Fanimal

Fanimal
Originally uploaded by Beebop Alula.

I've wanted one of these since spotting one in 'Puckman's Flickr album.
Picked one up at a local sports store at the weekend for £3. They're really cool; as well as feeling bizarre, it says a shed load of different phrases!
"I'm meat, I'm meat, you can throw me from your seat, Faaaanimallll, Faaaanimallll"

Boozeless Bank Holiday.....nearly!

Rather than spend all bank holiday in a pub (like we normally do!), we decided to head to Corbridge Show. We were some of the least likely 'Country Folk' there, - but hey ho!
The event is a lot more popular than we expected and there were thousands of people there. It's basically a huuuuge Country Fair which I'm assuming was used originally for trading cattle?
Of course we headed for the beer tent half way round then straight to the pub when we arrived home! hic.

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Bringing a touch of class to California

Check out this latest post from Ross and Pinar's travel blog. It's an excellent picture and I don't think you could help but feel proud to be from the North East if you saw this drive past.
I wonder if they have also have the special Shearer Testimonial Commemorative issues bottles over there and if not surely there's a big opening for someone on eBay.....!!

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The Real Firework code

Following Jen's surprise Birthday bash last Friday as everyone was preparing to go back to our house someone suggested setting off some fireworks. (Basically one of the guests owns a shop and had loads stored in his garage). As everyone was quite drunk by this time the idea obviously appealed to everyone.
After picking the fireworks up we got back to ours about 11pm and the first one was set off at 11.10ish. Within 30seconds (not exagerating here!), a neighbour from across the street was banging on our door playing holy hell! He ranted and raved about it being illegal and threatened to call the Police. After laughing at his over the top reaction it was decided that Jen would beat him to it and she called the Police herself. They confirmed that we couldn't set them off after 11pm. Knowing that everyone was drunk and not wanting to escalate this any further, that was the end of it.
It's been bugging me all week though because I was convinced that there are fireworks set off legally on other nights apart from November 5th. Sure enough, a quick Google for the Firework regs produced the following;

7. - (1) Subject to paragraph (2) below, no person shall use an adult firework during night hours.
...................
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(3) In this regulation, "night hours" means the period beginning at 11 pm and ending at 7 am the following day and a "permitted fireworks night" means a period -
(a) beginning at 11 pm on the first day of the Chinese New Year and ending at 1 am the following day;
(b) beginning at 11 pm on 5th November and ending at 12 am the following day;
(c) beginning at 11 pm on the day of Diwali and ending at 1 am the following day; or
(d) beginning at 11 pm on 31st December and ending at 1 am the following day.

So there you go, - you learn something new everyday.
Also in case you're wondering it appears the Hindu festival of Diwali is on a different date each year, - I bet that one would confuse the neighbours!!!

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Wedding Canvassing

I wanted to get Jen something different for her Birthday and decided to get her a Canvas print done of one of our wedding photos.

I've used this company (PhotoBox.co.uk) loads of times for prints and gifts (i.e. calendars etc), but this is the first time I've bought a canvas from them. Basically I've got a 30% discount code for this month and figured it was probably the only time I'd be likely to fork out for one!

I must say I'm well impressed with the result, and as usual I'm amazed at their speed of service! I ordered it on a Monday morning, and it was delivered on the following Thursday morning. They say 14 days to cover their back, but nothing I've ordered has ever taken even a week. Doesn't look that big in this photo but it's actually 40cm x 30cm and is just the right size for putting on one of our walls.

I can't believe it's taken me 9 months to get round to sorting out a decent sized wedding photo to have on display! Speaking of which, although the canvas has turned out really, really well, I guess it's reliant upon having a very good quality image to start with so a special mention must go to our wedding photograhers...again!

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Zoom right in

This is canny, - just keep clicking....

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Big Blogging

We had a house (and pub!) party at the weekend to celebrate Jen's 26th Birthday. Being the geek that I am, I was streaming music from our storage PC upstairs, through our surround sound system via my laptop! To add to the effect I'd wired up a projector to display the psychedelic Windows media effects on the dining room wall! (Sounds ridicuously over the top I know, but it creates a really good effect).
Anyhoo, as the party quietened down (about 5am), I went to have a butchers at Ross and Pinar's latest travel posting. Now just to clarify at this point, - I don't remember doing any of this!! It was only when I went through my phone yesterday to look at the photos that it all came flooding back. The funniest part was when Jen came in and in her drunken stooper she started having a conversation with the life sized Pinar on our wall!!! Drink's an evil thing.

