So this is Christmas...

Okay...so Derby officially sucks. As a city that is. Derbyshire the county is gorgeous. The city however, just depresses me. Granted, the older bits are sort of nice, but for the most part nasty glassy shops/bars have been squeezed in and the place looses its character. Then there's the indoor markets, which whilst being fun and cheap (I wish edinburgh had one) to be honest, are full of teenage mums and unemployed people (not counting the people who work the stalls), and at this time of year shelves and shelves of Christmas tat. I mean, who buys a plastic santa with a bulb stuck up his bum that will sit in a corner and glow ominously? Actually, I know part of the answer to that question, because I've seen the windows of the houses of the people who hoard them. Now I just need to find out who actually lives in them.

And for my final rant on this topic, i present the German Christmas Market. The one in Derby touts itself as 'The Original German Market'. But how original does it have to be to be original? It can't mean 'original' as in 'the only one' because every city I've been in this month has had one (Edinburhg, Liverpool, Birmingham...). Does it mean the first market? Surely thats in German?? Maybe it means 'the first market to come and slum it in the centre of some dreary city for a month'. But if it was the first market to come here, then surely they would manage to find a city more presitigious and less slumy than Derby?

Anyway, I still love the countryside out here. Its beautiful and smells of country and afternoon walks when its cold and the sun is going down and the mud is still hard and frosty are great. I wish I had my car with me (or my parents weren't using theirs for work), so I could escape further into the hills and see all the places I was forced to go for walks under duress when I was a kid.

So what actually have I been up to since I've been back? Mostly nothing. And it's been great. I've walked the dog a couple of times, I've slept in until midday a couple of times, Ive read some books, I've acheived some new highscores on old Amiga computer games I haven't played for 10 years, and I've even been out drinking in the afternoon with an old friend.

And this mornign I ventured into town (which sparked the rant above). Bus prices have gone up, they've even re-painted them from a tasteful burgendy to a kind of vomit/tangerine mix. Nando's have even managed to put in a restaurant since I was last here, supporting my theory that they're challenging Starbucks for world domination (to my knowledge there's still only one in Derby).

But probably the most exciting (and not very at that) moment was being stopped in the street by a guy about my age asking "excuse me sir, do you have a sense of humour"? When I answered that I thought I was very funny, he then asked me if I liked dirty jokes. Which I found odd. To my mind, dirty jokes aren't really associated with a sense of humour, rather they indicate a lack of a sense of humour, because the only thing you can laugh about is smut and inuendo. But then, maybe I'm a snob. Anyway, apparently this guy was a student selling a christmas book of dirty jokes for £2 (roughly the price of a pint - I'm not suspicious) to support his student loan. I duly declined, and walked 10 yards further on, only to be stopped by another guy doing exactly the same thing.

I hope the sheer length of this ramble has gone someway to making up for my lack of posting recently. Congratulations if you've made it this far! And apologies for the lack of photos, but I really can't be bothered uploading any through a dial up connection.

will write something new and exciting sooon, I promise. I'm back home in Derby, so who knows what excitment I'll get up to..... (spot the sarcasm)

Calm down! Calm Down!

Well here are the usual apologies about not posting for ages, but I have been away in Liverpool for a week. May I take this opportunity to thank the guys there for looking after me so well. I had an awesome (insert fake American accent when expressing this word) time!

Anyway, with so many stories to relate, where do I start? Well I must mention that I now truly believe Liverpool has it's own evolutionary culture going on all of it's own. I may disagree with it's European Capital of Culture 2008, but it's certainly scoring highly in an attempt to go for British Capital of weirdness. In a mere 6 days, I saw more things I wouldn't expect than I might in 6 months somewhere else.

