The Log Blog

On setting a gravestone for my Grandmother

2011-11-12T23:37:00.007Z

Today I did something new. I put in a gravestone for my grandmother.

My paternal grandmother could be a bit of a battleaxe at times, but she was only like that because she knew she was better than other people (she once told me this in all seriousness) and, if I am honest, I am not sure I am in any position to dispute that. Certainly I do not pretend to be knowledgeable enough to judge.

It is perhaps a wonderful and sensible approach to life, after all, is that not the whole point of CBT? Without doubt she had a profound effect on us all, particularly in the stoicism line and we do mourn her passing, although it was her time. The girls, in particular, loved to see her, delighting in playing with the osteoarthritic lumps on her fingers in the innocent way that only children can and which we all secretly rather enjoy - We were frightened of Grandmama as children, but my girls never were, despite her looking far scarier than she ever had in her youth. It saddens me that the youngest will probably not remember her.

Anyway, Grandmama died just before Christmas and the weather was bleak. The snow was so very thick that it seemed as though the interment would not be able to go ahead, but it seemed important to get her underground before Christmas, so we went down to the undertakers with a 4X4 and were quite insistent.

It was not easy - the hearse was automatic and would not get along the Dartmoor lanes in the snow - some hills are too much for any engine when the ground is a rink of Olympic properties. I had to get out and push the hearse up 3 hills on the way (we would have towed it, but for the towing eye needing to be screwed in and being housed under my grandmother) and we finally gave up about 20 yards shy of the church.

Some villagers made the journey on foot and they sang 'all things bright and beautiful' whilst we ferried folk who could not make it by car around in the 4X4 and started only 30 minutes late. No funeral, just my 3 cousins and my sister singing Brother James's Air and some words from the rector and in she went.

Apart from the Rector calling my grandmother "Kathleen" (her name being Katharine), which she would have absolutely hated, it all went well (and that made my father laugh out loud, which rather settled the whole matter down anyway).

We stood there for a bit, so I called out 'Well I'm freezing, what say we all go back into the church for a sing-song?' and so we did.

A few carols in the cold and back to warmth we went.

It was all very pleasant, if that is an appropriate word, but her brother could not make the trip (he is well into his nineties, after all) and several people have said that they felt that the missed out on 'closure'.

I detest the term, but I know what they mean.

So we are going to have a blessing of the stone on the 20th, which meant, of course, that it had to go into the ground.

I went to the farm my Grandmother grew up on and found a hunk of granite, which I dug out from what used to be a hedge and brought it back to Exeter to have it turned into her gravestone.

Here is the stone, along with a mock-up of how I first envisioned it looking:

I am very pleased to be doing this sort of thing, it is immensely satisfying to be able to do something so definite and useful. Not that gravestones are intrinsically useful, but you know what I mean.

As it turns out, I have also left a space for my Aunt on the bottom of the panel. I can confirm that discussing with an octogenarian the preferred wording of her grave marker is a little bit surreal, but we had to make sure we left the right amount of room.

Anyway, it was carved out and now it is in the churchyard, after much heaving of rock today.

The photograph cannot really convey just how massive it is. Not large, as such, just clearly heavy. Serious, even. 1/2 tone of granite (and ballast) is not light. It is, for example, not on jot lighter than half a ton of anything else you care to mention. Nor is digging a hole on Dartmoor normally that easy a task (although it was not too bad, as it happened), but the job is done and I am very satisfied by it all.

Hers is 2nd from the right, front row - next to the wooden cross in the foreground. It will settle in, but I am happy with it. Not only does it look vernacular, but, much more importantly, it is from the farm she grew up on and I would prefer that, even if it was rubbish.

As an aside, it looks a lot less like a television in real life.

Sorry for rambling, have fun and, should she be alive, go visit your grandmother.

some naked Welsh men.

2011-09-09T14:11:00.003+01:00

This amused me an inordinate amount:

I am getting abuse about my tie.

2011-06-16T09:42:00.004+01:00

Here is the tie in question. I have the same but in red and blue with me. Change or keep?

A quick poll - click on your choice:

Should I change my tie?

@Naturalgrump says it is foul, @thomassays suggests that it is yellow and black, not blue, and supplies this song:

Ice breakers.

2010-12-30T14:59:00.009Z

In which our hero goes canoeing on the Exeter canal and, in the space of a mere 5 hours, manages a width.

It transpires that The Dagnall, who you may remember from the incident when I tattooed his eye a few years back, is off for the whole winter break, whilst I slave over a hot Dell, & Is getting restless at home. In an attempt to break the mundane routine of spending time with his lovely wife and adorable son, presumably by way of spending time with In order to juxtapose that Idyllic home-life against my ugly mug, Invited me to come out with him In his canoe. I readily agreed. Sadly we had entirely different activities In mind.

No, It's not going to be one of those stories, you bloody pervert.

Anyway, the entirety of the canal and the river In Exeter have been covered with a thick layer of Ice. Very thick. Thick enough that I was confident enough to go ice skating on the overflow with my children. Thick.

See? It's thick. I have been pumping my friend Iain's yacht whilst he is away in Barbados and of late it is simply a solid hull of ice. (Here is Iain - he is the chap in the lower image, being hauled out of the water as his boat sinks beside him).

The river has cleared now, for the most part, but the almost stagnant canal still sports about a 4" thickness throughout, with the exception of the swing-bridges, where it is clear for a few yards.

This in mind, I am envisioning going ice breaking, but The Dagnall seems not to know of the iciness of the canal and has his heart set on paddling. This nearly scuppers my evening at the offset, but fear not, trusted reader, for the night was much fun.

After some arguments and a bit of going the wrong way, we set off to the Countess Weir swing-bridge at about half six. It was only once we arrived that I realised The Dagnall's confusion about the solidity of the water in the area and he was all for calling our expedition off, but I was having little of that and began smashing the ice near the bank with a hatchet. This was considerably harder than I foresaw. Ice which is 4" thick does not smash, it merely allows the blade of an axe to pass through it on the 4th or 5th blow. This was going to take some time.

On my own, wet of socks and tiring of arms, I was beginning to make up entirely new swear words to curse The Absent Dagnall when lo, he returns triumphant with a stainless steel length of pipe, like a heavy scaffolding pole around 4' long. With this we should be able to make some progress, no?

No. Well, not much. With My Lordship in the rear, holding us steady with an axe in the ice, and The Dagnall smashing away at the solid mass ahead of us, we manage to travel around 20' from the bank before he is exhausted and I am cold. We return to the bank feeling dejected, but I am not one to give up easily. Pure British Mindedness is bloody important, you know.

Whilst The Dagnall is having a wander around, looking for some wood to build a fire with, I go for a walk along the bank and out onto a jetty. It is slippery and a bit dodgy, but then I find my way under the swing bridges and sight clear water, so I return with a compromise. Peradventure a bit of a paddle in the open water will placate matters? I have, you should note gentle reader, absolutely bugger all intention of leaving tonight without making a passage through the ice, but at this early juncture I fancy that it is too soon to start pushing matters.

We hoist the canoe out of the water and place it upon the ice, upon which The Dagnall begins dragging me across the surface. Because the ice is floating it moves with my weight a little and, if I am honest, this is nothing like as exciting as I had hoped for. Much more 'dragging a legless dog through gravel' than 'midget face slide'.

So, sliding around on the ice is right out then. I get out and we tow the canoe across the surface to the bridge. This involves walking out into the canal on beams in a manner pretty much designed to make my mother shout 'STEPHEN' in the screeching manner of mothers everywhere, who tend to resort to using their husbands names for their children in times of real stress. None of the evening has passed by without stress, to be fair. The times when we have not been in danger of falling through the ice and drowning are by far fewer than those where we have, but that's the point, no? Anyway, I digress.

View Ice breaking. in a larger map

We paddle around a little in the water before striking out under the bridges to see what we can find on the other side. A quick scouting out of the river shows that the current is far beyond our capabilities this evening (well, we could go downstream quickly, but we'd have to walk back and we are seventy years old between us, so that's just not happening). We get up some speed before we suddenly come to an abrupt, ice-fuelled halt which almost capsizes us and so we stop for a wee between the bridges.

That's the thing about icy water, you see, it shrinks your bladder to the size of the combined brains of the EDL, which makes for numerous comfort breaks. Back in the canal we venture back to the far bank and onwards downstream to the main body of ice.

The ice is thinner here and I am able to just smash it with the scaffolding pole, breaking out a large area of water around us, but it soon thickens and we return to using an axe to cut a path. This is not going well, but again, there's no giving up on these things.

I soon develop a successful, but ultimately painful technique. I smash the scaffolding pole through the ice as far ahead as I can reach, then lever it back and forth, smashing both the top of the ice on my side of the puncture and the bottom of the ice beyond the holey fulcrum. The downside to this being, of course, that when the far tip of the pole finally breaks through, I punch the ice will the full force of my rapidly swelling fist.

Having cut a line of this nature on either side of the canoe, I then give it some welly and break off the central square, before pushing it down, under the canoe, moving forwards 3' and beginning all over again.

This is clearly less than refreshing and I am soon wet and tired. Additionally, at this stage we have a long wooden pole supporting a gas lamp hanging from the front of the canoe and, for fear of coming over all Ratty and Mole, it features the twin qualities of being quite beautiful, in a tranquil, countryside kind of manner, and utterly in the way.

Being the sensible chap I am, I soon counter this issue by implementing a 'splash and smash' manoeuvre, causing hazing to the glass of the gas lamp and eliciting some mild expletives from The Dagnall, who owns the lamp, yet understands the inevitability of the incident. Sorry Dangall.

A brief inspection of the damage is as good a reason for a break as any, so I begin breaking out a more narrow channel and engineer a situation where we are wedged into the ice flow and can hold ourselves steady using the handle of a hatchet with the minimum of fuss. We need to relocate the lamp amidships and also could do with some sustenance ourselves. This is not easy work.

Wedged in, as we are, we unload the wood from the bottom of the canoe, piling the pieces of plywood onto the ice beside us. Fire and ice are not natural companions, yet we still press on, placing a few lengths of four by two (two by four for any Americans out there, not the cloth we used in the army with our rifle pull through) directly against the ice, with a platform of ply upon them and the fire basket straight on the ply.

What does an Englishman do when stuck fast in the middle of an ice flow in a canoe? We made tea, what else?

Once we had the kettle boiling on the fire and some crisps inside us, the world became more peaceful and more painful concurrently. My bruises and cramps started to ache, but I cared less about it. By the time we had boiled the kettle a second time and had four mugs of tea between us, I was more than ready to continue opening the breach. The question was, where had it got to?

In order to make our way along the narrow channel I was breaking, it was necessary to push the blocks of ice which I cut free from the main sheet down under the canoe or beneath the solid ice in order to leave us clear(ish) water to pass through. During our tea break, however, much of this ice had floated up from wherever it had lain and our path was nothing more than cracked ice where the slabs had resettled in some sort of auto-completing jigsaw puzzle. That solved the problem of 'on or back' for us anyway.

I hadn't got but a few yards when the ambulance arrived.

Now an ambulance is not something one wants to see whilst being overtly intrepid. The brave ladies and gentlemen of that particular profession have to deal with the result of misadventure on an all too regular basis and, it is fairly safe to say, they view acts of utterly unnecessary bravado with an element of disdain. The average paramedic is wholly of the opinion that climbing mount Everest is all very well for your professionals, but that they really would be a whole lot better off staying in with a nice cup of tea. Not too hot, mind.

It was therefore not without some anxiety that The Dagnall and I watched their approach. For approach they did. Ill-content with merely parking up beside the canal, the ambulance crew turn their steed towards the canal and pull up (with a slightly worrying crunch of gravel, of the kind seemingly designed to make silly canoeists believe that they may well just brake too late and end up in the frozen channel) with their headlights blinding us.

