Apart from managing the miss the top of my head off the video, it's not too bad, and I hope to spawn a series of spin-offs - CRUNCHYBANG for iced liquid food, VEGGIEBANG for Vegetarians, and perhaps even SECRET VEGGIEBANG which looks like VEGGIEBANG but actually has meat in it.
I've had a great response from people with guest blog posts which I'm lining up to go out in June, thank you to everyone that has responded. If you'd like to perhaps get a post on here, let me know!
I've recently watched Dara and Ed's Great Big Adventure, a three part TV show where two comedians, Dara O'Briain and Ed Byrne, drive along the Pan-American highway for 4,000 miles, from Arizona to Panama, and going through all kinds of experiences on the way, from being wrestled by a Mexican wrestler, to eating iguana.
I found it all really interesting and enjoyable, and taught me a good deal about a part of the world that I have to confess I have extremely little knowledge about, and it did make me think more about travelling. I haven't travelled a great deal, but I'd like to one day.
What makes people travel? Exploration? Broadening ones horizons? New experiences? Perhaps challenging oneself? It's curious, and I do find it funny how people like to go away on holiday (and I include myself on this) yet they want most of the creature comforts from home - many years back I went to Majorca, and one of the bars I passed was set out as a "traditional British pub", serving pints of Tetleys Bitter, playing Only Fools and Horses on the TV, you could order a Sunday carvery, all that sort of thing. And it certainly wasn't empty.
Dara and Ed's adventure looked great, and it made me think of a blog I found a while back (which annoyingly I can't find now) where a couple packed up their life in Vancouver, and drove across Canada to Nova Scotia, sleeping in their car - I think that they had an estate car, and basically stuck a mattress in the back.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on travelling - do you travel or not? And why? Where would you like to go - Europe and North America are top of my list!
Here in northern England we're supposed to have a good couple inches of snow by now, yet it's really not here. A bit came down, but it hasn't settled, and all signs appear to be for a clear night tonight. The Met Office continue to warn of snow, but I suspect, due it being relatively low ground where I live, that the most we'll get is a bit of rain and some ice to fall over on in the morning. That said, they are suggesting that there might be a return of snow on Monday - we'll see what happens then.
Right then - I've been thinking.
My YouTube channel (and my blog too, for that matter) has been very quiet in the last few weeks. I've had other things that I've needed to focus on, but also I've been struggling with ideas for videos.
Last night I had an idea for a tabletop gaming show - so basically card/board/dice games (but maybe I could include computer games too) - but the key is that I'm looking at single player games. And I could call it "Playing With Myself". So I could feature games like Patience and Solitaire, but I could try some other games - there are various sets of rules for playing Munchkin (one of my favourite games) solo, for example. Or perhaps computer card games like Hearthstone, which although you play with someone else, the person is selected by the system, you don't need to have a friend available before you can play.
What do you think? Let me know in the comments if you think it's a good idea or not, if you do like it are there any special games you think I should include.
Today is a day to dress up as a time traveller, either from the distant past or the distant future, and be amazed by the world today.
I was extremely lazy in my video supporting the day, but at least I made one (it's been long enough!) and I did go through artistic hardship.
Warning: Do not watch if you are offended by expectoration (i.e. spitting).
I'm hoping that this video helps me on my challenges to hit 600k blog views by the end of the year, and 14k video views. As things stand I'm just over 91,000 views away on my blog, and about 800 views away on my videos, so we'll how how things go - it's all good fun anyway!
Firstly, today is St Andrews Day, the Scottish national day. St Andrew, the patron saint of Scotland, was a Galilean fisherman who is also apparently the saint of fishmongers, gout, and sore throats. Google celebrated St Andrews Day by linking to various brilliant views of Scotland - I particularly like the image of Threave Castle.
All this made me think of national days.
England (the part of the UK where I live - yes, the UK is made up of different countries) has its own national day, St George's Day, but we barely seem to recognise it. We don't get the day off work and its generally (always? I'm not sure how they work out what day it falls on) during the week.