In no particular order, here's a list of unexpected stuff I can remember (and haven't already banished to the 'please don't ever remember me' part of my brain):
Santa Claus being driving down residential streets blasting out hymnal music
A man in a wheelchair wheeling himself down the middle of a road
A blatant transvestite at a black tie screening of Narnia
A midget and a giant gay couple (sort of - there was at least 2 foot difference between them)
The random meeting of friend from school I hadn't seen in 4 years. Twice. In 2 days.
Scallys (OK, not unexpected but still repulsive)
Beatle's songs greeting me as I arrived on the train (should have been expected, but I hadn't imagined it could be that tacky).
John Prescott at the Maritime museum (For those of you who are American, he's the Deputy Prime Minister - the equivalent of Dick Cheney)

N.B. in case my musings leave you with the impression that I think negatively of Liverpool, let me reassure you that I actually quite like the place (some of it anyway), and had a great time there!!

Highlights of the week included sock wrestling, at which I believe I was overall champion, seeing as the second bout should be declared void due to certain participants cheating. Also up there was persuading the majority of the Americans to eat haggis (this one was 33% pork lung, 21% pork liver and 1% pork heart - mmmmmmmmm) and seeing them actually enjoy it. Oh, and if you ever get the chance to play SingStar, do it. You wont regret it.

The rest of what happened to me is probably not especially interesting to most of you, so if you want a more detailed report of Al's Campus Project to Liverpool. And briefly, Manchester, let me know.

Worthy of not however, is the fun I had on Saturday and Sunday, traveling down to Coventry and then Bristol to catch up with Ed, Chris and Lucie, some of my best friends from uni. We hadn't seen each other together for a really long time, so it was really cool to catch up. We ate in one of my (now) favourite restaurants ever, and on the flight home, you could see the fire continue to rage at the oil depot, 150 miles away, which was pretty surreal.

Here are some photos of the fun I had.


Turns out even Liverpool can be pretty sometimes!

There are things everyone has to do when going to Liverpool....

Boy, that maritime museum had everything - pretending to be naval officers and nurses, old school phones, and even a slave exhibition that smelled of poo

The scary thing is that Kevin almost suits it

It's St Andrew's day, so let's eat some haggis!

For those of you who don't know what haggis is, here is the Wikipedia definition (with only a few words removed to make it flow better):

Wild Haggis are creatures native to the Scottish Highlands. It is generally held that the haggis is a three-legged bird with vestigal wings like an ostrich or an emu. Each leg is believed to be different length, a short leg and two long legs, allowing it to run rapidly round the mountains and hillsides which make up its natural habitat. It is also believed that male haggis run only clockwise and female haggis run only in an anticlockwise direction. However, this only occurs when it is disturbed from its normal routine of sleeping on the heather which covers the hills and mountains of Scotland. During Haggis Season, Wild Haggis are hunted, and their meat served up as a local delicacy, the well-known Scottish food, haggis. Scotch eggs are this creatures eggs.

Wild haggis can sense also vibrations in the ground produced by other animals, including humans, and this, along with its nocturnal habits, explain why living specimens of the haggis are so rarely seen. However a haggis can easily be caught by running around the hill in the opposite direction. A group of Haggis is sometimes known as a heap.

There are two species of haggis, one with longer left legs and the other with longer right legs. The two species coexist peacefully but are unable to interbreed because in order for the male of one species to mate with a female of the other, he must turn to face in the same direction as his intended mate, causing him to lose his balance before he can mount her. As a result of this difficulty, differences in leg length among the haggis population are accentuated.

So Wednesday was the day of our patron saint (when will we get a national holiday for it??), St Andrew. Tradition therfore required that we eat some haggis. The brighter one's amongst you will have noticed that infact, wild haggis are a myth, and that the words I removed from the wikipedia description were mostly 'folklore'. Amusingly, however, a survey in 2003 revealed that one-third of American's believed haggises were real animals. What I find particularly hilarious is that 23% arrived in Scotland believing they could catch one. Oh, how my sides hurt.

So as the more discerning reader will note, haggis is actually, little more than some sheep offal cooked up with some oats and stuff traditionally in a sheep's stomach. Whilst my dinner yesterday had a synthetic bag, the primary ingredient was indeed sheep's lungs. And yes, it was very very tasty.

And finally, a little present especially for my good frined Jonny Arundell. Watching this video made me think of you thinking of me. Hellmans delight .
I apologise to any of the rest of you who watch it and actuallly gag. i did. It's at your own risk folks!!