adorned the walls shouting about petitions to George Osborne whose apparently taking over two thirds of the cost of our pint as we drink.
After visiting the Real Ale festival with Tom last year, Dad and Dougie, had told stories ever since of great beer and good music so I was curious to see what kind of music this occasion was going to serve up. As we shuffled through the crowd for our first beers, guys moved around on the stage at he end of the hall with wires and instruments.
First up, I tried the Kelburn Jaguar, a smooth, fullbodied ale with undertones of grapefruit and citrus with a hoppy aftertaste. No, I have not turned into the beer version of Jilly Goolden, I am merely reading from the programme, though I do remember this being the best beer of the night. As the crowd of drinkers got busier, a few of Tom’s mates introduced themselves, each with their own flagon of ale, and the band took to the stage.
Big Licks’ surprisingly good loud cover versions soon had Troon Concert Hall rocking with hits from the likes of the Goo Goo Dolls, Tom Petty, the Stones, Lenny Kravitz, Primal Scream and a whole lot of others. Three guitarists, one a bassist, a drummer and a lead vocalist who immediately reminded me of Bill Nighy from “Love Actually”. He was around the same age with a similar hairstyle, except a little longer at the back and a bit balder on front, with similar Bill Nighy glasses.

He made very decent attempts at the cover versions’ vocals, and jumped around the stage flinging the microphone stand around rather well, considering his age, smiling and laughing through his rather pronounced teeth excitedly. The bass guitarist looked on a little bored in his dark T-shirt and jeans, nodded emphatically to the beat, as most bass guitarists do, whilst the two other guitarists worked hard over their fretboards, spinning off into the occasional impressive solo between pints delivered to the top of a local amp by their wives.
Second beer of the night was the Golden Plover, a light, golden ale that was exceedingly easy to drink as we hummed along to the music. A beer named Red Dwarf followed as the third beverage of the night. I seen the name in the book and thought that since the new series had now started back I owed it to Doug Naylor himself to give it a bash. Another good choice.
Losing track of my beers, though taking it a little easier following the steak pie supper, I’m not sure what was drunk after the Red Dwarf but last of the night was by far, the worst. Merry Maiden’s Mild was this particular tipple’s title and it was in no way merry or mild. It was like drinking watery, alcohol imbued syrup.
Pretty horrible. Especially as I had to drink this one rather quickly.
The witching hour had swiftly come around and Tom informed us we’d have to run for the free train journey home to Barrassie. Dad, Dougie and myself followed Tom and his pal, a short running pal of my Uncle’s, up Academy Street towards the train station. Unfortunately we were travelling upwind.
As we walked there were some distinctive noises from one of the arses walking ahead of us and unfortunately we walked straight into some clouds of definite noxious nitrogen mixed with carbon dioxide with what tasted like the Merry Maiden’s Mild.
Up ahead, the train [ulled up at the station at the top of the hill. Tom and his pal arrived at the train station just as the doors slid open to the waiting crowds of beer swillers and other Friday night travellers. We had to run up the last hill behind them, after having deliberately fallen a safe distance behind whilst debating which of the guys the putrid gases were exiting from. Just as we ran up behind, gasping after the short jog, Tom’s short pal gave another loud frump. Our timing for arriving at their rear, out of breath, could not have been worse and as we suffered in another cloud of rectum gases.
After two minutes on the crowded train the five of us disembarked at Barassie, where Tom’s short pal left us with one last fart, propelling himself up Barassie station’s cross platform stairway behind some chattering girls. Tom had invited him back for some toasted cheese but I wasn’t too keen on the consequences of some more beer being introduced to the guys system, not to mention the cheese. Sally and Jake would have been packing their bags, never mind the rest of us.
Although Sally did almost get a rather more comfortable bunk for the night before we all headed off to bed. Just as we all parted from the living room following our toasted cheese, and Tom’s trip through his concert ticket memory box, I visited the bathroom to clean the old gnashers. Whilst I was brushing everyone else had a good laugh as, the now elderly, Sally made herself comfortable in my cosy mobile home couch cushion and sleeping bag set up on the living room floor.
She looked so comfortable.
I kicked her out.

Giant inflatables and disappearing buffets

Frank Sinatra’s slow, melodic version of Send in the Clowns’ played through the living room stereo speakers as we closed the front door on another day of guests at half past midnight on Saturday night. We were finishing up a little earlier than we had done at the previous housewarming but certainly didn’t feel any less tired.
It was the family’s turn to visit and from three o’clock that afternoon we’d had everyone from the Kerrs and the Taylors, to the Symingtons and the Leckies, not to mention the Reids and the McGarvas. The food had been demolished, the beer nearly all drunk, the wine bottles finished, the irn-bru and diet cokes swigged and the caffeine swilled, not to mention a bottle of the finest Arran Malt Whiskey with accompanying cheese and biscuits which more than a few people partook in, a gift to the buffet from my Uncle Jim from his new abode on the ‘geologist’s paradise’ (not to mention the golfer’s paradise, the camper’s paradise and the whiskey drinkers’). A text arrived in the morning from Jim to say he was supplying the cheese and crackers, bought from the famous Arran Cheese Shop, just before my Dad turned up in his gardening gear with his hedge loppers and his ladders. He was here to start the back garden.
The hedge running up the left of our back garden was ridiculously overgrown and, as a result, blocking a lot of the Scottish sunlight out so Dad and myself had been talking about trimming it all down at some point and getting it into some kind of order. I hadn’t expected to see him turning up on the doorstep with his ladders a mere four and a half hours before the arrival of the first guests though. The first of which would be the bouncy castle organised through one of the Mum’s in Ka’s work. This Mum owns, or is part owner, to a company that hires these inflatable structures out and Ka had the rather brilliant idea of hiring one to keep the kids entertained throughout the day. We had told people to turn up whenever, and however, they wanted from 3 o’clock onwards, saying there would be entertainment for the kids in the earlier hours of the afternoon.
Just as Dad and myself finished tidying the last of the giant bushes and hedge branches away from the back garden’s lawn, a job that involved surreptitiously chucking them over the back hedge into the council ‘controlled’ wilderness behind us whilst cutting and scratching my arms to ribbons, the bouncy castle man turned up at the front door, Ka immediately racing away in fright, up the stairs as she was once more still in her polka dot dressing gown (she does wash it, honest!). The guy brought through the black box generators along with a couple of mats and cables and gave the garden a quick check over and then instructed me to take down the washing lines before he disappeared through to the front of the house again. After obediently deroping our washing poles I jogged off through the house to meet the bouncy castle man once more, this time at the front door, mulling over how he was going to fit the giant roll of plastic between us, through the entrance. With a bit of shoving, a bit of squeezing, a bit of wall scraping and a touch of sweat we managed to squeeze the rolled up monstrosity through the not terribly wide front door, then finding ourselves in the hallway and faced with a similar problem three times more as we took the heavy delivery through the house and into the back garden.
That is the one major downfall of owning a terraced house. No side gate to the back garden.
Anyway, we eventually got the giant barrel shaped roll of plastic through and out on to the back lawn where the bouncy castle man immediately set to work, pinning the flat structure down into the wet, slightly mushy grass as I stood and watched the large square unfold over half the garden.
“We’re going to need a bigger garden”, I thought as John Williams’ dark, foreboding music built up in my head. The castle slowly rose up before me blocking the sunlight out that my Dad and myself had revealed in the previous few hours by chopping the surrounding hedges. A shadow now loomed over me from the giant arched roof of the inflatable monster which continued to rise like a cake in an oven with way too much baking powder. A slide seemed to shoot out from the nearest side of the structure as it filled with air, pillars and loops decorated with bubbling fish and swimming scuba divers rose up inside the filled framework and before long you could barely see a patch of grass around the plastic bouncy building.
These kids better turn up, I thought, as I seen the bouncy castle man off after he’d run through his rather vague health and safety procedure which basically involved making sure little kids were looked after within the castle and nobody did anything stupid.
I’m not sure he realised whose house he was in.
As Ka finished straightening her hair upstairs, I reminded her that I wasn’t doing any kid entertaining today. The whole reason we got the bouncy castle in was for me to specifically not do any child entertaining.
As soon as the first child came through the front door, who as the first on the bouncy castle? Muggins, that’s who.
At precisely three o’clock, on the dot, Aunty Lorna and her three girls, Wendy, Pamela and Susan, turned up along with Yvie, Wendy’s youngest. They all had their own customary tour of the new abode before Yvie finally got her way and headed out to the bouncy castle with Auntie Susan. Along with Yvie the first kids took to the bouncy castle and I helped support the little girl over the curved, wibbly wobbly surface inside the castle. Susan stood on the patio and supervised her niece as she got used to moving over the giant inflatable and the stranger egging her on inside it.
My cousin Sarah arrived soon after with her boys Christopher and Daniel and Uncle Ian and Aunt Anne just after. Before long I had company on the castle as Ian took wee Daniel up into the bobbing innards. More kids arrived in the form of my younger cousins Megan and Lauren with my Uncle Laurence and Aunt Maria, Claire arrived with her wee girl, Olivia and as the afternoon progressed and more and more of the families started trooping through the front door the house warming was soon in full swing. Ka got the buffet served single handedly, only because she refused anyone permission to help, I took coats and served drinks, my time on the bouncy castle now down to a minimal after the growing number of kids took over. I was also a little more hesitant to venture on to the bouncy castle along with so many kids after following Colin, Ka’s brother, on his first attempt to board the inflatable. He got so far as getting up on to the main section before losing his footing, falling back over his arse, taking me with him and managing to land on my head, much to the kids and the Symingtons’ amusement.
Mum, Dad, Jim, Lynsey Ann, Tricia and Tommy came in early evening, just in time for the second serving on the buffet table after the first table full got pretty much demolished within half an hour. Grace’s macaroni and homemade bread along with Ka’s wraps, olives, pizzas, prawns, cheese sticks and my very own chilli all went in the first tableful to be closely followed by the second which included Mum’s lasagne and Jillian and Jean’s coconut snowballs.
Jillian and Jean’s white chocolate coated coconut balls are now famous at family buffets, each in their own small paper cake cases and although merely around 2 – 3 centimetres in diameter each probably hold around 500 calories within their small, sweet interior. The coconut snowballs are almost becoming just as traditional as Aunt Linda’s trifle which, unfortunately, we lacked on Saturday as Linda could not make it due to an extreme cold.
My chilli was well received by most or so I thought until Pamela approached me in the kitchen and complemented it. She asked how I made it. As I started describing how I gently browned the mince in the pot she asked how I made my spices.
Make spices? I had no idea you could make spices? I bought mine from a shop in a jar, I replied to her.
Pamela frowned slightly and then asked how I made my chilli powder. Again I replied that it came from a jar bought in a supermarket. Morrisons own, I believe.
Looking thoroughly unimpressed now, Pamela squirmed with discomfort a little and started describing how she would usually make her chilli powder before trailing off and disappearing off to the living room again leaving me to ponder who invited Nigella flamin’ Lawson.
I wouldn’t have minded so much if it had been the real Nigella Lawson in my kitchen giving me her tips (just check my spelling there…).
Aunt Tricia had been so intrigued upon hearing about the bouncy castle beforehand that almost as soon as she arrived she joined Grace up on the giant inflatable and both ending up marooned, struggling to get up, thanks to the kids bouncing and ricocheting around them like popcorn in a microwave. At one point Joshua even accidentally headbutted Tricia across the head giving my Auntie a small, slowly growing, lump for the rest of the night whilst Joshua bounced off unaffected. In fact, he looked more than at home on the inflatable. He bounces about rooms like a blonde haired tigger at the best of times, giving him an inflated ground to use is possibly asking for trouble. I’m quite surprised he didn’t end up in Betty and Malcy’s garden next door.
The girls of the group also found it highly amusing to run up and hit, tap or punch either myself or Colin over the leg, waist or arse repeatedly before running off back up on to the castle. Lauren also took to mounting my lower right leg in an effort to hold me to the spot. Both were amusing at first but soon got slightly tiresome. There were perfectly good tall pillars of hot air within the castle, to punch and smack, why the kids felt the need to continue to hit Colin and myself I’m not sure.
Once the bouncy castle was gone everyone retreated inside for the night. Megan brought her guitar out to impress us with some Killers tunes and the rest of the night was spent chatting and drinking along with some more eating.
As I poured a few drinks for people and Tricia came into the kitchen requesting an aspirin, I spied Ka pulling a large, rather delicious looking, rectangular pizza from the oven’s innards. I’d barely eaten any of the previous tablefuls so I quickly rushed the drinks I was pouring. Once I’d finished pouring and dishing out the glasses I went straight for the buffet table in the living room to grab a square slice and found an empty breadboard with a large rectangular square of heat, grease and crumbs awaiting me.
“Who invited this lot?”