Anyway, St George's Day is next on Thursday the 23rd of April 2015, and I'm going to do something English to celebrate. I don't know yet (probably queue and complain about the weather) but this time I'll mark the day. I'd welcome ideas in the comments for things to do!
Moving on - December is coming, and with it the end of 2014.
So, I've decided to set myself a couple of challenges.
On my blog I want to hit 600,000 views by the end of the year - I'm currently on about 474 thousand (this is according to Blogger statistics - Google Analytics stats are rather lower), and on my YouTube channel I'm going to aim for 14,000 views - I'm currently at 13,133.
Blogger stats. Exciting wiggles.
YouTube stats. Less exciting wiggles (but exciting green triangles)
So, what would you like to see on my blog and on my YouTube channel? Again, any ideas let me know in the comments.
This looks like a blank web page. But it has an invisible cow on yet.
If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go to http://findtheinvisiblecow.com/ - you have to find a cow that is hidden somewhere on your screen, by listening to a guy shouting "COW" at you. It's good fun, and you can't help but feel a little bit of achievement when you finally see this:
Yippee!! It's an ex-invisible cartoon cow that says "moo"
Play long enough and you can unlock a goat too.
This cartoon goat doesn't say moo. They stick true to the principles of nature.
If you haven't been over to my YouTube channel recently, I'm doing Vlogtober - a video every day for the month of October - which is going quite well, I'm making some different videos, I actually have a fair few videos ready to make live, and some more that just need editing. Do drop by and say hi!
I've put my planned blog post to one side (yes, this stuff is sometimes planned, it's that good!) because of two reasons.
Firstly, you have 32 hours to go and check out the Kickstarter for Star Traders 2 RPG. I'm a big fan of the original Star Traders, where you get to fly around a galaxy, shooting bad guys (or good guys, depending on how you want to play), trading supplies, doing quests, listening to rumours, all kinds of randomness. The developers (the Trese brothers) did a fantastic job bringing a great deal of depth to it, and I'm really looking forward to Star Traders 2. As I write this they're about $1,800 away from their first stretch goal of adding Orbital Stations to the game, which I do think would be a really interesting addition, so it's not too late to get involved!
Second reason for my usual blog post being postponed is that because I have to say that I am taking part in Vlogtober. This basically means that I'm committing to releasing a video every day through the month of October.
I generally aim to release a video on my YouTube channel about once a week, and I find that a struggle sometimes, so it is with some trepidation that I'm attempting doing a daily video. Nevertheless I am attempting the challenge, and I've managed so far to keep to schedule the first two days:
The first day I told some bad jokes.
And the second day you watch me drink beer. It's that good.
If you're taking part in Vlogtober please do say hi in the comments, I'd love to hear from you and check out how you're getting on!
Earlier in the summer I've had little a bit of trouble sleeping, and although I've actually been sleeping better in the last month, before then I was essentially sleeping all night, and then still being tired in a morning. So, I saw the doctor who referred me for a sleep study.
For those unfamiliar with what this entails, I got a load of kit to wire up to myself while I slept. Cannulla up the nose, blood pressure monitor on a finger, three hefty straps around my body, and lots and lots of wire and tape.
The superhero t-shirt was part of the kit too, honest.
Fortunately I am very good at going to sleep because it isn't the most comfortable arrangement for resting in, nevertheless the study has been completed (slightly worried because the blood pressure monitor kept dropping off my finger in the middle of the night) and I look forward to hearing the results.
Meanwhile, things continue to be busy on the Travelling Book front. I met with Luke Arran of Hull College's Student Union yesterday, who is being amazingly supportive of the project - thanks Luke! Fingers crossed I will have a stand at Hull College's Freshers Fair next month for the project, details to be confirmed but watch this space. I did take the opportunity to abandon a travelling book in Hull College's library, so we'll see where it ends up!
I've also received a load of bookmarks from Jody at Chilli Promotional Products, many thanks to Jody for her support and these will be going in a selection of travelling books!
