Bad Car, Good Food, Long Waits

Phil sold his Mazda MX-5 last week that he's owned for about nine months making a big financial loss and has learnt the important lesson never to buy a car from Andy Cobb aka Andrew Cobb of Rotherham trading as AC Cars. Hopefully others will heed this warning.

I've been out for four meals in thepast three days. On Wednesday night I went to Zizzi's in Leeds. It's a nice place but the head chef walked out while we were there so we had to wait over an hour and a half for our food. We still had a good time though and Kari enjoyed her birthday.

Yesterday we went to Varsity from lunch. Four meals came promptly and two came about ten minutes later one of them being mine. I couldn't go wrong for my next two meals though with my mum cooking for me last night and Pizza Hut all you can eat buffet at lunchtime today though there was a short period when they ran out of pizza due to the Wheawills guys being pizza destroyers!

I should mention too that Adeel left last week. He'll be missed but i'm kinda used to people leaving now so life and work goes on.

Roz will also be missed by me as she's gone to Jackson, Mississippi for five months to defend people on death row, getting more press coverage than me in the process!

Record Update

Last January a new viewing record was set for number of viewers of this blog. 64 in a day, 257 in a week and, just beating the previous record, 399 in the month. As you can see from the figures below, all these have now been well and truly broken.

27 Dec, Sat 16
28 Dec, Sun 21
29 Dec, Mon 36
30 Dec, Tue 25
31 Dec, Wed 54
01 Jan, Thu 77
02 Jan, Fri 119
03 Jan, Sat 134
04 Jan, Sun 242
05 Jan, Mon 239
06 Jan, Tue 68
07 Jan, Wed 28
08 Jan, Thu 14

Week 01 687
Week 02 382

This is all due to the fact that when people around the world search for any variant of when they should take down their Christmas decorations, this post from tree years ago is shown very high on search engines. Hopefully they liked what they read and will return at some point. The next aim is 1000 hits for the month and it's looking good at the moment. I'll update on that when it's happened!

Chesterfield v Droylsden FA Cup 2nd Round Controversy

Chesterfield were drawn at home to Droylsden in the 2nd round of the FA Cup. Big deal. But from what followed you could almost make a feature length movie about.

The match was played with Droylsden taking a 1-0 half time lead but then had to be abandoned due to fog. In an interview after the game the Chesterfield manager said (unsurprisingly) that the right decision had been made. I believe the Droylsden camp were less happy. Ther was a also a report of Droylsden fans racially abusng a Chesterfield player.

The match was then played again with Chesterfield taking the lead and Droylsden equalising. Then the controversy continued. Droylsden sportingly put the ball out of play while someone was injured. Chesterfield then threw it to their attacker who hit a looping pass over the keeper into the goal to make it 2-1. Droylsden then appealed, a lot but Chesterfield hadn't done anything against the laws. In the end, to avoid a riot, Droylsden were allowed to walk the ball unchallenged to score a goal themselves. This meant the tie finished 2-2 so a replay was required.

The replay took place a week later at Droylsden's Butchers Arms Ground on a Tuesday night. Chesterfield were leading 2-0 when in the 70th minute some of the floodlights went out. The game was therefore abandoned. This (unsurprisingly) didn't please the Chesterfield manager who said there was more visibility than when the original game was abandoned. The Droylsden camp felt they were on top at the time and disappointed the game was abandoned but that the officials were left with no choice.

The match was then played for a 4th time (just like the old replay days!) and Droylsden emerged 2-1 winners thanks to two goals from Sean Newton. However, the day after the game it transpired that Newton had picked up a suspension which was due to start on the day of the match. The FA confirmed this. The last time this happened, Bury were expelled from the cup and their opponents Chester granted a reprieve to face Ipswich in Round 3. Droylsden were therefore expelled and Chesterfield would (coincidentally) play Ipswich in the 3rd round of the cup.

Droylsden then appealed but they lost ending the saga exactly one month after in begun. Chesterfield went on to lose 3-0 in the 3rd round!

2008 Into 2009

2008 was quite a quiet year on the whole. Since my last post there's not been a lot worth mentioning. I did a couple of exams which seemed to go ok but will have to wait until February for the results. Then there were four Christmas parties with work (inhouse, students, work, and audit) which were all good and I don't seem to have put any weight on which is good (not that that really bothers me).

On New Years Eve we ended up at The Moorings like last year. We had a pizza and a drink or two or three and then went to the pub. Kate and Jon, JJ and Caroline, Lucy and Dave, Amanda and I got a table fairly quickly considering how busy it was and stayed there for the night until about 1:30. I wasn't ill like last year and think everyone had a good time. We also got invited to a sex party from the table next to us but we politely declined.

Maybe 2009 will be a more interesting year for me. Maybe it won't. Maybe i'll write about it! Happy new year readers!

Calderdale Bonfires 2008

For a full list of bonfires in Calderdale this year, please click here for a link to the report in the Courier. The Elland one will be Saturday 1st November.

Ellipse, Jury Service, Taxi Prices

Having been working at Oval Insurance for the past couple of months or so I'd just like to thank for making me feel welcome and pretty much lie one of their own staff.

After Oval, I served my jury service at Bradford Crown Court of which i received notice of a few weeks ago. The first day involved a lot of waiting around as I waited to be allocated a trial. I finally got one at about 3:00 and it ended up lasting five days. I then got released from my two week stint four days early as there was a shortage of trials in the second week. I'm not going to give any details of the case on here but I shall say it was a rewarding and interesting experience and one I hope to get the opportunity of doing again sometime.

After the recent strikes, the taxis in Halifax have put their prices up. There's putting prices up and there's putting prices up. Before the rise I used to pay between £10 and £12 but last night it was £16.70 which I feel is a bit steep. Not much I can do about it though I suppose.

3rd, Work Stuff

I should start by updating what's been going on at work recently (like the last 6 months). I took 2 exams in June, passed one and failed one leading to me doing 2 in December. Just after my exams, I think it was 15th June, I was returning to the office from hospital only to find no-one was being let in as the fish and chip shop underneath the room where i sit had a big fire. We were sent home soon afterwards due to smoke inhalation issues. 3 months on (exactly) and smoke can still be smelled on the 2nd floor although it's not so bad in the room where i am on the 3rd floor now. Finally re work I should congratulate Victoria on passing her final exams recently.

Anyway my main reason for the rare post is that we have just come 3rd in the Big Six quiz. The team is a bit different to that of last year. I was joined by Kate and boyfriend Jon, her housemate Kari and boyfriend Simon, her mum and Rob (not seeing each other!). Ok so there were 7 of us and the team that normally wins were without their most influential member as he was setting the quiz so we beat them with 106 out of 136. 1st got 119, 2nd 113, 4th 103 and 5th 101. The last of the other 6 teams got 79. This is our first top 3 finish since New Years' Day 2007 hence it being such a big occasion! No cheating either (assuming having 7 in the team is not cheating)!

Taxi Anger

Right, apologies to regulars for lack of posts, I just seem to have stopped. However tonight (well it's almost light now so this morning really) I am angry.

Calderdale's taxis are striking (25 out of 48 firms was the last figure i heard) tonight. However is seems very few are running at all. I have had a night out and left the night club, Maine Street at 2:10am. I finally got home to Brighouse at 4:10am. It appears no major taxi firms in Halifax are running causing a huge queue in St George's Square. This was policed well by the Street Angels and Police although they did nothing to solve the situation.

The strike is because taxi firms feel they are being unfairly treated. It costs £80 to renew a licence (annually) in Calderdale compared with £35 in Leeds and Bradford. Fuel prices have gone through the roof. Taxi drivers are banned from taxiing once they have accumulated 6 points on their licence (might be 7 or 9 depending on different sources). To become a taxi driver, knowledge tests must be taken of the area in addition to the normal taxi test. All registered taxis must have a sticker on both sides of the car causing extra cost totaxi firms.

My driver last week said "It's more like being a doctor than a taxi driver. 6 points is nothing. Taxis make no money by keeping to speed limits and there is very little danger on the roads in the middle of the night anyway." I see his point. How many kids are running out of the playground by Park Wood at 3am justifying the recently reduced 30mph limit?

Tonight, after queueing for 90 minutes I finally got a hackney carriage (more expensive than from one of the regular firms) from St George's Square with a guy called Neville and a lady called Suzanne as they were heading in the same direction. Everything in the queue was reasonably civilised but if it has been a cold, wet winter evening, this strike would've been detrimental to many people's health. It is just lucky the strike came on the warmest and dry night of the year.

However, a lot of people left thequeue to walk home or get in unlicensed cabs just so they could get home. Should any of these people get beaten, raped or even killed on their way home then Calderdale's Councillors should hold themselves personally responsible as this strike should NEVER have been allowed to take place. With a bit of negotiation and fairness, I feel certain things could have been worked out without putting hundreds of people's lives at risk after a night out.

Hopefully things will be resolved soon before more lives are put at risk.

So...It's Been Three Months

Much has happened but little worth writing about. Although no doubt i'll get back into it soon.

Traffic Light Dating 3 - The Experiment

For the first two instalments of this trilogy (so far) see September 2004 and February 2006.

The Friday after Valentines Day, Rob and I were out in Halifax and Liquid were running a Traffic Light Dating night. This involved stickers being given to everyone going in which were colour coded depending on people's availability. Red is "i'm not available", yellow is "try me", and green is "come and get me".

Unfortuneately they didn't seem to have many stickers on the door and only about 10% of people were wearing them, not including us. It really didn't live up to the hype but perhaps if the idea had been executed better, it could have been a success.

Note - Last night we went again as they had advertised the first ever Circus to be in Maine Street. Hmmm interesting. Turns out there was nothing in Maine Street and four stilt walkers in Liquid and someone with a face mask on. Again rather overhyped. I was wondering where the tigers were going to go! I do have to say though Maine Street rules. I also seem to meet people who i haven't seen for ages there too. In my last two visits i've seen Clare and Natalie, my old boss, and someone whose form i was prefect for at school though unfortuneately I have no idea who she was!