am in a hurry

Theres an internal rumbling going on, and it’s a pain in my stomach. Trying to concentrate on a list of “to do “ stuff for the weekend. Strange idea to find a company, or someone who will let me walk their dog…where can I walk a dog. I want to try and see if these cute little furry things can get a long with me, and visa versa.

Topics to ponder…
What do you say when one person announces that they don’t actually like you? Do you say, ok, that fine. Do you think , so what, you’re a fool!, or do you look inside and think, what is wrong with myself. I wont continue this any more….

It’s the weekend, bank holiday. Three days. Stock take tomorrow counting handbags. Life doest get that much better. Im running out of ideas of what to do in London that wont cost me much money.
1) Jump in the Thames to cool down , that’s if the weather actually climbs above 18 degrees , which it hasn’t.
2) Sit down in a park against a tree, pour sum jam on the grass and see nature run its course
3) Eat curry after curry while watching 24 all over again, and see nature run its course
4) Pick up a new hobby…try and learn how to walk on your hands (that’s free)
5) Look at the sky and just point upwards with your mouth gaping in awe…
6) Go for the natural 20 minute run and spend the rest of the day recovering
7) Make dinner out of all the free food u see lying in London. That includes all the giveaways they have in shops and free cheese from markets.
8) Spend the entire day looking for property on the internet … an affordable two bedroom flat in London that has enough room to allow for your head
9) Read a book , fall asleep, dream, write about your dream, read a book, drink wine, sleep, wake up, head hurts
10) walk walk walk walk walk walk walk walk

As you can see, im running out of imagination of what to do in this country. Help me out people. I need to save money but I also need to have fun. Has London become into an overpriced , overcrowded, separate cultured mess. We have the Ben, the Parks, the pubs, the smelly urinated streets and ofcourse the Queen.
Anyway work has finished, my manager is happy, and now im happy, my services have been well appreciated and I feel so cheap Alas im going now because I cant stand sitting (?) on the same seat with the same people…need to run!

the gossip?

Spoke to one of my best friends on the phone. It definetley brought back the memories and shows how much we have all moved on, but also how our friendships have changed. She said one thing that I guess only a real friend can say, “no matter how long we don’t speak, whenever we do, its as if we had spoken yesterday”

Well I guess that makes sense eh?

So right now, I have been given the task of finding gossip? What gossip do I have now on my life? My life seems like its flashing past, until I decide to write this blog, which gives me a chance to pause and take a breath (like my diary in Japan). People have nothing but nice things to say about by writing, and maybe I critisize myself, or maybe it’s a lack of confidence but I cannot believe that these simplistic sentences can touch anyones feelings.

So any gossip?

From my conversations (while busy working, honestly), I found out one of my friends was run over in Japan. It happened on a well known road in Karatsu through a ine wood forest, adjacent to the beach. A place where they also serve the Karatsu burger. This area has nothing but fond memories of camping by the beach and hot sunny days with a morning bath in the sea. Anyway back to the point… and so my friend, very drunk, finds himself bent over in the middle of the road…at night. Unfortunately, and understandably a driver failed to see him clearly and hit him. Before you snigger and imagine a car hitting a man bending over bum first, imagine as I have tried, a man bent over , a car hitting him sideways, him crashing to the floor, bones broken and sticking out from his legs and waking up next morning in a hospital with no idea what happened apart from the searing pain of his legs.

I always wanted to go back to Japan. I still do. However I am always scared of something like this happening to me in another country. I remember when I had pain in my knees (from playing football on the hard gravel, as Japan fails to acknowledge grass playing football fields), and the doctor warned me they would have to stick a thick metal needle in my knee cap and suck the excess fluid that caused the pain…I chose the tablets instead

His parents have now left back to California. His friends are there. Where does he go from know as the recovery process will be long, who knows. I hope he chooses to stay in Japan, and follow his passions. He is a strong man in the heart and not on who gives up easily , but when something hits you so suddenly it can be hard to climb up again. Everyone has their crashes as well, it depends on the cliché of how you get up again…

My crash might come in the next three months when I take on these exams that might choose my path in the future…or it might not…

So that’s the gossip for you…

let my finger do the clicking

here are just some pictures that i thought should hit the big screen.
they come from my holiday in France. Some are the typical ones you might be used to, others look like a different country altogether...