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Lottery Fiasco

Here's the link for anyone who didn't see Eamonn Holmes absolutely bricking it during the live lottery show on Saturday night; BBC NEWS UK Lottery show delayed by protest. Watch the video - it's class!

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Water + Gadgets + Me = ERROR!

I spent most of Sunday trying to repair my phone after I dropped it in the toilet! (Don't ask how, and yes the water was clean!!).
I could have screamed at the time, - I went to put it on the unit in the bathroom and it fell out of my hand. Everything then went into slow motion as it bounced off the unit, hit the toilet seat then plopped into the water. To be honest my hand was in there so quick to rescue it I don't think I'd have even had time to react if the water wasn't clean! (eww!!). As I picked it up the screen faded and went off, leaving me fearing the worst...
I removed all the obvious things like battery, sim and memory card before going at the lot with a hairdrier. Half an hour later I was still no further forward with the phone showing no signs of life at all. I then turned to the Internet and things began to look up. Internet forums are priceless for times like this and I soon discovered a video showing how to remove the various facias from the phone, i.e. they're not actually designed to be removed by Joe Public. Again I went at it with the hairdryer to no avail.
I noticed there were a couple of specialised screws still in place holding the circuit boards together, so I figured I had nothing to lose and removed them too. After a quick blast of the hairdrier...SUCCESS it came back to life!
I managed to get the whole thing back together and so far (touch wood), everything's fine again. Maybe the optional Orange Care insurance wouldn't be such a bad idea after all, given my track record....Remember my digital camera is still dead (and in bits), from when I dropped it in a hot tub earlier this year!!! Note to self: Never borrow any expensive electrical gadgets off anyone!

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Weekends = Weddings

Every Saturday evening for the last 3 weeks we've been to someone's wedding party! Don't get me wrong, it's not a problem; you're guaranteed a cracking atmosphere, plenty of drink and best of all we can sit there happy in the fact we don't have to go through all that again!!
On the 19th April we were at Graham and Cheryl's wedding party (wedding was in Cyprus), on 6th May it was Scott and Andrea's wedding party (wedding in St Lucia) and then finally last weekend it was Mark and Emma's wedding at Linden Hall.
I don't 'think' we've got another one this weekend, but even then it wouldn't be a problem as Jen completely thrives on anything and everything related to weddings!!

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Evolution of Dance

Came across this last week on BoingBoing but didn't have the time to watch it properly. Jen sent the link out via e-mail last night urging me to watch the full 6 minutes, and I have to say it's pretty funny.
For those of you that dance (i.e. not me!), you'll probably be even more impressed...!
YouTube - Evolution of Dance

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You'd never get me up there!!

Church_3
Originally uploaded by Beebop Alula.

In the town where one of our new hospitals is being built (Morpeth), there is a church with a tall steeple which is apparently in a dangerous state. Scaffolding has been errected in order to carry out repairs and I have to say it looks one scary place to work, - check out the one long ladder used to get up to there!

From Mental Asylum to Mental Hospital

A new hospital has been built on one of the sites where I work, and it's literally spitting distance from the one it's replacing. I'm thinking of creating a photo set within Flickr to contrast old and new this is basically a test pic.

I'm also still relatively new to the whole Flickr thing and I'd noticed that Mac often makes use of a Notes feature to highlight certain areas of his pics. The Notes feature would be ideal for this and I've stuck a few on the pic in flickr. Go have a look and do yourself a favour.....open a Flickr account.
Cheers again Mac :o)

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The smell of childhood memories

I absolutely loved Play-Doh as a kid, and to be honest I think it was like a very early introduction to Lego for us creative types! Thing is though I think I probably spent more time smelling Play-Doh than playing with the stuff!! I can honestly say that the smell of it is one of my earliest childhood memories, so you can imagine how happy I was to discover there's atually such a thing as 'Eau de Play-Doh'...!!

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