Googling garden sheds

At half past nine last Saturday morning I was standing in a very quiet Argos. Yes, Argos. The shop for lazy people. The shop for folk who can’t be bothered going looking for something but can be bothered standing and flicking through a gargantuan catalogue, writing out a number from the big book, handing it over the till and then proceeding to a waiting area where they then go on to another desk but only after your number has been called. Surely the only shop that still operates with not only catalogues but also pencils. Short, neatly sharpened pencils.
Whatever happened to the bookie pens? They must have been too expensive. Maybe they were too old fashioned? We are now back to the lead and wood.
That Saturday morning had been dry since we awoke so I had decided, since it was the day of the grand house warming, to run up to the retail park and purchase a lawnmower and get the lawns cut, just in time for the visitors arriving at three in the afternoon.
Along with having our own staircase, we now have our own gardens. Something else that is currently a novelty.
Unfortunately we haven’t yet been gifted with good enough weather to enjoy the gardens but as the grass had needed a cut and there was a distinct lack of rain in the air for a change I zoomed straight up to the local catalogue shop after having spotted the lawnmower at a good price on one of my web meanderings during the week's lunch hours in work.
Due to the busy workload of recent weeks I've found my break times changing from day to day so have completely lost track with everyone else's tea times and have found myself eating my sandwiches at the desk, all alone. Spending my lunchbreaks googling lawnmowers is not how I'd imagined things to change after my move to the Glasgow offices.
The other day I found myself googling Garden Sheds!
Is this how it all starts? Middle age? Googling garden sheds?
Surely it's too soon for all of that... but then I do need somewhere to put a lawnmower now. The garden shed idea has been temporarily knocked on the head anyway as they seem to be far more expensive than I'd first envisioned. Even in our trusty local catalogue store.
Ka and myself had visited the same Argos the previous weekend after seeing a baby bouncer chair online for a good price. We’d went along to investigate and found the item unavailable. The helpful, slightly over enthusiastic, wee woman behind the desk that served us asked if there was any way we’d been interested in a store card. We turned the opportunity down. The Argos lady then asked if there was any particular time we could accept its delivery from another store further afield. We decided against it after finding that the bouncy chair would have to be delivered on a work day. The Argos lady wandered whether we’d consider travelling to pick the item up. We shrugged and then told her it didn’t matter that much, we would pick up another bouncy chair elsewhere.
Obviously this was the wrong thing to say. The woman asked if there was any other bouncy chair of interest to us. We said no. She asked if there was any other item of interest to us. Anything at all in the massive catalogue. Again we insisted it was fine, there was nothing else. Now with a hint of desperation in her voice, the Argos lady asked if there was anything else she could look up for us, anything else she could do.
I had no idea Argos employees were on a commission. I wonder how much she would have got for a bouncy chair.
The same lady was behind the checkout desk when I bought the lawnmower on Saturday morning. A Flymo Easimo, complete with grass trimmer.
I have no idea about lawnmowers. This one had wheels, a blade and a collection box so it looked fine to me and my Dad also confirmed it seemed like a reasonable price when he phoned me up that morning. Being the green fingered expert my Dad is the guy to ask when any gardening advice.
Thankfully the lawnmower was available to pick up, there and then so half of the wee Argos lady’s questions from the previous week were not needed making her look a little disappointed as she started the payment procedure. The lady did try and talk me into some monthly cover payments but after some quick, fraudulent, consideration from myself, involving some unconvincing humming and hawing, I was off to the pick up point in the deserted store. It was obviously too early for all the usual Argos customers so I had the pick of the plastic blue/green seats at pick up point B. Clasping my massively long receipt, for my one item, I looked up at the television screen to see at which position my number stood at.
I was second. There was literally no other customer in the store so how I was second in the queue I don't know.
Still it was only a matter of minutes until the lawnmower was delivered. One of the young employees shouted my number out, even though I, the only person standing waiting on an item, was already making my way up to the pick up point.
And it was the wrong pick up point. The girl had planted the lawnmower down blatantly under the ‘A’ sign. My receipt told me I would be picking my lawnmower up under the ‘B’ sign.
Obviously I couldn't be bothered hanging around any longer than I had to so let them off with this, grabbed the large box and ran for the car, ready to cut up some serious greenery.
After a quick unpacking of various orange and black metal pieces and a short ten minutes or so of construction, a quick cup of tea, a piece and sausage and a conversation with Dad over the phone who was now warning me of the dangers of cutting wet grass. I’d never really heard of anyone electrocuting themselves whilst mowing a wet lawn but Dad insisted it happens quite often. Surely there’d be health warning about cutting lawns then? Would lawnmowers come with safety gear or a license if they were that dangerous?
Whilst Ka prepared the food for the housewarming guests I tackled the back lawn only pausing to empty the collection box hitched on to the mower’s back and to talk to the wee neighbour whose head appeared over the hedge at one point. Betty chatted away for around five minutes, introducing herself and eventually her husband, Malcy, (not sure of the spelling there!) who ventured out into their garden when he heard his name mentioned. Ka introduced herself from the back door, still in her pyjamas and polka dot dressing gown. After the giving us the lowdown on the surrounding neighbourhood Betty and Malky disappeared back indoors and let me finish the back lawn before I headed out to the front. Dad turned up halfway through my frontal assault to either find out if I needed a hand or to make sure I wasn’t electrocuting myself.
Whilst cutting the front I met the neighbour on the other side. An smartly dressed old gent by the name of Leslie whose getting his windows replaced by the council shortly, has a son and a daughter and an alsation dog whose getting a bit long in the tooth and will have to be put down. I didn’t quite understand everything the old guy said but managed to translate most of it. Ka introduced herself from the front door, still moaning about being in her pyjamas and polka dot dressing gown.
After Leslie had gone back inside I quickly finished the front lawn, neatly strimming the edges, Dad disappeared off to get on with his various gardening jobs dotted around East Kilbride and Ka got herself ready after finishing her work in the kitchen, finally taking of her polka dot dressing gown.
Before long everybody started arriving. Cherly and Roslyn were the first to arrive, with Cherly’s two kids, Eilidh and Orla. Orla, being a small baby, was immediately dumped into my arms, for practice.
Around half an hour later the front door didn’t seem to close. Coats were taken, drinks were given out and the washing hanging out on the lines in the back garden, which included my space invader boxing shorts, quickly taken in. There were more babies and kids than predicted and soon babies were being tripped over, wiped up after, kept entertained, fed or generally watched like a hawk and all within the confines of the living room and kitchen.
Nobody went outside.
The rain was off, I kept telling everyone, it’s not rained all day, let’s go out and sit in the garden. I’d spent half the day mowing the lawns and making the gardens acceptable for guests so it was the perfect opportunity to show them off, not to mention my hard graft from behind the spinning blade.
“It’s too cold” David, the nursery teacher from Ka’s work, shook his head, to which everyone else seemed to silently agree and chat on among themselves. All the hard work had been for nothing.
Tony and Suzanne could see my plight but after Milo got his boots a little muddy from running over the grass, they decided against it.
At least Milo appreciated the freshly cut lawns.
Resigning myself to the fact that no one was going to be sitting out on the lawn anytime soon I went into the fridge and got out another beer.
Around ten or eleven hours later, and more than ten or eleven beers later, Ka and myself seen off the last of the evening guests. Chaz and Pauline sauntered out into the street to jump into their taxi and we shut the front door for the last time and got to our bed.