Yet another scam

What the difference between Walt Disney and McDonalds?

The answer? McDonalds at least you get your moneys worth! Plus there’s always the option of going somewhere else? Or not going at all….

I have never before seen such a capitalist idea work to such an effect as the effect that Disneyland has on its customers. Once your in, theres no way out. You have to spend spend spend. There is no way to escape once your there. They don’t warn you in the leaftlet, that tickets are over priced, that only continental breakfasts are served for free, that in order to take a picture with even Goofy, you have to queue and pay; that there rides are as reliable as the Northern line, that the magic isn’t really magical unless your children are happy with a pen rather than a massive bean filled , made in China, Winnie in the Pooh that wont even fit in the car on the way home…everything made in China. Thats the American dream i guess

As you can see, I don’t really believe in happiness through material and corporate mind games. Another hippy story coming up ? Probably not. Its rather stating the obvious. Ranting about McDonalds, Starbucks and now Disneyworld isn’t anything new. So I wont tempt to try and imitate any PHD student or professor.

What was much better than the smiling and waving Mickey Mouse (who underneath MUST have been the most pissed off arrogant smelly – due to the sweat – French man). I cant stop but wonder whose job it is to put on those suits and get on a little paper boat to start waving and acting high in front of all those kids. Getting hugged and hugged. Maybe there is something nice of being liked by everyone. I can relate to that being a teacher in Japan. Oh yes! However they are wearing a donkeys head, or a bears head or a mouse head over their faces. I would like to imagine that they are cursing at every screaming child who tries to grab a piece of Mickey’s nose. “Merde you stupid !**!” To summarise, I have never seen so many screaming and crying children in one place as I have in the land of magic and happiness.

Take me to Paris. Take me to the suburbs of Paris. I choose to live there instead of the boring paved pavements of Londinium suburbs. The open cafes with views of the roundabout, with a fountain spurting out of the flowers in its centre, and whose surrounding roads are more like cobbled stones placed hand by hand to allow for the lovely sound of stone against heel. The tiny little citreons, little barely alive cars whose tops have been torn apart to allow the sun into the driving seat. The cold Stella with some peanuts and a view of a side street with the Patisserie, Boulangerie, outdoor busking with an old trumpet, all under the shade of the setting orangey sun with wisps of creamy clouds. There is nothing more relaxed than that.

The only problem is that Paris itself charges for its beauty…
The search continues

what we should do next week...

And so it was, the great adventure. The first of what I hope to be several excursions., where the good become bad, the handsome become ugly and the remembered becomes forgotton. What am I talking about? Yes, it’s the traditional British stag party. So in true auditing fashion, I give you, ANDYS STAG DO

Establish Engagement objectives

The objective was plain and simple. To make sure Andy enters his marriage with the minimal amount of dignity and pride and to make sure that the rest of team help him along the way. As I sat in my corner of the pub, with the excitement buzzing around me, I paid careful attention while drinking my first beer in over a month. (After the first beer my memory is a bit hazy, so certain things if left out, are due to my failure as a light weight)

One objective seemed to be heard more often than not, the need to find a strip bar. (names have been changed to protect the identities of those that do not want to be named…erm). So big splodge-like person has confidently asserted that there are no , yes, no strippers in Belfast.

Imagine that, a whole city where no one can be paid to take their clothes of. Why? Having done a night out, It seems that these girls don’t need any pecuniary rewards for them to strip off (no personal experience). However having said this, it so happened that the stag himself seemed to find himself in the presence of a prostitute who had offered her services not only ot him, but to the whole "little italy" restaurant, full of slobbering, half conscious happy drunks.

