Thanks

I just wanted to say a quick thanks to my guest bloggers:

Max

A

Damian

You all did a great job, I certainly enjoyed reading the posts.

To my readers... I'll be posting a more lengthy post soon, but I am heading out of town again tomorrow and need to get prepared.

Across the miles

Caroline has been back in England now for about two weeks, making contact with people she knew years ago. I myself wrote recently about moving around from place to place, and the effect that had on keeping in touch with friends. It made me wonder about how we do make friends and then keep in touch.

Childhood friends, if you don't live nearby, for the most part seem to change as we all do and then lose touch. Does that happen if you don't move? Do you then change in similar ways? I've heard of people whose friends date back to the first day at school, but in my experience, moving means that we change in different directions. I've made friends, good friends, as an adult, but even when keeping in touch, they move off in different directions. Not all, it must be said. I do have friends dating back many years but often not the people I thought were "best friends". Then again there are others who barely keep in touch, but when you do meet up it's as though you had never been apart.

I knew as soon as I met one person that, in spite of quite an age gap, we would like each other and 15 years later we are still great friends. Now that we only occasionally see each other face to face, we chat online or make Skype calls every few days. What is that connection? Will we be able to keep that bond even after I move away from the area, as I will no doubt. She won't move, she never has - we are so very different in many ways and yet such good friends. Would we have made that connection if we had first met online?

And what is exercising my mind today is whether we can keep friends via the internet just as easily as if we were close by. Even more, can we make real friends over the internet? I know of at least one couple who have successfully developed a lasting relationship after they first met on a forum. But how? I've always believed in a sort of "chemistry" that occurs when you meet as it did when I met that colleague. Is there an equivalent chemistry that can be sensed online in a different way? Do we even have the same persona online as we do in real life?

I don't know the answers but I have found that, after a time, I do feel I have formed an idea of what people are like through chat, emails, blogs. Or am I being totally naive?

Tales of the Northeast: There be Geordies here!

No, not the Northeast USA. No Geordies there. Only New Yorkers. Vermonters. Kennedys.

The Northeast of England, thank you very much. A very special lot, actually.

In my vast studies of the species, I have discovered that not everyone in England pines to be called a Geordie. While I myself would consider it an honor, some take offense when mistaken for a Geordie, especially by the London Bobbies when one is intoxicated. Here is a story I read (but didn't understand a word - perhaps YOU will):
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Many years ago, a Boro-lad I know, got involved in a fracas with the local constabulary whilst visiting London. Safe at home in the Boro with some decent beer betwaddling his faculties, the story may well have been embellished somewhat but he reckons the Cockney Bobbies addressed him rather unkindly along the lines of 'you expletive Geordie expletive', 'you expletive Geordie expletive', and, even, 'You expletive Geordie expletive!'. (That last one was a bit much I think!) Finally he could stand it no more and he screamed at his tormentors. “Get me a expletive map and I’ll show you I’m not a expletive Geordie!”

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I'm guessing that means Geordies only come from a very particular part of England. So that story may be funny if you happen to be English. I'm not.

The name Geordie is a diminutive of George (referring to "George" as used in Scotland, North Durham and Northumberland.) Something to do with the 1715 Jacobite rebellion, in which the residents of Newcastle remained loyal to George I and were thenceforth known as Geordies. ::Yawn::

Here I get into the history much deeper than even Caroline would care to know, and so I will stop. I only wrote this to give me a chance to say that there is one particular Geordie whom I think is really cool. So.

Intelligence tests

Guest post by Relax Max

In my travels around the blogosphere it seems to be the thing to do lately to post little tests. Some of them are fun. Some of them are insulting. To me, at least. They are ALWAYS too hard for me and I end up being humiliated. For example, a few days ago I was visiting this blog and they had a link to an intelligence test. I won't embarrass the lady who runs the blog, but I will tell you her initials: A.N.G.E.L.I.K.A.

Anyway, after I took the test, it said the results showed that I was 94% dumb. C'mon! There has to be a more humane way of telling you your score on these things, right?

Little b to the rescue. Little b is a very cute (but verrrry cold - to me at least) South African blogger. But her redeeming quality is that when she posts tests, they are almost always easy. Of course I always steal her stuff, partly because I am a really lazy blogger and partly to simply pay her back for being so cold to me. Also, she rarely visits my own blogs, and doesn't even KNOW Caroline, I don't think, so stealing her stuff is never discovered.

So I am posting a copy of the test that was so easy I only got one wrong. Cool.

(Hit the road, little b, you know you stole this from someone else anyway.)
The one I got wrong was the second from the bottom. Don't tell me that thing on the right doesn't look exactly like a clown.