Gorillas, gritted teeth and grannies

£155. Brilliant. That’s the total I’ve managed to raise thanks to all those that sponsored me in my Glasgow 10k on the 2nd September. 310% of my predicted sponsor target. Fantastic. Facebook, email and twitter made using the Just Giving site so much easier so no one could have missed it really and even it they did, the sponsor page is still there, so it’s never too late!
Like I said I couldn’t have done it without you guys that gave your hard earned cash to such a worthwhile cause, Glasgow Sands, so thanks very much all of you, (you know who you are!).
The whole experience wasn’t without a certain amount of pain and hardship though as I did suffer a little for around four days. It wasn’t until the following Friday that I actually started regaining my usual walking abilities and stopped moving like a hungover John Wayne who’d been up all night. Going up and down stairs turned into an exceptional challenge, lurching up and down, like a limping Robocop. I’ve only got myself to blame, of course, it was the first time I’d ran 10k in a oner and I got very little training in beforehand. I even had to put the usual thrice a week trips to the gym on hold while we flitted at the turn of the month. If training for a 10k had included loading, lifting and the unpacking of heavy boxes, not to mention the seemingly constant use of a screwdriver, I would have completed the run in no time with no unfortunate after effects. Never before had small, menial, tasks been such hard work such as getting up off the couch and walking to the kitchen to make a brew. All with gritted teeth and noises and muttered sweary words.
The after effects didn’t actually kick in until the Monday morning when I had tried to get out of bed. I thought a gorilla had came in during the night and attacked me, refraining from waking me during the assault, as I slept.
Mysterious, nocturnal, gorillas aside, immediately after the race, under Nelson’s Monument on Glasgow Green, I’d felt great.
The run had gone well.
Later the results were published on the official website I had taken 58 minutes and 1 second.
Standing there, in Glasgow Green, I knew I had done it in around 58 minutes as I had timed myself with my trusty Rotary. I had aimed for under an hour at least so I was quite pleased with myself. Unfortunately I had no one to celebrate with.
Ka and the Mums and Dad’s had travelled into Glasgow to cheer us runners, Colin, Jillian and myself, off the starting line in George Square and, presumably, had the intention of cheering us over the finishing line. As I ran up through the last leg of the route, over Victoria Bridge and up Clyde Street and Greendyke Street into the Green, hollering crowds on either side, there had been no sign of the wife or either of the couples so I had assumed that I had missed them among the colourful, cheering crowd. As I slowed to a trot beyond the finishing line I picked up my medal, the traditional bag of runners’ goodies, and avoided the giant boxes of bananas, (I don’t like bananas… not sure why?) at the foot of Glasgow Green’s needle walked out on to the green picking a spot to stand and wait for anyone who may want to run up and congratulate me.
Nobody did.
Instead I watched all the others runners coming out through the finishing gates picking up their own medals and getting their goodie bags and then being greeted by loved ones over the surrounding temporary metal fencing.
I wasn’t bothered. I had run it in under and hour. I had seen it, even if no one else had. I kept an eye out for any of the ‘support’ but none could be seen. Not even the wife. Typical.
Around ten minutes later I spotted the familiar sight of Jillian in her Sands T-shirt, making her way through the puffed out running crowd, in the expanding queues for the medal, goodie bag and banana collection, a big smile on her ever so slightly red face. The brother-in-law’s missus to be, turned thirty that day and was celebrating by crossing yet another finishing line before she headed down to Newcastle for the Great North Run later in the month. This 10k was probably a mere walk in the park.
Jillian and myself then headed further down the park to the fencing at the side of the finishing line where we eventually met Ka and the meandering Mums and Dads who’d missed me because, on the long, tiring, arduous, walk down from George Square, they had felt the need for a McFlurry. In her wisdom, Ka had refused and walked on but had still managed to miss me, by a matter of minutes we worked out. However, minutes is everything when it comes to this kind of thing (especially 2 minutes, that’s donkeys… as long as it’s under an hour).

Ka has an excuse, of course, so I let her off, the fact that she’s currently carrying another Reid lifeform in her belly, (an excuse she uses way too often to be honest), and after we cheered Colin over the line we headed off, back to George Square to celebrate Jillian’s birthday over lunch in the Italian La Vita Pizzeria. We had tried the Greek Restaurant Elie first, where we met the rest of Jillian’s family, but the staff of Elie claimed half past twelve was too early to serve 12 hungry people, on a Sunday afternoon. This was the be only the first meeting for Jillian’s birthday though as her highly anticipated Muppets and friends 30th Birthday party was to follow the next Saturday in Kirkintilloch. Unfotunately, however, this was not be be, as Jillian’s wee Gran, Helen Hodge passed away early on that week.
Helen had not been too well the previous week and had been thought to be on the road to recovery and had missed Jillian’s birthday lunch whilst recuperating. So when Saturday did come around we all sadly found ourselves attending a funeral, rather than a birthday party, remembering the little 90 year old lady, with the seemingly endless energy with which she had constantly travelled up and down the country with her family, visiting relatives and seeing the sights whilst still attending all the party’s going and even the odd clubbing night. There is no doubt Helen will be sorely missed in the Hood household, not to mention the family parties, but forever remembered.
Like all grannies. Each one a massive cog in the machine of the family.
When that cog stops turning you wonder if the rest will keep going, knowing there’ll be none, in any way, similar to take it’s place.
Somehow though, the cogs do keep turning.
It’s the remembering of loved ones lost that sometimes keeps you going.
Why else would you go to the bother of running 10k?
Certainly not for your health.
My ankle still hurts.
But it was worth it.

