Sunday

As previously mentioned, I've recently ordered some fabric samples online.  

A LOT of samples online.

I'm thinking of sewing them together into a little blanket or some such thing.  One thing I didn't realise is the extra freebies you get with them - alongside all the fabric samples I've also got a little pencil, two tea bags, a hot chocolate sachet, and one of those Lotus caramelised biscuits you sometimes get with coffees in bars (which I love - you can even get a Lotus biscuit spread in some of the supermarkets which is way over the top, but amazing in small doses).  If you ever want some mail to open which isn't the usual bills, order some free fabric samples.

I've got a pretty good Sunday ahead of me today, I'm taking my dad out for a few beers around Beverley (market town to the north of Hull), there's a few decent pubs (and a micropub) there so that should be a fun afternoon.  This morning will be taken up probably with a few chores, I have a huge pile of washed clothes to put away - which is actually sort of relaxing, I'll put something good to listen to on my phone and just steadily work my way through it all.

Hope everyone has a good Sunday!

Mister Seahorse

The above photo is of one of my son's toys, named "Mister Seahorse" mid-maintenance.  It's a blue battery powered seahorse that, when pressed, glows and plays various lullabies.  He's had it for some years, but still enjoys having it in his bed when he gets off to sleep.

The trouble with having a battery powered song-singing toy is that about three times a year the battery levels drop to a low enough level that the song becomes slow, out of tune, and basically gives the indication that the seahorse is drunk, or possibly dying from listeria or some such infection. Leprosy, or Typhoid, perhaps - my knowledge of what infections make artificial seahorses lose their ability to play music is not complete.

And of course, the only time that we discover such an event is at bedtime, when my son is tired, ready to sleep, and quite keen for me to clear off and the seahorse to do its job.

So when it happens, as you can imagine the seahorse has to be very swiftly taken away for battery replacement to minimise the emotional distress that a tipsy seahorse can cause.  While I'm frantically fixing the seahorse, I'm always very slightly creeped out by what, to me, feels like carrying out major surgery on a seahorse (albeit a glowing and singing one), by pulling its guts, spine, and skeleton out and frantically testing batteries from our battery drawer to find three (three?!? Who designs a toy that needs THREE batteries?!?) that have sufficient juice in to keep Mister Seahorse singing away for a few more months.  Once done I then have to shove all the innards back into the seahorse skin and magically it works. I'm not completely sure how this counts academically but I feel that I ought to be awarded an honorary degree in something, Medicine, or Electrical Engineering perhaps.  Offers from universities are welcomed.

At any rate, I'm pleased to report that normal service is indeed restored, Mister Seahorse is fully back in action, and my son sleeps peacefully once again.  Therefore, it's time for a beer :)

In other news, my son has invented a new mathematical concept, called "splatting".  Watch the video of splatting calculations now! (and stay tuned to youtube.com/ravenswingthog for the UNCUT version to be released soon!)

Caravans and Crowdfunding Beer!

As all too often is the case I haven't blogged for ages, but at least this time I have an excuse, which is that I've been somewhere that I haven't had a wifi signal!  We've just come back from a short break to Mablethorpe, staying in a caravan, which was lovely!

We enjoyed lots of nice tasting food, including Papa John's pizza - we discovered that it was far cheaper to buy two pizzas with four drinks and fries than it was to just buy two pizzas, so we had that one night (and subsequently struggled to manage four fizzy drinks throughout the course of the evening, and had loads of leftovers for the following morning too)

My only concern is that John here seems to be a bit keen on people loving his pizza.  It was tasty though.

There was tons to do at the caravan park (Haven Golden Sands, if you're interested), with rides, arcades, a swimming pool and all that sort of thing going on.  I still have 21 tokens which I won in the arcades, which I think was almost enough to win a small pack of Haribo.

My son absolutely loved this slide, it was huge!

We also went for a bit of a drive on the Sunday, ending up in the Half Moon in Alford for a carvery which was very nice.  I discovered that not only did my mum used to work at the same caravan park we stayed in, but she also used to go to the Half Moon for her works Christmas dinners, and I'm pleased to say that it was very nice.

