I really need an air miles card now.....

... because I'll be spending quite a lot of time on a plane in February!

On Monday, we have some important Japanese visitors at work. After spending a lot of the day with them I'll be out for dinner in the evening. On Tuesday I fly to India to visit collaborators. It's a flying trip (did you see what I did there, flying trip!!!) My boss and I are flying out overnight, an afternoon arranged visiting Ghandi's house and then dinner in the evening. A night in a hotel then the next day on site and we are on the overnight back to the UK. We'll land at Heathrow at 7 am on Friday morning :-(

I'll be back in the country for 10 days beofre I'm on a flight back to Japan for some meetings and then a company conference. After that ends on the friday, I've been invited to the "drinking party" (just love the Japanese!) and then the saturday we have a day trip before I fly home.

There will be pictures :-) and it is a about time that fantastic camera saw some use!!!

Fear .....

I like to be scared occassionally, especially when it is short-lived and I'm pretty much in control and this is worth dwelling on ........

I like to read horror stories, if anybody apart form me actually reads this blog (ad I don't think anybody does) then you would see that quite a few of the books are horror based...... but they just don't scare me like they used to do years ago and I'm starting to loose interest.

I like the odd horror movie too. The Sixth Sense must be my fav film ever but then anything I watched directed by M Night Shalaban I've loved (sixth sense, the village, signs, unbreakable, all fantastic films!). The last good horror movie I saw was Paranormal Activity. I remember watching it in my last house, I was alone and being slightly scared I remember going up to bed wishing the kids were in the house with me!!

Then there is real fear. I think I'm actually a whole lot more insecure than I dare to let myself beleive. That seems to be demonstrated on a semi-regular basis. I think the unexpected and still unexplained breakdown of marriage (but I stopped trying to work it out ages ago) followed by my first new relationship in 20 years, getting dumped on Valentine's Day because her ex proposed and then the last relationship where I caught her touting herself on the web (!!!!) have left there scars. Still, these fears are sily. It's clear the wonderful woman I'm with now is nothing like the women I've been with before and she deserves the respect of trust.

Then there is real fear. This week I found out that someone close to me is not well. It probably is n't life-threatening but ... fuck ... I'm really scared now :-(

Perfect People by Peter James

Another one from Kate, one of her favourite authors. Was n't really up for this, did n't think it would work for me but it just goes to show you should always be prepared to try something different!! (Still on the Kindle though.)

The story of a couple who, having lost their 4 year boy to a devastating hereditery diesease, go to see a trail blazing scientist to get a "designer baby". They want a healthy boy, that's all, but given the option of improving things like diet, sleep patterns and intelligence they find themselves compelled to tweak a few things. Months later the scientist is apparently murdered by the religious cult who have swarn to kill him and the spawn from his experiements. The father to be has got drunk for an interview and told the whole world what they are up to too so they are now in fear of their lives.

They end up with twins, a boy and a girl, and quite remarkable twins at that. The story tells how they evade the clutches of the cult and deal with extraordinary children. An excellent read, difficult to put down, done in three days ;-)

That other guitar is not getting played much!!

Now before I take my Kindle to India and Japan in February I really shiould read some of the actual books that peeps bought me for Xmas :-(

The Ritual by Adam Neville

Good book this .... another on my Kindle. This one has again been on my wish list for a while and close to the top. The story of four British guys who were friends at Uni, they have lost touch quite a lot and hope to reconnect. However, they have to abort their long distance hike as one of the guys hurts his knee and the other is struggling fitness as he's overweight. So, a look at the map leads to them cutting through a massive valley with some ancient old wood in it, one of the oldest on the planet. Pretty much as soon as they find the carcass of some massive animal, hanging in the trees and stripped of it's skin, it is pretty clear that some horrible thing inhabits those trees. It is a book of two halfs really as in the first half the book chronicles their attempts to escape from the trees, lost, whilst it stalks them and kils three of them. As the fourth is on his last legs, quite literally, he is "rescued" by three young people who wear make-up as if they are part of the rock band Kiss and an old woman (the start of the second half). However it soon becomes clear that he is out of the frying pan and into the fire. Quite a scary, thrilling book, well written with characters you can relate to (one's from Yorkshire and one of the others has trouble with his temper!). Whilst a very serious book it has the odd bit of humour that had my lol'ing "here's the food, it will be aweful, we can't cook shit, we burn water" and talking to one of the younder guys Luke says "....hey Ferens, your eye-liner is running mate!"!!!