Flitting, phones and forklifts

Has it been so long? Sheesh, it’s been donkeys since I’ve had the time to sit and write anything on this here blog.
Ka and myself have now, more or less, fully settled down in our new abode.
The boxes have all been emptied, the rooms have been organised, the wardrobes have been built, the books unpacked, the Cds put into alphabetical order, the Virgin tv finally activated, the wifi enabled, the loft filled, all the junk cleared out and the dates for the all important housewarmings organised. We’ve had to arrange two housewarmings, one for family and one for friends. There’s just too many people to invite in one go. Don’t get me wrong, we could attempt it but not even a three bedroom house could hold everyone.
Three bedroom house. It’s strange even saying that.
We now have stairs. I was on the phone to Aunt Linda there and had to travel downstairs when it came to Ka’s turn in the conversation. The wife was sitting on the couch, supping a coffee, watching Eastenders when I made my way down to the living room and handed the phone over.
We have stairs now. I had to walk and talk in order to pass the phone over. Back in Kenilworth we simply shouted for the other person to take the few steps from the next room to take a shot on the phone.
Okay, yes, it’s probably nothing amazing to the likes of yourselves, but we’ve been living in a one bedroom flat for the past seven years. Not only that, we were using a cord phone handset. Now we have cordless handsets with which we can saunter around the house, visiting various rooms as we talk. Perhaps one of the three bedrooms. Perhaps one of the two toilets. Perhaps the sizable kitchen, the comfortable living room or the lower or upper hall, both connected by that weird, unfamiliar, rising passageway known as a staircase.
Very strange having a staircase actually inside my home after having used the cold, stone steps of the flat close for so long. We can now climb stairs without fear of jumping spiders, meeting neighbours on the way down, encountering singing postmen or noticing the absence of a wheelie bin. Well, the latter to some extent. We can just about see the blue of our recycling wheelie bin through the front door’s window and would probably notice if it suddenly went missing one night but I doubt it would be going missing in this neighbourhood to give the youngsters a quick thrill and fix as they sniff away over an open fire in the local forest at the bottom of the street which, unfortunately, had been the fate of one of our past wheelie bins. No, this neighbourhood feels a little different.
We put a pile of old carpets, garden furniture and general rubbish out on Sunday night for the council to pick up on Monday morning and found that anyone passing in the street was giving the pile of unwanted goods a dirty look or a shake of the head. If that had been Kenilworth the unwanted goods would have got a quick look over or a quick, inquisitive, glance at the very least just to make sure it really was for the scrap heap.
I’m always seeing stuff lying about in streets, left out for the council to pick up, presumably the next day, and always cast my eyes over it just in case I see anything that would come in handy. I seen a pram recently, lying unwanted at the end of a garden path and considered it briefly for more than a few seconds. It was missing a wheel though so I opted against it. If you see anything out there, we do need a wee table for the corner of our living room for the new cordless phone’s terminal box to sit on. (Is that what it’s called the ‘terminal’ box? That’s make’s it sound awfully final or important. We better not get any immigrants that have a more than passing resemblance to Tom Hanks hanging around the corner of our living room).
The actual flitting was great. I met Auntie Lorna’s son-in-law, Robbie, with his van in Birkenshaw Industrial Estate on the Saturday morning of the 25th August. Robbie had offered his services and his van for the flitting, which was great as it meant we didn’t have to go through the whole hiring of a Boulevard deathtrap.
The only problem was, it wasn’t quite a van. It was an 18 tonne Mercedes lorry. Brilliant for flitting with. Not so brilliant, I predicted, for flitting into a tightly packed, curving, uphill street on a oddly sunny, warm August afternoon. Anyway, I led him home in the car, dropping Grace off at the new abode to help Ka with the cleaning, and pulled up, back at Kenilworth, to find Tom waiting with Jack the dog. My Uncle Tom had been told ten rather than half ten so was getting a little impatient. After Robbie pulled up the large Merc lorry, with Dougie in the front passenger seat, we soon got started. My other Uncle Tommy then pulled up, followed by Uncle Laurence and Steven who all got to work in shifting the piles of boxes from out the wee one bedroom flat.
How a one bedroom flat had held so many boxes I’ll never know. There was a pile in the bedroom, a pile in the hall, a pile in the living room, and a few more in the kitchen. Some of the boxes were easily lifted, others were not. In fact, I’ll have serious considerations the next time I go to buy myself another hardback book. I think I may have inadvertently strained a few muscles that day with my book collection. Three shelves that had stood in the Kenilworth hallway for over seven years, filled with hardbacks, had filled three and a half boxes and had the potential of breaking three and a half backs. Once all the boxes were packed in the back of the lorry Dad and young Michael turned up closely followed by Iain, who had driven over from Motherwell, leaving a hungover Roslyn, in bed. This completed the A-Team and together we made our way over to the new house where the lorry slowly clambered up the street, reversed, then maneuvered, reversed then crawled up into Robertson Drive where it was swiftly unloaded in an organised line of straining, growling, humfing and, occasionally, complaining relations. Quote of the day had to go to young Michael who, as another large box of hardbacks was hefted through the house’s front door by two uncles, looked up the stairs at me and moaned.
“Michael, get a kindle!”
My Unlce Tom wasn’t at all happy either when a box of VHS videos was lifted into the house.
“VHS?!” Tom lamented. “Gawd’s sake Ka, get him told!”
Ka agreed with him oblivious to the fact, at the point, that Tom had sneakily nicked a couple of wine gums that had been left in one of the untaped boxes lifted from the Kenilworth kitchen. It wasn’t until later, when all the boxes had been unpacked in the kitchen that the pregnant Ka had went looking for her favourite confectionery only to find the bag with only a few remaining gums left. Fortunately for him, Tom had left by that point but as soon as Ka shouted as to the whereabouts of the rest of her bag of gums the other relative removal blokes, keeping their dignity, quality and conscience clear said only three words.
Unfortunately the words did not consist of “we don’t know”, or “we’re saying nothing”, or even “we’re no grass!”. The words were:
“It was Tom!”
The loudest accusation from Laurence. So much for brotherly love.
It was 2pm when the last of the 2 lorry loads finally made it’s way into the house.
The second lorry load had consisted mostly of the larger pieces of furniture, and a hastily deconstructed bed which Steven had toiled over back in the flat, obviously making up for the garden shed incident which he put me through on his own flitting day.
Have I mentioned that before?
I think I might have. (I can imagine Steven rolling his eyes with a groan as he reads this…)
Imagine opening a garden shed during a flitting and being being met with a tidal wave of screws, bolts, plastic balls and spirit levels (okay, it wasn’t quite a tidal wave, but this is my blog, and I’ll exaggerate if I like!).
As Robbie had pulled the lorry up once more with the second lorry load, into the tight curve of Robertson Drive, Uncle Jim turned up, just in time to help with the unloading and maneuvering of the couch.

Mum claimed at one point that Jim had turned up with a forklift to which she got quizzical looks before we realised she was referring to the two wheeled baggage trolley parked on the front door. A forklift would have been great though. Saying that, an 18 tonne lorry was annoying the neighbours as it was. I’m, not sure we would have got away with a forklift also driving up and down the street.
As Iain and my Dad chatted out in the garden, the sun was shining down over Robertson Drive, the tea was getting poured, a couple of bottles of Kronenbourg were being cracked open and people were resting on various boxes and oddly positioned furniture in the living room. As everyone else settled down for a wee drink and a chat, Steven, obviously still keen to work on, moved upstairs and started reassembling the bed.
Within the next hour Angela, Morgan and Joshua turned up and Morgan wasted no time in insisting that I order my four swimming pools that would fit in the back garden.
Not only do we have stairs of our own now, but we also have a back garden. Not to mention a front garden. We obviously don’t have any swimming pools as yet, but considering it was a suggestion I first put to Ka upon seeing the slightly overgrown back garden upon our first viewing, you never know.
Then again, maybe I should just stick to being grateful for a staircase and a cordless phone.