So no strippers? Really? Ok . What are our other objectives? Basic objectives on every ones score card was the necessity to be as drunk and homosexual as ever. This inevitably happens when large amounts of alcohol are consumed and puke regurgitated. Your mates become a sure way of knowing that you are loved. Unlike women who tend to stay away from drunk guys, us men, seem to be more in need of a hug, big kiss (cheek), and if better a sumo style lifting manoeuvre, accompanied with a huge bellow of might and power to let everyone know that this man that I am lifting, is MY man!


PLANNING

the top best things that one likes to see when on a stag do are

1.the groom to be, to be making a fool of himself by running around stark naked, apart from a tight little g-string, in and around a public area.

2.a nice game of paintball, to show our macho-ness, and empty our bullets on the stag and anyone else who is outnumbered. Hit your own team, dive over messy and dangerously muddy terrain to overcome ones enemies, to perform the art of war to its entirety!!!!

3.to create banter by writing poems to random groups sitting behind you, male or female,
"oh scarfed wonder, how we do ponder, how beautiful you are today, . so give us a glance, and together we will dance, and together we will play"

4.The regular mooning. No matter kind of arse is mooned at regular passers by, it is still as beautiful as nature intended

5.to all manage to cordinate with each other at a subconcious drunken level to meet up at 4am in a mates hotel room and have more randomness, especially seeing how many people you can fit into one bed

6.Like any other conglomeration of hot blooded drunken males, tehre should be competition involved, wether this be drinking games, to best dance moves to hurdling a post box...



and so with this in i end, i wish you all goodnight cos its 2am and i have a trip to France with madame and i must be awake and on the look out for any signs of mass riots caused by students who are too scared to find out that being a bum might get them sacked!

before i go, it is my honour to leave you all with two fantastic poems written by two very good friends of mine. Sometimes i wonder what wasted talent you two are ! One relates to the previously talked about subject, the other, well, the other is our well loved career...

like a dove

Genius I do say, works not work it is play, I read a poem true, all think I work but you.

Bish bash bosh, what a load of tosh, this auditing malarky is. I used to be a healthy, now I’m not even wealthy, cos this job drives me to the beers.

A belly I do grow, a face that’s lost its glow, an audit life takes its toll. I sit here and think how much I want a drink, as down the steep slope I roll.

Will I ever be the same, now my life is so mundane, as I audit bloody numbers every day, in the future people will say to me, you've lost all you soul and energy, what a terrible price to pay.

But all is not so bleak, when we near the end the week, we know that the fun will begin, we drink and drink to forget it all; in the following days we regret it all, as we start another week of auditin’.

And when that final bell doth ring, with the exams over we will sing, how wonderful it is to be free, and when looking back over the years, reminiscing on all those hard earned beers, remembering mates will fill us with glee.

It can’t be so bad, this entire audit fad, when qualified we will be. The world will open up, and free us like a dove, and into the open road we will flee.

by one of the jokers

Whilst the love is running high

Whilst the love is running high, and the hangover is nearly nigh,
let me tell you the story, of our night of debauchery,
in the land of the emerald isle.

It started with a flight, deep into the night,
and end with the stag, wearing knickers like a slag.

And in between all that there was paintball, poems and pizza,
not to mention the dancin, beers and chunder.

The was lots of clever rhyme, with the ladies from the bar,
And whenever it was Riko Time, then laughts were nor afar.
guns, mud and paint, enough to make one faint, bang bang bang, the friendly fire sang
The trees did see so much, but not a war as such, but jolly good fun, all people with a gun
women, girls and boys, alcohol instead of toys, bad behaviour did ensue with more than just a few
And much more happened, includiung lots of play. I'm sure you'd like to hear,
but until i've got the all clear, i've nothing more to say.