By now we have the gas lamp (in a poor state of repair) hanging amidships, so I am utterly retina-free by the time I manage my third blink and this is all a little authoritarian for my liking, however the situation was not all that bad. Beyond a little judgement on our characters we had nothing to fear. The conversation went a little like this, although you have to imagine my half-frozen Lordship continuing to break ice all through the exchange:

"Are you all okay out there?"
"Yes thanks, we are doing this on purpose."
"Are you not frozen?"
"No thank you, we had a nice fire and a cup of tea, just back there" I motion backwards with my scaffolding pole, highlighting the site of the camp-fire, so recently abandoned behind us.
"Haven't you got anything better to be doing?"

I have to admit that I was a little put out by this, after all, what could possibly be better than an ice-breaking expedition across the canal? I was, however, acutely aware that in this era, where reading the Daily Mail is still not an offence which carries a sentence of even a little incarceration, a bit of bitching at a copper could have my mug on the front of the Star, after an idiot ambulance driver tries to save someone who is in very little peril. Certainly not even as much as he desires.

"If we were not out here, breaking our way through the ice in the middle of the night in a canoe, we would be forced to remain at home with our horrible wives."

I have always found that the derision of the opposite sex, coupled with the use of a term of manly endearment, works wonders when dealing with public service workers (regardless of their gender). "Mate" I add.

This does the trick and, a few minutes of chatter later (during which I continue working, seeing as I can, in the light of their ambulance halogens, the large break where The Dagnall had first set out) they drive off, leaving us with an ominous 'see you later, then boys' to remind us of the situation which a cut or pierced hull would land us in.

I make good use of their short stay to mark out my path a little with some flung chunks of ice, which flitter across the surface as would spittle on a wood-burner. and we reach the bank in another twenty minutes of so and are able to rest.

Now, we never quite made it to the far bank and I am keen to manage a full width, so after a much deserved rest, I convince The Dagnall that he needs to take us back across. This proves almost too difficult to complete - getting the canoe into the tight passage from a position of floating around in an open lagoon is nigh on impossible, since the canoe is bounced back into the bay with ever ice strike, but eventually we are in and with The Dagnall pushing down the floating ice with a paddle and I propelling us along with the hatchet, we make admirable progress across to the opposite bank, where the thin ice we encountered earlier is weak enough that we are able to drive our way through and The Dagnall picks a piece of foliage to mark the occasion.

That is about it really. We return to the bank where the car is situated, load up, warm up (I make use of the Passat's heated seats, although I generally eschew them with zeal), return the length of scaffolding to its home in the fence (I dearly want to keep this as both a useful tool and a memento, but it is not mine to have) and return home for a cup of tea and glory.

A worthwhile use of my time and no mistake.

I am on BBC3 on Monday at 8:30pm

2010-10-27T15:51:00.002+01:00

I will be naked, farting in a bath.

Here is what I will look like.

An interesting morning

2010-09-23T10:30:00.004+01:00

On my way in this morning I decided to stop at the garage. Garage is a strange word and I may dwell on it later on. My van is abhorrent. Perhaps the least attractive vehicle on the road today.

Not that bad, I suppose, maybe I exaggerated a little, after all a colour coded bumper, whilst unattractive, may be to some people's taste and is hardly that offensive, eh? Let's have a look at the front.

Oh my God, what is that? AAGGHH! Kill it with sticks.

Etc.

Anyway, now that we have got the ugliness of my van out of the way, I am having some problems with her at the moment. She is surging a little when climbing hills and generally misbehaving, with a little yellow light to tell me that the garage (yes, yes, I'll come to it. It isn't really very interesting anyway) need to take a gander at the innards. They had a go and replaced the drive-by-wire throttle sensor, but it has been to no avail and nothing is improved (including my bank balance - it cost almost £200 for no gain), so I thought to myself 'I know, I'll pop in on my way past and see what they can manage'.

What they can manage is to see my car today, so I am writing this whilst walking to work, which is a lot further than I would have hoped for, but such is life. I was just passing the back of the recycling centre now and the scent of fresh dew on moist mattresses is delightful. No,not delightful, that other one. Shit. Anyway, I am walking and it is not the natural state of the My Lordship, being more suited to the recline.

Now for the bit which is mildly interesting. Not very, mark you, just mildly. If you are after a good yarn then today wasn't the day to arrive here. As I am passing under the railway bridge, I notice a lorry looking rather lost. The driver is adopting an air of subdued confidence, but I am not fooled, the artic is having no fun at all, blocking the road and twitching its wheels in concern.

As I watch a bus pulls up and the 'driver' (I have never been particularly fond of bus operators, they tend to run bicycles over for sport) begins conversing on the topic of directions. As I approach it becomes increasingly clear that the bus driver is sending the lorry down a very narrow, long, double parked, residential and generally arse dead end. One which will take the lorry a good 40 minutes to reverse back out of.

Given that the lorry is looking for Colas (which largely burned down recently) and that, from where the bus driver is sitting there must be all of 10 yards to the large sign at the Colas gate which, helpfully, bears the legend 'COLAS', I am a little surprised by the level of gittishness available.

For clarity, Colas is here: http://is.gd/foCsb and, if you turn around 180 degrees, the lorry is where the white van is at the junction. Bear in mind also that this is not Manchester or London, this is Exeter. The bus driver knows for certain that the directions he is given lead to a dead end.

I intervened and pointed out the sign, saying "Are you looking for COLAS?" and, upon receiving the expected affirmative response, continued "It's just there, by the big sign that says 'COLAS'". I was thanked and wandered on. It is getting close to me being late for work, I must hurry.

Have fun!

Oh yes. I said I'd say something about the word Garage. It's not that interesting, please feel free to leave now. I Pronounce garage in three different ways, depending on the meaning:

I buy petrol in a garage, pronounced 'garridge'.

I have my can repaired in a garage, pronounced 'garrardge'

I park my car (or rather do not, since I do not have one) in a garage, pronounced "g'rardge"

I did say it was dull. I need to get a shift on if I am to arrive at work before 9, I'll publish this later, by which time you will have read most of this already on twitter. Cheerio.

Infographics - the end of a love affair?

2010-07-27T13:11:00.008+01:00

When I first started seeing infographics I loved them. From chortling at the chucklesome 'Venn That Tune' book in Rick Astley's toilet to lusting after the VW camper in the Red Riding Hood infographic video (which you really should watch, if you haven't already).

When Iceland's Eyjafjallajokull volcano erupted I was in love with infographics. As a pedant, the volcanoes Vs. Planes infographic was a delight as it was not only informative, beautiful and topical, but also horribly wrong. We pedants commented in our thousands and eventually, after three more iterations, a corrected version was released. our relationship couldn't have been better. But then things went awry, leading us to where we are today.

'What can have caused such a dramatic split?' I hear you eagerly enquire. Well, I shall tell you. Yes, I do have to, now shut up and listen.

In the beginning we had some lovely designers producing some innovative work. such people as Flowing Data, Information is Beautiful and QRarts were making information into something we wanted to look at and to learn from. Sadly, everyone wanted to look at them, they became excellent link bait and, as so often happens, every traditional PR agency who want to pretend that they can do ePR jumped on the bandwagon and ruined it.

Where I had been salivating over the quite wonderful Drug Deaths piece in the guardian, I was suddenly faced with adverts, even infographics in adverts for infographics. Now I actually believe that a few diagrams are a wonderful thing, but there is such a thing as overkill.

So, what happened between infographics and me? How did things go so badly wrong? Let me explain through a medium I know you will understand.

In summary: My red pen colours in better than my blue one.

Gin-online, well, erm, online.

2010-07-13T15:51:00.005+01:00

So, it is fairly well documented that I am a fan of the almighty gin. Who wouldn't be?

I like to quaff Bombay Sapphire, seep sloe gin, gulp Plymouth, swig Larios, mingle with Tesco Dry London, stick with basic Tanqueray, embroil myself with some No 10, decucumberate a Hendricks, mix myself up a Ginness, delight in an Oxley cold distilled gin, prepare some blueberry gin or simply lounge around with some Pimms, dressed as a Pirate.

But drinking gin is only the beginning of understanding and, let's face it, Wikipedia is about as reliable as a donkey's overdraft, so I have been left to my own gin tasting devices. Until now!

I now see that www.gin-online.co.uk tells me all I need to know.

So, a blatant plug for a resource I am not involved in, and I am off for a gin.

Solving the oil spill one idiot at a time.

2010-06-29T10:26:00.007+01:00

So let me get this absolutely clear; In protest that BP (who produce oil, which does have negative effects) use some of their profits to fund arts, some children threw molasses (a product which has had its own share of spills - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston_Molasses_Disaster) at the pavement outside the Tate. [Video below the fold].

I suspect that BP will be severely damaged by this action, whereas the low income cleaners will be uplifted and gratified that their dictatorial and oppressive employers have suffered this blow.

I particularly enjoyed the aggressive way in which the lead protester threw his molasses directly at the young staff member, clearly a cog in the well oiled corporate machine which is BP. You can tell he is a wrong 'un, he is wearing a yellow vest.

May I suggest targeting Transocean with some Nivea or perhaps poorly cement up the doors to the Halliburton buildings next? That would show them.

This seems like misguided, poorly considered low level vandalism, akin to throwing eggs at houses on Halloween.

The original post can be found here.

[UPDATE: Turns out that the molasses will not scrub off and some form of oil based detergent will be required. Go protesters!]

An open letter to Nestles

2010-05-05T13:11:00.002+01:00

The 'knitted by nanas' campaign is excellent. Funny, clean and enjoyed by everyone. Sadly, it does not at any point or anywhere within the websites or, more relevantly, on the boxes, mention the fact that shreddies are not actually 'knitted by nanas'.

Sadly, whilst I like the campaign, I am left with a child who refuses to believe that shreddies are not actually made by old ladies who knit each square. I try to teach my children the truth whenever they ask questions, but I have found a brick wall here, where their age is such that they do not fully understand advertising and do understand small-print.

The argument 'If they were not really knitted by grandmas then it would have to say so on the box somewhere' is a valid one and one which is being used as evidence against me and, when I think about it, this is true. The box explicitly states, without caveat, a manufacturing process which is fabricated.

The thin end of the wedge which ends with dried turd being sold as organic, hand-rolled processed cheese? Probably not. Annoying when trying to explain things to children? Slightly.

All I ask is for an asterisk and an explanation in a tiny font.

Cheers,

Manley

Rusty bodies.

2010-04-20T15:13:00.005+01:00

So, Loxlee loves cars - I cannot say I share his enthusiasm, but what do I know? What I do like is cheap viral videos with bugger all real content and a lot of fun.

In his most recent post, this young Capri driver (yes, seriously) has been covering the PPC in the Park campaign for 2010, which are slightly less offensive than last year's "Burn your share of the oil while there is some left" but still sort of shows a touch of tits and, at the end of the day, Manley loves breasts.

Here are the videos:

Only one tit in this one and he's driving a Rover.

This one has tits!

You'll have to go to his site (loxlee-loves-engines.com) if you want to see last year's banned commercial, because I regard anything the ASA say with the utmost respect.

I am not sure that they have quite pulled it off, but it is good, clean, low budget fun and, frankly, is better than the Savebuckets.com video we made so, well, hats off to them.

iPad

2010-04-09T15:46:00.001+01:00

I got given an iPad today.

So I naturally got naked in the office and played with it.

Sadly there is no redtube, as it has no Flash.

Also it is made of pine.

The cheese is a lie!

