:(

Was out at the pub tonight with a few mates. Spent a long time staring at a very fit (but very young) bird. Nice. Sadly though, the night was dominated by the fact that one of our own is going through difficulties, marriage-wise. I'd love to be able to help, but I officially don't know anything and can't really broach the subject until/unless he opens up. He's not likely to, either. He's one of those very introverted types who mentions fuck all about his private life.

As predicted.

As semi-predicted a while ago, I've heard nothing from PD, let alone arranged the drink we had talked about. Perhaps she got caught up in the rush before Christmas and couldn't make arrangements, but it would have been nice to have had her keep her promise of contact. Never mind. I'm off to the pub this afternoon with old work colleagues and that should be a good laugh. An old fuck buddy of mine will be there too (where'd you think I learned my lesson about messing around with people you work with?) so that's going to be interesting (in a good rather than bad way).

A completely sexist comment...

It would be nice if the girls from work made the same effort every day as they did for the Xmas bash last night. The female members of our firm's workforce scrub up extremely well (and that's without beer goggles!)

Plenty of totty on show last night.

Xmas bash

I have been ill over the weekend - nothing serious mind - just a bad combination of stomach bug and the possible onset of the 'flu. I'm starting to feel much better though. I'll probably return to work tomorrow and make it through the day.

The issue is that it's our work's Xmas bash tomorrow night and I really can't see myself being in the mood to go - especially if I'm coming down off this bug/'flu thing. Plus, the Lickable Girl from work's not even going, which is a crying shame as this would really reduce the perving opportunities (plus there is/was a real chance to have an actual conversation with her rather than just say "hello" and then grab a sneaky perv). Damnit.

Why has no-one thought of this before?

A friend of mine pointed me towards this site set up by Sarah Beeney (of Property Ladder fame) where people sign their single friends up to a dating site and recommend them by describing them. I think this is fascinating as it has a completely different atmosphere to a normal dating site which seems to be very stilted and awkward (and I know people who use them regularly and agree).

Luckily none of my female friends know this site exists. They'd be more than willing to put my name up there, no doubt!

And it's over to you...

Reading back over some of my past posts, it seems to me that people might mistake me for a man obsessed with breasts. When it comes to the (so-called) fairer sex, it's not a pre-requisite, though. When it comes down purely to looks it might be their eyes, their arse, their smile and yes, their breasts. I wouldn't classify myself as a "breast man", though.

However, to completely negate what I've just said, tonight was the very last night of my Tuesday thing. PD was there and we had a good giggle as per usual plus, when she leant over to whisper to me, I couldn't help but get an eyeful of her rack which is absolutely magnificent.

Anyway, we caught up on our respective weekends (it transpires that I was in the right place until a last minute decision was made by other parties) and upcoming Christmas plans. As we parted company, the ball was left firmly in her court regarding heading out for a drink (she has all my contact details and I have none of hers) so it's a matter of waiting to see if she chooses to call. I see no reason why she shouldn't - we hit it off pretty well and have had fun over the past few months. I'm fairly upbeat about this, though with my usual reservations about whether she actually will call. There's also the fact that I'm not entirely sure what it is I'm looking for from this friendship. She would be a good friend, I feel, but she is cute and sexy and she also seems to be quite high maintenance. The first two are no problem, but if it ever developed beyond just friends, then the last thing would be a real issue.

I think I'm just getting ahead of myself though.

See?

I said earlier in the week that these thing never go according to plan, and that was certainly true. Having managed the near impossible of finding someone to head to the pub with, PD was nowhere to be seen (at least, I couldn't see her during my occasional trips around the pub a.k.a. totty watch). I'll probably not find out where she was until Tuesday, which is the last night of the thing where we meet up.

Result!

Mate called. We're going out for a few pints into the city. Probably only for a few hours, but that should hopefully be enough and it'll be great to see him again.

Cutting it close.

I've heard back from my mate and he hasn't said "no" to heading out for a few pints as yet. I'm expecting a call from him any minute, so it's still possible that I could be out in the pub tonight for a few beers.

The countdown!

With about 5 hours to go until I should be in the pub, I've yet to find any takers for heading out for at least a few pints. This distresses me not only because of the potential for a good evening (PD, apart from being easy on the eye, is great fun) but because, as I've stated before, it show just how much my social life really sucks ass at the moment.

The one guy I hoped I'd be meeting is off visiting friends today, so it's unlikely he'll be back in time (and if so, probably won't be in the mood as it involves a lot of travelling). Bah.

No, no, no!

As predicted, getting people out on Saturday night is proving more difficult than it should (a good indication of how crap my social life is). I had two guys in mind, and one of them is working. The other, who is only back in town for a few days has yet to answer my tests. I'd like to catch up with him (I've known him for aaaages), but the only free night I have between now and him leaving is Saturday (which ties in nicely with the PD thing) so I hope he replies soon.

Let's see what happens.

It's Tuesday, so that means spending time with the rather sexy PD (and she was looking rather foxy tonight with plenty of cleavage on show). It's always fun, but it would be nice to see her socially. I don't know if that's possible though, but the stuff that means we meet up every Tuesday ends as of next week. I do still have her email address, so asking her for a coffee or a drink isn't out of the question if it comes down to that.

I think I know where she'll be on Saturday night, or more accurately, I know where she thinks she'll be so if I can get some social chums together, that could be something to organise. These things have a habit of never going according to plan though.

Note to self...

When the opportunity presents itself to ask a good looking, sexy, funny woman out to the pub, take it.

Muppet.

Got an inkling tonight that PD might be a bit high maintenance though, so perhaps something might not develop (beyond what I'd spoken about anyway).

Titles are one thing I can never think of.

Was out with E last night. It was fun as usual, though not the usual alcohol-fest that we usually end up with. E's a bit skint, so it was a couple of drink and a lot of chat. It was still fun though. We were sitting in the bar when E pointed out a girl that I could only see from behind.

"She's your type", said E.

I couldn't see, but she did have dark hair, so that was a start.

I later caught a glance at the unknown girl and bloody hell, if E wasn't spot on. Dark, shoulder length hair (well, probably slightly longer, but who's picky?), dark eyes, a nice figure and a really nice smile.

However, I was too busy trying to see down E's top as she'd worn a top with a bit of a plunging neckline. Meanwhile, E was perving at the DJ, but he looked incredibly young.

Weird mood.

Have decided to text E to see if she fancies a trip to the cinema. I've only seen her a few times since she's been home, so we should have more stuff to catch up on. Let's see if she replies in time to organise something.

Oh. She's just replied. Can't do tonight, but we've provisionally made arrangements for next Friday. Gives me something to look forward to next weekend.

Denied!

Well, last night was a fiasco, organisational-wise. We didn't end up in the pub I'd hoped we would, so meeting up with PD was never an option. Come to think of it, there wasn't much to look at in the we did end up in. Maybe I am just too picky!

Tonight.

Out with bro-in-law and a few mates tonight. Dunno really what's happening, but if we end up a the bar I have in mind, there's a good chance that I could bump into PD. If so, it'll be interesting to see what happens.

The final telly totty?

I was going to leave it with Sarah Wayne Callies, but then I remembered the stunning Lexa Doig. Given that she ranks very high in The List, I thought that it would be a shame if she wasn't given some airtime. Lexa's probably better known for her role in Andromeda as Andromeda, but recently she has cropped up on The 4400 (which E tells me is a cracking show) and Stargate SG:1 in recurring roles. Seeing as I rate her so highly (not quite Jessica Alba high, but not far off), she's going to get a few more pictures up than the others.

Yet another television babe.

And on to Sarah Wayne Callies. I don't think she's been in anything big. The only thing I've ever seen her in was the very short-lived series of Tarzan that was shown on satellite TV either early this year or early last year. All the typical traits are present and accounted for here, and if there was a type of girl that I find myself attracted to, then it should be blatantly obvious by now if you look at the likes of Jessica Alba, Nicole de Boer, Keegan Connor Tracey and Sarah Wayne Callies are probably going to give you a good idea of who my eye would be on if we were in the pub.

Another day of perving.

Today I had the immense good fortune to see a lot of gorgeous, Lickable Girl. We bumped into each other at least four or five times to day (which, when you consider that until yesterday, I hadn't seen her in weeks) is quite a lot. She always smiles and says "hi", but I'm not entirely sure that she knows my name or anything (she has no reason to, after all).

An email from USHW has prompted some thought...

I think I need to find out if she's single or what the score is there. There was a story that went around that one of her ex-colleagues tried it on at every opportunity which suggests to me that she was single at the time, so I'll take that as a positive step. The issue is that I am quite a private person, so if I try and find out, I'll also be trying to keep it quiet around work and specifically my work-mates. That's the tricky part. I could easily find out tomorrow if she's single, but the entire world would know that I was hunting down that information. That's the last thing I want.

If I can find out her relationship status and keep it from my colleagues, who knows what I might do next?