Adam Neville, I'll read more :-)

Time to move on - when is it time to move on?

I've always been pretty risk averse in life. When I've bought houses, I was always sure I could afford them and did n't stretch myself finacially. Pretty much all of my pension fund is in low risk accounts. I don't like worry, it's not nice, but if you don't ever take risks then you don't get very far.

This lovely house I'm living in here I definately have until April 26th, but then I'm at the landlord's mercy. Will he want to rent for longer? Will he put the price up? Will he decide to sell? I've moved house three times in the last two and half years already and I'm struggling to feel at home and put down any real roots in the villages I get shunted between. When I first moved to Over and hooked up with the boys from the village bike club (careful!) that was fantastic but now I barely see them since I've moved to a new village (twice!).

Had an interesting conversation with my mum at the weekend. She's a shrewd old bugger ;-). It went along these lines .... how are old you again David? (!!!) ..... 43 mother, please don't forget my birthday in May when I'll be 44 ....... Oh, so do you think you'll be able even to get a 20 year mortgage before long? ...... probably not Mum (thanks for that!) ....... (Mum pauses for thought) ...... you know there's a recession on don't you and there will never be a better time to buy a house ...... so after the three hour drive back to Cambridgeshire with plenty of time to think, then 6 days later I seem to have appointments to look at houses for sale. My mum is hilarious and wonderful, rarely criticises (but will do when I need a poke) and always has my best interests at heart.

My future lies in Warboys, I'm pretty much convinced of it. The conversation with Kate was tentative, with me definately feeling my way, but it was clear that we were both in the same place. The idea of me moving into the village and us being a lot closer geographically was very agreeable. At the same time I wanted a second opinion (needed a second opinion) when viewing new houses and I wanted her to be aware that this house could end up being one we all live in at some point down the line. You get to point nine months into a relationship were it's either completley clear that it is wonderful, or sadly, it's time to move on. So along she came and was very helpful. Whilst the dream home did not present itself on saturday I (we?) did come to some quite clear conclusions about the kind of place that would work and the areas that might not.

And she's still not running for the hills :-)

The Moonlite Mind by Dean Koontz

This was a relatively cheap (!!!) "novella" from one of my favourite authors that I bought for the Kindle. It was very readable adnd overall pretty good. The story of a boy who failed to recognise or stop the sacrifice of siblings by an eveil cult. His incredibly beautiful mother took a string of lovers in order to get what she needed to get by in life but one day hit the jackpot and married one of the world's richest men. That man appears to have been a fanatical occultist who sacrifced her children one by one starting with the smallest and working up but not quite managing it with the oldest boy. The story is written in two parts, similar to many others these day with almost alternativing chapters, one written in the present the next in the past and so on. Whilst a good story and an intriguing prospect I felt it could have been so much more (maybe as a full novel it would be?). The ending was a little disappointing and left much unexplained and the real potential depth untapped. Much better than I could ever manage though ;-) Dean's still one of my fav authors :-)

Dracula by Bram Stoker

Quite a while ago I'd downloaded the Kindle app to my iphone and started reading this but picked it up as the first book I read on my new Kindle. It is a classic and when it was written I'm sure it was nothing like anything before and it has led to whole series of rip-off's of course (I'm thinking Twilight right now!). On top of its innovative nature (at the time of publishing) it is well written and the story is strong of course. I found the olde worlde text charming and at time amusing ..... " once they returned the house and Mrs Harker had done her toilet they began the conference..." - hilarious!! On the down side I thought the climax took too long to come (!!!) and was weak in the end (again !!!). On saying that I did finish it at about three in the morning when I really should have been sleeping and probably did not have all my faculties around me!

Great book, everybody should read it :-)

Christmas 2011

Well, it all worked rather well in the end!!

It began on the evening of Thursday Dec 22nd when Kate and I exchanged presents. We bought each other about 5 gifts and remarkably two of them coincided!! I got her a chocolate orange and a Kindle and she got me ........... well you can guess the rest!!!

I also bought her a grow your own olives set (she loves olives and likes to grow her own stuff), a Michael Bubble calendar (lol), and a book on choosing and keeping chickens (in joke, we are not having children!!).