2010-03-11T16:08:00.004Z

Chef Daniel Angerer has declared in his blog that he is making cheese with 'Mommy's milk'.

This is strangely interesting.

What I find most unbelievable about this is that cheese needs milk which is easily dehomogenised. Human milk is not. The production of sheese (that is to say, cheese made from human milk) is not viable since breast milk can not curdle, because the protein content is much lower than, for example, goat's milk.

I have tried. I had more success with Yoghurt and I have cooked two very nice placentas but human milk simply will not curdle.

After doing some more research, what this appears to be is normal cheese, made with a higher protein milk, with human milk included with it. Essentially this would be normal cheese with a human milk flavouring.

In his blog, the chef suggest that the rennet is creating curds from the mother's milk, but I am unable to replicate this - I have asked him if he can confirm that he is actually turning the human milk into cheese or whether he is simply adding it, but my comments are not being published and I am receiving no response.

Right now my knowledge, experience and experimentation suggests that it must be the latter. As such, I feel that this is basically a bit of link bait which, whilst it has worked, is basically based on a lie.

I look forward to contradiction with gleeful anticipation.

Flickr fun.

2010-01-06T11:57:00.000Z

I use Flickr a fair bit, but I have been playing with CompFight.com and found this image, tagged 'Manley', of a man, apparently having a poo.

[Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/14029570@N03/2599729699/]

As you know, I am easily pleased.

Manley Snapper

2010-01-05T11:48:00.002Z

I love Manley Labs products, but this photograph of their snapper made me smile.

[Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/35622002@N05/4090361992/]

I should stress that I am in no way affiliated with Manley Labs, although anything they want to send me free would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers,

Manley

A busy day

2010-01-03T20:26:00.002Z

In which Grandma falls ill, Ben goes missing and our hero is exposed momentarily to Jamaica ginger cake.

So, I crawled reluctantly from my pit at an hour which can safely be categorised as late. Matthewparker had called around with the intention of borrowing a megaphone in order to alert a large number milling athletes, who were about to embark on 6 miles of what any sane man would consider torment, of the presence of flood-water on the route. Matthewparker successfully on his healthy way, bullhorn at the ready, I rose and bathed the children.

We had taken a short stroll, following breakfast, so I was ripe for a snooze, but was cajoled by a trio of baying female offspring into playing Super Mario N64. In fairness to the daughters involved, I quite possible require a greatly reduced quantity of pleading when children's activities involve a joypad. Certainly I would take less readily to a game of hide-and-seek.

Anyway, their race completed, the Parkerboglus returned triumphant and we had quite settled into a normal Sunday sort of tea and cake affair, when my father, hereafter referred to as 'Old Man', calls me up on the telephone and informs me that his wife, my mother (Grandma from here on in), is being bungled into a helicopter with the express motive of winging (or perhaps blading, I could not decide) her off to the old hospital as soon as was practical. Obviously there was nothing for it but to get to the centre of medical excellence which is the Royal Devon and Exeter Hospital (Wonford) and pronto.

I arrived to find that I had preceded the chopper by some margin and there was some essence of anti-climax as I wandered up to the heliport and I found myself rather lounging against a pale, listening to the gradually amplifying whirr of the Devon Air Ambulance.

Once the bird had landed the crew seemed reluctant to acknowledge the fool on the ground, presumably the spectacle of a slow local waving at the flying medics is not an unusual one, but I happened, by pure chance, to be wearing a hoody which The Dagnall had given me, which bears the simple legend 'MANLEY' upon the left breast in gold seriffed lettering. It was to this that I gestured and, after speaking to the patient, with some gesturing which I clearly read as referring to my shoulder length hair, I was summoned to assist in the removal of Grandma from the flying machine.

I felt quite useful, since the porters had not arrived.

Anyway, before too long I was off, with Old Man and Little Helen having arrived, so I was off home. Grandma was a hole in the heart baby and, when you grow up with a mother with a tricuspid valve replacement you get used to the occasional high drama every few years.

Next up Ben was missing - he set out on a half cross-country, half road ride several hours before, but had not yet returned. This was worrying, since it was icy and unpleasant out and a lot of drivers were being skittish in the way that they seem to do when nearing the end of a long weekend.

Once again we were into the van and off to find Ben. I fully expected to see him zooming down a hillside in the other direction, grinning like a fool in his gay abandon, but the possibility remained that he had taken a spill on the ice or just had a bad puncture and was pushing his way back to camp. In this evening's temperatures that could be a serious matter. But no.

Ben turned up at his abode when we were not 3 miles out from town, so we were able to get home and have still more tea.

Something to do, even something unpleasant, like carrying a stricken Grandma or driving out to find a beleaguered Ben, takes one's mind off the real worry, the health of a relative or the welfare of a friend.

Happy new year.

Post office strike

2009-11-03T11:41:00.003Z

So, the Post Office are on strike? Well then, if you want more money, don't screw up my post.

I received a letter which I was expecting this morning, containing (or, as we will subsequently discover, not containing) a 3G Vodaphone dongle.

Rather than arriving in the normal way, emblazoned with a stamp, crisp, shiny and reminiscent of Christmases past, this package, for all its brilliant yellow envelope, was encased in a slightly shabby plastic bag, bearing the legend ‘ Our Sincere Apologies’.

The dongle was in a card envelope, standard 100g one. That in turn was in a Royal Mail plastic bag, upon which were the words:

Our Sincere Apologies

Dear Customer,
I am sorry that the enclosed item, addressed to you, has been damaged whilst in our care. Although we do all we can to prevent such damage, it does occasionally occur.

If you think any of the items are missing or damaged, you can obtain the form ‘Lost, damaged or delayed inland mail’ by phoning your local Customer Service Centre on 08457740740 (all calls charged at local rates) or from Post Office® branches and we will arrange for investigations to be made.

For more information please refer to Royal Mail’s Code of Practice booklet, your guide to our service standards.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Yours sincerely

Customer Service Manager

Telephone: 0845 740 740

Except the envelope hasn’t been damaged. It has been opened- neatly. And the Dongle has gone.

So you cannot have a pay rise until you learn how to send letters without stealing from them.

Allegedly.

Fray Bentos Pies

2009-10-06T05:55:00.004+01:00

Chez Manley, Friday is Fray-day as we celebrate the joy that is the Fray Bentos pie.

It is only as relatively recently as recently that I discovered that Fray Bentos was not named after a brace of culinary geniuses who I had presumed were named Messrs Bentos and Fray. No, gentle reader, it is in fact a small town of 25000 in South West Uruguay, close to the Argentine border.

The town appears to have pretty much always produced processed meat in one way or another and the site of the Liebig Extract of Meat Company (which was responsible for such meaty goodness as Oxo) now boasts a rather smashing museum, presumably dedicated to the mighty Fray Bentos Pie.

Personally I have always favoured the Fray Bentos Steak and Kidney Pudding, but the family Manley grows and, with it, the menu must adapt to meat [sic] every palette. Now Fray-days can stretch beyond steak and kidney, through to such delights as the Fray Bentos Mince Beef and Onion Pie (as recalled in late 2008 for containing shards of metal) or even the god-awful mushroom one.

So, I knew that Fray Bentos was owned by Premier Foods (The UK's largest manufacturer of foodstuffs), and I was not overly surprised to learn that, thanks largely to the UK market, last year the Fray Bentos brand was worth around £30million, but I am shocked to learn that, despite the huge success of the little pies from South America's cattle country (Fray Bentos Pies command a 94.6% market share), Premier Foods intend to change the Fray Bentos brand.

One of the positives from this is a Tender 'Just Steak' Fray Bentos Pie offering, which I welcome, but there is a massive downside.

"all recipes across the entire range have been improved, with a 20% reduction of salt per pie and no artificial colours and flavourings"

Why ruin my Fray Bentos Pie? I love it just the way it is. Oh, and there is more. . .

Why, PF, why? Why destroy the Fray Bentos Pie brand? You know it is successful, why ruin it?

Rob Stacey, who is something to do with Marketing at Fray Bentos pies, apparantly has been saying that: “The evolution of the Fray Bentos pie has led to the perfect recipes being created. These new modern recipes will attract sales from a wider consumer base without losing our original following of “Great British Blokes”. Premier Foods and Fray Bentos are making it our priority to create the ultimate pie and hot canned meal which can be eaten by any family, couple, or student.”

Well Rob Stacey, I say that you are a tit. Fray Bentos Pies were perfect, you are just going to wreck them and the “Great British Blokes” really are not a real persona to target, After all, the “Great British Blokes” are generally not going to be doing the shopping anyway, so you need to be targeting the “Beaten British Wife”, you bell-end.

I mean, really. Fray Bentos Pies are and almost saturation brand, utterly in control of their market, and they go and pull a stunt like this. I suppose that every Marketing Manager wants to put their stamp on a brand, but let's not stamp on the brand, eh?

I'll leave you with the complaints of Tricia, who feels that the new Fray Bentos Pie tine are too thick and even goes as far as questioning whether the new recipe is worth the extra effort needed to get to it.

Fridays may become fry-days at this rate, Fray Bentos. Don't forget your user base. I seriously believe that, in an economic climate which should benefit the Fray Bentos Pie, you may just have made a blunder which simply removes your product from the eyes of the consumer and opens the floor to a new pretender.

Then where will Uraguay be, eh? Apart, obviously, from in South America.

An updated interface - Hacklab's automated tweeting toilet.

2009-09-28T15:51:00.004+01:00

The crazy fellows at hacklab have produced a toilet which tweets every time it is flushed.

If you follow @hacklabtoilet, and I cannot imagine why you would not want to, then you'll get to see every time the flush is activated (or at least as often as it works).

The full tech spec is available here, should you wish to set up a similar device, or if you want to follow someone more interesting then you could do a lot better than My Lordship. Really, you could do better.

Oxley Cold Distilled Gin

2009-09-02T10:30:00.005+01:00

I am a big gin drinker. Let's face it, I am a big everything, but I do like a nice gin. Bombay Sapphire, my home made sloe gin, Plymouth, Larios, Tesco Dry London, Tanqueray or Hendricks (especially Hendricks), I'll drink it. The way I see it, short of novelty flavours, you are going to have to go a long way to pique my interest with something new on the gin front.

with their cold distilled gin, Oxley have done so.

The Oxley twist is that their ‘super premium’ gin is produced using a "cold distilling" process. 14 different botanicals are macerated in grain spirits, then the macerated grain is hand spooned into the kettle. Rather than heating the micture, in the traditional manner, a vacuum is then created, which causes the alcohol to vaporize at just -5°C.

The vapour then condenses in a secondary probe at -100°C, from where the liquid gin is hand collected in one of the 120 bottles a day which is produced. That is just 480 bottles a week - when you make gin this good you can afford a day off.

Obviously this all sound a little gimicky, so I had to taste it. I was pleasantly surprised. Apparantly "Oxley has a mild juniper bouquet that gives rise to intense, almost sweet, herbals on the tongue only to surprise with a return of juniper vapor. The mouth feel is very smooth and the martini it makes is excellent". All I know is that it was the cleanest tasting gin I have experienced.

Oxley also employ continuous distillation. Where batch distillation can mean that an amount of flavour is lost in the heads and the tails of each batch, where continuous distillation continually extracts the pure gin.

The Oxley bottle, with its sartorially worn galvanized tin bucket around the bottom a leather cord 'fashionably twisted around the neck' is quirky but tasteful, but it is not cheap at around $100/litre.

Indeed, it is too expensive for me, but . . . because of the low output, Oxley bottles are individually numbered. Whilst looking around I came across #00063 and my interest was aroused. Some time later we discovered #00073 and #00075 (which Dug purchased, it being the year of our birth). I was considering #00063, but had decided to leave it (it is very expensive gin) when #00069 was discovered.