If you do want to find out EVERYTHING about the project I have recorded a hideously long YouTube video all about the current state of the project, exactly what is in a travelling book, and the guidelines for taking part. It is ridiculously long - over 20 minutes in length - so I don't expect a huge number of views, but for those who are due to receive a book (I'm hoping to start sending them out by the end of next week) it says exactly what they're due to get.
As always, head over to the project website (www.travellingbook.eu) for all the latest information, and do pop on the forum there and say hi!
I am slightly overweight. There's no way of getting around this fact, indeed it is core to todays essay. I am putting in effort to get into shape, as I due have a wedding about 11 months away, but as things stand, I am overweight.
Of course, being overweight, you need to buy clothing of a certain size - usually labelled "XL" or perhaps even "XXL" on occasion. For more formal clothing, waist sizes for me are currently in the region of either 46 or 48 inches.
Now ideally I'd love to go to some top-end clothier and purchase some really nice clothes, but I don't have that much money to spend (and am a bit of a cheapskate anyway) so it isn't unknown for me to pop to the local supermarket and check out the clothes there.
And it's odd.
They have some clothes that fit me - it depends what I'm looking for. Work shirts tend to just about get up to my size, but no bigger. However casual shirts and t-shirts I can get, and indeed in sizes far too big for me, but not jeans or trousers, which seem to top out about 40 to 42 inches. And shorts I can get in a suitable size (and again in sizes far bigger than me).
Is it assumed that those of us, that are of a stockier build, don't have jobs and spend our time sat at home in a t-shirt and shorts watching TV and drinking beer? I certainly have to say that I'd be happy to spend time lazing around getting drunk, but I do have a job that requires me to look at least vaguely smart and I really don't think a pair of shorts and a can of lager would fit the bill.
Finally, I have something planned. Something cool and exciting that, fingers crossed, I hope to launch this weekend. It's going to involve other people (it could be you!) taking part in a fun and exciting project. Stay tuned here and also on my YouTube channel for news and to find out how to take part.
And before I go - my look at Facebook in the future (via Google Glass) has been quite well received, thanks to everyone that's watched it and if you'd like to see it, here it is.
This is really just a quick thank you to everyone who has read my blog in the past, and especially those that for some reason continue to read! According to Blogger I am currently at 99,949 views, which means that by the morning I should have passed 100k views. Now to be fair a lot of those views are from bots and robot crawlers and things (i.e. not real people) but there are a fair few of you that do come and check out my posts and I do really appreciate your time. Thanks!
It's about a year ago that I went to the Little Weighton Steam Engine Rally, and the photo below was taken. I hope to replicate it on Saturday when the rally takes place again (not to mention sampling the beer and cake in the refreshments barn!)
I do have some more videos upcoming on my YouTube channel which hit 50 subscribers the other day, thanks also to all of you that subscribe and I hope to provide more mediocre videos there!
Yes, I'm tired. It's been a busy (but good) weekend, although it has included a fair portion of shopping and cleaning the house, which, whilst certainly needing to be done, doesn't quite get me excited.
Plus, I've had to water the garden.
I have a certain opinion about the garden. I believe that as the garden is essentially nature, and nature has the rule "survival of the fittest" where elderly and infirm animals are generally eaten by a wolf (or me), that plants shouldn't need watering. If they need watering on a regular basis, I do think that they ought to be left out to die as they clearly aren't suitable for their location. You wouldn't put a sunflower in a cave and then take a sunlamp in there to give it the light it needs to grow, so why water plants every day?
Of course, it isn't as simple as that - the plants do indeed look nice (certainly nicer than if I did leave them to their own devices), and all through the winter don't really need any maintenance so five minutes with the watering hose (which has a rather cool gun attachment) isn't overly onerous.
If you haven't noticed, the summer solstice was yesterday. Putting aside the theological aspect of this day, basically it means that we're heading for winter and Christmas now. Having baked myself whilst driving this afternoon I can't say that it really feels as though winter is coming, but nevertheless it is. I just wish that it had come soon enough to keep the beer on my desk cold.