For as we all know, what goes on tour stays on tour.

by

the 2 jokers

documentation

Posts for the stag do....
if anyone wants to add their part...please do so by emailing me, and il put it up...
i think in order to add a comment yourseld, you have to be a "blogger" yourself..oh well...
dont worry...i wont censor anything .
Please give me some time however. This looks like a big blog. There is pressure, not to hurt anyones feelings, to make sure i get everything right in the "he said, she said" department, (Well just "he said i guess"), and then the pictures are going to go up as well.
Why am i typing this all up in the office? I have no idea.

Ill leave you with a little tantelising taster of what is to come.....

"Its Rrriiiiiikkooooooooooooooo time!!!!!"

Eaaaazzzay!

p.s a massive thankyou to big splodge!

a bit of life...

Have finished the book…I recommend everyone who wants to appreciate life that little bit more, whether it be those who have travelled to deserts, floated on ice caps or traversed the most dangerous rivers of the world, to those who have never left the comforts of their own bedroom, to read this book. It should, and will open your eyes to the beauty of life, and the miracle that seems to be forgotten by the millions of inhabitants of this city.

So, I sit on a train, and look around. Most people are reading, nearly everyone has some kind of music taking them away from a monotonous every day rat race.
I finish the last paragraph of the book, “we meet people who have cut through jungles, crossed deserts…and yet in souls we would search in vain for evidence of what they have witnessed…” but we should be attempting “to try , before taking of to distant hemispheres , to notice what we have already seen”

How can I appreciate everything that I have seen millions of times? I give it a go. So I close the book, move to the window seat of the metropolitan. One of the few tubes to resemble an overland junk train. The pen which acts as my bookmark becomes my tool as I look outside and take some notes…here is the end result…

A WINTER’S TREE
Standing Naked, frail but refusing to give up
Not like a willow, which humbly bows to its creator with its flaccid arms
The winter’s tree intrudes up to the sky,
Its branches like hungry veins, desperately searching,
Reaching out as far as it can
Trying to grab its ration of rare sunlight, a drop of water
Almost begging.
But there is something dignified with its posture, its stubborn posture
Its decision to stay put, whether it be surrounded by concrete slabs, or amongst others
It doesn’t fall
For its search is nearly over,
The long sacrifice of patiently waiting is repaid by mother nature
As the sun rises further, and the water generously pours
Its life has nt been overlooked,
It breathes , replenished, stomach full
Every naked arm to be rewarded
To be covered with a gorgeous earthly colours
To stand tall again and proud
To be prepared
For next time it will be a winters tree

There are many times when I feel that I cant deal with life’s issues. The stress of work, the pressure of having to prove to others everyday, of having to prove to yourself that there’s a purpose to your life, of having to deal with things that to you seem the most important matters in your life, but in the great whoohah of the universe, well, they are as important as the “please keep your feet of the seats” signs.

How do we all , try and focus ourselves away from the mundane tasks that we do, from the problems that we face whether it be with relationships with loved one, or with those that we find when we glance at a passing headline on the Evening Standard.

For me it comes with writing. Right now, I feel at a moment where I need to write to take my mind of something. A blog needs to be a “true and fair” representation of its creator. It needs to have no hidden agendas, no ambiguous meanings but through it, one should be able to create an imagination of who the person is. However for once, I cannot go any further to describe the reason … its not right

So my cure? Writing…and reading. Im on my last chapter on my book, “The Art of Travel”, and it talks about ones need to posses beauty. There is only one way the author says, quoting a famous bloke called Ruskin (no idea who he is!)…to posses it you must draw it, or “word paint it”. Only then do you actualy notice the physiological effects of beauty and you actually notice the beauty of what might just be a ‘blue sky”…he (Ruskin) “recognised that many places strike as beautiful not on the basis of aesthetic criteria - the colours match, symmetry, proportion…but on the basis of physiological criteria, because they embody a value or mood or importance to us”
So in order for me to forget, I get up from my bed and I look at the sky. I live on the top floor of my house, with a view of the whole horizon, encompassing a golf course, trees, telephone poles and right now a sheet of blackness. Being far away from the city centre gives us the advantage of a view of the stars…