I now own bottle number 69 of Oxley cold distilled gin. I just need to convince myself to open it.

Stop turning me against Freddie.

2009-08-22T11:07:00.004+01:00

I love Flintoff, he's a great British all rounder and I love his happy approach to the game (in contrast to, for example, Collingwood).

That said, I am getting fed up with Freddie fever.

Hearing today that Broad's performance yesterday was a rival for Freddie's at Lords was supremely irritating. 5-37 is considerably better than 5-92, whichever way you look at it.

His batting has not been extraordinary either:
37 + 26 at Sophia Gardens
4 + 30 (not out) at Lords
74 (and a good 74 at that) at Edgbaston
7 at the Oval.

An average of nearly 30 is not bad, but it is not even as good as Collingwood who scored only 4 runs across both innings at Headingly, where Flintoff was rested.

Bowling he has 8 wickets for 375 runs, which is not comparable to Collingwood's better 1 for 38 (because of the difference in scale), but Anderson has taken 12 for 496, despite playing in the disaster that was Headingly and Broad has racked up an astonishing 17 for just 473 runs.

I'm not saying Flintoff isn't great, he is, and I am not expecting him to perform as well as the batsmen and the bowlers, but why he is being lauded to quite the extent he is, I cannot understand. Sadly this media frenzy is turning me against him, when I want desperately to have him leave the scene with a great series.

Yes he is good, but he's no Botham.

The remainder of Nadia

2009-08-06T09:44:00.000+01:00

I turned up this morning to find this:

which amused me, slightly.

Nadia + Laurence Dallaglio = Sturdy Girl.

2009-08-05T19:46:00.009+01:00

This is Laurence Dallaglio, we escorted him from the premises of the pub (John Gandy's). We hope we can go back.

We think he is too Manley and so we have taken a model from a high street retailer who we call Nadia (because we have 'no-idea' what her real name is) and cut her head off. This hurt quite a lot. Not her, me. Donna, I am sorry, but your weak girly scissors were not suited to the job of hacking through cardboard. After all, this was not just any cardboard, this was hard, laminated High Street Retailer cardboard.

Because it hurt so much, David Tapp took over cutting duties. He likes it really and made a particular fuss of her hair.

This is the finished product. It looks a little like Sturdy Girl, b3ta's favourite celebrity:

She is fine! We like a girl whose neck doesn't quite fit her shoulders. And there ends the blog.

Locked in.

2009-07-23T18:13:00.004+01:00

Today I became locked in the lavatory with no paper.

This would be less irritating if it were not for two aggravating factors:

I would have had enough paper had I not blown my nose several times whilst on the job.

I had to call David Tapp to come and rescue me.

The toilet roll dispenser takes two rolls, each huge to the point of ridicule, so that when one is empty a slide allows access to the second. Sadly the second was not there today. I have yet to kill the cleaner.

David, bless him, came to my rescue by bringing a life-size cardboard cut-out of Lawrence Dallaglio into the toilets and assaulting the cubicle.

Thankfully he assaulted the cubicle next to me and I was able to get some paper and return to a full ovation in the office.

Bah!

Have I died of Swine Flu yet?

2009-07-23T18:13:00.001+01:00

No.

Ginness

2009-04-16T11:32:00.007+01:00

Today is a lovely day for a Ginness.

Ingredients:

4 ice cubes
2 oz Hendricks gin
4 oz Fever Tree Indian Tonic Water
10 oz Guinness Original Stout
Lime wedge for garnish

Preparation method

Gently pour Guinness into a straight pint glass.
Place the ice cubes in a tall, narrow glass.
Add the Hendricks and the tonic water onto the ice cubes.
Stir gin mixture well with a long spoon.
Upend gin into the pint glass with the Guinness.
Garnish with lime wedge and serve immediately.
Rinse and repeat.

* Calories 298.4
* Protein 2.0g
* Sugars 29.6g
* Total Fat 0.3g
* Salt 8.8mg

Blind as a bat.

2009-02-10T10:08:00.000Z

Having travelled up to That London for the last couple of days of last week, I am feeling positively cosmopolitan.

I had a lovely dinner, although their idea of a commentworthily huge meal in That London equates to a goodly sized bit of beef and too few chips in Exeter, but what can one do? I met some ex-Future people who were pretty much universally nice and it was excellent to see Melvin again after so long.

Perhaps I had better return to ground with which you, my gentle reader, will be familiar. Me.

Not a huge update, I went to the optician. I have been having a few headaches and so I toddled along for a check. The optician is nice enough, but she has terrible breath and a very hairy top lip, which is disconcerting when she leans in to within a mere 27 beard seconds of my face to peer at my retina.

After the normal puffs of air to the face and the watching the balloon test, I have some smashing news: "You have the best long distance vision I have ever measured . . .".

Woo! Yay! Hooplah! Maybe even a punani, except, wait. There was an ellipsis in there, wasn't there? There is a 'but' coming. Oh dear. I know that to many of you this will seem like a petty thing, I am a middle aged man with receding hair, a proceeding stomach and a hopefully infertile scrotum, so how unexpected can it be that my eyesight might be failing? Well, let me tell you this, it is utterly arse!

". . . but you will need a prescription for VDU use".

Bitch.

The overtly camp technician leads me back to the front desk to discuss my glasses, and hands me over to a woman cut from the receptionist mould.

There is something about Doctor and Dentist receptionists which can only be bred there. I sincerely believe that all medical receptionists and school secretaries are from the same original stock. If ever there was an argument for creation and short-Earth theories then it must surely be the guileless, embittered women who inhabit the desks and counters of our nations monopolies.

They know that you have nowhere else to go, you see. They sense that you absolutely need to have the tooth drilled, or to let the headmaster know that little George will be out of class for the next few days with a vomiting bug, so they can be as obnoxious as they like and there is nothing you can do about it.

As long as they smile and remain officious whilst they drain every last drop of joy from your situation, they know that any retaliation on your part will merely mark you down as 'one of them'. You know it too, you have seen them, the ones who are either genuinely unpleasant to begin with or, in the face of constant whittling bile from the haggard spinster behind the Formica worktop, finally snap and storm off in a cloud of expletives. There is no benefit in that, the receptionist merely retains the high moral ground and has another example to prove that the customer is always wrong. You know this and she knows this and, worst of all, she knows that you know it.

There can be no benefit to the human species for these abominations to have arisen naturally. There is nothing in the phenotype which could be classed as a positive variance. Indeed, the receptionist only truly serves to hinder mankind's progress. The only possible explanation remaining is that the receptionists are created by a deity, the alternative, that these acrimonious termagants actually engage in sexual relationships, is too absurd to contemplate.

So, we return to the shrew at hand. Now I only want to wear these glasses when I am in front of a VDU - I do not need them even for reading paper-based print, so appearance is of no real consequence. I mention this and she releases the smallest of sneers. Do not get me wrong, I have long ago learned to face The Receptionists with equanimity, I am not becoming even mildly riled by this crone, indeed I would be far more shocked were she polite or even human, I am merely relaying the situation. To cut a long story short, my lenses are to cost me £225, plus frames. "Shall we start at the cheapest and work up?" she asks with the belittling tone which suggests that a pauper like myself needs assistance.

This is another trait of The Receptionists, they always look down on mere mortal men. Be they manning an NHS drop in desk, behind a Post Office counter or idling away, processing the return of faulty goods at Marks & Spencer, they know you need them and somehow translate this into a superiority which must prove that they are a separate breed. Were these really the poorly paid jobs which The Receptionists pretend, propagating the myth through the advertising of false vacancies in the local press, then their universal confidence that the wealth of the customer does not match up to their own high standards could not be maintained. I digress.

"No, let's not".
"Sorry Mr Manley?"
"Let us not 'start at the cheapest and work up'" I should stress here that I am calm and not angry, just conversational, "Let's just leave it for now, eh?"
"I am sorry Mr Manley, but the optician does say that you need glasses for VDU work."
"Well, I have managed long enough and I rather think that 85 pints of Spitfire might well go further towards relieving the stress than a brace of glass discs. Good day ma'am."

I feel elated as I leave the shop. It is not that I have saved £300, but that I have shown one of The Receptionists that I do not need her. I can operate alone. I am a free man. I still need glasses. Bugger.

I slink, yes 'slink', I am not sure that my chin was actually clear of the floor tiles, into another optician, clutching my prescription and avoiding those with thicker spectacles in the hope that my newly discovered ocular deformity will not become exasperated by their condition. The Receptionists await me.

There are three of them, they ignore me. We have all been ignored by The Receptionists, they type at their terminal or hold a telephone to their ear for precisely 5 seconds longer than one can bear before raising their eyes to you. This is different. The Receptionists are not doing anything. Nothing at all. They are merely standing still ignoring My Lordship. The word has been passed.

The fear hits me and I can feel the sweat trickling down the nape of my neck for a full 2 minutes. I attempt conversation, "Hello". Nothing. A direct assault "Hello? Could any of you help me at all, please?". Nothing. Eventually I resort to a fully flanking attritional attack, using a passing little girl, "When you grow up, you make sure that you are not as rude as these ladies". Nothing.

A pretty girl comes over and says pointedly 'They will be with you in just a second' and suddenly all three of The Receptionists clamour to assist. Have I discovered the hedgemon? I leave the three to cackle a-whiles and approach the spectacular hive queen, who manages to sell me a pair of bins, with lenses, for a modest £25 and am away into the night.

16 weeks; the final outing.

2009-02-05T22:07:00.002Z

Well, I am something of an old hand at this now, having dropped off my first semen specimen almost 4 weeks ago.

I am riding Matthewparker's Lemond Reno, so I am being exceptionally careful today. There is nothing like having a pot of his own ejaculate in his pocket to make a man cycle with care.

This is the point at which everything comes together. based on this deposit Jim could stop using contraceptives and we can safely go on with our lives, OR the pain could have all been for nothing.

It is not really exciting, more worrying. still hurt too much to risk and serious cycling.

Whilst the pot is enormous, it is not as large as a fat cat. Bun is not actually sniffing the bag, it is a clever trick of perspective. Woo!

Anyway, the pot of goo was delivered without a hitch and I stopped in at the bike shop on my way to work and saw my bike, resplendent with its new, larger, 351 frame.

Not a bad day at all.

If it comes back fertile I am not doing this again.

Domestic snowboarding

2009-02-02T23:26:00.000Z

Okay, everyone knows that it is snowing in Devon. The M5 was closed. Dug had to abandon his car and walk the two and a half hours home, where his water, heat and general life support had all failed. Crashed happened everywhere. Many people could not get necessary food and warmth and Manley went snowboarding overnight.

I know it's a fuzzy image, but they all were, it was dark and I fell on every single run - image provided courtesy of the ever lovely Tinium.

The back out of the Land Rover was fun, as was three up on a board. I fell over lots and should apologise to Mel for smashing her trays, but if it is any consolation I have two nasty puncture wounds, on in my thigh.

Cheers in particular to Dagnal, Ads and the giddy-bobbards for a smashing evening and at least I was not the one who broke a snowboard.

And there goes the car.

2009-01-18T16:28:00.003Z

So, on Friday I broke the frame on my Dawes Milk Race, which I have had since passing my Common Entrance in 1988.

Today, upon leaving Sainsbury's car park, the prop shaft fell off the Delica. Buying the guitar is looking more and more like a mistake.

One interesting thing about this is the diverse nature of human behaviour. In the scenario of a supermarket car park everyone is very busy and selfish. Around a dozen cars manoeuvred around me, sounding their horns, whilst I stood in the road and picked up my prop shaft; none offered to help. Of these, all but one then pulled back into the right lane and queued behind my stricken Delica, sitting with her hazard warning lights on and without a driver, and proceeded to toot their horns in rage at the commander-less car.