Picnics, barbecues, beaches and tomatoes

My not insignificant forehead has been red raw this week and is only just recovering. For the first half of the week it felt like I'd had a particularly heavy injection of botox as I was finding it difficult to lift my eyebrows (and spending days on end with the inability to lift your eyebrows is most inconvenient – a look of surprise is misconstrued as a look on constipation).
The sun had once more got the better of me. After a day spent lounging about a beach on Elie harbour without any form of protection I suffered. I should know by now that even though the sun may not be obvious at times, it's still there. Quite often, as soon as I've set foot on a beach, be it Ibiza, Lanzarote or Largs, I’ve turned a violent shade of red.
The family, or in this case, families, were all gathering in the Fife coastal town of Elie for a beach barbeque. My Aunt Anne had arranged it with the extended family of my Granpa Reid’s sister’s, my Great Aunt Nan’s, side as, unfortunately, we only ever seem to really see each other when somebody dies. Anne had got talking with a few of her cousins at the last funeral, my Aunt Maureen’s, and had decided enough was enough. She was determined to bring the two families together for something that wasn’t a death.
So Dad, Mum, Lynsey Ann, Ka and myself all jumped into Dad’s citroen on the Saturday, and travelled up to Leven, and to the Caledonia Hotel, a half hour drive from where we were headed the next day. We arrived at around half past eleven and, as check-in wasn't until after one, we decided to take our picnic, organised and provided by Mum and Ka, down to the waterfront. Unfortunately the weather wasn't up to much and as soon as we climbed down the large stone steps on to Leven's short sand beach, the rain started to fall.
Not just normal rain though.
This was large, big, splodgy dollops of rain which made a fantastic attempt at soaking us before we ran for shelter, cowering under the shelter of a large tree, we'd spotted earlier, back up towards the streets, alongside some park benches. As the rain eventually lightened, Mum and Ka quickly started preparing the tea, coffees and sandwiches, the Firth of Forth stretched out before us under the continuously moving clouds.
After our lunch, we decided to take a wee walk around the seaside town.
It didn't take very long.
We walked up on to the rather neglected looking High Street, not even paying any attention to the decorative signposts which pointed the way to the town's various hotspots. Not that there was much in the way of hotspots.
The bigger hotspots consisted of the local Lidl, which stood opposite our hotel for the night and served as our picturesque view from our hotel window. An indoor swimming pool stood lay, across the road from the bus station, at the end of the short High Street. A Sainsbury's sat across the road from that. There was an Arcade amusement shop, a bounteous amount of charity shops and a few pubs.
My Dad and I left the women in a wool shop and wandered further up the street and came across and slightly more curious looking little shop which displayed examples of it’s wares in it’s window. World war helmets, military caps, uniforms, nazi war medals, gas masks and beer flagons were just a few of the collections adorning the shelves and walls of this particular shop all leading you into a false sense of security as you ventured forth into the back of the shop and found a bog standard second hand book shop. Dad bought some Michael Connelly books for a pound each (cheaper than the charity shops) before we headed back down the street to find the women in the hotel buying in the drinks.
Following check in, during which we checked over our basic, but clean, rooms admired the view of the local Lidl and unpacked our small cases of belongings, we headed out to Crail to meet up with Tom, Linda and the just arrived Jim who had driven all the way up from London. We arrived at Tom and Linda’s camper van just in time to see Cavendish and his team get beat in the Olympics cycling road race and decided to head up to Crail’s Main street and a pint in the Golf Hotel where Anne and Ian caught up with us and Mum noised up the barman for not delivering Ka’s coffee.
We headed back to Leven for the remainder of the evening, driving through the pouring rain, which seemed to suddenly only exist outside of Crail, and enjoyed dinner with Anne and Ian in the Caledonia, where the waitresses had neglected to book our table and then nearly forgot to take our dessert orders.
With the rain finally giving itself a break, we took a short walk afterwards, ending up in one of the pubs we’d passed on our walk earlier in the day. Now it was a little livelier and the Saturday night entertainment was in full swing with the pub’s DJ and karaoke machine. The karaoke only made up half of the entertainment though as we were introduced to the lively residents of Leven’s Molly Malones. Most of the singers were awful, successfully destroying perfectly good songs. One of the guys, who would probably have ate himself if he had been chocolate, could barely sing the last three words of each screen, struggling to keep up with the colouring text. A few girls attempted Lady Gaga and the like whilst one of the biggest karaoke stars of the night turned out to be a lady called Margaret.
At least we think she was a lady.
Usually Margaret is a lady’s name so we opted for the female option. This ‘lady’ would strut up to the microphone in her suit jacket and belt out the hits with a deep, but not completely tuneless voice, and was overjoyed to hear the cheers from Mum and Anne following her various song interpretations. Insinuations were even made the next morning about Mum getting a few heavy winks from Margaret.
After a quick drive across the road to Lidl, where we packed a couple of boxes full of chicken, burgers, ribs and wings along with wine, juice and a couple of large bottles of water for the beach feast we headed out to Elie.
Arriving at Ruby beach, Sarah Jane turned up with Yvie, Christopher and Daniel before Anne and Ian drove up and met us where it was decided we should change location and we settled down on a small section of beach in a rocky alcove on a southern point of Elie harbour.
The sun was out but the wind was strong as we started setting up camp. Tom kitted me out with some shorts and a pair of spiky soled sandles as I’d left the shorts at home not expecting much from the Scottish coastal weather, much to Tom and my Dad’s disbelief. Earlier, on the Saturday, Dad almost swerved off the road with incredulity when I told him that I’d not brought any shorts.
Anyway, tents were built (and never used), barbecues were laid out ready for use, canoes were blown up, windbreakers were erected and a couple of castles were built as the family gathered to meet the more distant, extended family. Granpa Reid’s sister, my 87 year old Great Aunt Nan, soon appeared on son-in-law Stanley’s arm, the majority of her family, all following soon after.
Considering I only see these distant relations briefly at funerals I still find myself getting names mixed up, if I can even remember the names in the first place. There were a number of occasions on Sunday when I had to ask reminders from Mum, quietly and subtly whenever I think none of them are looking. There was Paul married to young Nan, Joan married to Stanley, Allison married to Ken, Kathryn married to Vince, Claire married to… Paul… I think it was Paul. Gawd, see, there I’ve started forgetting the names already?!
Anyway, on the day mixing up the names and relations didn’t get in the way of the food. Before long the BBQ’s were lit, the cans were cracked open, the wine unscrewed (we realised in Lidl that we had no bottle opener) and Linda’s trifle was out whilst the sun shone down, the strong wind succeeding in fooling us into being cool, whilst the occasional shower pestered us from time to time.
In all there was probably around 35 folk crowded round that small piece of beach before some of the blokes disappeared off to the Ship Inn for a pint, or to see the hanging baskets, as some were claiming, and to watch the game of cricket taking place further along beach. Apparently Elie’s hanging baskets are lovely at this time of year, I suspect they’re even lovelier when there’s a pint or two involved.
Unfortunately for me I made the unwise decision to stay on the beach and get merry with the wine, my Dad only realising later that we could well have been breaking the law.
It wasn’t until I got back into the back seat of the citroen at the end of the day, after returning the shorts to Tom and spending around an hour saying goodbye to people, that Mum turned a fetching shade of scarlet, Dad got dizzy and tripped over a wall, Lynsey Ann started to feel a little drowsy and my whole head started buzzing with heat. It wasn’t until the next morning when I awoke that I realised I could no longer look surprised, let the water from my shower hit my head or dry my hair or head without screaming in pain. I walked into the office with a head resembling a expertly polished tomato. Now, a couple of days later, and after copious amounts of after sun cream, that tomato is now peeling.