And on the way back, awesomely, we discovered a Taco Bell!!  I've always wanted to try Taco Bell but thought it was a USA-only phenomenon, so when I saw it I insisted on us stopping for lunch. Verdict?  Good. Not the best fajita I've ever tasted, but not bad, and the crunchy taco was definitely good.

In other news, I've launched a crowdfunding campaign to shamelessly raise beer funds for next month when me and my dad go to Robin Hood's Bay for three nights.  Basically, you get to sponsor things like beer, the trip, and beds, and in return we'll be wearing sponsor t-shirts with your names printed on them.  We'll also cover the sponsors on this blog and on my YouTube channel, so if you want a piece of this, stop by the page. It's going to be amazing :)

Of course, it's only a bit of fun, but it gives me chance to practice my crowdfunding techniques.  And, unusually for most crowdfunding things, you actually get something even if you only support us for £1! Which can't be bad.

So if you want my dad to be really happy (like he is here with 3 beers), stop by the crowdfunding page! :)

Google is trying to help

Working on a story, I wanted to find a good location accessible across the world, and so turned to Google.

Got halfway through typing "easiest place in the world to get to" when Google leapt into life suggesting what I wanted.

Thanks Google - but not this time...

In other news, here's a video of me attempting to drink three beers infused with chilli, while playing FIFA 16, with some Baileys as a backup if it just got too bad. Don't worry, it's heavily edited!

The Pub

All the essentials for a good time in the pub - a pint of "Seven Deadly Sins", a Bill Bryson book, and a plugin keyboard.

So, the other evening I repaired to the local public house for an evening of jazz which initially appeared to consist of three people watching a man fiddle with a double bass, but eventually the other three got their act together and the group launched into some rather pleasant music. Geeky note: When the band launched into a decent rendition of "The Way You Look Tonight", I immediately thought of the finale of Deep Space 9, when Vic Fontaine sings it to the crew the night before they separate.


Periodically a man (the singer was female, or at the very least a very convincing facsimile) said something in what was possibly french over the microphone, and every time he did this he was met with applause, I'm not sure if. it was the content of.his speech or if it was just so impressive having someone speaking a different language in Hull, but nevertheless he was consistently met with a great deal of enthusiasm.

An interesting point of jazz is that, unlike other forms of music, within a jazz song a goodly amount of time can be spent with only some of the instruments in action, and it was fun to watch the rest of the band try to entertain themselves during these parts. The singer was quite good at this, whenever it. came time for a double bass solo she would gamely bounce along, the keyboarder, however, he looked bored to tears whenever he had to take a time out.

The evening was only marred by my phone running out of power, despite it assuring me that 8% of battery was plenty for a whole extra day of usage, in practice it took less than half an hour for the phone to tell me "You have 30 seconds before I shut down", resulting in a frantic bit of typing and pounding the Save option.

Lies.

Before I left a total stranger came over for a fistbump - which had to be provided!

In other news, I've had an idea - you may, now and again, get a piece of junk mail offering you a new credit card, or loan, or some such thing.  Well, I've written a letter.

A letter with a liqueur coffee decision tree, no less.

And this letter can go in the freepost envelope provided by the company. The letter thanks them for the offer, and in return tells them what wonders they can find on my blog (yes really). I look forward to entertaining thousands of financial support workers, who must be desperate for any kind of entertainment that they find even this enjoyable.

A post where I talk like a pirate that finds London really expensive

Ahoy!!

Well, ayeterday I went t' London for work. This isn't a regular occurrence (I don't normally live or work in London, and it's about 4 hours away on t' train) so it made a nice change, albeit bein' a long day. I was thar for a couple o' meetin's/events, which included an evenin' seminar which was held in a room o' a bar (this sounds like "I went drinkin'" which isn't t' case, thar was some really good presentations, but it was in a bar, hence t' rest o' t' story)

So, I got thar a little early. I be always paranoid about bein' late anywhere, and it be not unusual for me t' be anythin' up t' 30 minutes early, just in case I get delayed, for example by traffic, or simply by gettin' lost - which happens far too often t' be believable.