I think the next most likely option is that something develops between me and PD, but as I said yesterday, if anything, it's just case of lust on my part and would be unlikely to develop into anything other than a fuck or series of fucks at best (from a non-platonic point of view). I've not met many women where that would be seen as an acceptable option, though. All we can do is see what happens...

USHW suggested a leap of faith with E, but that'll never happen. If something did happen with E, it would be E who made the first move. I'm not prepared to risk that friendship.

Another good looking girl from the telly.

Her name's Keegan Connor Tracy, and she was the doctor/scientist person from Jake 2.0 which, if I am being honest, I only saw a few episodes of. I think she was also in one of the Final Destination movies, at least according to the picture below.

Things trundle on.

So, I am just back from my usual Tuesday night out. Once again, I got chatting to PD. My spider-sense at figuring out if women are interested in me is crap, but I do think that there could be something here. She seems funny, she's attractive and all the usual stuff, but something's lacking from my end. Perhaps it's nothing more than a case of lust. In fact, that'd be my guess. Given that PD usually shows up from work and she wears trouser suits... I love women in trouser suits!

I wonder if she fancies a fuck buddy?

FFS!

Man, that sucks. There I was, walking past the printer in my own little world about ten minutes ago, when who should come in to collect some printouts but gorgeous Lickable Girl. I was so in my own little world that when she spoke to me, I barely grunted a reply. Nice move, me. Bloody typical though, as she was absolutely stunning today, and that's no understatement. In fact, looking at the (admittedly, very nice) picture of Nicole De Boer below, gorgeous, Lickable Girl really puts her to shame (in that picture at least).

Following on...

... from my recent post about the gorgeous Lickable Girl from work, I found a picture of her online. I have to stress that this one is not the one I found the other day and there don't seem to be many pictures of her out there. Shame on that, she really is very cute indeed. While the picture below does show Ms. de Boer to be very pretty, the picture doesn't do her or Lickable Girl justice. If I ever find a better pic, I'll post it. You can, though, watch her in The Dead Zone which is usually shown on the Sci-Fi channel here in the U.K. or in some of the later seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

I might try and dig out a few other pictures of girls I've seen on the telly who take my fancy. At the very least, it'll give me an excuse to post something.

Ah...

We had a typically blokish conversation in work today about girls off the telly that you'd like to shag. This conversation was then backed up by many emails of pictures of said babes.

In the middle of hunting out a few pictures, I came across Nicole de Boer. It has to be said that the likeness between Nicole de Boer and gorgeous, Lickable Girl from work is quite astounding. Now all I have to do is nip across to http://uk.imdb.com and see what she's in so I can tune in!

More... more... more?

Was at the class tonight and, as usual, PD and myself had a good laugh together. I think I'll definitely see if she's game for a drink closer to the end of the class. Dunno if owt would happen... not sure it would, but she's good fun.

On another note, I was drunk all weekend. Friday night - monthly work's do. Some totty to stare at, but it was all from work. I try not to do that, if possible. All sorts of gossip and scandal breaks out once you shag a girl from work. Saturday night, went to my sis's. Drank too much and watched scary movies on the telly. Brilliant night. Went to a pub quiz on Sunday and got blootered. Won a bottle of vodka, too. Rock on!

Next weekend? Who knows. FP's suggested a night out and I'd like to see if E fancies a drink, too.

Have I already asked?

Are there any Jessica Alba lookalikes out there who fancy a fuck? Don't worry... I won't take up much of your time ;)

Recharge.

I've taken a few days off work. Hopefully, that should be enough to recharge the batteries, plus there's a possibility of a session with the boys from work on Friday. I handed in the latest phase of a project at work today and there's one to go, due shortly after the turn of the year. That, coupled with Christmas means it's going to be quite stressful over the next few months (I HATE Christmas). But that gives me a few days to get a few things sorted and a lie in in the morning. Bliss!

Still... yesterday I took the first step in licking my finances into shape by organising an 0% credit card. Capital One are doing one that's 0% until January 2007, which should knock a huge hole in my current level of debt.

I still have to sort ANOTHER card for my other credit card, but one thing at a time. Once the Capital One card has been sorted, I'll transfer the balance of my other to a 0% card and cancel the accounts with my current cards. I won't actually save money each month, but the money I pay out (the same amounts as I'm currently paying) will be knocked off my credit card debts each month. Hurrah!

Dreams.

I've been having some really weird dreams recently. I don't often remember my dreams, but the past few nights have seen me waking up, fresh from a dream, in the early hours.

On Thursday night, I had a particularly vivid dream about myself and QC2. I used to have a huge crush on QC2 from ages ago. Even now, I think that, physically, she still represents a lot of the things I look for in a woman. Brown, shoulder length hair, dark eyes and an ideal body shape - thin(ish), but with curves. Anyway, in this dream that I'd had, we were married. That was the bit that was most vivid - there were other, silly dream things going on (our town was being attacked by cartoon zombies or something), but it was the relationship between myself and QC2 that really stuck out. It wasn't disturbing or anything, I just thought it was weird. (No complaints about being married to a stunning brunette, though!)

I had another dream last night that was fresh in my memory this morning for being particularly weird and vivid, but I can't remember too much about it except that I think I was in a band of some kind.

I'm really tired though, so I doubt I'll remember too much tomorrow. Hopefully I'll get a really good night's sleep tonight.

Meh

My friend, E, who's been talking about spending a few years in NZ actually said out loud last night what I'd predicted. She doesn't expect to be coming home on a permanent basis. 

I kinda expected that to happen, though not really for it to be planned, just that it would happen. I had sorta predicted that she'd end up meeting someone out there and settling down, but last night confirmed it.

I told her that, from a selfish point of view, I didn't want her to go because I'd miss her too much. She said that was sweet. It was true, though. I will miss her. We had a great night out last night, though. We always do. 

Lots of talking and lots of drinking for me (E's on a diet). Oh, and if you haven't seen Serenity, go see it. It's fabulous and well worth watching, even if you haven't seen Firefly.

What's this?

Was at a class tonight doing something for work. Got talking to a girl I briefly met last week. I'll call her PD. She was great fun. I wonder if it'll develop into anything - perhaps heading out for a drink or something. I might suggest it closer to the close of the class in a few months time.

Just a little longer...

E's postponed until next weekend rather than this one, but that's no biggie. Nights out with E are always great. Hope she's in good form.

In between

Last weekend, I was visiting a friend. A great time was had by all, and I really must do it again (despite the expense, which was a lot). Next weekemd, I'm hoping to meet up with E. I'm envisaging a trip to the cinema to see Serendipity followed by a few hours and many drinks in the pub. Details to be confirmed tomorrow night.

My social life is probably going to pick up over the next few months at least, which I'm looking forward to.

Still here (barely)

Well, unsurprisingly, I've had no response from V. I'm a bit annoyed at that as she was very insistent that we maintained contact. Ah well. It's her loss.

This week's been quite busy. On Thursday I met with MA2 and AM for a meal and to catch up, which was excellent. I haven't seen them in months. We had a good chat over a couple of hours and hopefully, we'll see each other again sooner rather than later.

My sister moved house this weekend from literally 30 seconds around the corner to a few miles up the road. The work I did helping them shift was probably the hardest two days of physical labour I've ever done in my like (all of my jobs have been mostly admin or I.T. related, so physical labour isn't something I've done a lot of). I'm still feeling the after effects of three days of shifting lots of boxes and stuff around.

The girl who bought my sister's house was lovely and she had a cracking set of friends. I tried to have a conversation with them while we we moving, but it's hard to start a conversation when you're shifting heavy furniture around and only passing reach other in the hallway. It's a shame though, they seemed nice and it would have been nice to see if anything had developed - I had the strangest feeling that something could have with one of them. It's frustrating when that happens.

Ah well...

I texted V last night asking after her. Heard nothing as yet, and I'm not expecting to, to be honest.

WTF?

Completely out of the blue (well, I say "completely" but there is the subject of a large alcohol intake to be considered), I was overcome by a huge feeling that I missed V, a person I met within the last year (nearly a year to the very day, believe it or not).

I had a thing for her, and I truly believed that a fuck was likely, though nothing more given the circumstances, but we ended up being good friends. Good friends in that I haven't heard from her since last November, which is a pity given my obsession with my friends staying in contact.

Still, the feeling that I had lasted a few hours and I desperately wanted to talk to her again, and then it left. Weird. What's probably more weird is that, I never once thought about calling her, even though I have her mobile number stored in my phone.

I still have a good beer buzz on. I might try her now...

Still alive.

It seems like ages since I've been here, but the date stamp on my last post reckons it's only about 10 days. I kinda keep forgetting about this. Ah well.

Things are starting to fall into place. I'm getting a pay rise this month which should ease the finances a bit, plus with my new 0% credit card, I can start paying off some of the (huge) balance I have as well as put some cash by for savings. I've been meaning to do this for the past few months, but never got around to it.