I guess that was a factual dead description. It doesn’t explain to you how this unique view makes me feel. That when I look at the half eaten moon, which seems like a torch shining down towards you, its makes you feel a sense of awe that theres a perfect semi circle of light, a whole in the sky reaching to the heavens

…the yellow stars that seem to be of all different brightness seem to be more like dots that unfortunately , in this part of the world are too tiny and infrequent to imagine that they are actually burning hot chemical reactions millions of light years away. Closer to home, theres the dancing street lights in the distance, that seem to give a magical impression that the land is lit up like candles ona birthday cake. Apart from that, theres only blackness, where houses are, there is nothing now. Like a deep hole into the earth. One might never know what it is if daylight never happened. The sky is never really black. it’s a dark purple which melds into the yellow down on the ground. Then finally theres the snakey and more sinister black outlines of the tall trees that surround the neighbours house , itself a dark sploge of emptiness with all its lights switched off. The branches look like veins shooting up into the sky, but thin and starving for life

I could have done a better job I guess..but this surely takes your mind of other things. Also, il never forget this view …even though I must have seen it a hundred thousand times!

So next time…take a look up. A blue sky isn’t really just blue.

The pics have no relevance to anything that I fee like saying. Or maybe they do. “Whatever” as in the words of a wise girl I Know . Probably the point of the pictures are to show that i have no idea what is a good picture and what isnt. Everyone has their own views right?From being lost in one place, right on the tip of England, to being lost in your own town...


So today is a first of what I fear to be many. Im actually tired of talking. Not typing as you might see, but talking. Just generally exhausted. Found it hard to breathe. Not depressed. Though I guess I don’t know what depressed is like. Just tired. Lethargy. Hope not. Maybe it’s the fact that during the hours of 9-5, I have done NOTHING.

Sat in the office, an unusual feeling for a usual day, no idea what was going on. Ideas all over the place right now. I think I suffer from information overload. Too many things to take in at once. Too many thought processes each colliding with each other and running of the track.Same cd plays on my system as it has played for the past three weeks. He made it on his computer. Talented indeed. Especially the rain song with the Yorkshire accent, “is that you?”….who are you talking about geezer?

Another great man sits next to me in the office. Wondering why is he sitting in this room, why is he sitting next to me? He seems greater than one man, seems to be good at making people feel good. that’s LOVELY!


Another piece of good news. Football tournament. Apart from the fact that my knees go wobbly whenever competitions comes along, theres nothing better than letting a few curses, misplaced tackles and scorng a blinder of a goal…or at least dreaming about what you might do.Im walking across Westminister bridge with my top 100 songs softly taking away the buses, taxis, duck flute playing Chinese man. Dodging the “stop and take picture” tourists of Big Ben. I feel like a tourist every time. Always looking to the left, and then to the right. The sun setting over the London eye, light reflecting of numerous buildings. Ah, theres a nice song, “bye bye black sheep to the family”,(no subtle hints honest!) downloaded from another free spirited “dude”. Who sang that song? His father for all I know.

At the underground station. Not much to do apart from try and smile when the news of yet another delay is heard. Everyone queues outside the doors to the train. What,s the point. Theres another one in 2 minutes. Let the meat market fill up and squeeze through the tunnel. Il wait for another train. Still cant get a seat but who cares…Il pick up my kanji cards, Bored. Pick up my book. Now here’s a thought,“CONSIDER for a time how the world might look through other eyes…why might this be inspiring? Perhaps because unhappiness can stem from having only one perspective to play with”

Go home, tennisand gym are on my mind. Other things as well.... I have a strange passion as I step on the tread mill to not stop. To go on and on and on. I do that for 20 minutes. Im sure I could have done more. I come in and out of flash backs of moments of joy, sadness and utter randomness. Im just impatient (as my dad says), so I got bored. Swim and out.
Dinner, guitar, blog, sleep? Im sure im forgetting something. Il find out tomorrow