I got t' t' place about twenty minutes before t' seminar was due t' start, and didn't immediately see anyone that I knew. Decidin' that I had obviously arrived before t' organisers, I decided t' order a pint t' occupy me until they showed up.

"A pint o' Peroni, please" I told t' chap behind t' bar, who went t' t' far end o' t' bar t' use t' pump thar. Now Peroni glasses be relatively thin and long compared t' a traditional pint glass, and when he started fillin' two glasses I couldn't quite tell whether he was pourin' two pints, or two half-pints - maybe he was out o' pint glasses, I mused.

It turned out that he had misheard me and poured me two full pints, I'm not entirely aye how t' word "A" could be understood as "Two" but then again I do have a Yorkshire accent which could have made me hard t' understand. I decided that I would probably get through two pints in t' course o' t' evenin', and rather than cause a fuss I would just pay for t' two, which came t' a total o' £7 (about $11).

I gave t' barman a £20 note (for US readers that's around $32), and bein' an upmarket type o' place he put me change on a little dish, and sat it down in fore o' me. "Thanks" I said, pickin' t' change up. T' barman looked surprised. "Oh," he said, "Did you want your change?" A small part o' me wishes that I had released t' rant swellin' within me, which went somethin' like this:

Aye, thank you, I would like me change, I don't expect t' spend £20 on two pints o' grog, and I particularly don't expect t' give someone who was slow t' serve me (when I was t' only person at t' bar) and got me order wrong a 285% tip!!

In justification o' t' barman t' bar was starboard in t' middle o' London's financial sector and I could quite imagine that they will have people go in thar with oodles o' doubloons who wouldn't blink an eyelid at spendin' several thousand pounds in a night.

That, however, be not me.

You may be wonderin' why this blog post be in Pirate-speak. Well, today be International Talk Like a Pirate Day! Do head over t' t' website at http://www.talklikeapirate.com/ t' see what's goin' on, and make aye t' take part too! I must admit that I have been lazy and not written all o' this text meself in Pirate-language, I have used a handy translator courtesy o' Trevor Sehrer, which can be found at http://www.talklikeapirate.com/translator.html

Shiver me timbers!

If you want to hear about other times I was in London and paid over the odds for beer (plus was told that my name is Brian) check out my Adventures in London post!

Gym

I tried to go to the gym tonight.

But my gear hadn't been washed.

So I'm on the computer.

With beer.




Things sometimes work out quite well.

Adventures in Leeds!

 Welcome to the second of my series of "Adventures in" posts!

I went to Leeds yesterday with my dad.  We have an occasional hobby of finding and trying out new pubs - as you can imagine, this has become more difficult to do as time went on, and we exhausted the pubs locally, plus I don't have that much time now to spend visiting drinking establishments (more's the pity).  So we'd planned for a while this trip, and decided to try out Leeds.

Highlights include:

Starting our adventures at The Hop at Granary Wharf (located somewhere underneath the train station), we enjoyed a pint and a steak pie, which is something of a speciality at the Hop.  The pie came with mash, peas and gravy and was delicious.  They serve the food in a card tray and provide wooden knives and forks presumably for its environmental benefits, which my dad was quite taken with, and his set of cutlery came home with us.

The second pub we won't name (I'll just be naming the good ones!) but after wandering along the towpath for a think we found it on Wellington Road, and wasn't the best - to be fair it was more for eating than just going in for a drink, but the beer wasn't great (you could easily see bits of something - sediment? - floating around in my dad's pint) and the staff were overly keen - hovering by you, glancing over every few seconds just in case we should contemplate ordering food.  Not really the best for relaxing.

However, it did mean that it led us to the third pub, Baby Jupiter down York Place. I must admit that when we saw the sign outside, which is somewhat psychedelic, and the perfectly-normal-for-a-house-or-perhaps-a-garden-shed wooden front door, we hesitated, but trying new pubs is all about pushing your comfort zone (I know, wild eh?!?) so we ventured inside, and I'm so glad we did.