Here are the obligatory suck-up blog links:

1. My idol Angelika's blog

2. Stern, cold, never comes around to my blog anymore little b's blog

3. Caroline's home phone number

I'm kidding little b. Put that knife down! :)

Straight from the Angry Clown (because I'm lazy)

Go get em tiger!

I'm scared of jealousy and at the moment I'm jealous of all the other great blogs out there but I'm even more scared of failure, failure of blogging I know it doesn't seem important but I have a saying that if you can't be the best why bother? This belief has seen me have a lot of great non-failures in the area of non-success due to non-trying or something like that.

Failure is also very funny and we all can't be the best at what we do (except me).

Some dictionary on the nets describes failure as...

Failure Fail"ure\, n. [From Fail.]1. Cessation of supply, or total defect; a failing; deficiency; as, failure of rain; failure of crops. 2. Omission; nonperformance; as, the failure to keep a promise. 3. Want of success; the state of having failed. 4. Decay, or defect from decay; deterioration; as, the failure of memory or of sight. 5. A becoming insolvent; bankruptcy; suspension of payment; as, failure in business. 6. A failing; a slight fault. [Obs.] --Johnson. Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary, © 1996, 1998 MICRA, Inc.

Hmmm interesting somehow I don't think that explains these guys!

Thanks to the sites that I stole these pics from (I'm lazy whatever)

See you soon

I was hoping to get a chance to write more today, but things are not going and smoothly as I had planned.

So, I am leaving you in the hands of Max, Damian and A. I hope they take good care of you.

I'll be posting pictures, twittering, and hopefully will write the odd post.

Have fun while I am away - I'll miss you.

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OK, things are a bit more settled now.

I decided to take a cab to the airport instead of the MAX, been as they are doing work on the tracks, and I have no idea how long it will take.

My stupid blackberry wasn't working this morning, but that seems to have fixed itself now, so that makes me happy.

I am all packed, and am now just tidying up the house before I leave. Its really hot here today, but raining in the UK. The heat is the other reason I decided to take a cab. I didn't really feel like carrying my bags half a mile in this weather, I'd get all hot and sticky.

So watch out Shotley, I'll be there soon :)

Still Here

I have not gone yet. You get me for today and tomorrow, and then I leave you in the (capable) hands of Max and Damian. I must be crazy.

Last night we had a team building happy hour. My boss had prepared a few questions and we played a round of 2 truths and lie. I am curious if you can figure mine out:

1. My Dad has met Nelson Mandela.
2. I lived in 4 continents over a 3 year period.
3. I have sky dived.

Do you know which is the lie? No one that I worked with got it right.

One of the questions she asked was, when did you have your first taste of an alcoholic beverage?

One of the guys I work with grew up in the Philippines, when he was 11 he sold cigarettes at the cock fighting ring. After the fight was over, he tasted some beer for the first time. Its always interesting to hear stories like this about people you work with, I would never have guessed that he did that as a child.

I don't really remember the first time I tasted alcohol, but I do remember the first time I was drunk. I was up in Scotland with my friend from high school, we were 15 or 16 at the time. I was drinking Scrumpy Jack. I didn't have that many, 1 or 2 I think (but I could be wrong), but gosh I was trolleyed. We were crossing the street, and I looked down, my legs were going so fast. I thought to myself "this is sweet, when you're drink you don't have to think about anything, your body just takes care of itself". Well the next thing I knew I was lying on the ground, I had well and truely bombed it to the floor. My friend kindly helped me up and guided me to her aunts house. Some creepy guy came up to us at some point in this process, and asked if we needed some help. My friend gave a sharp "NO", I of course was trying to chatter away to this helpful man...

Once in the door, up the stairs and into bed, the room started to spin... and I started to feel a little ill... as I chunted away, my friend became more and more impatient with me, and finally got tired of telling me that the room was not spinning but I was in fact just drunk, so she told me just to shut up and go to sleep... nice friends I have :)

Is she gone yet?

Well shall we begin? Go grab a coffee and get ready for midget wrestling fun, kidding although that would be super cool and all! First I have to thank Caroline for this amazing opportunity to further my career in guest posting, I plan on becoming the best in the world well my street at least yeah take that next door neighbors ... so thanks!

All these memories about my first kiss have flooded back into my head causing a slight headache but all is still good. Don't you miss being a kid? I wish I was a kid again because then I could experience all of that fun and not so fun stuff for the first time again.

The first time you were thrown into a pool and told to swim, the first time you rode a bike without training wheels, the first time you fell off your bike and mom or dad had to kiss it better and it always fixed it! If only life now was that simple and a kiss from someone you loved could fix anything that was wrong.

You may think that they were the best times in your life but the best is yet to come. Everyday you can discover something new and try something new and be a child all over again, travel and eat new things, get married and have kids and just one kiss can still fix all your problems. These are the best things in life and it doesn't get much better then that...except for maybe winning the lottery and midget wrestling !