Given that I was actually standing in the road, holding a prop shaft in my arms, one would imagine that they could have considered the situation and avoided delaying themselves further.

In stark contrast, once I was out on the open road (the great joy of a four wheel drive truck is that, on the occasion of breaking a half shaft, prop shaft, or even the diff, one can slip into 4WD and trundle on, to all intents and purposes a normal front wheel drive vehicle - that and being able to go jumping in the woods) several individuals were intent on warning me of my oil leak (I lost a chunk of gearbox in the process of the prop's suicide) in a friendly manner.

Given that the first group of people were merely forced to change lanes momentarily (if you are a Usonion then you probably need to look that word up - the way you use it is entirely wrong) and the latter chaps were actually having gearbox oil sprayed all over their cars, I would suggest that we, as a species, cope more easily with problems as they become more severe.

Either way, my Delica is undoubtedly beyond economic repair (the prop managed to take a goodly chunk out if a fuel tank and the water and oil pumps look likely to die, quite aside from the broken gearbox) so I am sans voiture, as the French almost certainly would never say.

I shall take a picture but, in the mean time, I shall settle for swearing mildly about it on the internet:

Bugger.

Late for a wank?

2009-01-16T12:44:00.005Z

It turns out that my 12 week specimen was due on the 8th. I had completely forgotten and we have all been somewhat under the weather, so this morning I had an early start and then cycled off to the RD&E with a pot of rapidly cooling semen in my pocket.

Now, as you almost all will know, when one has, for whatever reason, the need to drop off a urine sample at the physician's office there are special containers provided for the purpose. These come in a variety of guises, some with salts or chemicals in the bottom, some with labels and some in bags, but they all have feature thing in common. They are almost, but not quite, exactly the opposite of 'large enough for the task'. As a man this is less of a problem. Your average gent has a combination of penis length and waist measurement which afford a reasonable view of the proceedings and, whilst slightly piss-ridden hands are an oft-unavoidable result, getting the sample into the pot is relatively achievable. For those amongst us with orifices which number into double figures the procedure is somewhat more convoluted and I doubt that there are many in your number, dearest readers, who have not at some point thought to themselves 'why do they not make the bloody things in a bigger size?'.

Well they do.

So I am sitting in my bed contemplating an entirely cold-blooded activity which, by its very nature, requires an element of enthusiasm. It is hard enough to muster this with the need to get from the finishing post to the hospital in good time, not to mention getting to work on time and a house full of other people preparing for their day. Adding a collection container which seems better suited to housing an entire shoal of barracuda does nothing for the confidence.

Seriously, the average human male produces between 2ml and 5ml of ejaculate. Where in the name of Hades's least desirable convenience is the need for what is essentially a half pint beer glass with a plastic lid?

So it comes to pass that, with a basically empty pot stretching my jacket pocket to bursting, I cycle off into the cold January wind.

Some men can be somewhat embarrassed about this sort of thing, so the hospital is discrete. There are no large signs at the hospital bearing the legend 'Jizz samples, this a-way!' nor does the depositor have any requirement for human interaction. There is, instead, a small letter box on a building which spectacularly fails to claim it's pathology credentials (I know, I know, but they have all the equipment for the study of liquids, so it's a cinch really).

So, after a minor issue with a car trying to run me over whilst I transport my precious load of hopefully infertile semen, I arrive at the hospital and spend 15 minutes asking a variety of people for directions which, obviously, is far, far less embarrassing than an actual sign saying where to go would have been. Praise the Lord Zeus for the consideration of the powers that be for providing haven from potential ridicule.

In a way it was somewhat anti-climatic. I dropped my pot into the flap and then I was done, so off I rode into the morning mist. To be honest it was probably the least exciting part of the process to date. I simply pedalled off up the hill where, as happens, my bicycle frame snapped cleanly through at the head-tube as I was overtaking a bus.

I have been riding this bike for 21 years now, so it was very upsetting for me as I am sure, gentle readers, you can appreciate. To cheer myself up I bought a Vintage AMG1 Bell Brass Resonator on impulse, so now I have a broken bike and no money to pay for a new frame.

These things are sent to try us.

For those who have asked about the pain, it is still with me, but I intend now to wait until I have the all clear (or, Heaven forbid, the news that I am still fertile) before bothering the Quack again. Poor old bicycle.

For Laura.

2008-12-21T14:17:00.001Z

Okay, I know that I have not blogged for a while and I apologise. In my defence, I have had exceedingly sore testicles and this had lead me to pursue pursuits in my spare time which lean less towards the typing and more in favour of curling up, grasping my genitalia and moaning softly.

In the past I may have been less than sympathetic to the trials of those who have injured gonads. Getting a chap drunk and betting him that he cannot house both his bollocks into a standard sized Marmite jar was a favourite pastime.

This is, incidentally, an easy feat, one simply pops them in, one at a time. Unfortunately there isn't room for both a plum and a digit, negating the chances of removing said testicles.

As I say, in the glory days of my youth, nothing made My Lordship happier than watching a grown man's face as he holds a claw hammer aloft and contemplates smashing the glass jar which houses his goolies.

This has changed.

I am not sure why I was surprised. After all, a soldering iron was plunged through my scrotum and I could have reasonably been expected to foresee that this may cause at least some level of pain, but the stories from those jaffas who had proudly gone before me were all of joy and pride.

I know, only now, that they were merely eager to be sharing their woe.

The initial agony was far from unexpected. No amount of localised anaesthetic was ever likely to entirely dull the pain and there is a limit to what measure any pain relievers are going to effect upon freshly seared testicles. I was, if anything, pleasantly surprised by how little things hurt once the anaesthesia had worn off.

What worried me was the residual pain which remained with me for weeks.

Now, when things first failed to settle I took it on the chin. It is hard to be anything but stoic when one has voluntarily submitted to such an intensely invasive procedure after all. When it became apparent that my continued discomfort was out of keeping with the advertised norm I had to admit some of the responsibility, after all I had been warned that 7-10 days of rest were called for, whereas I went straight back to work, attended a children's birthday party and generally failed to rest at all. As for the week of abstinence, well - I am sure that nobody really meant for me to remain celibate for a full seven days. I personally was rather proud that I had held off until the day after the operation, although I have to admit that this was more through Jim's protestation than my own self control.

Whatever the cause, after a few weeks I felt I had no choice but to toddle on back to visit Dr Watson to address the issue.

A bit of a prod around discovers a small amount of bruising around the area of the procedure in the right vas deferens, which happens in about 10% of men - nothing to worry about there - and a level of bleeding into the left of my scrotum which has left the poor little orb positively radiant with a ruddy hue and which appears to be unusual in the extreme.

I have the utmost faith in Dr W. (obviously, really - I let the man loose on both my testicles and my future family planning with an instrument which was clearly designed more for minor repairs to a transistor radio than for the severing of a sperm thoroughfare) and he is confident that the bleeding has now past, so I return to base camp.

The pain has yet to abate, but hopefully it will eventually subside. As things stand (and thankfully they still do) the pain is not unbearable, but the idea of living with it for my remaining share of eternity is not one I cherish.

The Vasectomy

2008-10-16T12:30:00.014+01:00

Okay, so it is vasectomy time at last. The day started with the youngest Manley throwing a whole large tin of golden syrup on the floor (which was harder to clean up than I had thought) which served to take my mind off the oncoming procedure rather well.

The eldest at school already, the lovely Helen came to collect the younger brace and took them off for a picnic, so there was no real excuse to do anything other than press on to the surgery.

It's a fair old walk down to Dr Watson's dungeons, but I am legally excluded from driving home afterwards, so a walk it is. Normally it would be no problem, but I have a fairly nasty cold and my knee is playing up, not to mention the ever increasing feeling of impending doom.

Of course the receptionists are expecting me and all have a bit of a chuckle - you would think that, by now, they would be used to this sort of thing? Anyway, i settle down for a read of HEAT and associated pulp dross. I did find a nice article about retreats for the famous, which appeared in two seperate magazines, each professing to be from a seperate publishing house, with the same imagery, decoration and words.

A good rant about the improbably low quality of today's print media does help a little, but then Dug arrives. Dug is my boss and, if you want a top Search Consultant, Dug's the man. He also has a new car, so whether his readiness to collect me from the surgery was entirely down to his decency as a human being and his excellent man management has to be questioned when measured against his glee at now having a manual gearbox. Either way, Dug is here to collect me and I have not even gone in yet. I do a little jig as I go to meet him and there is a level of forced jocularity, although we both know that today is not going to be about fun.

Eventually I am called in and Jim comes with me. She is needed to take video footage and photographs, as well as there being the reasonable chance that she might faint, which would lighten my mood considerably, but she is sent out by the nurse. Apparently the first stage is mine to suffer alone.

First off I am placed behind a curtain and invited to strip from the waist down. I have got my massive padded cycling boxer shorts on, so I am a little bit pleased to have privacy, but I have always found it most odd that I get to hide whilst undressing, but then the nurse comes back to prod around with my goods.

Anyway, I get a hot water bottle to apply to my freshly shaven testicles and the doctor arrives. Making a loop in the end of an elastic band (questioning unearths that these are just normal elastic bands and that, indeed, he asks his postman for them) he slips it around my ever shrinking penis (by the time I lost sight of it I essentially only had a tube of skin left, as my willy disappeared back into my spine to escape the hell of surgery) just below the head.

This slips off and I have to reattach it myself, whereupon a pair of scissors shaped clamp is passed through the loop and the clamp attached to my shirt, serving to pull my phallus up onto my stomach and keep it out of the way. A green sheet with a small hole is placed on me, with the target items on the outside and Jim is finally allowed in.

To be honest the nurse was a bit more upset when I showed the elastic band to my wife than I was expecting. She was positively horrified, from what I could gather, but as far as I am concerned, I am doing this for Jim and she has to put up with seeing it, warts and all. I have no warts on my penis or elsewhere.

The next problem is losing cameras - the nurse is quite keen on removing them beyond my reach, but I am adamant. Many people do not understand, but if I am going to go through this then it is important to me to know what happened. It is also worthy of record, just so that, when my memory fades and I recall a 40" blade and searing pain I am able to correct myself.

Then it's the injections. They really hurt. Here, look for yourself:

How much does it hurt? The "Little scratch" (and I was most disappointed that there was no "little prick" joke) was not too bad, but the actual injecting of the local anaesthetic was bloody awful. You are aware, no doubt, of the pain of a dental injection, when it goes all the way to the back of your throat? This is the same. Yes - the back of my throat.

Next comes the vasectomy itself.

I can hear it burning my flesh, I can see the smoke and smell the singe. You hear in that clip how the doctor says there 'It's not a soldering iron'?

Soldering iron?

Soldering iron.

Here the vas deferens has been brought to the surface and Dr Watson is burning through with the soldering iron:

The tube serves to take away the smoke and the smell.

The hole has been clamped and the vas deferens burned, so it is time to locate the other vas deferens now (the left one was first, then the right).

There are two clamps in this image - the sharper, more standard clamps, which are used to seperate the tissue and find the vas (the scrotum not being a sack, but a series of layers of tissue) and the special device used to seperate the vas from everything around it, with the curved ends:

After another round of anaesthetic, it is time for searching for the other vas:

And there it is! (although actually this is the left one again - the right side proved harder to work on and needed a second run - when the second run started I had an active nerve and Jim had to put the camera down to be with me.

All in all, it was not as bad as it might have been, but still considerably worse than I had hoped. I have a couple of giant containers for samples and Dug drove me home so that I could get on with some work.