Nothing else has changed, really. Work's still fine, the social life is still non-existent (more on that later) and I'm going to the gym.

So far, I've only managed to get to the gym about once per week since I've joined. Work's sorta cuppered that with a few late night meetings etc. on my gym days. It's started to settle down, so I can now realistically aim for at least twice per week, especially now that GC produced a fitness plan for me.

The social life is, as I said above, still dead. Hopefully not for very much longer, though. A mate will be more available within the next fortnight for socialising (weekends - beer and midweek - squash). Plus, the guys in work are starting to get a bit more together, which should mean a few more nights out on the piss.

All in all, things are starting to look up, even though they're not exactly down. Hurrah.

What a tangled web we weave.

F reminded me, over MSN, about a drunken conversation that I had with K about this time last year.

K popped on to MSN late one night to chat. She was very drunk. She claimed that we had grown apart and pretty much accused me that it was all my fault. She implied, though never directly said, that I'd distanced myself after we'd screwed one night.

And, I'm being honest here, I did distance myself. However, I did so because K started talking about us having a relationship. It bordered on demanding, actually. She tried to talk me into it, despite me telling her over several conversations that a) I viewed her as a friend and the sex didn't change that, b) I wasn't looking for a relationship and c) even if the first two points were not in the picture, the geographical distance between us would make it a non-starter.

I said that I didn't regret what happened between us, but a relationship was NOT on the cards.

K refused to acknowledge any of this and treated it as a debate where logic would win by trying to counter the points I raised above. This caused me to distance myself from her, primarily for her own sake. F pretty much made the same arguments when K confided in her, but K still refused to listen.

As this all was happening, I was chatting to F on MSN at the same time as K was ranting at me, and I was relaying all this back to F.

F then admitted that K had declared that she was going to fuck me when we all met up for a group weekend. So, apparently, K wanted to fuck me and she knew I would contemplate something casual/FwB but not a relationship... but she kept angling for a relationship. F teased me because, by our count, we reckoned there were at least three women who wanted to screw/date me at that meeting. And I always had my suspicions about F herself, though she is purely a physical, "let's fuck then remain friends" kinda woman.

Today, I have been mostly thinking about...

USHW and how she's getting on with her offline life. I hope things are going well...

Where should I be?

Tonight is the gym night out. I should be there, I suppose. I keep moaning about how much my social life sucks ass, and I think GC was going to be there, too. I have an inkling that she's interested, but I'm not even 20% certain that she is (or that she's even single or that I'm even interested).

There are two reasons: the bar in which the soiree is happening and the fact I'm skint until pay day. The skint thing could be overcome - at least to scrape enough together for a night out, but the motivation is gone due to the bar which I detest. If it had been another bar, chances are, I would have made the effort.

On a positive note, I heard from USHW today who very kindly presented me with an Amazon voucher in return for a roof over her head at our recent get together with a group of acquaintances in April. That's already been put to good use.

Hmmm.

Was it just me or was CG, my personal trainer, really disappointed that I'm not showing up to an organised night out for the gym members on Friday night? Ordinarily, I'd have jumped at the chance, but it's a bar/club that I detest because it's far too dark and doesn't play music that I like. I couldn't even pretend to like the place I hate it so much.

I do, however, know a few bars that GC does like. I might see her around one of those as they're haunts that I frequent, too.

I am going to be single FOREVER!

OK, after yesterday's post, I decided to see what kind of woman was available on a dating site, so I created a free profile at match.com (and I'm not telling you what I called myself) and set up a search to see if any ladies that took my fancy were available.

From my search results, I have now decided that every single woman under the sun thinks she is spontaneous (but it still takes them an hour to dress before leaving the house), likes fine wine and restaurants (and I hate wine and eating out). Not a good start then!

Not too many girls are into footy either, I've noticed. Not that I'm a big footy fan - I'll watch my team, but I'm not footy obsessed. In fact, apart from a few physcial features, there's not much on dating websites for me.

Looks like it's back to getting drunk down the pub and lusting after gorgeous (but probably taken) girls. Heh, heh.

Mind fuck.

Bit of a mind fuck day today. Was having a discussion with A regarding online dating. This was brought on by the fact that I met a couple in the pub last night who had met through an online dating site: match.com to be precise. I've never considered the use of online dating sites for a number of reasons. The main one is that, most of the time, being single doesn't bother me, even with a lack of any casual action in between relationships. Obviously I do get a bit lonely from time to time and there are moments when having someone there to hug, to watch telly with, to cuddle (and yes, to fuck) would be most welcome. The female I was talking to was very cute, very intelligent and good fun. I wonder why she felt she had to join a site? On the plus side, it's good to know that females on dating sites aren't all desperate mingers!

Other things are seen to be much more acceptable. Speed dating, for example, is taking off in a big way here in the U.K. and it doesn't have the stigma attached to it that online dating does. I've no qualms about meeting people online - I've done it many times over the course of the past five years that I've been an internet regular with my online responsibilities. Some people have been friends and others have been more than that (for a day or so - no relationships). I'm not sure why this subject ended up occupying my thoughts for most ofd the day - I'm fairly happy at the moment, so it's not as if I'm on the lookout for female companionship. That's part of the confusion.

So, I was saying to A that there weren't too many people from our mutual internet venture that I'd consider dating and that actually going looking to these people for a romatntic relationship was something I'd never considered. That was a slight fib. There was one person that, if the geography had been right, I might have made a move for. Her name was M. I haven't seen or heard from M in nearly three years. I left the country about three years ago and we kept in touch vis MSN and email until she suddenly returned to her parent's house and lost internet contact. Her disappearance was so sudden that I didn't get a chance to get an address or anything off of her. Apart from the odd fleeting glimpse of M on MSN (where we swapped pictures and she looked gorgeous), that's been it. I've tried to leave her messages via our mutual venture, but they've gone unanswered.

Until today.

The first time in ages I think of her, and she makes an appearance. Luckily, rather than just swap stories and history, I was sensible and got her email address. Now, if she doesn't appear on the mutual venture anymore, I can still get in contact. Nothing's goping to happen romantically though. I know that now. The geography is still a huge negative factor and she's been seeing a bloke for about a year and they could be moving in together. It still brought about a pang of disappointment though.

I'm still not sure why this has fucked with my head apart from the co-incidence of thinking of M and her appearance. Maybe it's partly the lack of sleep from the weekend. Things might be a bit clearer later in the week after some proper sleep.

I'll let you know.

Bad habits.

I know that I keep neglecting the blog. I don't mean to, it's just that I've never been comfortable giving out information about myself, even innocent facts about going to the gym or shopping or whatever. My friend, USHW, kept asking me to do it and I do enjoy posting when I remember, though I miss her feedback and questions on the occasional post.

I've not done much over the past few days. I've struggled to the gym once or twice, but not before work (which is my eventual aim as going after work requires more motivation). My nephew was around today and I got a few hours to play with him. Work's trundling along nicely at the moment - I seem to have fallen into place as my boss's second in command (completely unofficially, of course) which is nice to have as a vote of confidence and should help me in future, but there are other factors (that I don't want to go into here) that make it a frustrating experience, too.

The social life still sucks ass, although it has been slightly busier over the past few weeks. It should continue to be busier than usual for another few weeks, but who knows what's going to happen beyond that?

Argh!

My arms feel like jelly. GC may well be easy on the eye, but she's bloody tough. I did about an hour tonight and it bloody near killed me. On a scale of one to ten where one is sitting on the couch and ten is dying, I reckon I hit about an eight a few times tonight.

I'm hoping that things will go well and I'll get more into the gym though. I really need to lose the weight and I really want to tone up my tum area.

The way forward.

I had a friend visit over the weekend and much time was spent in the pub discussing our relative love lives (or lack thereof). We came to the conclusion that we both need to be pro-active in searching for female friends. It's probably a valid point - my point of view when I'm out with friends, looking out for girls seems rude (after all I choose to go out with my friends, why then ignore them?) Maybe I should change this point of view.

Secondly, if/when I do see someone, I really should be more forward in making contact. I used to be terrible shy, but I'm not that bad these days, so it shouldn't really be an issue.

So, I'm looking forward to seeing me get more success in the coming months...

The Gym.

Finally made it to my induction at the gym today. Didn't do a lot - maybe about 40 mins worth of (very light) exercise, but it reminded me how good it feels to actually burn a lot of energy that way. You do end up feeling a lot better for it, even if it rips your heart out at the time. I got to meet GC though and learn about the machines and have a brief chat about what my goals were.

So, I have another appointment with the lovely GC next week (who was indeed easy on the eye) to get me through an initial session and draw up a plan for me to follow on my own, then I should get back to her every 4 to 6 weeks to adjust my fitness plan based on my goals, targets and ability.

