What a drawn out process.

At times I feel like my head is going to explode and I really do not know how to burn off my frustration and high blood pressure. The source of my angst of course is my on going job search.

I really had not realised how much harder it is these days! The pleasure of working for yourself for such a long time I suppose. I rode up to Nottingham earlier in the week and had a very productive day. It started early with my first appointment at 8am. That was the start of an eight hour run around that has produced 2 job offers.

The problem with these offers is that one is for a wacking £5.99 an hour and the other was an agency with only the promise of work until Christmas. Niether is a decent enough option to uproot the family and make a 70 mile move to the north.

So the search is still ongoing but I have to admit it is taking longer than I have ever experienced before. As wifey so helpfully pointed out, the days of leaving a job on Monday and starting another on Tuesday are long gone!

The search widens...

After careful consideration I wound the business up, it was costing more to run than it was earning, about 3 weeks ago and started the hunt for a full time job.

Now our little neck of the woods has been obviously dying for some time now with lots of boarded up shops and companies going under but I have been looking for work in the papers, online and calling direct to no avail!So....wifey and I had a chat today and as she is from

Nottingham originaly and has alot of family still there it was suggested that I start searching around that area as well. I then pointed out that I do not want to live in a city to which she replied what about all of the villages in the area?? DOOHHHH!! LOL

What a plonker there are some really lovely areas there so the search has begun for work first as I would commute to start with but I am really surprised how many more vacancies there are up there!! Did a quick search and found there local paper is online with an added extra of a job site which is topped up as the work comes in...57 job posts already today!! I have applied for more work today than in the last three weeks!Anyone else planning on moving for work or is it just us that are mad or is this a sign of the times??

Pish & nonsense!!!!!!!!!

There I was first thing this morning enjoying my first brew of the day, you know the one that quenches your thirst the most as no other does all day long, when up pops on the news a specialist who has now declared that sleeping with your partner is bad for your health! As we all toss and turn as well as pinching the duvet during the night we should now sleepp in seperate beds so we can live just a little longer. What a load of crap!
What do they think will happen? Will we all rush out and buy up single beds creating a glut of doubles that are no longer wanted? Of course not. Do you remember when you were in your late teens and you had your new partner over to stay for the first time? We always squeezed into a single bed for the whole night :) Now of course you wouldnt want to do that on a daily basis and of course the novelty of being crammed together does wear off in time but apperently the average double bed isnt enough for two.

I have a far easier solution if you are not enjoying a double bed, I have used this one myself and I can assure you it works, BUY A KING SIZE BED!!!

A fun trip to the dentist this morning to have a scrape and polish....I hate paying for torture and the invasion of other peoples fingers wrapped in rubber probing the depths of my mouth is beyound repulsion...it takes all my strength not to throw up in the chair :) Then of course there are the patronising comments and info of " Dont eat too many sweets" "You shouldnt smoke it stains your teeth" well I do bloody smoke and I pay you a fortune to polish my bloody teeth so get on with it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The best line of all was upon leaving..."I want to see you again in six months" I want a Ferrari but that isnt going to happen either! So now I have two days of pain whilst my poor gums get over the pasting they have taken...

Theres alot to be said for the posiitive side of tartar LOL

Bank Holidays & Birthdays

Again its been some time since I last tapped the keyboard but in all fairness its been really busy :)

Now on bank holiday Monday our little close had a BBQ. Now picture all of the neighbours, 10 households in total, putting up 3 gazebos, getting the bbq out and then spending the afternoon chatting in the sunshine playing games and generally getting to know each other. It was fantastic! What a superb afternoon! It really promoted a real sense of community spirit which in our fast paced world where most people do not know who their neighbours names let alone spend time with them a welcome it really was and it was agreed that we will do it again a few times next year.

My oldest daughter has now turned 13 years old!!!!!!!!! Will she turn into a Kevina??? Will she spend most of her time sulking in her room??? Will her speech turn into a series of grunts and shrugs??? Well if it does then there wont be much of a change as shes been like that for the last couple of years LOL. Of course she is happy, smiling and coherent when she wants a Dads Taxi run doing! The pleasures of parenthood eh.

Now to celebrate this passing of age wifey talked me into throwing a party in the garden complete with bouncy castle and lots of food. Well lets start with the castle. My sisters boyfriend conviniently runs a bouncy castle business so for a discounted price he popped around on the Saturday morning with the castle and blew it up......now you know when you go to fun fairs or fun days and you see the bloody great big huge castles complete with turrets and roofs which you have to pay a pound for 30 secounds of jumping around....it was bigger!!! LMAO this thing was 20ft wide by 17ft long and was held down by big metal stakes :) To say the kids enjoyed it would be an understatement. It took up most of the garden and I thanked wifey for having the forethought to put the dog into kennels for the weekend as she would have had kittens with that up and would have been desperate to get on and play!