I'll update on the recovery later.

To give you an idea of what is going on down below during those videos, here's a bollock shot. This chap cuts and ties the Vas, but mine was burned with the soldering iron:

I am a Jaffa

2008-10-16T12:20:00.000+01:00

It hurt and it hurts, but it is all over now, bar the wanking.

Vasectomy consent: Given.

2008-10-16T08:23:00.002+01:00

Surprisingly it seemed to take Jim more summoning of nerve to sign the forms than it did me. I still feel terribly put out that Jim has to be involved in the decision.

As it happens this is her idea, although she is going off it as it comes near, in case I blame her in later life if she dies and I cannot sire children by another woman.

I am waiting with two children whilst Jim takes the third to school and yes, I suddenly can see all sorts of reasons to have a fourth. I wish I was dim enough not to realise that I am looking for outs here, so that I could legitimately bottle it, but to be honest I never want to shave my 'nads again anyway.

I, Richard Manley of XXXXXX
Hereby consent to undergo the operation of bilateral vasectomy, the nature and purpose of which has been explained by Dr M B Watson.
I consent to the administration of a local anaesthetic.
I have been told that the intention of the operation is to render me permanently sterile and that there is a very small chance I may become fertile again, even after two negative sperm counts.
I understand that two negative sperm counts must be obtained at 12 and 16 weeks after the operation to confirm my sterility. Until this has been confirmed my partner and I must continue to use a method of contraception.
I have been warned that the operation has a low complication rate usually due to infection or bleeding into the scrotum. I have been told that men occasionally experience some scrotal pain following vasectomy but due to the technique used by my Doctor this is considered to be unlikely.
Date.................... Signed....................................................... (Patient)
Date.................... Signed..................................................... (Girlfriend/Wife)
I confirm that I have explained to the patient the nature and purpose of this operation.
Date.................... Signed....................................................... (Doctor)

Vasectomy day.

2008-10-16T08:20:00.006+01:00

My freshly shaved balls are itching, my heart is aching and my hay fever is perverse.

I am sitting contemplating the vasectomy consent form before me.

I will sign, but I do need to consider it for a while, none the less.

The first half of this is terrifyingly appropriate.

Vasectomy shave 3

2008-10-15T21:12:00.002+01:00

This goes on a bit, but it is probably worth watching me cut my own testicles twice.

Vasectomy shave 2

2008-10-15T20:40:00.004+01:00

A second attempt - the scissors worked well, but I just lose my nerve part way through and need a break.

UPDATE: The final instalment of the shave

Vasectomy shave 1

2008-10-15T20:18:00.004+01:00

Not much to say here - the beard trimmer simply did not work, so I have to find some scissors somewhere.

I am nervous as hell.

Sound quality is poor (well, very quiet) so you need headphones - although, to be honest, it is not worth watching really.

Update: I continue my shave.

Vasectomy instructions, an analysis.

2008-10-15T20:00:00.001+01:00

Padded pants, requests for sex and raw fear.

Instructions for a vasectomy

2008-10-15T09:08:00.001+01:00

BEFORE YOUR OPERATION

Please attend for your vasectomy on 16/10/2008 1115
~~Please note that you will need to come to the back door of the building through the car park as the main doors will be locked~~

1. Please shave the hair from the scrotum with a safety razor but it is not necessary to have a complete shave of the pubic area

2. Please wear tight underpants, which give support to the scrotum.

3. When you attend for the operation, please bring someone with you who are able to take you home. For legal reasons you must not drive yourself.

4. Please bring something interesting to read whilst the vasectomy is being carried out.

5. Be prepared to rest for 48 hours after the operation and if you have a very heavy job please arrange for some days off work if at all possible.

AFTER YOUR OPERATION

1. Please take it easy for at least 3 days avoiding heavy lifting and rushing about.

2. You may shower in the evening following your vasectomy but avoid bathing for 3 days.

3. Some pain and bruising is usual. Paracetamol should help but if you are worried in any way please contact us Tel: XXXXXXX. Urgent advice over the weekend: XXXXXXX

4. Please make love when you feel comfortable, for most men this is at least 7 days after vasectomy. It takes about 20 ejaculations to clear active sperm left in your system.

5. Remember to use other contraception until you have had two negative sperm counts and a letter stating that you are sterile.

The chances of failure of vasectomy are very small (less than 1 in 2000 vasectomies), but even after being confirmed sterile there is stiii a remote chance of the tubes healing together. We emphasis that pregnancy occurring after vasectomy is however a rare event and as a comparison vasectomy is 10 times more reliable than a sterilisation operation for your wife.

HOW TO COLLECT YOUR SPERM SPECIMENS
Two specimens of semen are required: the first at 12 weeks and the second at 16 weeks after the operation. The whole of the ejaculation needs to be collected in the plastic container provided and posted through the letter box beside the door of the pathology building at RD&E Wonford Hospital before 9am. Please do not take specimens on a Saturday or Sunday as the laboratory is closed.

After your second negative sperm count has been received we will write to you within 10 days and confirm that you are sterile. Please remember we cannot under any circumstances give results out over the telephone and we appreciate your cooperation in this matter.

Vasectomy shave.

2008-10-13T12:02:00.003+01:00

Well, I have to shave my testicles prior to the operation and I thought it best if I had a dry run.

I won't spoil it by explaining it all here, I shall just let you see it for yourselves (SFW except perhaps for the manic hippy in it).

Right, well I think that covers everything.

Having shaved the area with my beard trimmer I shall move on to a cut throat razor and clear the area of any stubble, ready for the vasectomy on Thursday.

Also, I think it is noteworthy that I would never do this outside of a medical scenario where I absolutely need to be clean shaven in the testicle area - bald balls are just not my thing.

Update: The actual shave.

Vasectomy leaflet.

2008-10-04T19:05:00.003+01:00

Well, I have a leaflet explaining my vasectomy to me.

I am having what is called a 'No Scalpel Vasectomy', which is a Chinese practise and which scared the crap out of Manleys.

No Scalpel Vasectomies at St Thomas Health Centre
Available: You can get an appointment now for a vasectomy within 3 months
Local: At St Thomas Health Centre. Run by a local general practitioner for Exeter patients
Convenient: Procedure out of normal working hours. Minimal disruption to your job

Advantages of No-Scalpel Vasectomy over conventional methods:
Less discomfort
One small opening in the skin instead of two incisions
Faster procedure
Faster recovery
Less chance of bleeding and other complications
Just as effective

How Can I Be Sure I Want a Vasectomy?

Be absolutely sure you don't want to father a child under any circumstances. Talk to your partner; it's essential to make the decision together. Consider other kinds of birth control as well. A vasectomy might not be right for you if you are very young, your current relationship is not stable, you are having the vasectomy just to please your partner, or if you are under a lot of stress.

Well, I am not very young, so that's one anyway!

What is different about a no-scalpel vasectomy?
No-scalpel vasectomy differs from a conventional vasectomy in a number of ways. Instead of two cuts the doctor makes one tiny opening with a special instrument. The "tubes" are then blocked using a cautery method. There is very little bleeding and no stitches are needed.

The no-scalpel vasectomy was invented by a Chinese surgeon and is used throughout China. It was introduced in the United States in 1988 where it is now the preferred method because of its low complication rate. Dr Watson, a St Thomas general practitioner, is fully trained and accredited to perform the no-scalpel vasectomy.

Is no-scalpel vasectomy safe?
Vasectomy in general is safe and simple. Vasectomy is an operation and all surgery has some risks such as bleeding, bruising, or infection. However, serious problems are very rare; less than 1 in 100 cases have even a minor problem.

Does no-scalpel vasectomy work?
Yes. It is estimated that after a vasectomy there is less than 1 in 2000 chance that a man's partner will become pregnant. This is ten times more reliable than if your wife had a sterilisation operation.

Do I need a referral?
Yes. Please consult your GP first. Provided there is no medical reason would make it unwise or unsafe to have a vasectomy your GP will refer you to our clinic.

How long will the no-scalpel vasectomy procedure take?
You come to see us for a consultation at which we explain the procedure and answer your questions. Your partner does not have to attend with you but it may be helpful if she does. You then book in for the procedure to be done on another day.

On average the procedure takes about 10 minutes but you will be at the surgery about 30 minutes in all. You should bring someone with you to drive you home afterwards.

"Bring Jim!" Bloody sexism that is!

Will it hurt?
Before the vasectomy if you feel especially nervous, we can give you a mild sedative to be taken an hour beforehand to relax you. When the local anaesthetic is injected into the skin of the scrotum, you will feel some discomfort but as soon as it takes effect, you should feel no pain. Afterwards you may be sore for a couple of days and you might want to take a mild painkiller. But the discomfort is usually much less with the no-scalpel technique because there is less injury. Also there are no stitches. You will be provided with complete instructions about what to do after surgery.

How soon can I go back to work?
You should not do heavy physical labour for at least 48 hours after your vasectomy. If your job doesn't involve this kind of work, you can go back to work sooner.

Will vasectomy change me sexually?
The only thing that will change is that you will not be able to make your partner pregnant. Your body will continue to produce the hormones that make you a man. You will have the same amount of semen. Vasectomy won't change your beard, your muscles, your sex drive, your erections or your climaxes. And you won't sing soprano! Some men say that without the worry of accidental pregnancy and the bother of other birth control methods, sex is more relaxed and enjoyable than before.

Will I be sterile right away?
No. After a vasectomy there are always some active sperm left in your system. It takes about 20 ejaculations to clear them. You and your partner should use some other form of birth control until two samples of your semen have been tested and confirmed free of sperm,

When can I start having sex again?
As soon as you are comfortable, but remember to use some other
kind of birth control until you have received the letter to say that you
are sterile.

Well, that is less comforting. I might need a sedative and I will no longer be able to sing soprano.

Does vasectomy cause any medical problems?
Medical experts, including special panels convened by the World Health Organisation, have concluded that vasectomy is a safe procedure. A number of studies have examined the long term health effects of vasectomy and the research evidence continues to be reassuring and suggests that vasectomized men are no more likely than other men to develop heart disease, cancer or other illnesses.

Will it protect me from getting or passing on STDs or AIDS?
No. It will only prevent you from making your partner pregnant. If you or your partner have a sexual disease, or have more than one sexual partner, the best way to protect yourself and your partner is to use a condom.

Can a no-scalpel vasectomy be reversed?
No more than any other vasectomy procedure. Remember that vasectomy, especially by the no-scalpel method is quick, convenient and causes very little discomfort but vasectomies should be considered permanent. Reversal operations are expensive and often unsuccessful. If you are thinking about reversal perhaps vasectomy is not right for you.

To book an appointment, please see your GP.

Well, I had thought about freezing something, although that was more for future practical jokes than anything else.

I find it very hard too understand that there are poeple out there dim enough to think that burning through their scrotum (oh GOD!) will stop them from contracting AIDS and I wonder if we should tell them. Perhaps they deserve to be caught out?

Sainsbury's car washes suck, part two.

2008-09-28T20:18:00.005+01:00

It is unfair not to explain.

I always understood that supermarket car washes only took "normal" cars, that is to say 5 door saloons and the like.

Anything high, or anything with odd shapes I had always thought were a no-no, but they have a large list of things to avoid.

I looked at the list and took the trouble to remove my rear parking mirror (which is part of the car and is factory fitted), since they stated not to have one, just to be on the safe side.

And it ate my car.

The first spray went okay, then the hard metal dryer bit came across, spraying.
It went up the front in front of the mirrors and, as soon as it cleared the top of my right mirror, which is slightly lower than the left one, it came straight for the windscreen.

