With all the speed of a dead sloth

Not dead or a sloth, McG does his impression
of the speed of a BlackLOG posting.

For the record this is my 93rd post. It has taken me almost 2 years to get here and it will be well into 2010 (about 4pm on the 1st of January, if I can get a signal from the ski slopes of France, at my current rate of posting) before No.100. I'm getting excited - will I get the blogger equivalent of a telegram from the Queen?

Some sites passed 100 postings in less than three months and are still accelerating. All I can say is it takes time to craft this drivel and I make no apologies for my once a week strategy. (If you wish to read between the lines, Mrs B would become the former Mrs B if I spent much more time here.)

In all that time and through all your suffering some good has actually come of it. I know for instance that I have inspired 3 people to create their own blogs. I would like think that they were impressed by my efforts, although I have a sneaky suspicion that the thought process was more like:

Inspired Blogger 1 :- "If that idiot can do a blog, anyone can."

Inspired Blogger 2 :- "What, who is he? I've never heard of him..."

Inspired Blogger 3 :- "I must save the dignity of Bishops Stortford from the outrage that is the BlackLOG"

Readers - your mission this week is to go check them out and read some of their old stuff. If you like it, get on and become a fan and support them in their future endeavours, laugh at the good times and cry through the bad.

Skipper the Quarter Horse - (We go way back and Mrs B and I try and see Skipper and the family at least once a year. They always make us so welcome.)

Conform Consume Obey  - (Despite working in the same firm for a number of years we have never met. He has moved on to pastures new but still supports the Fantasy Football (that's soccer to you non-Europeans) league I run.)

Midge's musings- (My relationship with IMO started when she stumbled into the BlackLOG earlier this year, I think she is still looking for the exit. Despite living in the same town we have never met. Or perhaps we
have......?)

Yoga update
I've been a bit quiet on the Yoga postings recently as there are only so many ways I can describe how rubbish I am at it before you get bored. I thought you might enjoy this exchange however:

Yoga Teacher: :- "Are you comfortable in that position?"

Me :- "Yeeessss" - I always get skeptical at any point in a class when attention turns to me, it's never destined to end well for me....

YT :- "Are you sure you are comfortable?"

Me :- "I can assure you it feels as comfortable as I ever get in Yoga"

YT :- "I'm the teacher and I know what's comfortable for you!!!"

This could have gone on for a while but it suddenly dawned on me we were at cross purposes.

I thought, selfishly, when YT said "are you" she meant "Did I feel comfortable" but what she really meant was - my position was not aesthetically pleasing to her and made her uncomfortable.  I, as usual, tried to explain that my body did not move in the same circles as the rest of the class, preferring to find its own path. A couple of attempted adjustments later and some earth shattering shrieks from me and we compromised. This meant me being left as a quivering wreck, while she moved on to the more malleable members of the class...

TV watch
1 hour and 15 minutes, 33 seconds after getting agreement for the new large TV from Mrs B it was ordered. It would have been sooner but it took a little while to get the local shop to price match and include the 5 year warranty.

How things have changed. The last time, when I was negotiating for the 36"
TV, there were tears and an outburst of why do we need anything bigger than a 21"? This time, with 58" of Plasma magic heading in our direction, Mrs B actually declared that she is looking forward to watching the big TV ....Damn I should have held out for the 65".

It's time to step into the TimeBLOG (patent still pending) while I take you back a few years .......

Unintentional experimentation with homelessness
I managed to lock myself out of the house last week through a combination of bad luck, poor timing but mostly gross incompetence on my part. While I would like to sweep this incident under the proverbial carpet, a sense of fair play (I'd certainly report it if any one of you did the same*) and a lack of other interesting incidents this week leads me to this sad confession.

While the experience only lasted just over two hours, before Mrs B returned to save me from having to track down a shopping trolley, put all my worldly goods into it and then head off to the nearest soup** kitchen, it felt like an eternity. I had a bit of luck in that I had my Ipod with me but sadly the headphones were the other side of a locked door and at least it was dry until it started raining.

The cats were very supportive through the entire event, peering at me from the warmth of our well-lit kitchen. They decided not to use the cat flap to come and visit but made it perfectly clear they were less then happy that their dinner was going to be served late. Mrs B was most surprised to see me rushing up the driveway to greet her and I'm sure it was only shock at seeing what looked like a genuine homeless man, 2 hours of beard growth, dishevelled clothes and a look of hopelessness which caused her to swerve towards me and nothing to do with the extra life insurance she took out on me last month***.

* In fact here I go. My story of woe managed to flush out that a friend of ours locked her child in their car with the internal sensor alarm engaged. This made me feel a little better about my situation. My advice if you own both a child and a car is to get a child flap fitted, I suspect the child is unlikely to use it, especially if they are strapped in like Houdini but it will allow you to feel better about the situation. Especially when you work out that there is a one in a million chance of the child working its way out of the restraints and then out of the car, but as every one who has read Pratchett knows, million to 1 chances work out 9 times out of 10.

** I never was that keen on soup and somehow I don't expect they are likely to serve it with a side order of steak and chips.

*** I would like to point out this last part is pure fabrication and used for dramatic effect. While most things in the BlackLOG are based on real events, for reasons of pace and interest they are often stretched into the world of unreality**** . In truth, Mrs B was most concerned at my plight, especially as, like the cats, it resulted in her dinner being delayed.

**** I have for instance been asked if at Halloween I really drove the Mini with the roof down through a bunch of potential Asbo's. Are they mad, of course I had the roof up, those little ankle biters can move quickly and you really don't want a bunch of them clinging to your head as you speed into the night.

McG trying out a new home, in case I try and
experiment with homelessness again…

That's it for another week, thanks for dropping in....