I am looking forward to it and hopefully I shall see results sooner rather than later. Actually, if I am to keep this up, seeing some sort of results quite soon is probably a necessity.

Gym.

Hurrah! Got my gym induction sorted for tomorrow with GC who's "easy on the eye" according the guy I was speaking to this afternoon. Looking forward to that, then!

Mr Motivator.

Right! I've been in contact with the gym and got my induction arranged for sometime next week - they'll get back to me with exact details. So, starting next week, it's the gym for me!

Weird day.

Weird day… I bumped into two people that I haven't seen in a while. The first was a guy that I used to work with. We both left our mutual employer around 8 years ago and it was nice to catch up, despite the fact we weren't particularly close or anything.

The second was FA1. I've known FA1 for about ten years now – she was introduced to me as a friend of a friend of a friend. We hit it off pretty much straight away and met up with each other once in a while for a drink or lunch to catch up. For a while, I even toyed with the idea of asking her out when she'd finished with a boyfriend, but I didn't really fancy her that much I don't think. In a weird, twisted way, I could see us ending up in bed (and having a bloody good time of it as well), but could never see us in a relationship. As it happens, the night I was considering asking her out is the same night I ended up hooking up with FA2 for the first time, much to BW's chagrin.

She's never said anything, but I think she had similar thoughts. We kinda circled around it for ages and I can think of quite a few times we could have ended the night in bed. Too late now though, she's married. Happily, I think. Certainly recently. Though we only passed each other in the street.

I should email her and find out if she fancies catching up sometime soon over lunch or a drink.

Lickable girls.

Lickable girls are like buses. You don't see one for weeks and then the same one comes along twice on one day!

Not that I'm complaining at the perving opportunities, mind you!

Body language.

Had an interesting night in the pub with E a week or so ago people watching. E knows a bit about body language (she called it something different, but I can't remember what it was due to the large quantities of booze I'd imbibed). Actually watching the body language in action was incredibly interesting and made me wonder what E made of my body language...

Gym.

I'm actually looking forward to going to the gym. The gym for me is not about weight loss, but it's about achieving two things:

• getting rid of my belly and by association, 'love handles' which are far too large for my liking
• getting some upper body strength

The upside of this is obviously that I will be a lot happier with my body (not that I'm unhappy at the moment), I will spend more time outside of the house and less time in front of this PC (my social life sucks at the moment) and obviously, my health/fitness should improve (although I'm not unhealthy per se, just unfit).

Things to do...

Things to do this week:

• Arrange induction at gym (yes, I finally handed in my gym forms, now all I need is an induction and a general exercise plan for attaining my exercise goals.)
• Buy my nephew a birthday pressie. It's his birthday next week.
• Start planning some trips to visit friends during the autumn and winter.
  

The weekend.

Ah. An excellent weekend all round, and it's not over yet. Spent Friday night catching up with old friends (and then half of Saturday fixing their PC problems), both of which I enjoyed immensely. Yes, I am a social nerd! The downside was being awoken at 5am on Saturday after 5 hours sleep when my friend's son decided to get out of bed and shout (he has no volume control in his voice - everything's said at "shouty" level).

Saturday night was spent out with my sister, bro-in-law and a few friends in a belated birthday celebration, which was also good fun. I also got some perving in at a cute waitress, which was nice. Was awoken at 7am this morning by my nephew who was staying over. I guess I'll be having an early night tonight.

Now spending a lazy Sunday reading and generally doing nothing in particular. Bliss.

V3

Still not completed anything to send to V.

The weekend.

Had a fabulous weekend visiting E. As expected, the liver took a hell of a bashing with most of our time spent in the pub on Friday and Saturday followed by a relaxing chillout in the garden on Sunday due to the amazing good weather.

I often question the relationship that I have with E, probably due to how it originated. E started working at a place where I was doing some temp work where the people we worked with were a fairly close knit group with a few exceptions. I think E and I hit it off pretty well, and to be honest, I might have fancied her just a little bit. She left after a relatively short time (a few months) to take up a permanent job elsewhere in the country. I still kept in touch though, but it was quite hard beginning a friendship like that by swapping the odd email every so often. It's pretty much taken us five years to get to a point where, if we'd been in contact in person fairly regularly, we'd have been after a few months.

Now we're fairly close, though I am still aware that it is quite often me who initiates the contact and even those visits I make to see her are done at my suggestion, though we always end up having a blast.

I did have a bit of a crisis of conscience recently where I suspected that I really fancied E (and it's easy to see why because she does have a lot of traits that I would like to see in any potential girlfriend) but obviously with her being a (platonic) friend, I really didn't want to ruin anything by doing something stupid. I don't know if it was a phase I went through or what, but this weekend went by without a flicker of anything untoward going through my brain. Well, about E, plenty of stuff went through my brain about various young ladies who wandered through the pub as E asked me to pick out those I considered attractive. I think she has some plan about matchmaking. That'd be interesting. It didn't take too long before E announced that she had my type nailed down. "Yes", I wittily replied. "You're going to ask Jessica Alba to date me?"

To be fair though, when it comes to looks, I do think I have a distinct preference (rather than a 'type') although I am also quite picky.

That developed into a bit of introspective analysis there which wasn't meant to happen. Suffice to say, the weekend was fantastic, my liver is complaining of over-work and the sun is shining outside. I'm off to do a spot of reading in the garden and enjoy my day off work.

This weekend...

Yay! Tomorrow is my visit to see E. We've got a trip to the cinema already planned (Batman Begins) followed by a muted night on the booze. Depending on my alcohol intake on Friday night, there may be a British Lions match viewing on Saturday morning, followed by an afternoon (and perhaps evening, if last year's shenanigans are anything to go by) going to the pub and playing pool. Whether or not E will pot a ball using one of her breasts like she did last year remains to be seen.

V... again.

I've started the letter to V at least three times, but it's simply not going down on paper the way I want it to...

I don't like Mondays...

That's not strictly true, but today was a complete 'mare. Nothing went right, so I left work early-ish. Hopefully, with a good night's sleep under my belt, tomorrow will be more productive.

Wandering mind...

This time next week, I'll have returned from my weekend with E. Probably tired and drunk out by then, too. That's the way things usually go when E and I get together. Luckily, I also have the Monday and Tuesday off to recover.

I must investigate and see whether the paperwork for my gym membership has gone through. I'm tied up this week, but could make a start when I return to work after my few days off.

"Sun" Day

No sun, it's bloody freezing so I'm indoors in front of the PC rather than sunning myself and reading.

To do...

It's sunny here today, as it was yesterday, although it's much cooler than yesterday. Hopefully, if it gets a bit warmer I can get into the garden and do a bit of reading. I have loads of reading I want to catch up on, and I really don't want to spend all day sitting in front of a screen. Yesterday it was Live 8 (despite the significance, I was still under-whelmed), and if it stays cool today (temperature -wise), it'll be my PC monitor.

Live 8 : The long walk to justice.

What the fuck are you doing here?

Go here: The Official Live 8 website

Orlaith...

Orlaith is stunning.

Orlaith in Big Brother

I'm bored.

When I'm bored I get evil. An idea has been floating around my head for months and months now. It's got to do with an online hobby of mine that I go through phases with. Someone almost beat me to it about two months back, but they didn't really make the best use of it, leaving the door open for me to step in and cause havoc.

Some work stuff.

Took my camera into work today to take pictures of some colleagues to send across to out partners in America. Sadly, Lickable Girl wasn't one of them, or else I'd have a photograph to perv over. Still, there are some nice looking girls in our section of the building.

Started a new project today and it's already gone to the dogs. We've got two weeks to complete the project and I'm off work for three days next week plus my co-worker has taken a week off. Things are going to get messy!

It's E's birthday today, so 'Happy Birthday, E'. See ya next week :D

V2

The problem is... I've no idea what to say to her. I've sent the odd SMS message, but really with no idea if she ever received them. Hmmm... Thinking cap on, methinks.

V.

Having spoken to USHW, maybe I will try and get in contact with V.

The wonders of alcohol.

I have spent a very enjoyable Sunday reminiscing about the alcohol and drug fuelled, but sadly non-sexual experiences with V. When I say "reminiscing", I mean "reporting to me brother-in-law". The end result is the same, though.

I still wonder what might have been. But only when I have the best part of a bottle of Gin in me... Like now ;)

Secret fun and games.

I have two friends, well, maybe not friends, but there are two people I speak to fairly regularly. For the purposes of this anecdote, I shall call them A and K. 

I don't know A that well - barely at all, in fact, apart from a few MSN conversations recently. I have known K for a few years though. It would be inaccurate to say that K and I slept together as we didn't do any sleeping, but fucking was involved. Sadly though, K is not the kind of person to take sex at face value and she believes it has to turn into something, When I refused her offer of a relationship, she went all bunny boiler. 