I have published a new video today, with some reviews of alternative milks - as part of our bid to become healthier, the family have given up cows milks. While in the video I do talk about oat milk as being my favourite, we are actually now all on almond milk, and I must say that it is very nice indeed.
Finally, whilst mucking about on my YouTube channel (I'm on 48 subscribers and 9,942 video views - I'd love to make those figures up to 50 subs and 10,000 views if you feel the need!) I noted that I could enable Live Events.
So I did.
So, I can now do live events. I have no idea of any live events that I could do, or even if I did do an event whether I'd do it on YouTube or on Twitch, but it's nice to have the option. If anyone does have any ideas for live events, or video collaborations, or indeed blogging collaborations, do get in touch, I'm always keen to hear from people and work together on stuff. It makes this creating thing fun.
Speaking of which - I tried to make a new video the other night, but it didn't work out due to my smartphone auto-focusing halfway through (it's one where I need to do some special effects so it makes it really bad) and not having quite the right area in shot. But it involved shaving foam and a bottle of cognac. Ideas on a postcard (or in the comments below!)
Hmm... I would like to spend it on some new video editing kit or maybe a new computer, but I'd probably just put it towards bills (boring eh!)
What is your favourite singer/group?
This changes regularly, Pink, Steps, Alanis Morrissette, Psy, Charlene Soraia... at various times in my life I've listened to all of these hugely. Steps is the most recent one, but as I write this I'm thinking that I haven't sung along to Alanis for ages...
If you had one wish, what would it be?
Guns. Lot of guns.
(Only joking - it would be for my family to be happy. Dull but nice!)
If you could meet anyone famous, dead or alive, who would it be?
Stephen Fry. I love his work and his intellect, I bet he'd be brilliant company.
Why do you blog?
It's an outlet for my creativity. And I guess in a way I feel "needed" because I do have people visiting my blog, and I like to entertain them. Needed is too strong a word because if I stopped blogging overnight I doubt anyone would be really bothered, but nevertheless I like to feel needed.
If you could give something up for 24 hours,what would it be?
Fat absorption.
If you had the chance to move to any country, what country would it be?
Difficult to say as I haven't experienced the place yet, but Canada would be high on the list, probably either Toronto or Vancouver. I can say that I had the most wonderful time in Paris (and sod what people say about Parisians being rude, almost all of the locals that I interacted with were great!) so it'd be one to consider. Dublin is brilliant too but I don't know if I'd want to live there - I think the pubs would be too much of a temptation for me!
First car?
A 1986 Nissan Micra Collette. I loved it.
First favourite pop singer or band?
First favourite - I remember getting my mum to buy me a Madonna album when I was very small. But that was basically just because I knew her name. I'd probably have to say Shaggy or 2 Unlimited.
What pop song would you not admit you liked?
I don't really go in for not admitting this sort of thing, I know that I have a dreadful taste in music! 2 Unlimited, Steps, B*Witched.... they're all great :)
Thanks again to the domestic goddess for the nomination. Also, thanks to Tim and Jay for their excellent guest posts this last week while I've been away in a caravan enjoying the sunshine! Thanks guys and if I can return the favour in the future let me know.
This was the vegetarian breakfast I had one morning while on holiday. With extra bacon.
I've recorded three new videos this evening and am in the process of editing them so hopefully my YouTube channel will show some more regular activity in the weeks ahead, I've got an idea for a new regular video that hopefully I can do several times a week too so fingers crossed for that.
I'm typing very quickly because as I write this post, the Eurovision Song Contest is just about to kick off.
For those not familiar with this event (who could that be?!? Americans perhaps) basically for one night, the whole of Europe gets into a massive battle, but instead of using traditional weaponry to fight with, we use songs.
Songs which generally vary in quality.