I spent a happy 10 hours in the kitchen cooking as the party was split into two with my daughters friends coming from 2pm until 6pm and then our families turning up from all over the country... now even though the day went off without a hitch I wouldnt want to do it again! I have for the last few years just booked somewhere and let them take the stress of the party and now I remember why ;)

The job hunt is well underway and I have to admit to feeling really low at the moment. I dont do scratching around finding something to do very well and have been struggling to fill my time. Of course the weather had been crap of late so even the allotment has been out of the question but at least the last couple of days have been dry so some time and work has been done.

Well time for a bath so enough drivel for today :)

How times have changed.

Charlie Brown was a B-17 Flying Fortress pilot with the 379th Bomber Group at Kimbolton, England. His B-17 was called 'Ye Old Pub' and was in a terrible state, having been hit by flak and fighters. The compass was damaged and they were flying deeper over enemy territory instead of heading home to Kimbolton. After flying the B-17 over an enemy airfield, a German pilot named Franz Steigler was ordered to take off and shoot down the B-17. When he got near the B-17, he could not believe his eyes. In his words, he 'had never seen a plane in such a bad state'. The tail and rear section was severely damaged, and the tail gunner wounded. The top gunner was all over the top of the fuselage. The nose was smashed and there were holes everywhere. Despite having ammunition, Franz flew to the side of the B-17 and looked at Charlie Brown, the pilot. Brown was scared and struggling to control his damaged and blood-stained plane. BF-109 pilot Franz Stigler B-17 pilot Charlie Brown. Aware that they had no idea where they were going, Franz waved at Charlie to turn 180 degrees. Franz escorted and guided the stricken plane to, and slightly over, the North Sea towards England. He then saluted Charlie Brown and turned away, back to Europe. When Franz landed he told the CO that the plane had been shot down over the sea, and never told the truth to anybody. Charlie Brown and the remains of his crew told all at their briefing, but were ordered never to talk about it. More than 40 years later, Charlie Brown wanted to find the Luftwaffe pilot who saved the crew. After years of research, Franz was found. He had never talked about the incident, not even at post-war reunions. They met in the USA at a 379th Bomber Group reunion, together with 25 people who are alive now - all because Franz never fired his guns that day. (L-R) German Ace Franz Stigler, artist Ernie Boyett, and B-17 pilot Charlie Brown. When asked why he didn't shoot them down, Stigler later said, "I didn't have the heart to finish those brave men. I flew beside them for a long time. They were trying desperately to get home and I was going to let them do that. I could not have shot at them. It would have been the same as shooting at a man in a parachute." Both men died in 2008. This is a true story http://www.snopes.com/military/charliebrown.asp THIS WAS BACK IN THE DAYS WHEN THERE WAS HONOR IN BEING A WARRIOR...THEY PROUDLY WORE UNIFORMS, AND THEY DIDN'T HIDE IN AMBUSH INSIDE A MOSQUE, OR BEHIND WOMEN AND CHILDREN, NOR DID THEY USE MENTALLY RETARDED WOMEN AS SUICIDE BOMBERS TO TARGET AND KILL INNOCENT CIVILIANS...HOW TIMES HAVE CHANGED...... A wonderful story

New toys and vandalism

I arrived at my allotment this afternoon to find some friggin toerag has nicked my marrows and some beans the to add insult to injury they smashed a few panes of glass in my greenhouse! You have to ask yourself why? What sort of person would spend the time harvesting my crops then decided that some wanton vandalism was on the cards? The police have given the usual shrug off and in all fairness I suppose they couldnt catch the kids that did this if they wanted to but it did wind me up a bit.

I believe that we should save and work hard to get what we want. I learned the valuble lesson years ago that credit doesnt get you anywhere but into a worse mess so just save your pennies until you have enough for what material possesions your heart desires. So when some local lowlife comes along and thinks I want that and takes it does not sit well with me. If I cath the buggers there will be payback and a few late night visits to the plot are in the pipeline as I was not the only plot holder hit with this theft and destruction.

There was something that took the sting out of this though and that was the fact that I bought a new toy this morning...

Its a Ninja 600cc and goes like the clappers!! Ive wanted one of these for years and like most people could not buy one new so have waited patiently for the prices to come down and here we are! Ok its nine years old but it rides very well and im over the moon!! Best be watching out as I dont want to collect anymore stamps on the old licence :)

This evening my youngest daughter and I spent some time going through old photo albums one of which was my wedding album which she has never seen before! She was amazed at how young everyone looked and I have to admit being suprised myself! Its amazing at how much your kids change in seven years :) The older albums were from my late teens and early twenties and it can really open up old memories and remind you of who you are and how you got here! I have to admit that I have just been feeling like "Dad" lately and this evening has put my mind in a much better place feeling like me as an individual again.