On one hand, I fail to see why - she offered the sex and I fancied a shag. I think we were both probably a bit drunker than we have admitted to each other, but that's not to say that it wouldn't have happened if we'd been sober. It's only what happened afterwards that has put me off K. However, in her regular confessions to my friend, F (long story there about K's friendship with F, too, but it's linked to K being a fucking nutter), K still tells F that I am interested, despite over-whelming evidence to the contrary i.e. avoidance, refusal of meetings, nothing ever happening since etc. Oh, and I actually told her to her face one time that I was no longer interested. 

So, K remained interested (and convinced that I was, too) until last October. Through F, I became aware that K had found herself another object of interest. By doing some detective work, I figured out that the object of K’s affection was none other than a third party, an acquaintance from an online venture I often potter about on. With K being K, though, she was making it awfully hard work for herself and was refusing to tell me because she was still insisting to F that I would be devastated as I was still interested.

F knows the score, though. K’s progress with the third party was limited because there’s a substantial distance between them and the third party is not available every single weekend. It was (or is) slow going. Eventually though, K’s legs parted and the inevitable happened. And after the inevitable happened, the other inevitable happened and K decided that a relationship was on the cards. 

Where it all gets interesting is that A has been quite open to me about her relationship with her boyfriend. As I said above, I don’t know much about A, but I know quite a bit about her relationship with this mysterious bloke. However,the bloke is K's third party. 

I’m not sure how much each of them know about the other. K certainly has her "suspicions" as A has actually told her that she’s dating the third party, although she believes that A is simply trying to throw her off the scent. A, on the other hand, seems oblivious that K and the third party have made the beast with two backs. According to what I’ve been putting together from A (because I don’t think that A knows that I’ve identified her boyfriend as yet and she doesn’t want me to), they’ve been seeing each other for just under a year – at least three months longer than K has been pursuing D (mysterious boyfriend/third party). 

 According to F, K has been meaning to ask me that I report back to her regarding A and the third party, though seeing as she has still to tell me that she’s “involved” with the third party, I can’t say I’m expecting it too soon. It would be very funny though! I wouldn’t say anything to her either, by the way. K’s problem is that she can’t see the obvious if she’s made up her mind, even if it’s planted in front of her and that anything that doesn’t go to plan is someone else’s fault. Sometimes I feel that K has some real issues with life. Either way, I hope all goes well for A and the third party. It’s sad to say, but unless K starts taking more responsibility for her actions and stop blaming others, she’s going to find herself being very lonely.

Heeeeeeellllllloooooooo!

A note for those females who are interested in my current relationship status (and my attempts to change same): Spoke to gorgeous, Lickable Girl in the lift today.

Gah, hmmmm, ummm... etc.

I keep meaning to post more here, adding thoughts etc. I suppose I really need to open to people a bit more. I'm incredibly open to one person and to others I do have a certain amount of openness about some aspects of my life, but not all.

I've booked my tickets to go and see E. That weekend is going to be a mixed bag. I've stated before that I've been having less than platonic thoughts about E. It's been over six months since I've last seen E (though we've emailled and called each other), so I have no idea if this is going to get weird. Weird from my point of view, obviously. I doubt E has any inkling of what's going on in my head (or my pants).

Oh, and I finally managed to hand in my gym forms at work. Sometime over the next two or three weeks, my gym membership will get activated and I can begin to lose some of my tum. I'm not particualrly interested in losing weight per se, but more about toning my tum so that I can fit into the nice clothes I bought myself at the end of last year (and haven't been able to fit into since!)

Fun!

Spent the weekend at a mate's house, out of the city last weekend. I think I need a new liver. Got horrendously drunk both night, but the second was at my friend's friend's friend's house, at a party. I'm not fond of those kinds of invites as I'm never sure that I'm simply tagging along or actually invited.

This time I was invited, but mainly because my friend was invited along at the request of *gasp* a girl! We'd both met this girl before - a few months back, and my friend, as they say, was quite taken with her. It appears that the feeling was mutual, as it was she who asked for my friend to be invited. However, for reasons still unknown, she left early which meant that another girl ended up "becoming friendly" with my friend. Much hilarity ensued.

Me, the racist.

Someone accused me today of making 'racist' jibes. When I say "someone", I mean the idiot I was talking about in my previous post. He has a habit, as I said, of using the phrases "you're wrong" or "you're mis-representing the truth". It's hard to say if he uses this because he disagrees or if he thinks you're lying, so I called him on it today.

I am not sure if he was born in France*, or if he is of French blood, there I think he considers himself to be French rather than English though.

Anyway, he accused me of exaggerating today, and I called him on this. I asked him if 'exaggerating' was French for lying. Rather than answer the question, he then starts making 'racist' accusations. Personally, I was questioning whether he was calling me a liar and trying to hide it, his nationality doesn't come into it. Fucking idiot.

*Nationality changed to protect identity.

Stupid/selfish people and debating.

As part of one of my online ventures, I deal with a fair number of people who all hold various areas of responsibility. I'm a fair believer in taking a harsh line and leading by example, but over the years, this has brought with it a certain reputation.

Strangely, as time has gone on, a lot of people, while not agreeing with my methods, are at least coming around to my way of thinking. Of course, I have to point that out to them, much to my own amusement. However, there's one guy whom I believe to be abusing the position of trust that a website owner has bestowed upon him. We usually end up in various debates about this particular website. His typical reaction to any perceived criticism of him or his "friends" is complete denial, usually followed by a "you're wrong" or "that's deliberately mis-representing the truth". At first, I thought it was me, but several other people have also backed me up in my version of events and a few people have told me in private that they've suffered similar fates when having a discussion with this person.

Anyway, he continually challenges any suggestions to change his working practices despite the fact the website in question is really going to the dogs. He refuses to support other people's endeavours to help the site and, thus far, has yet to offer any ideas of his own on how to accomplish this goal. His basic philosophy toward the site is to reap the rewards of his position, but bury his head in the sand at the state of the site.

Every time I think of this, the phrase "laissez-faire" springs to mind from my old GCSE Economics class. I think it translates roughly as "leave to do" or similar. What it actually means that you use a system whereby if you leave everything alone, you hope that it will all work out in the end. This seems to be exactly the attitude of this person, which is frustrating when you consider the amount of work being put in by many other people, only for this one idiot to be spoiling it for the rest of us, and yet the web site owner doesn't listen...

Airline fares.

Why won't the fucking EasyJet fares come down in price so I can book a reasonably priced flight to visit some friends?

Hello again.

USHW is back on MSN. Yay.

Are you listening?

One thing that I have learned from my friends (and especially my female chums) is that I'm a good listener. It's not something I ever worked at because I've always preferred listening to talking, so it all kinda came naturally.

Tonight showed pretty much what I'm capable of (he says, his ego rapidly inflating...) An acquaintance, whom I've only started speaking to on MSN recently, was/is having a spot of bf trouble. She's no reason to trust me - we barely know each other having had less than a dozen MSN chats over a month, but she still managed to open up tonight (although, in all honestly, she didn't open up fully).

As usual, the other party then gets all guilty like, apologising and telling me that i must surely be bored. However, the fact of the matter is, I like listening.

No imagination = no title.

When I started this blog, I envisaged my sad, untrusting little self eventually coming to post some stuff that I needed to say, but didn't know who to turn to. While that hasn't quite been the case, I do think that the blog is actually of some benefit.

I appreciate that the entries probably aren't particularly exciting for the most part, and as much as I would like post details of the time I snorted coke off of Jessica Alba's naked body or thousands of no-strings one night stands, they're just not me. Not that I would want to snort coke off Jessica's naked body or fuck thousands of women - I would (in theory at least).

I think, mainly, that the blog is under-performing due to my lack of social life at the moment. A lot of my friends left and moved away, others got married and settled down with mortgages, kids and the like. That left me, a single bloke, trying to summon people to go pubbing etc. with. I might try and get a few of the people in work more interested in doing social stuff, but they're tied up in relationships, too. So, what I need is a social life, or maybe a girlfriend. Hell... even a fuck buddy so that we can go to the pub and then shag (or go to the cinema, then shag... or shag, then shag... anything, then shag!) Anything to get me out of the house! Heh.

One more thing to ponder: in one of my more time consuming online ventures, I seem to have a reputation of being a no nonsense, tell it like it is kind of person. However, for some reason, I also seem to have attracted a female fan base, most of whom have become fans despite knowing next to nothing about me. If only I could translate that kind of action down at the pub!

Bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored, bored.

Ever had one of those days where you're constantly bored and nothing you do holds your attention long enough? That's today. So far today, I've watched two films, played a game, completely reinstalled Windows on my PC, sent a lot of emails, reinstalled a game (because of the new Windows installation), did a bit of writing (a hobby of mine whioch I do from time to time), did a load of surfing, did some shopping, got all my post sorted for tomorrow and had a huge clear out of rubbish.