Instead of featuring the best singers and songwriters we have to offer, typically we (certainly in the UK anyway) feature a new act, who does a good job, but (mainly because song voting is massively swayed by friendly nations - and no one likes us, which to be honest is understandable) doesn't do very well.
To be completely honest I have no idea who is singing for the UK this year, but I do hope that they do well, I understand that the song is pretty good and I am actually looking forward to watching it tonight. I'm also looking forward to Austria's, I understand that their song is interesting too.
Touching on my last YouTube video, I'm pleased to say that it has gone, well to use Tim Clark's words (thanks for the blog post Tim) bacterial - it's gone over three thousand views, which for one of my videos is absolutely amazing, and it's attracted perhaps ten new subscribers which again is a lot for me. Hope everyone sticks around, and if there's any particular videos you'd like making do let me know.
On Monday, I posted a video for the Clash of Clans Clan Wars Karaoke contest. To be honest, it wasn't my great video - it basically involved me rocking side to side, singing badly, accompanied by a vibrating pig.
And the pig wasn't even vibrating.
As I write this the video has scored over 2,000 views - not exactly up to Gangnam Style, but it is four times more views than my second most viewed video.
It's attracted a lot of comments, and the dubious honour of receiving more dislikes than likes, but nevertheless I've found myself checking my channel statistics a couple of times just to see the view count soar way beyond my usual, so if you have watched it, thanks.
And I hope it didn't scar you too badly.
While I'm talking about YouTube, YouTube have just started their latest Creator Academy Boot Camp - even though I've completed the academy before, I'm retaking it to refresh my memory and hopefully connect with some other YouTubers. It's well worth doing if you're a YouTuber that would like to improve.
Finally, this blog wouldn't be complete without pointing you over to Tim Clark's blog where he's talking about the challenges of modern life, and what we need to do. Well worth a read - I for one look forward to Tim's control of the planet, I'm sure he'll do a perfectly acceptable job.
If you haven't encountered Clash of Clans, basically you have a village that you upgrade, and you raid other villages for loot (as well as building defenses to protect your own). It's quite addictive and straightforward to play.
Anyhow, Supercell, the makers of Clash of Clans, are quite proactive at engaging the community by running various contests, and they've just launched their latest one, which is karaoke.
We've been challenged to recreate this video, in whatever way we wish to:
Happy Easter! Are you having a good Easter weekend? Mine so far has included:
Eating chocolate
Having a cold
Drinking Lemsip
Eating a curry to try to kill the cold
Drinking beer to try to kill the curry
Having my garage broken into and my partner's bike stolen
Walking the streets in an effort to find the aforementioned bicycle (unsuccessfully)
I've also made a couple of videos, so all in all it's been a busy weekend.
The first, short, video, is of me opening an Easter egg in my preferred way (i.e. nutting it)
I was quite pleased with the chunky noise that the egg makes when you nut it.
And the second one discusses the joy that is a hot cross bun with bacon.
I'm aware that many of you will want to lynch me for suggesting bacon with a hot cross bun, but I am a long-term supporter of bacon in teacakes, and so the hot cross bun is merely one step further into the abyss for me.
So, it isn't April 1st here yet - but I wanted to do a post ready for April Fools Day!
So, what I've done is listed a number of things about me. See if you can guess which one of these is an Aprils Fool!
1) I can't swim or ride a bike.
2) Sneezing out of a window seems logical to me.
3) I once eBayed a cherry that had been kicked by Dylan Moran, the Irish comedian.
4) I massaged a Moroccan chap called Abdul. Multiple times.
5) Stephen Fry once called me "Mark" instead of "Mike".
6) I once planned to travel around the country in a van.
7) I wrote a skit about Tony Blair.
8) I wrote a short story about a fruit machine, and a mans love for it.
9) I once conversed with Robert Llewellyn about the state of Starbug in later series of Red Dwarf.
10) As I write this, an uneaten doughnut is on a plate next to me.
See if you can guess which one of the above is false, and drop me a comment with your answer - all will be revealed later in the week!