Lets see what tomorrow brings...

Wedding food & Birthday presents

I have been having a recuring dream. Its not every night but at least once a month and the detail is unbelievable. I can do what I want in this dream and mingle freely with the people in it, I do not know most of them but its a freindly town and the people seem very relaxed.
This hamlet, as ive just realised as town is far too grand a word for it, seems to be in Northwest Spain. How do I know well its down to gut feeling and the fact the area is so green.

I have a house and that is very spanish being very higgly piggly in its set up with the toilet being down a long set of stairs and being more a less outside with a basic roof covering covering the courtyard to get to it giving just a little protection from the elements. Its set on to a small mountainside and is very rural with adjoining land , I think this is mine, growing many fruits and vegtables. I seem to always walk or catch a bus as near to it as I can from the Hamlet/town and the scenery is nothing short of breathtaking with its lush trees and grasses, rolling mountains (big hills) and lots of adjoing streams to one large river rolling through them all.

Guests appear on a regular basis in my small home and they are always most welcome visitors. Last night it was my brother and we sat and chatted for hours then had a wander around the land inspecting the crops. I love this dream and this is the first time I have remebered it in such detail once I have woken up but strangely I always reconise it when it comes around again in my sleep.

Back to reality then... Wedding food.

What about it I here you ask? One of my Brothers, the one in the dream, runs his own catering business and he had a very large wedding to cater for last weekend. I had been booked to give him a hand from the day he got the job so it was early on Friday morning I set off on the 25 mile drive to his house to begin the long weekend of work.
Our first job of the day was to go and collect a large chiller van from Melton and this was to be somewhat of a problem. We arrived to find a suprised looking chap behind the counter who obviously was not expecting anyone that day. We were then told that we hadnt booked a van! Pillocks were obviously wrong as we had the paperwork to prove it but we were then told that the van we wanted was in Loughborough!! This was another 25 miles away!! Enough was enough so I stepped in at this point as my brother was looking like he was going to explode! I pointed out somewhat forceably that we needed the van now, that we had paid for it and there was no way we could both lose another 2 hours buggering about to sort their mistake. With this they backed down and found someone to take me over to the van whilst my brother went off to carry on with the day.
Well when I got to Loughborough it was the wrong type of van!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was supposed to have a stand alone chiller that was deisel run but this one had to be plugged in to a 16 amp electric supply. The proverbial hit the fan in a big way!!!!!!!!!! The biggest problem was THERE WAS NO OTHER VAN ANYWHERE so I had to take this one and deal with it when I got back!

I went straight to the site of the wedding and what a wedding site it was!! A huge Marqui shaped with two turrets but most importantly for me there was a sodding great big generator being set up so off I went to see the sparky who lined us up with the power we would need for the wedding the next day! I then saw the sound man who had a converter I could borrow so we could plug the van in at home whilst preparing the food so by the time I got back to my brothers house I had the whole fridge thing sorted so one less worry for him!

We then spent the rest of the day, evening and until 2am that night preparing the food. Up at 6am on the Saturday to do a bit more food prep and off to site to set up. We pulled 38 hours out of 48 feeding 148 people on the first meal and then around 400 on the evening buffet. It turned out the wedding was for a brother of one of my brothers old friends so the day was spent seeing the faces of boys and girls in the men and women in front of me!

This group are very laid back and I have to say I havnt seen a better wedding. It was very relaxed with 2 live bands and a disco follwed by people jammong with all manner of instruments outside around fires. Around 100 chinese lanterns were sent up in the dark and what a spectacle that was to see! Lots of bright lights that could bee seen floating away for many miles.

So lots of hard work yes but well worth it. It made me realise how much I miss working full time and with other people so I have decided that it is time to find full time employment and kiss my failing business goodbye.

As I write it is my wifes birthday and she is having a well deserved lie in. I think she will be pleasently surprised when she awakes as we dont normally go too mad for birthdays with a single present but this year I have spoilt her with 2 new perfumes, diffuser hairdryer thingy she wanted, a large boquet of flowers and five new books. I have also arranged with friends to go out for a meal this evening because she deserves it. She has been working so hard of late and does not moan once. Without her hard work we would have really struggled this year as my business has been so quiet so time for a bit of repayment I think.

Ok then its about time to take wifey a cup of tea up and start the day. The suns shining so I intend to take advatage of it :)