Reading back over it, it sounds like a really productive day, and it probably is. However, what the above paragraph doesn't say is that I didn't start and complete these tasks one after the other - I spent five minutes doing one before moving onto the other etc. I'm surprised I actually accomplished so much given this state of mind.

Ego wanking.

There's nothing like having your ego stroked. It's even better when others are doing it!

AWOL.

Not me, but USHW. She's decided, I think, to give certain internet aspects up for some time. Don't really blame her, to be honest. I just hope that she posts something about an incident that's aroused my curiosity before she does, or else I shall be frustrated. I hate it when people tell me snippets of stuff but don't give me the full story. Grrr.

Travelling.

I've made two plans for long weekends over the course of the next 12 weeks. The first is to Dublin and then one to Bristol. I'm looking forward immensely to both. Both will be completely different weekends, but both will be busy and fun.

Sigh.

Just been speaking to my friend, E. It seems she's moved up her timetable for going to New Zealand for a couple of years to October of this year. Dunno how I feel about that. I always knew she was going, of course, but I didn't think she'd be leaving this side of Christmas. On the bright side, if she does goes out in early October, she might well be up for a visit in January (when their weather is really good) as she'd have time to have gotten settled in and found a job etc.

I wouldn't mind seeing NZ again – especially the South Island that I never got a real good chance to see before, plus there is the thought of not seeing E for ages. We do see each other a couple of times a year, which is great, but if she's gone for a couple of years, I'd miss her terribly.

To perv or not to perv... that is the question.

We were on a work's night out last night. It was great fun. Ten pin bowling followed by food then booze (all with extra booze, of course). It started off quiet at work yesterday with no-one saying much, but I got the ball rolling with some banter around the team by telling everyone I would kick their asses at bowling. That seemed to do the trick as many emails were sent yesterday afternoon.

My first two balls down the lane knocked down a grand total of 1 pin, much to the amusement of my co-workers who thought I was being far too arrogant about my skills. Of course, following that up with two strikes, a spare and a 7/10 split for another spare soon wiped the smiles from their faces and I resumed being my normal arrogant self.

Predictably, once our one and only female co-worker had left, the conversation turned to company totty. I work in IT, so you can imagine that the male/female ratio is heavily stacked in favour of the males (sadly). However, there is one girl who sits close to my desk and is simply stunning and has a very lickable body, too. It came to light last night that she's not the 21 year old I thought she was, but is actually 27 or 28. Pity her department is moving soon – perving opportunities are going to go waaaay down. I might have to do some work. Anyway, from previous 'conversations' with UHSW, thinking about sex at work is simply far too frustrating to be enjoyable.

All in all, it was a great night out. I'm now at home with a raging hangover, but the sun is shining, it's a warm day and more importantly, it's a Friday!

Rant about a fucktard.

One of my internet hobbies involves being active around a site that has quite a lot of personal interaction with other people, and an offshoot if that is discussing stuff on a semi-related messageboard. The messageboard owner, TBM, is a fucktard. While he stumped up the cash for the URL and hosting last June, pretty much all the ideas and other work has been done by other people including myself and USHW. It should also be known that one of TBM's closest friends, my friend F, advised him against setting up such a board as she knew he'd get bored of it (no pun intended) and didn't have the backbone to make tough decisions. F was right. TBM only set up the board to bolster his own popularity around the main website, and once he realised what was needed to create a successful board, he pretty much gave up within two months. Since then, it's been pretty much myself and UHSW with a few others helping out.

Around Xmas, he decided that he'd got too much other stuff on and would let USHW admin the site until such time as he could return. Recently, his absence was noticed and commented on, and before you know it, the toys are being chucked well and truly out of the pram.

Apparently, TBM is upset that he's being criticised, despite the fact that the environment in which this messageboard operates, is rife with criticism and the like. People have offered to take the site off his hands if he's that pissed off, but I'm guessing that the recent perceived criticism will simply just make TBM decide to shut down the site. TBM, if you hadn't already guessed, is one of the most immature people I've ever met.

So now, all of a sudden, TBM is claiming that he isn't the site owner anymore, despite still owning the rights to the URL and the hosting package (and claiming so in various messages). I've no idea why he would stupidly make such a comment in public, especially when the only other person it could be, USHW, would probably call him on it in public, too.

It's my personal feeling that he's been looking for an excuse to close the site down for some time. I do know he's not particularly willing to give the site away for free (the stupid fucker took out a two year hosting deal and there's still a year left), but I also know that he wasn't public, until a few days ago, about not being willing to come back to the site as owner/admin.

What TBM doesn't really realise is that the people now involved with the board will be majorly pissed if he suddenly pulls the plug and that the popularity that he so craves will evaporate right before his eyes when the truth of what he's actually done for that site is made public. I, for one, will make sure people realise what a glory hunter he is.

Final words on this: I bet he closes the site down, and quite soon. I hope I'm wrong and that USHW can talk him round, but I'm not feeling any positive mental attitude (PMA) towards this at this time.

Contact (Part 2 - a specific person).

My friend, BW, is lucky to be alive. About three years ago, he was diagnosed with a brain aneurism which was causing him to have fits. He eventually underwent brain surgery and is still alive to this day, however his mental capacity is fucked, his memory's shot (not that it was great in the first place) and he's generally not the person he used to be. Dare I say it, but I'm not sure I even like the person he is now. I've mentioned before about people staying in contact – BW doesn't, and expects people to answer to his every whim.

We've had more than one argument about his lack of contact. I'd spent the best part of six months emailing a Hotmail account of his, only to find he'd never checked the fucking thing. Text messages go ignored and he refuses to sign up to stuff like Skype or MSN that would make it easier for a lot of his friends to stay in contact.

A lot of people are now coming to the end of their tether with him for these reasons, and if he doesn't pull his socks up soon, he's going to find himself without friends. His long-suffering girlfriend, E2, is well aware of what's happening, but he simply refuses to listen.

Best laid plans..,

This weekend has ended up being a lot quieter than it was supposed to have been. My mate, G, was due home from London this weekend, which would have meant a few nights out on the town – always great fun with G. Sadly, he's had to cancel. But, the flipside to this means that I might go and see him sometime over the summer – I've not been to London to see him for some time – about 10 years, so now that I'm gainfully employed, I really should make the effort.

I also have a trip to Birmingham due sometime in September or October to see F and perhaps a trip to Bristol in June or July. I might not get away on a summer holiday (but I don't really have the desire for that), but a few long weekends with friends are always welcome.

I've done enough procrastinating, so I'm gonna contact my brother-in-law later to see if we can't start getting fitter this week, preferably tomorrow.

PHP-Nuke themes

If any of you browsers know of any good PHP-Nuke themes in a red/white/black colour scheme, can you please leave me a comment or use the email link to the right? I'm looking to set up a website for a relative and their logo is red/white/black text.

Thank you.

(sigh)

It appears that things have taken a turn in the life of USHW. Her other half has discovered her MSN chat logs with various people (but especially me), and the proverbial has hit the fan. Why? Well, let's just say that our chats were, at times, lusty. I've no idea if he knows anything else (not that there's much else to tell), but from the little pieces of information that I currently have, I'm guessing that 'other half' didn't want USHW to come to the recent meet up that I posted about. The reasons aren't entirely clear, but an assumption I'm making is that a part of his point of view is that he expected something to happen while USHW was gone. I'm not sure if he didn't trust her or trust me or anyone else who was at the gathering a few weeks ago, but I do think that's an element of it.

Don't ask me what 'something to happen' is, because I don't know, but you don't simply start reading through someone's chat logs for entertainment. It's almost like reading through someone's diary, or blog. You will probably find something there you don't like.

This all sounds like bad news, and to a certain extent, it is. Not for me – OH only knows me as a name on the internet and chat logs, so I really can't see any fallout for me on this. It could potentially be bad news for USHW though, coming at a time when she is already unhappy. The irony of the situation is that, before the gathering, 'fallout' was something we'd discussed. I've brought it up before in one of my previous posts.

The optimist in me thinks that it could be turned into a good thing by USHW though. If there was ever a good time to get stuff off her chest regarding the past year or so, then it's right now. She has been reticent about coming clean to OH about all sorts of things because she feared it would hurt him, despite the fact it was doing her damage, too. So, she's now in a situation where she can sit down and clear the air with OH and see about moving forward. I hope she does, and I hope OH sees the opportunity... she deserves it.

I'd assume that, at least for the next few weeks, USHW will not be online much until things are clear(er). She knows she can email me at any time though. I'm gonna stay off MSN chats with her for a while to give her and OH a chance.

On a selfish note, my ego is sad because I’d been hoping to chat with her about something another female at the gathering was supposed to have said about me. That'll simply have to wait...

Ummm...

I'd like to post, but I'm too pissed to do so.

Keep on running...

