Friday 28th October 2011

Business Studies is go!  My new Uni course officially starts today, but I am already a little way ahead with the reading.  Not too far, just about a week.  Not like some loser on the Café forum (a forum designed for all students on this presentation of the course, not just my tutor group), who has finished the first book, prepared a draft of the first assignment and is looking to start book 2!  All I can say is this person obviously has no life!  I could have spend the whole of October reading the first book, but I think it is important to take a break from these things, as there is only such much studying one brain can take.  The build up to the T175 EMA was really hard going and I had to really apply myself to get it all finished.  I think I earned some time off, and since we don’t get the regular holidays like those is full time education, I took the gap as a holiday.

I’m settling back into reading again quite nicely.  In the shake up and move around of our house, I have moved my desk from the ‘study’ upstairs to behind the living room door, next to our new furniture.  I think it will be easier to study here, but the TV does provide a large distraction.  Hopefully I will be able to coincide study time with my wife watching something from our Sky+ planner that I don’t really want to see.  If not, I will stick my earphones in and disappear into iTunes. 

I downloaded the new iOS last week for my iPod Touch.  There seem to be some good new features there, but I do find it quite strange that they add many of the new features of the iPhone to the Touch.  I know they are basically the same, just that the Touch can’t make calls.  Now however, it pretty much can!  You can send text messages and use Facetime (video calling) with other iPhone or iTouch owners.  The only drawback being that you must be connected to Wi-Fi in order to do it.  I guess this is great for those who have access to a wireless network for most of their day.  I don’t, so I can only use these features at home, which is totally pointless for me.  I think I’ll stick to my trusty Android for now.  Don’t get me wrong though, I love my iPod!  When my previous one broke I was devastated.  I use it multiple times a day to listen to music and podcasts.   My favourite casts at the moment are:

Answer Me This!

Radio 4 Friday Night News Quiz

Richard Herring’s Warming Up

Richard Herring’s As It Occurs To Me

Phil and Phill’s Perfect Ten

They’re all comedy based, but also topical too. 

We’re having a Halloween party for my daughter and some of her little friends tomorrow.  We did say on the invites that the little ones are to dress up and fancy dress for adults is optional.  My wife and daughter are both dressing as witches, and I am going for the firm favourite, Dracula.  Nothing too scary though, as the oldest child there will be 4. 

I feel there may be some Xbox time squeezed into the evening tomorrow too; namely when Strictly Come Dancing and X Factor are on.  Both shows are quite watchable, but I think it is best that I do something else when they are on, as I have a tendency to comment on how stupid the contestants and the like.

My Wife and I went to a wedding last weekend, which was cool.  I went to school with the bride, Vikki, and my Wife now works with her.  Small world, you might say!  I had to miss the service at the registry office because our daughter fell asleep in the car on the way over, so I sat with her and took her over to say hello to everyone once she woke up. 

My Wife and I then went to the reception in the evening, leaving our daughter with her grandparents.  We got a lift which was great, because it meant we could both have a few drinks for a change.  One of my Wife’s colleagues got really drunk and lost her balance on her enormous high-heeled shoes.  She fell flat on her backside in true Hollywood slow motion.  I bet she felt a little bruised the following day.  Both in pride and buttocks!

They served fish and chips as the buffet in the evening, along with sausages and bacon.  I had a cone of chips with some fish goujons.  Such a great idea for a wedding, I loved it!

It was our third wedding anniversary on Tuesday.  To celebrate, we went to The Fish Factory in Littlehampton for a meal, which was amazing!  No lift this time, so I drove and no alcoholic beverages were consumed.  That’s ok though, as I don’t like to drink that often for various reasons. 

All this blog writing has made me a bit hungry, so I’m off to grab a Ryvita.  Yes you read that correctly, a Ryvita.  I am dieting, and it’s takeaway night tonight, so I’ve got to be careful today.  It’ll be worth it in the end, you’ll see!      

Friday 14th October 2011

I am afraid that today’s TOWIB is going to be brief.  I feel rubbish today, and can’t really focus on what I want to write. Not sure what is wrong to be honest, but I think it is a mixture of being tired and feeling generally unwell.  I’m at work at the moment, but not sure how long I will last today.  I ate my breakfast a bit earlier, but I am getting the sneaking suspicion that it might not stay in for too long. 