It's fantastic inside, the walls are covered in pictures and artwork, there's a huge metal dude at the end of the pub adjacent to the kitchens, one of the walls is covered in what I assume to be purple velvet, the music is eclectic (my dad described it as reggae, I'm not sure if I'd agree but he's not a million miles out) and the toilet signs are hilarious.  Plus we could sit down with our pints and play Pacman 2-player.  Definitely one to return to, it looks as though they have a lot of music nights on which I'm sure would be good. We both sampled the Kirkstall Pale Ale here (in proper beer mugs with a honest to god handle too!) and it was excellent, especially after the previous place we'd visited.  Dad ended up shaking the hand of the very friendly chap at the bar in thanks for an excellent experience.  It was shame that we were still full from lunch otherwise we'd have definitely tried the food too.

Dad relaxing in Baby Jupiter - in the bottom right corner you can see the Pacman machine.

After that we visited a pub that is mostly forgettable - although in the toilets there was an advert for a scooter man - basically the idea is that you drive to the pub, enjoy yourself, and when finished you ring for scooterman who rides a scooter to you, puts the scooter (it's a fold up one) in your boot and drives you home in your car.  I thought that was quite a good idea - saves paying for a taxi (at least one way)

The next pub again was excellent, very different to Baby Jupiter but just as good - the White Swan.

We stumbled across the White Swan by glancing down an alley that we were walking past, on doing so I spotted a sign for a shop selling crystals and being vaguely intrigued decide to investigate.  As we went down the alley we found that opposite the shop was the White Swan.  The pub has a nice interior, lots of lightness making it feel quite airy and open, arty posters up on the walls, a bookcase full of books to meander through in one of the little alcoves (I'm going by my dads description right now - I wasn't wearing my glasses so couldn't see that far) plus we had the ability to try three real-ales for £3.30 (which we both did!)

It is to my shame that I didn't try the Leodis so I don't know if it's good or not!

We spent a while in the White Swan, having a coffee before trying the ales on offer in an effort to rebuild our constitutions - dad managed to get lost in the toilets but made his way back in the end.  He spent a while writing up notes about the journey so far, and I'm sure he would be able to give much more detail about the pubs than I can remember!

Dad writing notes about the pubs so far.  It's amazingly how quickly we were able to forget details about the pubs!

Being able to try various real ales without having to commit to tasting full pints is excellent and something more pubs should do - as you can see in the picture below we were able to try six different beers for under seven pounds, and had some pleasant surprises as a result.  The dark beers were better than I expected (not being a fan of dark beers - Midnight Bell stands out to me as being ) and the Yorkshire Gold reminded me and my father strongly of Deuchars IPA (one of our favourite beers but one that pubs often don't look after properly, spoiling the taste) - a testament to both the brewers and the White Swan for keeping it well.

Dad taking care of approximately 189 millilitres of dark mild.

Special mention goes to the White Swan for their chips which we also ordered to help deal with the alcohol - very nice (although more vinegar and salt required - bear in mind though that when I have chips generally I put so much vinegar on that if you breathe in the air above them you cough!)

We finished the day off in the Packhorse - again a perfectly reasonable pub, a little livelier than we'd probably like but to be fair it was teatime on a Friday afternoon, and the bar staff again were very friendly.  All in all an excellent day and one we hope to repeat!  Apologies to all that offered recommendations on places to try in Leeds, the day ended up being us more or less walking aimlessly around the city centre stumbling across places.  I did hope to get nearer to the universities but didn't make it this time - perhaps the next!

Don't dare me!

I can't even remember how it came up.

My partner was asking me to do something, and threatened to drop her pot of brown sauce in my beer if I didn't agree.

So, I agreed to do as she said.

Theakstons XB - with extra brown sauce

And then dropped it in my beer anyway.

It was my son's third birthday today, and I think he's had a good day.  He absolutely loved various presents, in particular his nightlight, his Gruffalo book, and his Leapfrog Lettersaurus.  He also had great fun pulling all his balloons down from where I'd taped them onto walls etc.  We took him to Kinderland in Hessle this morning and after lunch he went to nursery this afternoon and they had a party there.  All in all a good day!