It smashed straight through the mirror and then lifted up, but had got inside the frame and so it lifted the front of the car off the ground repeatedly.

I sounded my horn as soon as it touched, but it took the woman a good couple of minutes to stop it.

When it hit the mirror I was a bit concerned, but then it just exploded the whole mirror unit and I was really genuinely scared that it was coming through the window.

When the car started lifting up and down I was not so bad, but everyone else was understandably shocked, although I was becoming worried about what it would do next - with the sensor failing and knowing it could pick the front of the car up, I was worried it might come down on the back and crush the kids.

It took far too long to stop it - I sounded my horn and after a while a customer came over and stopped the machine, but to be honest that does not seem good enough - if a window had broken and water was being sprayed at a kid in a child seat they could easily drown in that time, not to mention being crushed or hot wax through a sun roof (if someone was daft enough to open their sun roof!).

I was going to drive to Milton Keynes tomorrow, but now I cannot as I cannot really go up the motorway with no mirror, a smashed frame hanging off the side and, hopefully not, but possibly, a bent superstructure, where the body rises beside the windscreen and the door hinges attach.

[UPDATE: David tells me it is called the 'A Post'.]

I guess it will have to be a hire car.

Sainsbury's car washes can eat your car.

2008-09-28T19:38:00.002+01:00

Try something new today, that is what Sainsbury's says.

Well it tried something new today, it tried eating a bloody Delica with one of its car washes.

I am far from pleased.

It's a date!

2008-09-27T09:28:00.006+01:00

Well, I went to see the doctor last night for a bit of a pre-op chat. I discussed things with a friend who is already a Jaffa and he described things from his perspective and I felt very comfortable with things.

Jim came along, as my relevant significant other, to give her blessing and to make sure I did not bottle it. After all, as she keeps reminding me, we agreed that this was for the best.

I was allowed in early, but all the receptionists know that Dr Watson's late night Thursday surgery is the vasectomy surgery and there was an unnecessarily high level of mirth emitting from the denizens of the reception. I owe the surgery £19.99 for a letter from a few months ago, so I made another attempt to pay it, but was, as always, sent away with the mocking laughter of the receptionist's disgust. If I want to pay then I shall have to find the original invoice. I think that I shall probably simply not bother for now.

Dr Watson is considerably slighter than most doctors. He seems a little shocked that Jim is accompanying me and passes comment, before offering me a chair next to his desk and insisting that Jim occupies a chair in the corner, as far from his desk as is feasible.

The comfort which discussing a vasectomy with the doctor without Jim's input is short lived as a laminated diagram of male genitalia is produced and placed before me. Now, I have long since understood that the severing of the vas deferens before they reach the seminal vesicles is the basis of a vasectomy, but it is a very different matter when I am sitting looking at a picture of a particularly small specimen with hugely oversized black sperm swimming towards the break.

Dr Watson tells me that he will have done 700 vasectomies by the time he has finished mine and I cannot help but wonder what kind of dreams a man who has maimed fourteen hundred testicles might have.

We have a bit of a vasectomy chat and discuss the issues which surround the procedure, which I shall go into at a later date. I mention my fear that, should Jim be brutally slaughtered by a jaguar which has swum the Atlantic, I may want more children by another lady in the future. Dr W gives this serious consideration and has a good response, but I can tell that the big cat reference was not overly appreciated, so I avoid any comments about the Leopard which I had envisioned coming over on the Chunnel to finish the job.

Well, it turns out that the hole which Dr Watson will be making in my scrotum is only 1mm by 3mm, which doesn't sound so bad. Apparently it will stretch to about a 3mm diameter circle during the procedure, but will shrink back almost immediately without any stitch or suture. I did enquire about inserting a transdermal implant at this stage but, whilst he thought the idea had merit, Dr W tells me that what I get up to in the comfort of my own home after he is finished is up to me.

It is explained to me that I have to continue using contraception for 16 weeks after the op, which includes 2 sperm counts. In China apparently the norm is to merely wait for 24 ejaculations, which I describe as 'a good afternoon's work', but which the good doctor tells me is an afternoon's work which will be both highly uncomfortable and unlikely to leave me in any fit state to take advantage of my haste. Basically it is 16 weeks for me.

"Right then, let's have a look at them then."
"Damn! I thought that this appointment was just for a chat. I am not sure how fresh I am, I have cycled here from work, you see."
"That's not a problem, I cycled to work today as well."
"Yes, but I am not going to be touching your genitals."
"Not on this occasion, no."

I am going to like this doctor.

Why is it that I am placed behind a screen to lower my trousers and pants? I go behind, drop me kecks and hop up on the couch, then Dr W comes around and pokes my nads for a few minutes before retiring to allow me to dress. What is the privacy for? I hardly gain from it and it all seems a little unnecessarily coy to me.

The doctor manipulates my testicles until the vas deferens comes up to the surface and shows me it through the skin. He explains how the scrotum is not an empty sack, but is made up of many layers and is, essentially, full. As he releases this vas deferens and hunts to bring the next one to the surface in the same spot, I comment on how strange it is that in can change shape and size so dramatically if it is full, but I am also acutely aware that, for whatever reasons of its own, my penis has shrunk to the size of a whelk. This is not the time to let me down with your irrational fear, little soldier. I want to get some decent shots of this and I am not going to want to keep them if I appear in them as a hairy twelve year old.

I broach the subject of having a photographer and video at the operation and he has no problems at all. He offers to bring a mirror too and suggests that it will make things less boring and that he would normally advise that I bring a good book. Jim is not so keen and becomes convinced (and still is) that she will pass out when he begins to burn into my testicles. The only concern which the doctor expresses is that if I try and watch directly by sitting up, I may be in his way and, if Jim zooms in too much, he won't look terribly photogenic.

"Anyway, that's no problem at all, I sometimes have trouble with the 18 stone truckers, getting the vas deferens to the surface, but it is no problem at all with a slim chap like yourself."

SLIM!

At work and home alike, I am routinely ridiculed for my obesity. Dr Watson, whilst not my regular doctor, is GP to a number of my friends and is well know for being particularly pernickety about weight. And he said that I was slim. In front of a witness. Jim laughs and I protest, fishing slightly. "I am fifteen and a half stone and I am hardly thin!". I bare and wobble my stomach at this.

The compliment I am after is duly delivered: "At your age there will be some loose flesh, but you are definitely not overweight. I am very happy with your weight, we have no problems there."

HAH! Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, David 'fat face' Tapp.

Anyway, from here I return to the desk, although Jim has now occupied the chair closest to the desk, presumably to make it clear who makes our decisions. She is wearing trousers, whilst I am only wearing shorts, which is coincidental, but appropriate.

I pick up the diagrams from the desk and notice that there is a need to shave. "You are shitting me!". But apparently he is not. Being bearded, I shall actually have to purchase a bloody razor for the job and, frankly I do not relish this at all. Having a cock like a dolphin is not my idea of fun at all. I have had a quick look for my cut-throat to see how I can manage with that, but I appear to have lost it.

One of the things about having children is that I do tend to put things in safe places, out of reach. Sadly I also am slowly losing my mind and cannot remember where I put anything at all. I digress.

Anyway, I explain that, now that Jim has let me down three times already, I am ready to give up my fertility. He asks if I am sure and I nod to Jim and say "Absolutely, she told me just this morning". Immediately catching on the the fact that I have 3 daughters he offers some condolence and is shocked to learn that even Bun, the cat, is female. What am I letting myself in for here? Is my family name to be severed as cleanly as my tubes by this vasectomy?

He has some selected questions to be sure whether I am being bullied into this and quickly determines that I am. We have a few talks about effectiveness and procedure and I wince a few more times at the fact that he is going to burn a hole through my sack and I am released with a date 3 weeks from now.

I shall look through my disclaimer forms and try not to panic about things such as this, this, this and so on. Also, a man burning a hole in my 'nads. Let us not forget that bit.

*shudder*

Vasectomy counselling

2008-09-25T16:06:00.003+01:00

Well, when I initially visited the doctor about my vasectomy I also had torn the cartilage in my knee. My visits to the quack normally works like this, I save up 3 or 4 issues until I get something serious enough that I cannot wait any more and then go bustling with ailments to present for her delight.

I always suspected that this makes me somewhat unpopular with the Doctor, but I recently changed practises and my old GP, Laura, was evidently sad to see me go, so I assume that it is only the receptionists who become irate. Where do such obnoxious women come from anyway? Is there a doctors and dentist receptionist nest somewhere, churning out mentally retarded clones, with only the very worst being selected to be a school secretary?

I digress.

Anyway, the severity of my knee injury (I am awaiting a call from my surgeon as we speak) distracted somewhat from the old vasectomy nad-hacking and the chat I had with the locum at the time was fairly minimal. Today I have to have a proper talking to.

The thing is, I rather fancy that I DO want to keep my old chap in full working order. I know it sounds harsh, but the reason that we want no more children is a) we have enough, but more importantly b) that Jim is a bit knackered after squeezing three out and frankly does not think that she is physically up to a rematch. Whether she is with me or anyone else, Jim just does not want to go through another p
pregnancy.

On the flip side if, for the sake of argument, Jim dies, perhaps after being mauled to death by a jaguar which has swum across the Atlantic or a leopard which has walked across from Africa and stowed away on the Chunnel (and I hope it's the jaguar because I prefer spots in my rings), I might find me another special lady.

Not straight away, you understand. I'd leave a reasonable period of 4 or 5 days before moving a new woman into the house.

Anyway, what if this new lady wants sprogs? It seems hardly fair to deny her simply because Jim doesn't feel up to the task. Bloody slacker!

Anyway, for whatever reason, I am told that we have decided that, since sterilisation is so much more invasive than a vasectomy, it is Manley who needs to have a sodding great blade thrust into his genitalia and, if that is what we have decided, who am I to argue?

Anyway, tonight is round two of the vasectomy quest. I'm off to see Dr Watson to discuss the removal of my fertility. wish me luck.

Vasectomy Time.

2008-08-13T15:03:00.003+01:00

Right then, I think that the title is pretty much Ronseal (that is to say 'self explanatory' for any non-Brits out there).

I have 3 daughters aged 6, 4 and 1 and I do not think I need any more, so it is about time that I put my money where my mouth was and got the deed done.

This is utterly childish.

2008-07-12T22:17:00.001+01:00

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International Mockney Day

2008-03-27T09:43:00.002Z

27th March is international Mockney Day.

Alright Geezer?

Go spend your workday being phat and large, before returning home for some jellied eels and a spot of television and climbing the apples and pears to your comfy Ikea bed.

Sorted!

Woman stuck on toilet for 2 years

2008-03-14T11:21:00.001Z

Just so you know, learning that a Kansas woman allegedly spent two years on the toilet did not directly influence my decision to cease weighing my turds.

Police in Kansas are investigating after a woman became stuck after sitting on her boyfriend's toilet for two years.

Ness County Sheriff Bryan Whipple said it appeared the 35-year-old woman's skin had grown around the seat.

She initially refused help from medics but was finally convinced by ambulance crews and her boyfriend that she needed to be checked out at a hospital.

"We pried the toilet seat off with a pry bar and the seat went with her to the hospital," Mr Whipple said. "The hospital removed it."

Mr Whipple said investigators planned to present their report to the county attorney, who will determine whether any charges should be filed against the woman's 36-year-old boyfriend.

"She was not glued. She was not tied. She was just physically stuck by her body," Mr Whipple said. "It is hard to imagine... I still have a hard time imagining it myself."

He told investigators he brought his girlfriend food and water, and asked her every day to come out of the bathroom. of their home in Ness City.

"And her reply would be, 'Maybe tomorrow'," Mr Whipple said. "According to him, she did not want to leave the bathroom."