I also received some Muse guitar picks, a lovely shirt and a set of five toy Ferrari's (again, I 'd been joking that all I wanted for Christmas was a Ferrari - I'm so lucky, I got 5, I think I'm about to cry!!).

The next day I had taken the day off work as my brother and family were coming over so I needed to clean and cook. I'd already prepared and frozen down the obligatory spaghetti bolognaise but I also made my first casserole, using starting ingredients, some of which I'd never even bought before (go me eh?). All the food was lovely. Us boys washed it down with bottles of Corona with lime slices in the top - nice!!

My Mum came across with Stephen, Pamela and Alex as well but they left in the afternoon of Xmas Eve. Tom, Robin, Chloe, Beth and I went to Christdingle at Bar Hill church, which was nice.

Beth stayed over on Xmas Eve so there were all here when we woke up (first time since the separation). Chloe had the stocking on the end of her bed that I'd prepared for her and then plenty of toys waiting in the empty fireplace. They were with me until 1 pm so we had the whole morning together. I seem to remember that once they got bored with my "help" I ended up watching Adam and the Ants songs on Youtube (bizarre, I know).

As soon as I'd dropped them off at their Mum's I was over to Lowestoft to be with Kate as her Mum and Dad had very kindly invited me Christmas dinner. When I arrived Kate was tired and stressed and the kids had not slept well and I think things were n't quite gioing to plan. However, the next day she was more like her gorgeous self and we went for a walk along the sea front (all of us including Kate's sister Emma, her husband Shane and 2 yr old son Harry). We stopped off first at Costa on the way back and then at the pub where after one drink Kate's Mum and Emma took the kids home we got to stay for a couple!!!

Back to Kate's Mum and Dad's and her Dad had prepared another feast!! An evening of great food and drink and I think everyone was tired and an early night was in order. Kate and I were on the blow-up matress in the living room again but boy, it is like no blow up matress I've ever experienced, so comfy :-)

Next day we left relatively early in two cars. I followed Kate most of the way home until she veered off to drop her kids at their other Grandma's house. I popped home and headed up to hers. We had two days of calm just to enjoy spending time together, just me, Kate oh and the wii!!! So lots of wii sports, wii olympics and Just Dance 3. Mix that with copious amounts of alcohol and we had a riot!!!

Then I had two days with my kids when we just stayed at home. They played on there new toys and played my guitar, read and surfed. Very chilled.

New Year's Eve and my kids were away but Kate's were back. So, more wii sports and just dance!! NYE was spent devouring numerous bottles of Frixeinet champers that I'd found on special offer the week before.

2011 was amazing. Sorted out the divorce, sold the enormous family home, Tom got into Leeds to read Physics following his excellent "A" level results and I found Kate (or she found me, I think!). I think 2012 could be even better ...... sun in the sky, you know how I feel :-)

Bye bye Strat

FENDER STRATOCASTER CLASSIC PLAYERS 60 .......

This lovely guitar was deemed surplus to needs so has now departed. It was a 40th b'day present from the family and myself but I'm not playing enough to justfy two electric guitars and I've not been listening to or playing that kind of music for quite a while.

I MIGHT use some of the money to buy an acoustic but we'll see.

Meanwhile, there is a very nice young lad from London who has just got himself a smashing guitar at a great price ;-)

Play Dead by Harlan Coben

Another one from Kate this, when I told her I'd started reading it she commented that it was his first and not one of his best!!

Inspite of that I enjoyed it a lot. Based on a pro basketball player who fakes his own death because his new mother-in-law mistakenly convinces him he is his wife's half-brother. The tale takes twist after trun, is written well and the characters are engaging. it is told form the position of his wife who systematically goes about tracking down the truth. I like Coben a lot and expect to read more of his in 2012.

I also received Miracle Cure by the same author and Johan Theorin's second novel, as well as buying myself Dark Matter which was on special at amazon just before xmas. This is all well and good but quite unexpectedly the gorgoeus Kate bought me a Kindle for Xmas, which was hilarious as in complete ignorance I bought her the very same.

I had talked myself out of buying one because I though I would not take to it but the evidence of the last week is that I will, very much so, and with trips to India and back to Japan coming up in January and February I think it will get quite heavy use!!