Weird dreams and freaky flamingoes

A few nights ago I woke up in the middle of the night and moved to shuffle my pillow around. This, in turn, woke Ka up and she moved round to adjust her position in the bed. Upon turning round and seeing me, her eyes burst open and she let out a loud scream, which punched through the quietness of the night like a verbal explosion. Ka then turned around again, mumbling and whimpering under her breath and went off to sleep again as if nothing had happened.
Had she forgotten she shared a bed with someone? Was it a scream of shock? Had the shock of reality disturbed her dream of being married to Brad Pitt or Damon from Vampire Diaries?
I know the sight of me half asleep can’t always be a good thing but I didn’t think it was reason enough to scream quite so loudly.
I’d be surprised if she hadn’t woke up the singing postman upstairs with that scream.
Anyway, Ka was soon snoring once again, oblivious to what had just happened and once again needed reminding the next morning.
It reminds me of how I used to sleep walk as a kid. I used to wake up on the living room couch, sitting watching tv, late at night with my Mum and Dad. Apparently I used to just get up a few hours after having gone to bed and amble through to the living room, plonk myself down on the couch and sit there until I came to.
Ka doesn’t generally sleepwalk, though she does occasionally talk in her sleep. She even replies sometimes if I ask her what she’s talking about.
One night she awoke just as I was switching off the light and started talking. Once her mumbles finished I asked her what she meant.
“She doesn’t know how to push the cat”, she grumbled back with eyes still shut under a frown of annoyance.
I have to admit, it may not have been that line exactly, it was difficult to make out exactly what she said but it was something along those lines. I’ve no idea what cat who didn’t know how to push, but most dreams rarely make sense anyway.
My most recent dream that I can remember involved me accompanying Lynsey Ann, my sister, to church on the first anniversary of her Wedding. She wore her Wedding dress to commemorate the anniversary. The interior of the church was enormous and we sat at the side of it’s interior before the massive altar, or at least I did, where there was a cassette player. On this cassette player, a double deck, I kept pressing play, listening to the music, letting it echo throughout the church, disturbing the hymn singing and the voice of the priest, and intermittently flicking it off with the stop button. The priest on the altar, Father Pat, kept getting annoyed with me for disturbing his mass with the loud music clips and I think he asked me to leave on more than one occasion, a request I denied, rebelliously pressing down on the play and stop buttons, whilst he spoke to his congregation.
Can anyone guess what that is all about?
Apparently you can have up to 7 dreams a night. I used to be great at remembering dreams and actually wrote down what I dreamt from time to time, a vague effort at a dream diary (Yep, in those days I had more time on my hands). I would sometimes have dreams that lasted for up to a week, my sleep continuing on with a dream where I had left off the previous night like an ongoing, surreal, drama serial. When I was young I remember actually looking forward to going to bed to see what happened next after the cliffhanger ending from the previous night or morning awakening.
Then there were the nightmares.
I used to have a recurring nightmare when I was small, set in our first house, Vancouver Drive.
It was dark. The curtains were all shut, but some moonlight could still be seen shining through the fabric of the curtain. Mum and Dad had locked the doors and windows and the five of us sat in the dark living room, cowering from what was outside. I remember peeking through the gap between the two curtains covering the living room’s rear window to look out into the small, dark back garden, the old rusty second hand see saw at it’s centre, partly hidden by the old stone hut that came with those houses. I would freeze in terror at the sight of the things outside, all standing, or pacing around, moving around the house, threatening just by their presence. They were large birds with tiny, beady eyes and giant beaks, standing as tall as a man, on long feather less legs. Things that can only be described as large dark, horrific versions of flamingos.
I remember, as I looked out, looking over the gathering block in the pale moonlight, the head of one of the creatures suddenly appearing directly before my nose, on the opposite side of the glass, straight up at the window. It’s small black eyes glaring at me over its large beak.
In one particularly frightening version of the dream I remember having a little later, the giant birds actually somehow got into the house via the back door and spent the majority of the dream ascending the hall staircase. Obviously I was in my bed for the entirety of the dream but could somehow see what was going on. Some of the creatures made their way up the hall’s stairs (Vancouver Drive’s stairs featured in quite a few of my nightmares when I was wee) and after the familiar creaking on the landing directly outside my, and my brother Kenny’s, bedroom the noises stopped. I watched my closed bedroom door, pressed up against the wall behind me, eyes wide with fear. On the other side of the door, a clawed hand reached up and turned my bedroom door handle. Just as the door swung open to reveal the creature beyond, I awoke.
Thinking back that was probably the last time I seen those scary black flamingos in a dream.
In work we quite often have Radio 2 on in the background and occasionally folk come on the Steve Wright afternoon show claiming to understand dreams and know what your subconscious mind is telling or instructing you. Personally I’m inclined to believe it’s a lot of subconscious babble, your brain conjuring up stories whilst you sleep, using elements from all over your life, including family, friends, experiences, locations. In your mind, whilst you sleep, what starts out as a simple thought develops, grow, mutates and expands like a patchy watercolour with too much water soaking through the paper making the colours spread and merge.
Say that, I have had a few, weird, eerily accurate moments involving dreams.
I did have one, very different experience recently. One that came back to me in a horrific flash, like a very bad sense of déjà vu.
I dreamt that I was sitting in Angela’s, Ka’s sister’s, living room, surrounded by the McGarva family members and, what was stranger, my Mum, Dad, brother and sister, who, in real life, had never seen or been in Angela and Steven’s house. Together we watched as young Joshua played in the centre of the living room, dressed in a strange uniform with a big red object on wheels upon which he could ride. Throughout the dream Joshua played with this red object and the relatives talked but I just couldn’t escape the feeling that something horrendous had happened. A terrible aching pain echoed throughout my head which I couldn’t pinpoint in the dream. Even though I recalled the dream the next day the dream faded over time as they all do.
Around six months later, Lucy passed away on Hogmanay and Angela invited us all round for dinner on the New Years Day in an effort to help us through the remainder of the ‘festivities’. The McGarvas, and the Reids. Sure enough, following dinner, we were all sitting in Angela’s living room talking, when Joshua sauntered in to the living room pushing the new fire engine he had received from Santa for his Christmas. Previously, before Lucy had arrived on the 29th and departed the day or so later, we had enjoyed our Christmas Day with Joshua who had been playing with the new truck dressed in his Santa outfit.
It was all probably just strange coincidence but it did make me think, not for the first time, that maybe there’s more to dreams than just mere mental rambling.
I’ve still never encountered a flamingo though.

Go West

Colin waved up from Templeton Street, his tall, dark form looking a little bedraggled in the rain that was descending over Glasgow Green and it’s surroundings on Saturday afternoon. My Dad and I had arrived five minutes earlier, disembarking the number 18 bus round the corner on London Road just after the rain had started to pour and Colin had called to say he’d made it as far as Trongate.
It was the jolly boys outing and Colin, Dad and myself were attending a tour at the West Brewery in Glasgow’s Templeton building, a building that was formerly a carpet factory and designed by Scottish architect William Leiper, who apparently based his architectural designs on the Doges Palace on St. Mark’s Square over in Venice, a building Ka and myself visited whilst on our honeymoon in the spectacular city. Leiper apparently based his designs on the building following the Venetian design craze at the time being forced to keep in mind the City Council, and Mr Templeton himself, who had wanted the building to have an attractive exterior considering it was on the verge of one of Glasgow’s biggest parks. The whole building now houses many different companies ranging from crèches and dance studios to offices and breweries.
The brewery was the part we were interested in.
As we awaited Colin’s arrival, Dad ordered up the first pint, a crisp, cold, golden coloured mug of St. Mungo’s, the West Brewery’s only beer currently being brewed for the off-trade. Whilst the bartender served us, another, bearded, bartender introduced himself as our future tour guide. Taking my first taste of a St. Mungos pint, Dad confidently informed me that you didn’t get hangovers with this kind of beer. He’d visited only a few months back with friends and had woke up the next morning feeling unaffected by the previous night’s pint intake.
Definitely a good thing as the St. Mungos was delicious and we ordered up a second pint, this time of St. Mungo’s stronger brother, Hefeweizen. Unfortunately, as we did so, the tour guide started shouting from one end of the bar and the small gathered crowd ambled off to start the tour we had booked on.
We were still waiting on our Hefeweizen. As soon as we grabbed the tall glasses from the bar we strode off to find our tour party, finding the door at the back of the large bar that we’d spotted them crowd through and then a descending staircase in a echoing brick walled corridor on the other side. When we got to the bottom on the twisting stairs we discovered only one black door marked ‘Private’, locked.
“Er, hello?!” Colin knocked on the door and laughter was heard from the other side. We waited for an apologetic tour guide to open the door but instead found ourselves still standing waiting in the corridor. Colin knocked again. “Hello? Are you letting us in?” Colin knocked again and again, each knock echoing and being greeted with more laughter and a few indistinguishable comments for the other side.
“B*stards!” I thought to myself, before some bloke from the tour eventually opened the door for us, allowing us to join the party. The bearded tour guide himself sat perched on some silver barrels in the middle of the large fermenting room we now found ourselves in, talking away, waving his hands around enthusiastically.
So as we supped away at our hefeweizen, the tour guide took us through his well practised speeches, telling us all about the West Brewery and it’s produce. From the building’s humble beginnings as the carpet factory all the way up West’s inception within the building and the establishment of the Brewery itself. The first UK brewery to produce it’s beers in accordance with the German Beer Purity Law, or the Reinheitsgebot, which originated in Bavaria around 1516. A Bavarian Duke, of some description, decided to take it all upon himself to make an official proclamation of how beer should be made. Apparently people used to make beer out of all sorts of stuff, usually other ingredients to substitute hops. Nuts, berries, poisonous ivies, dandelions and bits of old oak. Basically anything that was lying about the garden after a good weeding session. Presumably it wasn’t until the Duke’s mates actually started falling over due to food poisoning, rather than drunkenness, that he decided to make a law.
The Reinheitsgebot states that beer should only be made by it’s four key ingredients, hops, yeast, malt and water and the West Brewery follow these guidelines in their beer production mirroring the great breweries of Europe, and Germany in particular.
After the main fermenting room the small tour crowded into the large malt cupboards where we passed round plastic cups full of the various malts, giving each a good, hard sniff and tasting the various malt grains, like some alcoholic version of a Nescafe commercial. The bearded tour guide then took us up into another open roofed room, down below the actual bar area, to the giant copper chimneys in which the malts and waters are mixed.