The boyfriend called police on February 27 to report that "there was something wrong with his girlfriend," Mr Whipple said, adding that he never explained why it took him two years to call.

She was taken to a hospital in Wichita, about 150 miles southeast of their home in Ness City. Mr Whipple said she has refused to cooperate with medics or police.

2008-03-13T09:29:00.000Z

209

BUT!

I have had enough of this, I am not going to weigh the bloody thing on my return.

This project is OVER!

2008-03-12T10:43:00.001Z

207.4

204

2008-03-11T11:00:00.000Z

207

206.4

Monday!

2008-03-10T09:14:00.002Z

Domething

209.4

205.6

Saturday

2008-03-08T09:19:00.001Z

201.7

=================
I am having a poo
=================

200.4

Friday!

2008-03-07T11:08:00.004Z

204.4

=================
I am having a poo
=================

202.8

A lunchtime run - only a mile and a half, but the start of training for a marathon in October.

207.2

=================
I am having a poo
=================

206.8

The Matthewparkers came to our house and cooked us dinner, including home made raspberry ice-cream.

I have excellent friends.

208

=================
I am having a poo
=================

207.2

Thursday!

2008-03-06T14:55:00.003Z

202.4

=================
I am having a poo
=================

197.8

Massive!

209.6

=================
I am having a poo
=================

209

David Tapp's guest poo:

178.6

=================
Tapp is having a poo
=================

178.2

GOLF!

Wednesday!

2008-03-05T09:44:00.003Z

205.4

=================
I am having a poo
=================

201.3

209.6

=================
I am having a poo
=================

208.6

209.6

=================
I am having a poo
=================

208.2

Tuesday!

2008-03-04T10:06:00.003Z

204.8

=================
I am having a poo
=================

203

211.8

=================
I am having a poo
=================

209.7

208.6

=================
I am having a poo
=================

208.2

Monday!

2008-03-03T11:06:00.003Z

199.2

=================
I am having a poo
=================

198.4

207.2

=================
I am having a poo
=================

204.6

Mother's day!

2008-03-02T09:14:00.000Z

Mothers day = mothering things.

198.8

=================
I am having a poo
=================

194.8

a 4lber!

We're all going to the zoo, well, today really.

2008-03-01T09:06:00.000Z

199.2

=================
I am having a poo
=================

195.6

Today we all went to the zoo with Dagnall and his mother and daughter.

Leap year poo!

2008-02-29T09:05:00.000Z

204.4

=================
I am having a poo
=================

202.8

Gestation period is up!

2008-02-28T11:49:00.002Z

201

=================
I am having a poo
=================

197.6

40 weeks of blogging!

204.8

=================
I am having a poo
=================

204.2

About poo.

It is mothers day today, so we will be doing mother things.

2008-02-27T11:17:00.004Z

202.2

=================
I am having a poo
=================

198.8

205.4

=================
I am having a poo
=================

204.6

2008-02-26T08:49:00.002Z

203.2

200.2

Getting fat again!

204.8

203.2

2008-02-25T10:01:00.002Z

202.2

201

2008-02-24T10:12:00.000Z

199.6

196.6

Identical poo to yesterday!

204.8

202.2

2008-02-23T10:10:00.000Z

199.6

196.6

2008-02-22T09:33:00.001Z

196.8

195.6

Where to stop?

2008-02-22T09:27:00.003Z

My workload is very high at the moment, so I have made the decision to call a halt to the log blog at the point where I would have carried a baby to full term, rather than stretching to a full year.

I am unsure whether I should do this on 28th February (40 weeks from My first documented poo, on 24th May 2007, or whether I should wait until 10th March so that I do not include the single day I missed, on Ben's stag weekend, back on Sunday, 3 June 2007.

I weigh 204.6lb

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 203.4lb and would appreciate any emails helping with this decision.

Ben's neighbours.

2008-02-20T16:51:00.002Z

I weigh 201lb

==================
I am having a poo
==================

I weigh 197.8lb

I know I am being lame with my blogging at the moment, but I AM very busy.

I just want to say hello to Ben and Kate's new neighbours (next door but one).

Hello!

I weigh 200.2lb

==================
I am having a poo
==================

I weigh 196.6lb

2008-02-19T09:46:00.003Z

195.6

192.6

201

199.4

2008-02-18T17:43:00.001Z

200.2

199.8

202.4

200.4

2008-02-17T16:34:00.000Z

196

193.8

2008-02-16T16:33:00.000Z

197.6

196

2008-02-15T10:14:00.002Z

198.6
=================
I am having a poo
=================
197.6

204
=================
I am having a poo
=================
202.4

206.6
=================
I am having a poo
=================
204.6

2008-02-14T10:14:00.001Z

201
=================
I am having a poo
=================
199

2008-02-13T10:13:00.001Z

200.8
=================
I am having a poo
=================
199.2

2008-02-12T13:09:00.002Z

196
=================
I am having a poo
=================
193.2

--------------

196.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
190

2008-02-11T17:31:00.003Z

205
=================
I am having a poo
=================
204.4

2008-02-10T11:18:00.002Z

196.8
=================
I am having a poo
=================
194

200
=================
I am having a poo
=================
198.8

A note from my mum.

2008-02-09T09:45:00.000Z

I weigh 198.8lbs

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 193.6lbs.

As you will have noticed I have been a bit sparse with the posting of late - I have recorded the weights of all my stools, but I have been under the weather (indeed, ill).

I shall back-fill my posts as best I can, certainly with weights, as soon as I am up and about.

Cheers,

Manley

2008-02-08T09:31:00.001Z

194.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
195.8

https://www.stjohnrestaurant.com/shop/?ID=1

201.8
=================
I am having a poo
=================
198.2

203
=================
I am having a poo
=================
200.4

2008-02-07T10:16:00.001Z

196.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
195.8

2008-02-06T11:03:00.001Z

203
=================
I am having a poo
=================
199.8

2008-02-05T10:16:00.001Z

196.6
=================
I am having a poo
=================
190.4

2008-02-04T10:15:00.001Z

204.2
=================
I am having a poo
=================
201

2008-02-03T10:15:00.001Z

192.2
=================
I am having a poo
=================
189

Christening

The day before.

2008-02-02T09:40:00.001Z

This week has been a bit

198.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
196

2008-02-01T15:19:00.001Z

204.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
199.4

2008-01-31T10:26:00.001Z

194.6
=================
I am having a poo
=================
192.4

202.2
=================
I am having a poo
=================
200

2008-01-30T09:54:00.001Z

195.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
191

Guest poo number two.

2008-01-29T12:30:00.000Z

This is Rowan:

Today, Rowan will weigh his poo for us.

I weigh 200lbs precisely.

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 198.2lbs, but now it is time for Rowan to have a poo. Rowan weighs 151.4lbs. If we say that men are, on the whole, larger than ladies and my wife is a lady, then I am twice the weight of my wife. Being that she is undeniably a woman and I am fairly confident that I am a man, if Rowan falls half way between our weights does that mean that I am twice the man he is?

No, it doesn't.

====================
Rowan is having a poo
====================

Now Rowan weighs a mere 149.8lbs. He reports that it was somewhat sloppy.

2008-01-28T12:39:00.001Z

195.4
=================
I am having a poo
=================
187.2

Haggis poos!

2008-01-27T12:19:00.000Z

Somehow, in all the excitement, I have not mentioned Burns Night at all.

We had an excellent evening, just 14 for dinner, and ate heartily of neeps, tatties and haggis. I would have liked to have made more, but it was more than made up for by the pudding, as provided by the lovely Mrs Boddy.

I feel that would be remiss to not thank Mr Smith for coming along and basically take over the cooking at the point where I began to fail. He can come again.

This morning there were enough of us to ring all 8 bells as well, so this has the markings of an excellent weekend.

Last night I siliconed the bath, which went badly. I have done a splendid and tidy job, but the children bathed and the silicone has lifted in a couple of places where they were less cautious than is required, so it looks like a job I shall have to repeat.

I am now about to partake of some bike cleaning, do some work which needs addressing, and take a van load of junk to the municipal recycling centre. I weigh 193.2lbs

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 191.6lbs

In the words of my Geography teacher, Mr Ellis: 'Manley could do better'.

A trip to Bath.

2008-01-26T18:37:00.000Z

Today I went to Bath with Matt, who is my cousin-in-law, I suppose.

Being entirely narcissistic, there are very few occasions when I meet someone and think 'there's someone who I respect', since nobody is ever as utterly wonderful as my Lordship, obviously. Matt is one of those exceptions, he is a church warden and nearly an accountant and has achieved all the sorts of things which I wanted to do when I grew up, yet is still thoroughly likeable.

Matt drove me up to the wedding outfitters and we tried on appropriate clothes (all of which fitted pretty much precisely my idea of what size I thought I might be, sadly) and then, after a couple of beers drove back down.

It was only upon arriving in Devon that I realised that I had to drive home from Matt's, so I had to sit about, drinking tea and chewing the fat at the farm, to let the ale subside. Damn, what a frightful strain!

I weigh 194.4lbs

=================
I am having a poo
=================

At 189.6lbs I still had a nice day and am rather looking forward to ushering at Simon and Kate's wedding in May. I was rather flattered to be asked, since they hardly know me, but they are a lovely couple and I am uncommonly pleased to be of service. For me this is rare as I prefer not to leave the house as a rule of thumb.

Bum Dug

2008-01-25T09:59:00.000Z

I think it is important to mention that Messrs Wenger and Angell want to bum Dug.

Why they want to bum Dug is something I would rather not go into at this juncture, but there can be little doubt that Dug bumming features very highly on their agenda at the moment.

I weigh 192lbs and, you will no doubt be pleased to learn, have no desire to bum Dug, whatsoever,

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 190.6.

I am very hungry - I think I will go for some noodles now. And not to bum Dug.

Battling deliverymen.

2008-01-24T11:07:00.000Z

Well, yesterday went better than I expected. I weigh 189.6lbs.

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 188.4lbs.

On the road through Darts Farm I was overtaking the line of traffic and as I passed a small blue van the driver saw me, growled and deliberately swerved across the line and hit me in the leg. Being clipped in to my pedals I nearly came a cropper and slammed back into the side of the van hard, but managed to stay rubber side down.

The other three bikes passed me and there was an incident with Ben being deliberately driven into the side of a temporary traffic light which added to the enjoyment of the stretch of road no end.

Then we passed the van again and he tried to side-swipe me.

Then he passed us again as traffic cleared and cut in front of me and braked hard, then sped away. Half a mile later he was waiting in a lay-by and then pulled out on me in a manner which would have been disastrous, had I not expected it. At the next lay-by he pulled in again and I had to pass, so I allowed a car to pass me and tucked in behind it to pass. I then decided that enough as enough, so I pulled in to a gateway to let the van be where I was not.

The van pulled into the gateway and began to get out, so I rode on at which he drove pretty much through Matthewparker and then blocked the whole road and started storming down towards us shouting that all four of us had hit his van and that we should not be overtaking on bicycles.

I was sorely afraid for the fat pillock looked like it would take some stopping him and I could not see myself not getting hurt here, but he then changed his mind and buggered off.

Most scary. I weigh 200.2lbs

=================
I am having a poo
=================

I weigh 197.2lbs.

The day in general was excellent, the play we wrote about penguins and polar bears, in the style of Derek and Clive meeting Monty Python, went down well and I was pleasantly surprised to find that Tracker, the host, was not of a mind to teach field-craft, but was actually an excellent example of the best kind of person to lead these motivational team-building days.

All in all everything was a little more positive than I am prone to be, but still relatively painless.

One can only hope that, in this environmental guise, Mr Brown would approve of my cycling expenses.