Not a huge amount has happened this week.  My new Uni books have arrived, and although the Business studies course looks really interesting, it’s also a little daunting.  I’m not really sure what to expect, so it is just a natural fear of the unknown.  From reading the study companion, it looks to be lots of report writing, and considering I can waffle on pretty well once I get going, that shouldn’t be a problem. 

I still don’t have the results from my EMA (End of Module Assignment) for the Networked Living course that finished last month.  Apparently the assignment is sent to my tutor for her to read over, and then sent to an independent marker.  God knows how long they have to mark it, but I handed it in on the 22^nd of September, so they’ve surely had long enough!  No they haven’t, and don’t call me Shirley!  Sorry, little in joke there for good measure.  According to the assessment calculator on the Uni website, I should achieve something in the realms of 80 – 85% as an overall score for the course.  That’s pretty good, and I’d be more than happy with that!  I got 86% for the first course too, so that’ll be nice and consistent. 

I think I’ll end it there because staring at the screen for too long is making me feel sick.  Go away illness, you are not welcome here!

Thursday 06th October 2011

I am changing my name this week.  No longer will I be the boring Rick Keates; as of today I am Flat Pack Man! 

We bought some new furniture from Ikea at the weekend, and I have spent pretty much every evening since, putting it together.  A task I do not detest, as the end result will be amazing!  The object is to reduce the amount of clutter in our lounge.  Having a 2 year old = having lots of toys on the floor.  This is fine, but at the moment they are all next to our TV, and my wife and I are growing tired of looking at them all of the time.  We have bought a total entertainment unit.  The TV will move from the corner of the room to the middle of the outside wall and will be surrounded by two bookshelves, two CD/DVD racks and will have two shelf units above it.  It is going to look amazing when it is done, which is my motivation for not having a relaxing evening for a few days. 

In other news; I was given a Herman the German friendship cake on Monday by my good friend Ingrid at work.  It’s a sour dough mix that you mature in a bowl exposed to the open air for 10 days.  Herman has to be fed every few days with flour, sugar and milk, and stirred regularly.  Then on day 10 you get to add a whole heap of cake like ingredients and bake him.  I’ve never done anything like this before, so am pretty excited about it.  The sour dough mix does smell a bit, but it’s strangely pleasant.

October is upon us now, and we are looking forward to hosting our daughter’s first Halloween party at the end of the month.  She and my wife already have their costumes, and I am going to order mine this week.  There is a huge selection on the web site that my wife found, but I think I am decided on what I will go for.  I’m going to buy the Ghostbuster costume!  It comes with an inflatable proton pack and the overalls, it’s pretty awesome!

I’ve also got two days off later this month to have some Father – Daughter time with my little girl.  The first day will just be a chill out day.  I’m going to take her on a little walking adventure in the village where I grew up.  Lyminster in Littlehampton has a legendary pond known as the Knucker Hole.  There are several versions of the legend, but the main crux of it is that the Knucker Hole was inhabited by a dragon many, many years ago.  We used to have the dragon as our school logo when I was in infant school, and I remember visiting it when I was a child and being very excited about the prospect of seeing a real dragon!  I may also take her swimming, if the pool timetable allows.  If not, we will go over and visit my Grandparents for a few hours. 

I got some rubbish news last night that the bungalow that I grew up in has been demolished.  The Haskins group bought the land that the old Roundstone Nurseries used to be on a few years ago, and people had been renting the bungalow after we moved out.  To be honest, they never kept it looking as nice as Nan and Grandad did.  They didn’t put any effort into the garden at all.  It makes me sad to think that people would treat the place that way because Grandad spent every spare hour that he had in that garden, making sure it was always pristine.  Even in the winter months!  I remember helping to lay the patio when I was no more than 8 or 9 years old; then helping Grandad and my Uncle Alan build the summer house a few years later.  The biggest achievement though was helping Grandad destroy the old and rebuild a new pond in the back garden.  We spent days designing it, pulling up the old pond and laying down the bricks for the new one.  We rebuilt the rockery behind it to hold a new waterfall and then stocked it with new fish.  My absolute favourite being the diamond Sturgeon that my little sister, who was probably only 4 or 5 at the time named Sharky.  

I have so many fond memories of living at the bungalow, and in some ways I have to thank Haskins for demolishing it because it has bought them all back to me.  In other ways though I feel slightly cheated that I didn’t get to take one last walk around the house and grounds.  I’m sure whatever Haskins has planned for the site will be new and exciting, but for me that site will always be The Bungalow, Lower Trees Farm, Roundstone By-Pass, and I am sad to see her go.