Using the copper chimney’s one small porthole like window in the angular top section we where allowed to stick our head in and once again give it all a good sniff. According to Colin, the dormant, pasty looking mixture lying inside the copper vault had the stench not wholly unlike that of cannabis. Of course, being unaware of such smells I shrugged. My Dad would probably recognise it better than I would as he uses cannabis air fresheners in his car. For a good while he had felt cannabis leaves hanging from his rear view mirror. Everyone else has magic trees but Dad has magic leaves.
The tour ended with a long chat in which the tour guide, on more than one occasion, slagged off a popular Scottish lager, which he refused to name, but illustrated by use of forming his hands into a blatant T shape. All of West’s true German influenced lagers and beers are all given, at the very least, months to ferment. Apparently the Scottish lager, whose ingredients were also brought into question, only allow their lager to settle for a couple of hours, at most. Perhaps a reason why hangovers and more prolific with the ales we usually partake in. The bearded guide then started defending the price of The west brews and why it was dearer than the usual lagers on the street to which I decided to pipe up and argue that some of the ‘usual’ lagers were just as dear, or dearer, than that in some places, to which the tour guide replied by refusing me my beer samples at the end of the tour?! I was sticking up for his beer and he reprimanded me? What was all that about?
Colin then piped up to defend my comment to which the tour guide insisted that he wasn’t to get any tasters either?! The guy obviously misheard us or was still in a huff for us turning up late for his wonderful talk.
As it happened he was only joking, even if he had misheard, misunderstood or just hadn’t listened, and delivered all our beers to our reserved table where we spent the following hours, chatting drinking and eating whilst the rain continued to pour outside and Wedding guests started gathering outside in the main pub hall, where an evening reception was being set up in the crowded bar.
We tried the majority of the west’s beers including the Red Munich, the caramel flavoured malt beer, the West lager and another St.Mungo before heading off for homewards.
We strolled up the dark London Road to Trongate and then onwards to Glassford Street where we decided to go for a night cap before jumping on the bus home and Colin, the last train home.
We strolled up Glassford Street heading for the Blane Valley, a quiet wee pub on a corner Dad recommended where Mum and him have been known to go for bar lunches on shopping trips. Bacchus was the next bar along the street but as that is the warm up bar for the gay club further along we thought it would be safer to opt for the Blane. Shrugging we opened the Blane Valley door to find the place heaving, a bald, cheery looking karaoke singer roaring into his mike, almost directly before us as we pulled the door open. Deciding against the Blane we headed back down the street and ended up stepping through a set of ancient black, double doors into The Steps Bar.
A small, black window, between the clean, lunch friendly Blane Valley and the opulent Mansion House, we entered the The Steps Bar through the double black doorway into a small, dingy, dusty old dive that looked like the Phoenix Club after the fire.
The few occupants all turned and eyed us suspiciously as we entered, trying to look casual. In a corner two middle aged couples eyed us up and down, a flirting older couple looked round at us from a darker, grimmer looking, corner and various other elder folk glowered at us from the bar, including the barman who looked like an older version of Gregor Fisher’s Baldy Man character, without the smile and the cigar. He spilt our pints as he delivered them to us at the bar and claimed he was ‘just learnin’.
As we sat trying to enjoy our last drinks of the day, eighties music playing on the tv up on the heavily stained wall, the two middle aged couples to my right start waving papers around in my direction, laughing and guffawing in my general direction. Turning I asked what was wrong to which they all laughed even louder asking what I’d been eating. Outraged and insulted I insisted I had not farted, in anyway, shape or form, to which the two couples argued, and continued to insist, that I had. As Colin and my Dad joined in, waving beer mats around and laughing, I eventually gave up and turned back to my drink.
Around ten minutes later a definite stench started circulating the dark little pub from the couples’ corner and this time I think the culprit was found out. The wife sitting closest to me of the two couples was distinctly quieter as a similar carry on involving papers and beermats ensued and indeed that wife soon disappeared to the loo for a good fifteen minutes during which the three remaining drinkers had to admit that they no longer reckoned it had been me that had suffered the flatulence.
Shortly after, we finished our drinks and headed back out through the black double doors, back out into Glassford Street and within ten minutes my Dad and myself were on the last 21 home. Arriving at home 12 hours after leaving we were greeted by Ka who immediately went to the kitchen and produced us a nice cup of tea and a slice of toast. Dad jumped in a taxi quite happy and Ka and myself went to bed.
The next morning I awoke to the familiar pounding head of a hangover. It must have been that last pint in the Steps bar.

Good day sunshine

The sky is a brilliant blue over East Kilbride today. Who would have thought that driving around the streets of EK on my first week off could be so wonderful?
With the job still up in the air, Friday was my last shift for two weeks. I’ll have to pop by the office at some point during the next two weeks to attend an interview, but I’m free from the office during all the time in between so I finished my shift on Friday with a spring in my step.
Not only that but Ka was going out on the Saturday to her pal, Louisa’s, 30th birthday night out so I was free to do what I liked.
Watch what I liked. Eat what I liked. Drink what I liked. Go where I liked.
Until I remembered it was Mum’s birthday and something had been said about dinner on the Saturday night. So I gave up my chance at the remote control (it’s overrated anyway) and went out for dinner with Mum, Dad and sis, Lynsey Ann, to the local Steak house where we enjoyed a slap up meal and a few glasses of house red. Afterwards we enjoyed a few drinks in the lively Monty across the road where we took what looked like the last empty table, which just happened to be situated next to a table occupied by Mum and Dad’s old neighbours, from their first flat in the Greenhills, who were out with their daughter. Apparently I used to go to playgroup or nursery with their son. Memories obviously long fizzled out by alcohol abuse or age, or both. I did recognise a few faces as I sat in the bar though. Faces from school, long forgotten about, mostly deliberately.
All this while Ka was out on the town for Louisa’s cocktail filled birthday for which they’d managed to book themselves a booth in Mansion House and a couple of nice rooms in a central hotel by the name of the Alexander Thomson Hotel. There was a little uncertainty regarding the location after suspicions were aroused when some local ladies of the night were spotted in and around the hotel’s vicinity, perhaps attempting some arousing of their own. Not the kind of neighbours you wanted staying in the hotel room next to you.
I clambered out from my taxi, happy with red wine, and downed a cup of tea at around one in the morning with a slice of toast not forgetting to put the clocks forward by an hour and thus eventually begin the British summertime.

Since then it’s been blue skies all the way. Temperatures of 22 and 23 degrees. The green emerging slowly from the trees. The tops and t-shirts starting to get taken off at the first sight of the sun. Bikinis making appearances on the pavements again. The slamming on of the brakes as you turn to realise the driver infront has actually stopped.
With the car heater on ‘cold’ and the electric windows fully down to let some air circulate, it’s almost like driving around in a foreign country. The streets feel different.
Sitting in the flat with the windows open I can actually hear footsteps in the street outside.
Not rain. Not wind. Footsteps.
Neighbours walking by. The occasional conversation echoing up as they pass, their voices seeming to travel further in the warm, quiet street. Blue skies must be good for echoes too.
Bikes cycle past, their tyres whirring and ticking. The cars going up and down the road seem louder as if they’ve all souped-up their exhausts with those ridiculously stupid sized versions you see on cars roaring by with before breaking at the lights along with everyone else.
The kids are slowly emerging from the surrounding houses, out playing for the first time in months, like animals coming out of hibernation. Shouts and yelps echo around the street as they once more start to hang out, kicking balls about and hanging around the large hill of uncut grass directly opposite us which stands alongside the ruins of the old college that was demolished to make way for flats at least three years ago (needless to say the flats never turned up). This long grassed hill is particularly popular for sledging down. Not when there’s snow about though, no, that would just be silly. When the sun’s out and they slide down the grass on their hind ends, straight into the large, mangled, rusty old fence which stands at the grassy slope’s end. Hours of entertainment. Their Mum’s must have a great time with the Vanish.
The daffodils are out in force too. The front garden of our block as an abundance of green and yellow climbing up out of the usually weed filled soil.
Where did they all come from? Who planted them? It wasn’t me. Daffodils just jump up out of nowhere when spring comes around. Those pesky phantom daffodil planters must have been round again.
I’m sure the grey clouds will roll back in at some point though, casting doom and gloom over the days to come. I’d better just enjoy the sunshine while it lasts.

Weapons of choice

Just about finished Al Pacino this weekend. Ka hit the shops yesterday with Claire and Olivia leaving me in the flat to my own devices. The devices in question being my easel, acrylics and paintbrushes in an attempt to finish the Pacino portrait I have been working on, on and off, for over three months. Thankfully, it’s just about finished now.
It’s not bad for a first attempt anyway.
Even though Mum thought it was Bob Marley.
Mum and Dad popped in for a cuppa last Saturday afternoon and after a few minutes pondering the portrait before them in quiet contemplation, they eventually started muttering some compliments, being careful not to say what was obviously on the tip of their tongues.
“Who’s that supposed to be?” being the main phrase that springs to mind. I could tell the two of them were struggling to contain the words escaping from within their mouths as I stood back before going into the kitchen to switch the kettle on. Hopefully a cup of tea would enlighten them.
Yesterday I gave the portrait it’s finishing touches – hopefully. Though I’m sure I could fuss over it for a little longer if given the chance. Like a mechanic with a prize car in the garage, I’ll probably go back to it and tinker at small niggly bits now and again.
I’ve still to give my Christopher Walken portrait it’s finishing touches also, something I also meant to get round to yesterday.

