A Tea For A Tea

Today was all about the strikes.

All those public servants were out protesting about the proposed penguin cuts and salami reductions. Honestly, do they really have nothing better to get upset about?



They should look at my problems. They're far more pressing. For example, I'm definitely not getting my fair share of tea at the moment! Yesterday, I made eleven cups of tea for various people. How many did I get in return?

Five.

And I made three of them! Shocking, isn't it?

Today was marginally better. Although I only got five again, of which I made three, I actually only made a total of nine cups. Even so, I think I should be receiving around the same number that I make.

Lazy Bastards

It used to be that when I got up in the morning I feared for my very life!

You see, wherever I stepped, there would be a cat under my foot. A hungry cat.

As I performed my necessaries in the bathroom, there would be a cat winding around my legs or jumping in the sink, making absolutely sure I knew that they were good and ready for their breakfast.

Walking down the stairs was to quite literally risk life and limb as the two cats joined forces to hasten my descent.

And then, as I prepare their delicious breakfast, they would circle like vultures, making their demands known at unpleasantly high frequencies.



But, just recently they seem to have lost their enthusiasm for turning my morning ablutions and stair traversal into a death defying fight for survival.

In fact more often than not, I can wee, wash, dress, tea, breakfast and provide Dr K with her morning cuppa before the furry little bastards even stir. If I'm lucky, Rochester will yawn at me.




I should be grateful really, I suppose. But there's something about avoiding 14 murder attempts before breakfast that gets me going in the morning. I miss it!

Oh My God, It's An Even Bigger One! And Other Stories

I started my day by finding an even bigger chair near the hotel restaurant. Obviously I had to make my boss take another photo!


With a start like this, I knew it was going to be a good day!

Our contact in the Chester office had informed us that the hotel we were staying at was 'just at the bottom of our car park'. Which was true, but what he didn't tell us was that there was an impenetrable fence between the hotel and the office car park that required us to wander the streets and canals of Chester for half an hour before we pretty much accidentally found an unlocked gate allowing us ingress.

Now, when my mum discovered that I was going to Chester for the day, she was a great pains to instruct me - at great painful length - to make sure I visit the Cathedral, the Tudor buildings and the City Wall. Despite my protestations that I would be tied up in a meeting and then getting home as quickly as possible and therefore would not have time to visit the Cathedral, the Tudor buildings and the City Wall, she insisted that visiting the Cathedral, the Tudor buildings and the City Wall were essential to my wellbeing and that should I not visit the Cathedral, the Tudor buildings and the City Wall, some unspecific unfortunateness might befall me. Maybe.

So these are for you, mum:


One cathedral.
One town hall (anyone wanting to do a bit of Boss Spotting is welcome to do so).


Some Tudor buildings.


Some more Tudor buildings.



Me looking unusually cool on the City Wall. (I think my boss has one leg shorter than the other, hence the 'arty' angle of this one! Actually, I kinda like it - it makes me look... jaunty...)

We had the top down most of the way home. I got even more sunburnt. I've never got sunburnt on a joll... er, business trip before.

One final thing, when I got home, I discovered that Dexter The Killing Machine had been cruelly efficient in my absence and left a small pile of corpses on the drive.

Oh My God, The Roof's Come Off! And Other Stories

I went to Leeds with my boss today. She drove which was nice, in a life-threatening sort of way.

You see, she hadn't fastened down the roof of her convertible*. And then we went on the motorway. And then hilarity ensued.

So further on in the journey, we had to stop for petrol. She put £20 worth in, refusing to fill it all the way because of the (expenses-claimable) cost of petrol at the Services. And then later, on the motorway, when her petrol gauge was hovering around zero, she refused to put more petrol in at the Services we were passing because it was too expensive.

We didn't actually run out of petrol, so she won on a technicality, but it was a very stressful twenty minutes driving around Leeds, which is, apparently, bereft of petrol stations!

And then we had our meeting with some Northerners. And then we headed back to the car, discovering half-way that she'd lost her car keys!

I'm being mean, really. I like my boss. I wouldn't trade her in for any of the other bosses. But she does live life like a Chinese proverb!

Now I'm in a hotel in Chester as we have a meeting with another Northerner in the morning.

As we (intentionally, this time) had the roof down for the final part of the journey to Leeds, I've caught the sun a bit. I didn't realise how much 'til I looked in the mirror just now. The top of my head is a bit red.

Here's the view out of my window.



There's a fountain. This place must be well posh.