OK. I now have some time to myself with a couple of major projects at work out of the way. That means that, starting next week, I'm starting to get fitter for the summer (and more importantly to start fitting into some clothes again) by going running with my brother in law. I think I said something along these lines in one of my original posts about goal setting.

I'll have to speak to him later this evening to organise something. Motivation has always been a major factor in my lack of exercise. It's not something I can do alone. By all means ask me to go and play football or basketball. I've no issues with that, but try and get me to do something on my own (running, gym etc.) and you're in deep trouble.

Let's see how this goes...

What next?

So, the meeting people weekend has come and gone. Was it worth the months of hassle and stress for some? I hope so! I certainly had a great time meeting new people and catching up with previous acquaintances. Other people are also making approving noises, so congratulations will have to be paid to USHW, the organiser. As I have said before, at these things, there are usually some complete tossers in the mix, but this time around everyone that I spoke to was really nice. As is usual though, I didn't get around all the people I'd have liked with at least three people deserving of more time which I was unable to give. I'd like to think that we'll all meet up again at some point, though.

I finally met USHW, too. There was bed sharing, but no fluid swapping. All moral codes remain intact, which was never in any doubt, really. She's a lot quieter and a lot more timid then I was expecting, despite repeated warnings from her that that was the case.

Now what? I've sort of been focussed on this one event, so now that's over what?

I am meant to be heading to Birmingham in September, so there is that to look forward to, but it seems an awful waste of a summer to be looking passed that to the early Autumn. Probably best to put on the old thinking cap.

Booze!

This weekend is meeting up with people weekend. That means that I should, hopefully, get to meet USHW. A while ago, it looked like this was going to be a disaster... I'd booked the hotel and my travel and was looking forward to this, but apart from USHW and myself, only fucktards had actually said they were showing up. Now, with only a few days left, the fucktards have cried off and decent, interesting people are going to show up. Even R has said she might actually attend, which would be great.

only a little effort is required

If I have one major pet peeve (and I have many, many peeves), it's people keeping in contact with me. I'm not talking about those shitty emails that we all get from our mates telling us that if we join this mailing list then GAP, Microsoft, Apple et al. will provide us with loads of lovely free goodies. Will they fuck!

My close friends know my postal address; they know any one of my many email address, my MSN name, ICQ number, Skype username, YAHOO messenger account etc.

How come that very few of them actually uses them (those that I don't see regularly, that is)? It's not that they don't know that I value personal contact. I have been more than vocal in my desire that my friends stay in contact more. It's not as if they don't see the consequences of not doing so as I've distanced myself from people who simply don't make the effort.

An ex-girlfriend of mine, FA2, repeatedly complains that I am no longer in contact with her, despite the fact that out of all my friends, she's the one who probably knows best that not staying in contact is guaranteed to piss me off. "I haven't heard from you in ages!" was an email I once received from her (her first in months), despite the fact I'd been emailing, on average, every fortnight when she was out of the country.

As I've said before, I was in the States recently and met a lovely girl, V. We seemed to hit it off really well, and by the time it was time for me to return home we had, I thought, the beginnings of a friendship. What have I heard since then? Fuck all. I've sent "proper" mail, SMS messages and if I could make out her handwriting, I'd send an email too.

Out of them all, only MA2 and QC2 actually send stuff out of the blue asking how I am. It's not a lot – just a few lines in an email, but it means something to me and more often than not, ends up in arranging to visit them or meeting up for a drink.

I don't understand why more people don't make the effort.

Never, ever volunteer.

What a weekend. Not that I did anything terribly exciting at all, but I'm still ready to go to bed and I'm completely exhausted. For the past few weeks, I've been trying to fix a relative's PC. It's been a struggle since day one, to be honest. First of all, trying to find the actual error which was causing the PC to reset itself about 90% of the way into booting up took ages and turned out to be faulty RAM (or at least incorrectly seated RAM). That took about 10 days. So off it trundled to relative HQ, only to be returned immediately. "It's still broken" cried the bastards.

Was it fuck! So I fiddled with it a bit more – updated the BIOS, fragmented the hard drive and generally made sure it was running as well as it could (and that's not to say it's great – P3 450Mhz. 256MB Ram and Windows XP are not a good combo).

I sent it back to them in the best health it's been in since they bought it. But, oh no, that's not fucking good enough, is it? "The modem doesn't work!" they moaned "Reinstall Windows for us... and we want new anti-virus software, too!"

Can't these people just reinstall the fucking drivers?

Now... that was all two weeks ago. It's taken me two fucking weeks to reinstall Windows XP. I have no idea why the PC didn't like it (there were about half a dozen different reasons I could find why, but can't narrow it down any more than that). Ordinarily, it's a 2 hour job at the most, but two fucking weeks? Give me a break!

So, I was sitting at my PC today, staring at some lovelies when I got an SMS message from my cousin asking after the PC. This is the same family who told me that they'd give me space to look at it, no pressure, and I'd call them when it's done. Fuckers.

Call it Murphy's Law or whatever, but I decided to give it one last go because they're family. Doesn't fucking Windows fucking install? Gaaaaaaaa! OK, so I'm a bit pleased (because a week ago I wasn't going to let this wanker beat me) and so off I go to install the bare minimum of software (you know the score – anti-virus, adobe acrobat, a graphics package and some home office software) only to find that Windows doesn't actually want anything to be installed onto it.

It was at that point that I gave up, sent an SMS to my cousin pronouncing the PC to be dead. It is an ex-PC. No, it's not fucking sleeping, it's dead. Here's something for free - if they're looking a new PC built, they can fuck off and look elsewhere...

Previous post.

I've read it and re-read it and I still can't figure out what I was trying to say...

Just sit back, close your eyes and tell me everything... You have one hour.

I have a lot of female friends. Is there a reason for this? Perhaps. I've no idea though. However, I seem to just click easier with females than males (though don't get me wrong – my oldest friends are guys I've known for nearly 30 years now). That's hardly a big thing either. Where everything does seem to fall down is that, in a few cases (too many), I will end up feeling things for my female chums that are not at all sensible.

Not all of them, mind. Don't get me wrong, I haven't fallen for every single female that I've ever met. My friend AM is possibly one of the closest friends that I have, and she's never short of giving me a verbal kicking (especially on the subject of female companionship). Not once did I ever regard her as anything other than a friend, though. I do have another few friends who have become friends because I was attracted to them and ended up not doing anything about it until it was too late (QC1 and QC2 being prime examples). Actually, maybe not QC1 as I did kiss her and ask her out for drinks and she turned me down.

I thought that I'd outgrown all that until about 18 months ago I went to visit my friend, E. Suffice to say, upon my return home and after nearly five years of friendship, I was having less than platonic thoughts.

That was an easy decision to make, though. I valued her friendship a lot and it was too important to me to throw down the toilet by trying to take our relationship to places that it probably wouldn't have gone anyway.

Saying that, last year wasn't bad – out of five attempts (yes, bite me, my social life last year sucked ass), four ended up with some sort of result. The fifth (and last) was while was out of the UK where a young lady, V, took my fancy. Even now, I've no idea how I didn't even get close to *ahem* closing the deal. She was obviously interested, and we got along brilliantly.

Re-reading this post, I've come to the conclusion that I don't understand women. And I don't understand myself, either.

What to post?

Sometimes I feel like posting. Like now, for example. But can I figure out how to put my thoughts into words and make it understandable? Can I fuck!

This one might need a bit of pondering first.

woohoo

Christ, I'm tired. It's approaching clocking off time, but today has been excellent, professionally. For the past few weeks, we've been under the cosh a bit regarding getting our project completed on time (mainly due to atrocious communications from our clients), but with the help of another guy, we have managed to simplify the most complex looking (and thus time consuming) task down into four easily checkable points which means that everything should be on target for handing over in two and a half weeks time.

Groove on.

Ages ago, I downloaded a bootleg of U2's last date on their Zooropa tour of 1993 in Dublin from bittorrent. I was there. The bootleg quality is fantastic and I have been listening to it all day long.

Interesting side point about that night… At the start of "Bad", Bono says "Michael Jackson, guilty before you've been given a chance. We don't think you're bad".

And 11 years on, I wonder if Bono still thinks that?

Note to self...

Don't try and create blog entries at work then post the half finished article on the way out the door because you're late for din dins.

Countdown.

As we edge ever closer to the weekend of the various people meeting up (13 days and counting…), it's looking more and more like USHW will be unable to attend. That's my point of view – in these circumstances, I tend not to "say die" as it were until it's an impossibility, though I suspect that USHW may well have already made her decision. Her journey from January 'til now has been mentally and emotionally draining and I probably would have jumped off a bridge aaaages ago under the same stress.

That's disappointing in many ways. I'd love to meet her and that's primarily what I'm looking forward to if she can make it, but we're due to be sharing a room (and a bed), and to be honest, I was kinda looking forward to that, too. Get your minds out of the gutter! There won't be any sex (at least not between USHW and myself) but it is pleasant to share a bed with a female, even a platonic friend. That's not to say that if another young filly were to offer that I'd say "no". I'm a single bloke as much in need of a fuck as the next one. I did, at one point, have a totty list, but most of the people on the list were unrealistic for various reasons and the others won't be showing.