Another portrait I started more than a few months ago, long before Rowland Rivron even considered the idea of defiling the great man’s brilliant dance routine which accompanied Fatboy Slim’s fantastic ‘Weapon of Choice’ (It is for the Sport Relief charity though so I suppose we should let him off). Just as I was about to pull the portrait out from under the dust covers I was interrupted by an unexpected phonecall from Oz.
Ka picked up the phone, not long after returning from the shops, expecting the monotonous tones of a computerised female ‘Important message’ or the slightly over friendly tones of a 3 salesman, (3 have suddenly been calling trying to sell us mobile phones repeatedly for the past few weeks) but was surprised to hear the unexpected tones of my happy brother calling from the other side of the world.
It was 10 past 3 at night over there which meant it was now the 18th of March on their side of the world. Kenny had hit the grand old age of 29 and was now on his way home to his hostel after a celebratory few drinks in the pub. Tequilas being the drink of the day apparently. Kenny’s in Sydney now and once more enjoying the Australian city life after a few weeks on the quiet Gold Coast.
He sounded high spirited (in more ways than one) but keen to get on and find a job whilst in the big city although he wasn’t particularly enamoured by my own job situation.
S&UN Prepress is being moved to the Glasgow offices on the Clydeside but unfortunately for Dave and myself there is only one Studio job. We were each given the dreaded brown envelopes on Monday so it’s either apply for the one post or take the money offered. It wasn’t a great start to the week really but hey, life goes on.
Recently I’ve been helping with the organisation of a ‘Charity Hat Disco Night’, a brainchild of DJ William Rae. On the 26th May, DJ William Rae will be hosting a disco night in the upstairs lounge of The Salmon Leap at which all who attend must wear a hat, the best of which will win a prize! Raffles, rock ‘n’ roll bingo and games will all be interspersed within the music and all proceeds are going towards Sands (Stillbirth and Neonatal Death Society) and Cancer Research UK. At the moment we’re fishing around for some raffle prizes and myself, William, Ka and Jane (DJ William’s better half) are all selling tickets which are going like hot cakes so if anyone out there is interested in attending please see here or contact me at mike@reidnet.org.uk.
I’m not sure which hat to go for on the night. I have a rather battered looking trilby sun hat from Ibiza which I could wear but I don’t think that’ll win me any prizes.
Ka suggested I wear my Boba Fett helmet but I pointed out to her, as the title suggests, it is a helmet, and I’d probably find myself getting disqualified if I wore that particular piece of headgear. Still, it would be a laugh to see a shirted Boba Fett throwing some shapes in the middle of Calderwood’s Salmon Leap.
After DJ William’s best hat disco the following crazy party idea came from Jillian who hits the big 3-0 in September.

Obviously inspired by the recent trip to the flicks to see the new Muppet movie, Jillian thought it’d be a great idea for everyone who attends her birthday party to go as their favourite Muppet. Ironically enough, the party is to be held in the Kirkintilloch Rangers Supporters Club. I’m not sure if that’ll go down well with the regulars to be honest. I suppose I could always play it safe and go as the Cookie Monster.

350 friends

I spent three hours on facebook the other night updating my profile page to it’s new ‘timeline’ design before it’s forced upon me on the 12th of March. Suddenly that date is suddenly almost upon us I thought I’d better get it done before the wonderful programmers at facebook take it upon themselves to mutate my profile page and pick layout to their own liking, probably slapping some tagged picture of my mug up, massive on my profile, for all to see.
I haven’t spent such a long time on facebook for ages. In fact, I’m very rarely on. I usually pop in to wish Happy Birthdays and pop back out again. It’s great for keeping in touch with people you rarely see in day to day life, such as a brother in Australia. Drinking, partying, sky diving, bungee jumping, nighty wearing.
With the exception of the occasional brief visit, I’m rarely on facebook. Especially recently. Everybody on my home page, who I haven’t hidden from view in my preferences, seems to be having babies at the moment. Either that or just talking about what their babies are doing, in minute detail.
Before you think it, it’s not jealousy, I just have no interest in what a fb friend’s wee Baby had for dinner and why he or she (or it in some cases) looked so cute eating it. Some folk on facebook struggle to talk of anything else other than the latest movement or noises their baby is making. Do they have nothing better to talk about? Politics, sport, the war in Afghanistan, art, independence, cinema, the state of the block’s wheelie bins even? None of these subjects seem worthy enough.
If Lucy were around I wouldn’t be boring everyone that’s befriended me with endless stories of how Lucy belched at the dinner table.
Why do facebook have to keep modifying things anyway? They’ve been messing with the design for a while now. Adding bars, pop up screens, new newsfeeds, new buttons, preferences, scrolling effects.
And how many times do they need told that no, I don’t know that person that somebody else does and no, I’m not interested in gaining their friendship just because someone else is.
I suspect there are people that do aim for that though. You come across folk on facebook that have 350 friends.
That’s just not possible is it? How can you have 350 friends? I’ve got about 3.
Excluding family members of course. They’re friends whether they like it or not.
But then facebook friends and Friends, real friends, are very different things. The word ‘friend’ is a very loose term of phrase online.
There must be loads of folk out there that just add and befriend folk for the sake of it, just to make their friends list look attractive and popular. The place to be, like they’re involved in some kind of game to see how many hundred facebook friends they can get?
When I get a friend request from someone I don’t know from Adam (whoever Adam is?) I send them a polite question asking them who they are exactly and how they know me, just in case I have known them in a previous life and have just managed to forget all about them (if that was the case, would you even be interested in befriending them?). This usually gets ignored and I lose out on another +1 to my friends list, a fact which I do struggle with at first, but usually manage to come to terms with over time and persevere onwards with my life.
Twitter’s a good one for that. If it’s not complete strangers, it’s scantily clad girls in provocative poses (thankfully not involving sheep), looking at me hungrily on a profile picture telling me they’re now following my tweets. Then there’s the completely crazy followers you somehow obtain. Twitter emailed me one day, informing me that Coronation Street had decided to start following my tweets for some reason. Why Coronation Street was interested in following me I’ll never know (perhaps they mistook me for Norris or something?).
After changing my facebook profile page to it’s new timeline set up, I looked over it to make sure there was nothing too embarrassing on it.
How did facebook know when I got engaged? I couldn’t even remember when I got engaged! (because it was such a blur of joy and happiness!!)
A low profile on facebook is getting all the more unlikely.
The timeline documents the birth of my brother in 1983, yet there’s no mention of Lynsey, my sister, who was born in 1980 or all the other family members that have confirmed by a simple click that, yes, to their misfortune, they are indeed related to me.
Admittedly I do quite like the new timeline profile. It allows for a little more creativity for your profile page. If you’ve got a particularly stunning picture that you’d like to show off you can now make that you’re main, cover picture. My cover picture is not particularly stunning but it is a rather nice shadow photo of Ka and myself walking over Saint Peter’s Square in Rome on our Honeymoon (I wonder what my facebook timeline remembers about that?). Of course it just looks like a couple of shadows over a stoney ground on it’s own, but at least I know what it is.
Looking back, the old profiles were pretty boring giving you only the one smaller profile pic to toy with alongside the small photos that you’d either uploaded yourself or had been tagged in by other happy snappers (Jillian!).
But even the old profiles were a struggle for some.
My Mum phoned me the other day while I was at work. She needed my help. I had been attempting to tell her over Yahoo Chat how to upload images from her phone by connecting it to the computer via USB and then navigating to her device’s memory drive on the computer and lifting the photos from there. Mum had wanted to upload a picture of herself from her phone to use as her new Facebook profile pic.
Unfortunately she must have got a little muddled on the way.
I answered the call to Mum howling over the phone. I mistook the howling for crying which immediately made me panic and think the worst. After a few moments of a rather strange, undecipherable conversation, I realised it was uncontrollable laughter and with the few words I eventually managed to piece together what had happened.
In attempting to upload a new profile picture from her mobile she had successfully uploaded something quite different from the computer.
My Dad’s letter of discharge from the hospital, following his heart scare last year, was now her profile picture.
Jillian, who had been on Facebook at the time, seen this new update and clicked the ‘Like’ button assuming it to be a happy statement of rejoice from Betty for her husband’s good health, be it six months later.
Needless to say I had to log in under Betty’s name and sort it all out for her.
This was the same day my Uncle Jim left a Happy Birthday message on my profile page. Moments after I started getting a little excited about my birthday I realised that Jim had his Michael’s mixed up. It was my cousin’s birthday, not mine, which I quickly pointed out to him, just so he had enough time to give the right Michael his many happy returns.
My ambiguous, evasive brother, currently adventuring in Oz, even found the time to comment on that. When not exploring, working, partying and dressing up in nightys, Kenny has now decided to start jumping out of planes.
Now that does make a good profile picture.