Also, it's full of random tat. Like this giant chair that I forced my boss to photograph me in!



And this creepy wall feature is hanging over the bed:



To conclude, I give you the obligatory shower cap shot:





( * Don't get excited - it was a Ford Ka )

Sunday

12:04 - Eventually, the satnav took us on a circuitous route back to the centre of Southampton where I was able to direct Dr K onto the A35. We may make it back to the B&B before 1 rather than the originally expected 12.

08:43 - The B&B's policy of serving breakfast between 8:30 and 9:30 on a Sunday is cruel and unusual.

08:47 - Dr K has just discovered that she can put her shoes on before her jeans and then still get her jeans on. She's so clever. I can't do that!

09:45 - turns out the the B&B landlady makes weekly visits to Bedminster in Bristol to babysit her grandson. Small world.

Weekly, though...

10:30 - Arrived at Wilverley Inclosure. Inclosure. Not Enclosure. It keeps the ponies out, not in. Vermin. I should set Dex on 'em.

11:26 - drinking tea in a cafe in New Milton. Emms says she'll be joining us in five. Which makes me wonder what she's leaving out. I'm here in seven. Kaz is in eight.

Also, there is a ninja child outside. New Milton has become much more cosmopolitan since I left 11 and a half years ago.

13:45 - Roast beefs. Beefs are my favourite vegetable. And no, my steak excesses last night haven't put me off cow at all!

17:25 - The journey home went quickly, primarily because I slept most of the way! The cats don't seem excessively pleased at are return, focussing mainly on escaping opportunities.

17:45 - cafe tea and B&B tea and brother tea and mate tea are all very nice, but nothing quite beats Home Tea.

20:18 - Made Dr K beans on toast. Cut her toast into heart shapes. All she was interested in was what I'd done with the bits I'd cut out.

I'd eaten them.

Saturday

8.55 - Apparently we're married now. Dr K had a dream in which we got married in her mum's lounge. It's not really a dream location for a wedding (well, technically it was exactly that). Later, she went to the loo and found edible toilet paper made from recycled mobile phone batteries.

Unusually, I remember elements of my dream last night, too. I was staying in a hotel and, every time I went into the bathroom, I saw a child in the mirror, who wasn't there. It wasn't creepy, just odd. He was brushing his teeth.

Later, I worked out that it was actually an iPhone bug which meant that I could see videos recorded by other people in my hotel bathroom mirror. For some reason, I knew that this video belonged to my friend, Hannah although I'm unclear on just how I knew it.

It all made sense in the dream.

Back to real events: we're all breakfasted. Nothing of note took place, although the 'toast' was actually warm bread. now we have a couple of hours to kill before meeting my buddy, Stut.

9:36 - Look at my groyne:




10:20 - Beach done. Lots of joggers. Lots of jigglers...

Off to Poole now. I wonder if I can persuade Stut to go to the beach again!

10:58 - Westbourne is technically Poole, right? Anyway, everyone here needs facecloths, apparently.

12:25 - I was going to have soup. I really was. But they didn't serve soup 'til 12 so I was forced to have Dime Bar Cake.

Next stop... Hengistbury Head.

14:03 - Bakewell tart coffee?




16:22 - several teas have been drunk and stories exchanged. Now we're on the road again. Southampton and big brother's birthday celebration. Maybe more tea, as well.

19:23 - we're sitting outside a pub near the theatre in Southampton where they have a Michael Jackson show on. Dr K thinks it's a bit wrong that there are loads of kids walking past dressed as Michael Jackson.

19:42 - ew. I just saw a man's bottom.

20:30 - 16 oz. Before.




21:20 - 16 oz. After.




22:55 - Big brother refuses to believe that there is a road feature called a 'gyratory'.

23:15 - Egads! The motorway is closed and the sat nav is lost. Fingers crossed.

Friday

16:30 - I'm home. Hurriedly packing a bag with clean pants and stuff. Yay! I think I'll take my Batman pants and my Union Flag pants. You never know, I might get lucky and I wanna look my best.

I wonder what my chances of getting Dr K to drive down are...

16:55 - She took no persuading at all! Now I'm in the shed trying to figure out where she's hidden the automatic cat feeding device!

17:30 - Packing Dr K's boot is a bit like playing tetris. In other news, there's a cement mixing lorry doing it's dirty business on one of the neighbour's drives. Can't work out why.

Still, we're leaving now. We're on the road, baby!

17:55 - Just saw a cow having a poo in the field next to the motorway. Dirty bugger.

18:15






What's a Caution Horse?

18:33 - Melksham. I used to live here. I used to have dinners here. Which reminds me: I'm hungry.

19:00 - Yum. Just found a bag of crisps!

19:14 - More cows. Another one pooing. What is it with pooing cows today?

19:30 - No cows in Salisbury.

19:45 - But the cows in Fordingbridge definitely poo!

19:56 - Nearly there. I guess I'd better figure out where this B&B is.

20:05 - arrived at the B&B, but it's all closed up with a sign saying they'll be back soon. Oh well. I did tell them we'd be there at 9ish, so we can go and find some dinner and come back later.

20:10 - Italian... Closed.

20:15 - No room in the Thai.

20:20 - a sign at the pub:






20:25 - Curry it is! Woohoo!

21:45 - And a very tasty curry it was too.

We are now safely ensconced inside the 'Regan' suite of the White House B&B. I feel quite sorry for the people in the 'Nixon' suite across the hall.

22:15 - I just had half a shower. I got as far as washing my hair when the electric shower started to make a very scary whirring noise. The sort that makes you get out f the shower pretty sharpish in case it explodes.

On the basis that my pits don't smell too bad, I think I'll just settle for mentioning it in the morning.

Sleepy now. Night.

Here's The Plan

This weekend, I'm heading down to the deepest south to visit friends and family. I'm expecting it to be a busy blur of social activity!

So rather than doing a traditional blog post, I thought I'd have a go at what I'm going to call 'microblogging'. Basically I will post a short sentence or two telling what I'm up to in near-real time. A bit like tweeting, only much, much better.

I will start this evening when I get home from work and you will be treated to every mundane detail of my weekend. You can look in at any point and, hopefully will see something new every time!

There may be pictures.

Even More Things that People Say

"I'm so sleepy and you look so comfy." A friend referring to the cushion-like properties of my midsection.

"You should eat the evidence, Kaz. Whatever you've done, you should always eat the evidence." I give Dr K excellent advice all the time!

"I had such a bad day at work that I wanted to eat as many animals as I can."  Bezz once ate eight animals in one night.  Or was it nine...?

"Damn you and your silky lining!" A friend complaining that the shiny lining of my coat made it difficult to carry.  But it sounds ruder than that.

"I have tried to clean up my act, but a bird's got to fly, a fish has got to swim and I have to be filthy, inappropriate and childish." Jo, defending her behaviour.

"I don't think anyone will want me to access their dog, Kaz." I state facts, sometimes.  This is one of them.

"Tea was your downfall." A winning Scrabble opponent commenting on my habit for placing the word 'Tea' whenever it was possible.  This little OCD may have been my downfall.

"Holy Christmas Cakes!" An exclamation of surprise from Bezz.

"Karma. Not Korma. Never Korma." My response to a friend who suggested that a bad canteen curry experience might be karmic.

The Relative Horribleness Of Foreign Sweets #3: Poland

So then.  Today I have the pleasure of reviewing the foreign sweets supplied by the Fish Lady, who as I may have mentioned before, is foreign.

Polish, if you want to be specific about it.

Anyway, these sweets were hand-picked by the Fish Lady herself and, presumably, represent the finest confections available in the great country of Poland.

We'll start with the presentation:





As you can see, today's foreign sweets came in a personalised paper bag of the white variety. It was smart enough but, in my opinion, lacked the colourful pizazz of some of the previous entries.  This was made up for with the personal message.  I don't know what the word between 'bag' and 'Poland' is.  I think it might be a picture of a fence or a very small cannon.

Inside the bag were 8 delicious looking sweets:





You'll note that some of the sweets are in shiny wrappers.  I like shiny things, so this is definitely a bonus.

Obviously, I started with a shiny one:





This one looked a little bit like a Ankylosaurus, before I bit into it.  Sweets that look like dinosaurs are definitely brilliant in my book.  I don't know what Ankylosaurases taste like, but the insides of this sweet tasked quite a lot like hazelnut and I have a feeling that Ankylosauruses do not taste like hazelnut inside.  I like this sweet. Here is an ankylosaurus:

Next up is Michalki Zamkowe.




That's what's written on the wrapper anyway.  According to Google, Michalki is a place and Zamkowe translates to Castle, which is all very well but doesn't make much sense as, when unwrapped, the sweet doesn't look like a castle at all.  It did taste nutty again though, so I forgive it.





And then there was the selection of chocolate covered fruity jellies.  You read that right:  chocolate covered fruity jellies.  Those Polish are crazy.

Dear god, they were disgusting. And strangely difficult to photograph, which leads me to suspect that they might be slightly vampiric. On their mother's side.

Sadly, the 'jelly nightmares' brought the whole score down from the nutty heights of 4.5 to a round 3.  Sorry, Fish Lady, your country's sweets only rate a 3/5.  That's the same as Switzerland.

I think we have enough results to start displaying on my patented map of the relative horribleness of foreign sweets:





You'll see, if you zoom in, that the UK and Turkey are a lovely green colour, while we have a disappointingly middling orangey hue for the Swiss and the Poles.

Hopefully, we will be able to populate this map well enough that the budding sweet tourist will be able to plot a route around the globe eating only the tastiest sweets that the world can offer.

Now, I have a feeling that the Fish Lady was lacking in confidence somewhat, in her sweet selection as she also provided me with some white mice and some chocolate boobs.





I'm not sure if they were a bribe or a consolation prize!  Either way, thank you Fish Lady.  Yours was a worthy and most welcome entry!

I'm going to end this post with a bit of a plea.  You see, several of my friends and co-workers have been abroad to exciting places like Jordan, Egypt, Sicily and the Nederlands and returned with exactly no examples of horrible (or otherwise) foreign sweets.  So this whole thing is taking much longer then I'd hoped (by which I mean, I'm not getting as many sweets as I'd like).

So, if you are a Foreigner and your country has sweets, or if you're planning a visit to foreign climes, please send me some - or bring them to me.  Together we can change the world.  Or at least colour it in!

Special Chops, Lamb Madras, Pilau Rice And A Peshwari Naan, Please.

Curry nights with Bezz and the Fish Lady are always great, but last night's was especially awesome!

Not only did I get to eat curry, talk rubbish and discuss the relive merits of fun words like 'perineum' (a word we don't get to use enough in general conversation), I also got presents. And it wasn't even my birthday!

As indicated by the title of this post, I more often than not order the same meal every time I go to this particular curry house. This time however, I had planned to play against type and order something different. Maybe even something I'd never had before.

Events conspired against me, however. And by 'events', I actually mean 'Bezz' and 'The Fish Lady'! I also mean 'presents'.

I like presents nearly as much as I like curry, so you can imagine how delighted I was to receive presents on my curry night. I was almost overwhelmed!

One of the presents was a selection of foreign sweets courtesy of the Fish Lady. More on that will be forthcoming in tomorrow's post.

The main present, though, was an awesome t-shirt. Here's a picture of me wearing it:



And here's a close up on that manly chest detail:



As you can see, it's a visual aid for my favourite curry order... In T-shirt form! Amazing!

Of course, having receive this fantastic gift, it would have been downright rude of me to order something different. So when the waiter asked me for my order, I simply showed him the t-shirt.

When he, and the six other waiters that he called over, had finished laughing at me, they went and got my dinner. Which was delicious.

Now, if you look again at the lovely photo of me in my awesome t-shirt, you'll note that I am holding a shiny pen.

Why, I hear you ask, is Dazza holding a shiny pen in the lovely photo of his awesome t-shirt?

It's because the staff at the Indian restaurant wanted to give me a present, too. I think they were convinced that it was my birthday, a reasonable assumption, given the general flow of gifts in my direction, and not one that I was inclined to contradict.

It was all wrapped up in pretty paper and everything!

Here it is:



I don't think it's real gold! But it's a damn fine looking pen!

So thank you to Bezz and the Fish Lady for all of my presents. And thank you to the staff at the Taj Brasserie in Winterbourne for the tasty dinner and the shiny pen. And thank you to Dr K for her boobs. And thank you to everyone for a super duper evening!

The Huge, Mega Tea Related Post I Promised Yesterday

Remember the day that Dazza tried to drink 12 pints of tea from a mixing bowl?

In the future, you may find yourself asking that question. This is the day you will be talking about!

Here's how it came about:






"A huge jug of tea. Extreme tea drinking. Not for the faint hearted!"

That was the photo message that my brother sent me yesterday. Obviously I took this as a personal challenge and immediately set about locating the largest tea-worthy receptacle I could find.

Although I was tempted to simply fill the bath, I settled on a mixing bowl that took a very respectable 12 pints of tea. I had to boil the kettle three times to fill it!




Look at the unadulterated* glee on my little face!

Delicious though it was, it soon became clear that drinking from a mixing bowl in the conventional manner was a little on the difficult size due to the size and... er... flexibility of the receptacle.




So, I had to find an alternative delivery method. My first attempt was a ladle:




This proved quite effective, but didn't really provide a proper, thirst quenching tea experience. It felt like I was eating soup, and tea flavoured soup is just weird.

Fortunately I had Dr K's keen scientific mind to hand and in no time she had provided a curly, purple solution to my problem:




Perfect. Although I recommend waiting for your tea to cool down a bit before you try sucking it through a straw, otherwise you may be as surprised as I would at the unexpectedly hot liquid spurting into my mouth**. Straws, it would seem, make hot things hotter.

Anyway, armed with my curly, purple tool, I made excellent headway into my enormous cuppa***.

Sadly, I was unable to finish the whole twelve pints. In fact I only got this far before I had to give in:




I broke out in the tea sweats. It was quite nasty.

We estimated that I'd drunk maybe five pints. It was certainly less than half. And I think that's quite respectable for one sitting.

Following this little adventure, I probably went for a wee about 15 times. In fact, just thinking about it is making my bladder twitch, so I'd better sign off now...




( * Emphasis on the 'unadult'. )

( ** Yes, yes. I know. )

( *** Cuppa? It ain't in a cup. Must be a... bowla?)

I-Bloody-Kea

Following an overly vigorous video editing session, I found myself forced to visit I-Bloody-Kea last night to replace the computer desk that I managed to break!











Tomorrow, you are in for a very special, tea-related treat'

Not Just Clean...

I Think They Must Like Me...

My workmates, I mean.

Today was a Freaky Friday, which means that they didn't have to put up with my stupid face, inane wittering or slightly creepy innuendoes.

I thought they'd be glad to be rid of me for a bit.

And then one of them turned up on my doorstep with a tin of delicious homemade cakes. Look, here they are:



I hadn't even got dressed. I was lounging around in my Batman PJs and dressing gown.

Now, you know me. My body is a temple, so I wouldn't normally eat cakes, but it was such a nice gesture that I guess I'll have to make an exception. Only to be polite, you understand.

I think I'll start with the rock cake... Om nom nom...

Thanks, guys!

Another One?

Same person. Same game.



That's two gynaecologically correct rude words in one game.

Awesome.

I Hate Adverts

Adverts aren't usually a problem for me as I rarely watch anything at the time of broadcast, preferring instead to record or and watch it later. Adverts are something that whizz by at 30x speed.

But every so often, Rupert conspires to show me adverts against my will.



The other night he hatched a plot with Dr K. It was thinly disguised as a desire to watch the Kerrang channel. Live. With adverts.

It took about two seconds for my eyes and ears to start bleeding as some hip youngsters started prancing around the screen singing a cheery song about how I should recycle my mobile phone.

This was followed up by a seemingly identical bunch of irritating tweens trying to convince me, via the medium of song, that if I were to drink their delicious orange brew, I might be able to jump around with people just like them.

Because that sounds like something I'd want to do.

And then someone decided that in order to persuade me to buy some sort of loan product, it was necessary to patronise me with the most condescending voice over I've ever heard.

Fuck you, Rupert. Your plan didn't work. I'm still here!

A Moral Dilemma

I have a problem. I'm in a pickle, if you will.

I'm playing scrabble online with a female co-worker. That's not the dilemma.

She's winning at the moment, but I can claw back a substantial amount of the points difference by playing a particular word.

Problem is, I'm reluctant to play the word because it's a bit rude and I'm not that good friends with her.

Let me illustrate my problem for you:






If I place the contentious word at the bottom there, I can get a good 30-odd points. But would it be ungentlemanly for me to play such a word in a game with a lady (who presumably has the ladypart in question).

Ah, what the hell! I don't really know why I'm worrying about it. I don't normally let propriety get in the way of rude words. Rude words are funny! At least it wasn't 'pissflaps' or 'poonani' or 'wookie hole' or 'pink velvet sausage wallet' or 'beef curtains' or 'tampon tunnel' or 'dugout' or 'fish mitten' or 'cum crater' or 'cooze' or 'magician's sleeve'...

See how I turned a post about scrabble into an excise to write lots of filthy words? Heh heh heh!

What's your favourite rude word?

Tea One Thousand

This is me and my one thousandth cuppa of 2011, which I enjoyed at around 10pm this evening.

I had it in a special commemorative Tea One Thousand mug and put on one of my favourite movies to celebrate.

My mum would be so proud if she wasn't so busy tutting and shaking her head!