Odd Thomas Odd Blog

Holy cow, two posts within a week ... this could almost be habit forming!! Actually, its probably not a bad idea to start getting back into the habit of posting considering some of the ideas I've been having recently... With several friends all now looking at round-the-world trips, its gotten my little brain ticking over about something I considered a lot a number of years ago ... cycling the world! Okay, you can stop laughing now. Please. I know, I am 100% dreamer and 0% adventurer, but what's the harm in looking into it?? With the level of work I have to do at the moment, there really isn't a great deal of point my being here, especially as I am off to spend a day next week with another team so I can transfer my job knowledge to them. Was the promise of working on a mega-project for real or was it a line to tempt me? Who knows!!! Anyway, from what I have managed to find, there are actually a fair few people that have been doing this for a long time, such as these guys ...

Its hard to believe how long it has been since I last posted an entry here - okay, that might actually have been a good thing considering everything that has been happening!! This past year has been one of the busiest and most eventful in a while: a bit of an emotional rollercoaster I wish I'd put a seatbelt on for and certainly something I wish I had managed to blog about before now. As a very brief summary - which does not do justice to the experiences themselves - we have... Said our final farewells to family and friends as they move to the great beyond Had lots of illness and a variety of operations between family and friends Upgraded my Focus LX to a Mazda 3 Sport (lush!) Felt bullied by my boss Transferred employer under TUPE regulations Seen close friends split and come back together Celebrated several weddings/partnerships Put up with abuse from idiot kids * Appeared in two more plays with a third due at the end of this month ** Realised the parents are getting on a bit as ...

Have you ever wondered what a cross between Simon Pegg's Shaun of the Dead and Run Fatboy, Run would produce? No, me neither, but today I discovered what the result could look like as RoadRunner* kindly pointed out that the pics are in on the Great Run website, so now the world and his mum can see the full horror for themselves! Number seven says it all really... * Unfortunately, RoadRunner has stopped blogging, but you can still check out her pics with race number 35018 ;-)

Well, the curtain has been called and the set dismantled for another three-and-a-half months as our production of "A Murder is Announced" closes with a record audience number of around 130!! Henderson Hall is not a particularly large place and we generally have a maximum audience of 100, but due to so many advanced bookings for the Friday and Saturday nights, we had to put a couple of extra rows out.  Everyone has been astounded :-) I think it is safe to say that everyone felt Saturday night's performance was bugged by a few little gremlins, but everyone took it in their strides and the feedback from the audience was that it was a very enjoyable production, so smiles all round! As a way of saying thanks to the cast and crew, the producer managed to sneak some little gifts up to the dressing room for when the play closed and we all piled in full of the highs of a complete production ... I now have my very own Oscar!  LOL My first ... and final ... 'Oscar'!! Some o...

Whoever coined the phrase "Out of the frying pan and into the fire" wasn't far wrong! No sooner am I back from the Great North Run than I am straight into final rehearsals for the next production by the Centralian Players , "A Murder is Announced", a fifty-year celebration for one of the group's members. Fifty years! That's a long time to dedicate to a hobby - I usually get bored after just a couple! :-) After three days of technical rehearsals that ranged from absolute disaster* to pretty good run-through, we finally opened last night and that's when the nerves finally hit. Its fine when its just the group of you that learned the script together, but add an audience to the mix and my stomache suddenly starts somersaulting like a clumsy trapeze artist. In fact, its starting its little routine again as I sit here typing this! Andrex is making a mint out or me right now. * Tuesday's technical rehearsal was the worst to date. That said, I have...

Okay, not so much fatboy as love-handle boy, but the Great North Run 2008 was still a challenge! As per usual, I was a little late booking a place to stay but was incredibly lucky to find a characteristic little guest house called Bush Nook about a month beforehand, situated along the A69 between Carlisle and Newcastle. My little bed - very comfy! Slept like a log! The shower/toilet room - where I broke the flush :-$ Some of the room's character :-) Due to the bad weather on the way up on Saturday, I was rather late arriving and the owners were starting to wonder if I would arrive at all. I did ... seven hours after I set off. I know I'm not a speedy driver, but that's a long time even for me. The forecast was that there would be showers on the Sunday morning, so I had made sure that I had a suitable running jacket. I didn't need it. When I opened the curtains first thing Sunday morning I was greeted with a view that made me long to live in the hills: Imagine waki...

A year or so ago, I wrote a rather harsh review of the cappucinos made by a new smoothie bar that had opened in Tring, called Smooth ... and no, I'm not adding any links to that post as I am quite ashamed of how harsh I was! However, that didn't actually stop me from going there most lunchtimes to grab a smoothie and cookie for lunch: prior to M&S opening there, it was the only place to get anything reasonably healthy without hiking out of town to the little Tesco store. With the opening of M&S , all the good food options started appearing, so Smooth, Sandwich Plus and Tesco were all pushed to the back of my mind. Smooth re-opened after a short refurbishment period, but something seemed to be wrong. You couldn't guarantee from one day to the next that it would be open. Pretty much every other day, there would be a sign in the window stating that it was closed due to staff sickness, somewhate ironic considering the nature of the business! Then finally, during the...