Ah well… Looks like it's more porn for me then.

Professional life.

I work with a guy whom I will call Stig. There's a reason for this. He behaves like caveman. His personal hygiene is atrocious; he has no concept of a balanced diet (he eats like a six year old i.e. all junk) and he's a paranoid drunk (plus, it only takes him about 4 beers to get wasted). He has no inter-personal skills and other people are continually bailing him out of trouble, plus he never seems to do any work – he's forever playing games or surfing Asian dating sites (we believe he's secretly planning on moving to Japan). Our boss is fully aware of this, but that doesn't make Stig any less of a wanker.

What the fuck?

Sometimes, you come across a website that simply has to be a joke. You spend loads of time laughing at it, at it's cleverness, it's biting satire and then it hits you...

It's not a joke.

http://www.christianshirts.net/index.php

Type.

What's your type?

I like to think that mine's brunettes, but in all honesty, I've fucked all types of girls - blondes, brunettes, redheads, thin, athletic, sturdy, tall, medium, short etc.

My friend, F, likes nerds for reasons known only to herself.

I can go into lots more detail, but suffice to say that Jessica Alba (there's a picture of her around here somewhere) pretty much resembles my ideal woman. I think I've been lucky, too. Two ex-lovers (what a crap phrase that is) of mine have had those characteristics, too. Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying that I've shagged two Jess Alba lookalikes - far from it! But they were both brunette, dark eyes and curvy in the right places without being too big or too thin.

So why this post? Ummm... dunno, really. I don't suppose anyone knows a single Jess Alba-alike in her early to mid thirties?

No more Microsoft bollocks.

Fixed the sizes of the pics, so there shouldn't be an display issues any more.

Hopefully.

Microsoft Bollocks.

I've just noticed that if you're viewing this in Internet Explorer, then the extra side bar on the right hand side is out of position.

You really should use a better browser like Opera or Firefox, you know!

(Yes, I am aware it's my fault for not resizing the Jessica/Catherine pictures correctly, but that still doesn't mean you should be using IE.)

The good ol' U S of A.

I spent some time in the States recently. Looking at those maps on Google and Microsoft made me think about what I was missing from there.

It's mainly food related, though.

Fast food:
Chipotle
Taco Bell
Wendy's

Starbucks (yes, I know we have that in the UK, but I liked the American prices)

A decent steak

American cocktails

Things I don't miss at all:

American beer. It is vile.
Homeland security.

Maps galore! (None relevant to me, but still fun).

Today, I have mostly been playing around with:

http://maps.google.com/

and

http://terraserver.microsoft.com/default.aspx

Tremendous fun!

Uh oh!

I get the feeling that when USHW finds this, and reads this post, then I shall be in for a verbal kicking.

Not looking good.

As I've said before, I'm meant to be meeting up with a group of people in a few weeks time. Numbers are fairly fuzzy at the moment, but a rough guess suggests anywhere up to around twenty people could show up.

I've done meets like this before, but where this one is different in that there's not much motivation for me to show up apart from one thing, and that's the chance to meet USHW. Until now, we've only spoken via IM and email. There are other people who will be in attendance that I'd like to see again, but I also like to meet new people, and the "quality" (for want of a better word) of new people at this meet is lacking.

The problem is that USHW has problems of her own, and it's looking increasingly likely as if she won't be able to make it to this gathering, despite the fact she's put a lot of work into organising it. It would be a shame if she didn't get to the meeting as I believe she really needs to spend some time on her own away from the stresses that she's currently facing (and would make her frustrations at the organising worthwhile). A few days spent on the lash would be an ideal tonic - at least, that's what I think.

We can only see what happens, I suppose. I'm not feeling particularly positive right now though.

Blogger templates.

If anyone who knows anything about Blogger templates happens to pass by this li'l ol' blog and would like to tell me how to increase the width of the title bar above and this main content pane, I'd be very appreciative. Thanks.

What if...

Sometimes, pub conversations can be fun. 

Last night, whilst out with FP, the conversation turned to "What if...". Not in a sentimental kind of way, but more along the lines of "Christ, it would be so easy to be in a completely different place by now" kind of way. 

Like "What if I'd passed my A-levels the first time and gone to university at 18 instead of 27?" or "What if I hadn't spoken to that girl who I ended up dating for a couple of years?" or "What would have happened if I hadn't fucked that girl from work?" 

Three situations that did happen and would probably have had various degrees of influence on my life from those points onwards... 

The university thing was probably the one thing that could have had the biggest influence on my life, given that the industry (I.T.) was buoyant when I was 18 and was on a downward spiral with the dot com bubble burst when I was halfway through my degree (ten years later). Not only would my starting salary have been higher, but chances are I wouldn't have stayed local looking for a job, either. 

The girl thing is self-explanatory, really. During those few years, I pretty much stayed in the state that I was in when I met her - all thoughts that I'd had of travelling, looking for a promotion/better job etc. all kinda fell by the wayside. 

Not as big an influence as the university thing, but could have been fairly major. Sleeping with the girl from work was relatively minor in terms of influence - a short term series of fucks that I think she was trying to build into a relationship and that I was happy leaving as a series of fucks. So, perhaps obviously, we're no longer in regular contact. I haven't seen her in a few years, but we're at least still on speaking terms when we do bump into each other in the street. 

I think I watched "Back to the Future" too much when I was younger.

Confession.

I'm meant to be meeting up with USHW (amongst others) in a few weeks, if she can make it, that is. I've told her one fib in the time we've been speaking to each other through our mutual interests. I could easily just 'fess up at any time, but this is one I where quite fancy seeing the look on her face when I do tell.

The thought of it makes me giggle.

Microsoft MSN Messenger.

I use MSN Messenger a lot - I know a lot of people across the UK (and further afield) and it's a brilliant way of keeping in contact (though Skype also comes close for VoIP handiness).

But why oh why do fucktards insist on ignoring my status messages?

Setting myself as "Away" or "Busy" isn't done for the good of my health, you know!

Grrr...

More pondering.

A question that was raised from talking to USHW months and months ago (and also relates to a previous experience):

"Shagging married people: who is ultimately responsible for what happens? The married person, seeing as are the person in the relationship? Are they ultimately responsible or does the external party also have some sort of moral obligation to behave themselves, too?"

As a single male, I have to say that I have slept with a married woman, once. She did all the chasing, and I was in the mood, so I went along with it without a thought. The next day, I got thinking though. From a personal point of view, I had no issues with it. We both had a good time (at least I know one of us did, and I hope the other did, too), but I've no idea if there was fallout from what happened. Did MW go home and confess all? Did she say nothing? Herein lies the question.

It might happen again. I'm not going to chase anyone who's married (or even those in long term relationships), but that's not to say if someone in one of these were to offer that I'd say "no". I might, of course. Ideally, I'd need to have some sort of idea about whether there'd be fallout as a consequence. If so, then you wouldn't see me for dust. That'd still ring true if I wasn't going to be involved. If there was no fallout on the cards though, then who knows? It's the fallout that's the key here, I think.

Of course, in an entirely hypocritical twist, I wouldn't want my other half to go off shagging around.

Goal setting.

It's been my experience that I am a lot more active and forward thinking if I list the stuff I have (or want) to do. A few years ago when I was living away from the UK, for about a month I listed everything I need to do that day, and I really was achieving more. I sorta just lost track of it though when I moved back to the UK.

So, in a vague attempt to start this good habit off again, here's another list:

• Join that local gym that I've been planning to for a while (and use it).
• Be more careful with my diet (currently it's "eat what you like").
• Try and save some money.
• Start looking long term for permanent housing solutions - investigate mortgages and house prices.
  
• Ummm...

I think that's enough for now. I might update this as and when I accomplish these goals and need to think of other stuff to add to it.

Titles. Fucking titles.

I fucking hate titles. Everything about them sucks huge amounts of ass. I've been on the interweb for a shitload of years now - since mid-1997. Since then I've used mainly two user names (none of which will be referred to here). But when I do decided to create something new, like this, for example, I run out of ideas even before I've begun.

The blog title, for those of you who are interested, is a line from an episode of the excellent Futurama spoken by Bender. it's not as if it's some profound statement that cunningly reflects my personality.

I'm not sure where this is going to go, really. If you eventually want to blame someone, then hunt out USHW for hinting/nagging etc. for me to set up my own blog. (I did have another one, but it sank before it got off the ground because I stupidly give the URL to a friend, despite my intention of keeping it private and being able to use it to clear my head from time to time.)

For USHW: I'm not going to promise that I post in this regularly or that I will bare my soul. It should stand a better chance than my last one though, so it might contain something of note at some point.