While I'm blogging, there will be a little hiatus for my series of YouTube interviews - I don't have another YouTuber lined up to interview just now, but I would urge you to read back and check out my previous interviews: Nick Crompton Brutall Jason Fisher Scott Tumilty CtrlAltDammit
All these guys I particularly recommend, they're well worth a watch on YouTube, all for different reasons.
Finally, I am working on a new YouTube video which I filmed at the weekend with my good friend Andy from Bad Dog's Gaming Blog, it will be a few days before the editing is finished (and it doesn't help that I keep putting it off because it's going to be a big job!) but hopefully it'll be well worth a watch when finished.
So, making YouTube videos is an art. Something for a natural creator to undertake. But there are experiences that all video makers will share, whatever their video style, regardless of whether they make short hardhitting films, music, or perhaps just videos of a monkey riding a vibrating pig.
Oink.
6) Recording the video will be unreasonably difficult.
I have a variety of equipment to record with. None of my equipment is top of the range, but it includes an HD webcam, a camcorder, and my smartphone.
The webcam is basically the cheapest 1080 one that I could get, and although it works, it isn't great. In my computer room it inevitably gives an image too dark, unless I select the "Low Light Compensation" option.
Which solves the problem brilliantly!
Except that this option then makes the speech go out of sync, so you look like a poorly dubbed french film.
If I had a live stream from my webcam, it would look like this. I haven't had that beard for months. And I haven't even used that headset since I first got it dancing like a night elf.
Next up is the camcorder. The camcorder isn't HD, and what's worse records in 4:3 aspect ratio, which probably means nothing to you unless you make videos on YouTube - basically it means that, for it to fit in YouTube nicely, you lose a chunk of either your head or your gut out of the video.
Meanwhile the smartphone is actually the best piece of kit, except for one odd feature. If you have a modern smartphone, you'll know that the display rotates to whatever way you are holding the smartphone. Got it upside down? Not a problem, the display will flip round.
However, the camera records a certain way up, and even though the display may look fine, if the smartphone records the "wrong way up" (which isn't obvious as you generally record YouTube videos with your phone on its side) it'll record your video upside down.
Which makes editing REALLY easy.
I hate technology.
Of course, I don't have the best kit to record with, but even if you do...
5) Your video will have a tiny, but critical, mistake in it that means after waiting four hours for it to render, it will be absolutely dreadful and will need amending.
Seriously, this happens far too often. If you aren't a video creator, you might be forgiven for thinking that actually, percentage-wise, a large chunk of the video makers time is spent recording the video.
No.
Although you might spent a bit of time recording re-takes, and rerecording certain scenes, the vast majority of time is spent mucking about with the video on the computer afterwards. As an example, I made a ten-minute video talking about video games, as a sort of audition for a gaming channel. I really enjoyed doing it, but for the two hours I spent recording stuff, I spent about twenty editing the video.
And it still turned out bad.
But there will be some setting in the video editing software that you'll forget to change. As a result your speech will be out of sync with the video, or the video will end up with black banners around it, or just be plain bad.
Yes YouTube, that's what I wanted. Some big black frames around my video, just to give it that "condolence card" look.
Oh. My. God. That's the professional quality that has attracted an entire thirty two subscribers to me.
But rendering a video takes an age. And if you do anything with your PC, it'll slow down and take even longer. So, as a result, you'll have to wait at least half an hour, watch the video, discover what you did wrong, and repeat.
But eventually, you'll get the video rendered, it looks fine, and you'll start uploading it to YouTube. Which takes hours if you're uploading a decent quality video, so you'll probably use your PC for other stuff in the meantime. And you may well do the next one.
4) You will log out of Google in one of your browser windows, whilst your video is uploading in another window. This will mean that you have to start the upload process again.
Yep.
Next!
3) Any time that you tell YouTube to publish a video, there will be a problem in that video, meaning that a shedload of tweets, Facebook statuses, and Google+ notifications go out, with a link to a video that you don't want people to see.
