Pieces of a Man Think it. Do it. Be it. Embellish.

67.68.69.70.71.72.73.74.75.76 77.78.79.80.81.82.83.84.85.86 87.88.89.90.91.92.93.94.95.96 97.98.99.00.01.02.03.04.05.06 07.08.09.10

On Sunday we invited a bunch of Oti's school chums round for bouncy castle fun in the garden. We really lucked out with the weather; it drizzled right up to kick-off but then - just as when Haile Selassie's plane approached Jamaica in 1966 - the clouds parted right on cue and it was dry for the next couple of hours until people had gone.

Labels: 2007

It's been a strange week in The Socialist Republic. What looked like just another damp day in the city centre was in fact washing away entire council estates on the other side of Sheffield and the rest of the week has been one long consequence.

Personally it's not been too bad. While the stranded masses huddled in university emergency shelters, a pal in our estates office sorted me a room in a student hall. It was actually a nice change of pace; an evening pottering barefoot around a deserted office, eating chinese and listening to the tennis, then the first uninterrupted night's sleep in ages. Hardly Hurricane Katrina.

The next morning, suitably refreshed, I hitched a ride home on the one and only train that managed to get out of a waterlogged Sheffield station. It was jam-packed with a polyglot group of refugees trying to get to Manchester airport, and even before we'd reached the open country beyond Totley Tunnel everyone was able to confirm their national stereotypes;No wonder that making the trains run on time was top of Mussolini's list of things to do...

Labels: 2007

Kids atop a rotten tree stump this morning in Marple during the Saturday morning constitutional. We had chips afterwards to balance the ying and the yang of all that fresh air.

Labels: 2007

Here's the main gate of the British Library where I waited for Nick and Anna to turn up for beers on Wednesday. The library was rather underwhelmingly new brick, especially with the magnificent Kings Cross/St Pancras station next door, but I'm sure there's lots of good book stuff inside.

I was in London for a committee meeting of the amazing acronymed UCISA-TLIG-USDWG, the Universities and Colleges Information Systems Association's Teaching and Learning Group's User Skills and Development Working Group. Now that's what I call branding! Nice bunch of folks, though, and we hatched various plans for training-related events this year in exotic places like Reading and Birmingham.

It was interesting to visit the LSE, though, especially their bookshop which had a stack of great reading on politics and development. I will be saving my Xmas pennies for the next meeting there in September.

Labels: 2007

Here's a picture from brother Nick over at Blog Off, taken on the big night out this Saturday, when, in the absence of a whole herd of cats, the mice went out to play;

Unencumbered by the need to a) tend to the oldies and significant others b) babysit the twins (!?), We the 'pre-1980, 3' took advantage of a rare 'nite off' together and hit maDchester town for an impromptu evening of food, beers and old school grooves! Special thanks to big brother Miles, for reminding Nina and I how to own the dance floor! Rock on! X

For 'own the dancefloor' read "work up such a sweaty, demented storm that people clear a space around you like a demilitarized zone"! Yes, it's the old guy in the club with years of pent-up boogie ready to unleash on an unsuspecting public. What the hell...

Dance as though no one is watching you.
Love as though you have never been hurt before.
Sing as though no one can hear you.
Live as though heaven is on earth.

~ Souza

Labels: 2007

Yesterday we all took off to the Crocky Trail near Chester for a day out on Oscar's 6th birthday. There's lots more camcorder footage when I get round to it, but for the moment here are some phone pix.

Labels: 2007

The view from the Stretford End a couple of months back when United kids played Liverpool kids in the FA Youth Cup Final. The Scousers stole it 4-3 on penalties after extra time, kick starting celebrations in the away stand and the mother of all paddies from Oscar...

Labels: 2007