YouTube tries to be helpful. It tries to automate the social media promotion stuff that you do, but it will either not work, and make you do it anyway (particularly when trying to post to Facebook), or when it works, about ten minutes later you'll realise that there's a problem with your video, and have to take it down, and restart the whole process. And when the new video goes up, and is promoted, everyone will think that you're just spam posting about your video and hate you.
Obviously a joke - who could hate a chin like that? Covered in cuddly grey spikes.
Finally, your video is live. It looks okay, it has a custom thumbnail, it has annotations, you've done hours of promotion, you've done all the things you're supposed to do. This one is bound to go viral, right?
And yet...
2) After publishing your video, for about the next six hours you grab your phone every time it vibrates in the hope that it is a nice comment about your video, or perhaps even a new subscriber. Every time it will be an update from Candy Crush Saga.
NO I DON'T WANT TO SEND ANY OF MY FRIENDS AN EXTRA LIFE
After a few days, you decide to check out the videos statistics, and see if there's anything there that will help soothe your battered ego.
What do you see? A dislike.
1) You pretend to be okay when a video gets a dislike, but inside you want to kill.
WHY?!?!?!?
Of course not everyone in the world will like your video, you tell yourself. Of course they can't. Psy's Gangnam Style has around a million dislikes. You have just one.
Plus, you've got more likes than dislikes, so on balance it's all good.
It doesn't matter. Someone disliked your video.
Time to go hunting.
You can't beat a wooden sword for revenge. Splinters hurt, boy!
All's said and done, I still love making videos. If you do want to watch any of my videos, which contain a lot of eating and a significant amount of vibrating pigs, they're over at www.youtube.com/ravenswingthog - thanks for reading!
Here is a picture of my sons playroom - halfway through a tidy up.
In the middle of the picture no doubt you'll see the purple ball.
The evil purple ball.
The purple ball we originally bought when my other half was pregnant, and it has basically hung around since then, acting as an emergency chair as well as just a huge ball to throw at people.
But when you tidy up, it will not leave you alone.
As you tidy up, you'll push the ball out of the way. It slowly rolls away, hits a wall or sofa or set of drawers or something, and rolls back. This vaguely irritates me, so I give it a slightly firmer push to get rid of it.
And of course it rolls away a little faster, bounces a little quicker, and impacts upon me with slightly more force than before.
My annoyance increases, and before long the ball is picked up and launched across the playroom - which isn't that large, and it will continue to bounce back into you with increased vigour.
I've never snapped and tried to puncture the ball, which is probably for the best as these balls are reinforced somehow and I have visions of stabbing it, only for the knife to bounce off it and plant itself in a wall or carpet or face or something.
On my YouTube channel I have a new video up, and I need your input! In this question I ask four questions that can't be googled (at least that is my view, feel free to try to prove me wrong), and I'm looking for people to reply with what they think the answers are. Fire your answers back to me at mike.raven@gmail.com
I love my phone, but it does have a tendency to overestimate the battery capacity.
20 hours remaining? It'll eat that in time it takes me to take a photo.
And for some reason the last 10% lasts an amazingly long time (in comparison to the other 90%) - it'll hang on 3% for ages while you frantically do whatever it is you need to do on your phone before the battery dies.
In other news, chip week (french fry week for US readers) is now over, and I hope you took part via fried potato consumption. I beg you to watch the below fantastic video from a chippie in Birmingham, it is fantastic.
And while I'm talking about videos, I've published a new one today - I say published because it's been made for about two weeks, but I have been really quite busy lately, plus my PC has died so I'm resorting to using my partners computer. In this one I put on a variety of professional-quality accents and invite you to guess what they were. Do let me know how you got on!
I hope you've been enjoying my series of interviews with YouTubers on my blog, I've really enjoyed doing them and engaging with some other (far more talented!) creators. I am in talks with two more people about interviews but they haven't been finalised yet so there may be a slight delay before they appear on here.
If you haven't seen them already check the interviews out below:
