Two Thousand and Great – The round up.

Dear all

Happy new year to you all, thanks for all the support and challenges last year. It’s over, the beard has gone and a new year and a new challenge awaits.

I had a big fear that at about 5 to midnight someone would set me the challenge to do it all again the this year, but thankfully with all the alcohol that was flowing nobody thought of this and I escaped.

Big thanks to Andy (and Sarah) for hosting the NYE party, lots of others for putting up with my terrible DJing – Don’t blame me for finding the Vengaboys CD – once i’d seen it there was only ever going to be one outcome.

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Good god it’s cold!

Some of you might have seen the pictures of my NYE head shave, what many people don’t know is that was not the only hair that was removed that day. turning up in St Paul’s earlier in the morning I went to do the challenge I had been putting off more than any other.

Several times over the year people commented that seeing as I was not allowed to cut the hair above my neck I should redress the balance and have the rest of my hair waxed off.

One of my oldest friends took it upon himself to make this happen – I have rarely seen this man so driven in 15 years and he literally gave me no chance not to pass this challenge.

One of the people he works with used to work in a Turkish salon and as she said, they have some very hairy ladies in Turkey… after hearing all about the challenges that I had been set last year she agreed to help out.

As a waxing novice I had no idea about what to wear or how to prepare, after a morning bath I decided two pairs of underwear would be a start briefs and boxers to avoid any unnecessary showings.

In a room which virtually overlooked the whispering gallery I delighted in the irony that just over the road people were whispering whilst I was genuflecting on a chair yelping every now and then as the hair was forcibly torn from my back, legs, arms torso etc… by a maniacally laughing girl and one of my best mates who decided to join in and tear strips of me literally.

To illustrate here’s a shot taken halfway through the event…. you could have cooked bacon on my back.

Now you’ve all got the Ken doll image going through your brains, I should move on swiftly, Later that night I got very drunk and the job was finished off properly. Two of the biggest sponsors of the hair growth challenge Venita and Paul shaved my head. Seeing as they had paid for it, it only seemed fair.

Arming drunk people with scissors. clippers and razors is usually not advised – my mantra for the entire thing was “don’t cut my ears off`” – I think they did a great job.

The aim was to shave my head straight down the middle so I could do an impromptu ABBA impersonation by switching my head side to side alternating between Annafried and Benni (you can make your mind up how it went….

One small thing can anyone recommend a new aftershave for me? At the beginning of 2008 I threw out all my shaving based stuff and now lack anything like that. Usually like most Hugo Boss fragrances but willing to listen to others for inspiration

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The last challenge I was set in 2008 was to try and get the story of the year turned into a book. I took a laptop home after christmas and have put together the synopsis and started to try and structure the book. Currently, I’m stuck between writing a chapter per week or mixing it up into themes like all the strange days together the cycle ride, the animal challenges etc…. Hopefully I will find the time in the next couple of weeks to put it together and present to publishers.

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Talking of published things, I made an appearance in the Northern Stars – the North Surrey Bell Ringers Association Newsletter. The man who is teahing me to bell ring asked if he could do an article on me and the year and I have added it below as I think it is the best thing that has been written about the year so far.

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On the way to my last bell ringing session of 2008 I had to give a radio interview for BBC 3CR who had heard about my challenges. It was quite odd as I took the call whist heading up to the tower where I ring and due to all the noise I had to talk rather loudly, meaning that everyone else on the bus was forced to listen to my end of a very strange conversation that included talking about walking on water, shearing sheep and looking like father christmas. I have requested a copy, and will post it up soon, I think I fared ok, the lamb bikini joke might have fallen a bit flat but it was worth a try.

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In some ways the year has ended, but I still have a few challenges to complete – as and when I complete them I’ll let you know. thankfully for you it won’t be a weekly newsletter (so you no longer have to deal with my awful grammar). Luckily nobody challenged me to learn to write properly – subject, verb, object seems a sensible system but for some reason I can never remember it.

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As a few people have asked – my total to date is £6,165 (+ gift aid supplement) £5060 on my main page and £1105 on the separate cycle challenge page I created.

My company have promised to donate a further £1,000 to the total which is incredibly generous, and I have to say thanks to them as it can’t have been easy having a bearded fool in the office all year taking half days to try and get in submarines etc… or taking over the kitchens to try feeding the 5,000.

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I still have to go through all the mailshots I sent from last year to see which challenges I still have to complete – I haven’t finished the TwoThousandandGreat song yet. Can you believe I was going to record a version of Halleluah – and two others had beaten me to it???

Once it has been penned and put to music I will upload the video to youtube.

It’s all over (well nearly)

The donations page is open until the start of July 09 (to give me time to do things like the live off the land challenge) so all those who pledged to donate for things like the beard growth and body wax still have time to donate.

Every penny we have raised will help families affected by cancer. It means so much to me that in some small way we are able to help others.

Cheers for all your support again.

Rob / Devani

www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat

Two Thousand and Great – As I Lay Me Down To Sleep

Dear all

A little something to end the week, today I died… Not a strange day challenge that went wrong, but, I was sent a few pages of the new book by Stuart MacBride called Blind Eye

A few months ago I was set a challenge to die – a friend of mine who works in publishing mentioned that one of her authors wrote lots of gritty crime fiction with plenty of deaths in it and could ask him to write me in as a character.

Stuart was told all about the challenges, what i’ve been up to, why I raise money for MacMillan a bit about Richard and asked for a photo, he said he would try to help out and then it went quiet.

Today Stuart submitted his first draft to the publisher and included a special copy with a few underlined sections.Below this post is a couple of pages from the forthcoming book. I was sent a slightly longer section of the book where I get named in full – this excerpt is deliberately short to avoid any spoilers appearing on the internet. 

My character is called Dirty Bob, I’ll let you judge how well he knows me.What i’ve read is great, if you are stuck for presents to buy someone dad, uncle, brother, cousin etc.. please buy one of his books, they make gripping reads.

Blind Eye will be released in May with advanced copies being available in April. I guess a few people will be getting copies from me for gifts and stuff next year but please order a copy of the book.

Cheers

Rob / Devani / Dirty Bob

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Blind Eye Excerpt

Logan peered out at a dishevelled man: swollen nose, red eyes, bushy black beard; monk-tonsure bald patch; blue parker jacket with half the fur trim missing; trousers that had seen better days and some sort of curry, going by the stains; filthy grey trainers. Robert Danavell, AKA: Dirty Bob.

‘What do you want, Bob?’

Karim’s favourite tramp gave Logan a gap-toothed smile. ‘Them fags…’ He pointed at the fallen cigarettes with a grimy finger. ‘You no’ needin’ them oany mair?’
‘Knock yourself out.’

‘Ah, cheers min, yer a fine loon.’ Dirty Bob creaked his way down to his knees. ‘No’ like that fat bugger yesterday. Tellin’ me I’m stinkin’ up his reception. Me! Wie ma best pal lyin’ deid in the morgue…’

Logan watched him picking through the gutter. It wasn’t much of a life, but at least Dirty Bob knew what mattered to him: drink, fags and the occasional half-eaten fish supper, or discarded kebab – whatever he could forage from the bins.

No life-or-death decisions. No moral or ethical dilemmas.

It probably said something about your life when you started envying people like Dirty Bob.

Bob was sitting on the pavement now, one of the windfall cigarettes clamped between his lips, patting round his pockets until he found a little book of matches. Lighting up with a sad little smile on his face. He looked up at Logan. ‘Kin yeh spare oany money fer an aul mannie tae have a wee drink tae his best mate’s memory?’

‘Aul mannie? You’re forty-two Bob, not seventy.’

Dirty Bob shrugged. ‘Aye, but forty-two’s a lot older in tramp years. Lookit poor Richard.’ He sniffed and wiped a sleeve across his nose, leaving a clean-ish streak. ‘Deid afore his time…’

Half past ten. Some of the pubs down on Regent Quay would have been open for hours, catering for the nightshift crowd and early morning drinkers. Tempting. Logan produced his wallet and dug out a fiver. Then changed his mind and made it a twenty instead. ‘Here.’
Dirty Bob eyed it suspiciously. Then grinned and grabbed the note. ‘Aye, that’ll dae Richard proud.’ He grunted his way upright, threw Logan a salute, then turned and hobbled away in his filthy trainers.

Twenty quid wouldn’t make a dent in a seasoned alcoholic like Dirty Bob, not in a pub anyway. But it would probably buy a whole load of white spirit.

Two Thousand and Great – Weeks 50 and 51

 

Dear all

Sorry about the lack of updates last week, but December is one of those strange months where there seems to be a hundred different things happening, whether parties, gigs or things.

I’ve had an odd morning, on the way to work I tried my hand at animal wrangling, (I think that’s the right term) it’s National Cat Herders Day and every moggie I saw I tried very deliberately to drive in a certain direction – mainly towards roads with traffic but it was harder than I imagined. Having seen the film Babe I imagined it couldn’t be too hard all you have to do is gently guide them. I even have the big beard like James Cromwell does in the movie. I will cal a friend with some cats on my way home to see if I can borrow them to try and make them do an assault course or something… I could have just re-read a lovely little book called Herding Cats by John McCabe but that’s not in the spirit of the strange days. (ps. If a girl ever needs to understand a blokes mind and how it works they should read the first few chapters of another McCabe book called Stickleback, trust me it will all make a bit more sense after that.)

I’ll combine my last two bell ringing lessons into one for the next bit, I’ve worked out why it’s so diffiicult – You sinply can’t practice it to get better as a novice. I have considered speaking to the young family upstairs to ask if I can instal a ring upstairs in their lounge but it’s unlikely they’ll accept. I asked how long the others have been ringing and it ranges from about 6 years to 40, so it’s little wonder I am awful in comparison.

Anyway with the cold wet weather on one night the group was down to 8 members, this meant that between rings I had a little more time to practice and ask questions to the group. As I was ringing quite well I was invited to join in with larger groups – and by the end I was ringing as part of the full ring, with all 8 bells ringing in order. It’s only at this point that my lack of experience really shows, I am so intent on keeping in time and following the person that I start to pull too hard and then end up doing twice the work I should – my technique also starts to fall apart with my hands getting too far apart and coming away from the rope. In my head I have to continue tell myself to keep my hands together but then I get so caught up in trying to keep time and place that I get lack again.

Anyway despite my flaws I have been getting slightly better, last week saw me try and incorporate a new skill ‘called changes’ where the tower captain changes the order by shouting out a new series of numbers eg, 5 to 3 and the bells mentioned have to change their order with one then coming in front of another. I found this quite confusing but I seemed to stay in time and place most of the time, I need to read my little guide book a few more times as i still struggle to retain the information about what rings where and when in a tune. Sometimes I feel that Tony is just making things – watching the group last week a new call of “Go Antelope” was shouted and the ringers all responded going from rounds 1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8 into a new pattern  which I am assured is 3 blows in 5ths, dodge, 2 blows in 4ths as you can imagine I have no idea at all what this means.

This though might make it clearer to anyone who is interested - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Change_ringing

A week last Wednesday I went to see a very talented group called Kitty, Daisy & Lewis where I bumped into one of the hairdressers who refused to dye my hair, that said she took one look at my sorry attempts which have turned me ginger and has agreed to finally turn my hair white, this should be happening on the 21st December.

The next day was also my works xmas party – this clashed with another of my strange days, National Dice Day, there’s no easy way to say this but I don’t remember much if anything that went on. The idea for the day was to try and live my life by the throws of a dice like the lead character in The Dice Man, it’s a fantastic book and for those who haven’t read it the premise is simple,  you assign each side of the die a value or task eg. roll 1 quit your job roll 2 jump the receptionist 3 commit arson etc… and then do what the dice says… After a couple of safe early rolls which chose my outfits for the day I set off to work (only after consulting the dice…) Whilst in the office I kind of forgot all about the dice. i had lots to do and they remained in my pocket, I got asked to do things and the dice said I had to say yes to everyone and be as helpful as possible (trust me it’s not that often I’m like this) and all was going well.

As I got changed to go to the restaurant my works party was at I remembered to put the dice in my pocket and set off down the road. As we got to a pub next to the place a colleague asked if I wanted a drink a quick roll said yeah but not one drink in the 20 odd minutes before we were due to arrive but 3 – this then became a set practice, 3 pints became something like three bottles of wine, which lead to three ports and then I can’t really remember much. The pics on the work camera show me in full makeup wearing my strawberry hat with a platted beard – people tell me we went dancing afterwards in a Northern Soul joint (might have been the dices idea) but the magical beer scooter got me home. Waking the next morning though was something of a shock – the first thing I saw when I opened my eyes was a pair of ladies tights on my wash bin, this then lead to that strange thing that many of us have had to do which is extend and arm out backwards praying you don’t make contact with anything. Thankfully I was alone and all things considered in good shape, everything I needed to get home got home, presents cameras me etc….  Walking into the office the next day wasn’t fun though as my memory of the night from around 10pm was completely gone – people kept telling me stories about what we /they /mainly I had got up to and I simply have to believe them as I know no better.

As it is getting close to christmas I thought I would put this picture into the email. With the person who set the challenge being a big fan I hope this is enough to pass her challenge. I was tasked with turning on some christmas lights with a celebrity. A client of ours had asked for Jordan to turn on Croydon’s lights but that went quite so I tried to think of other ways to do this. Great Portland Street and Riding House Street do not have official lights so in my head if I managed to get a celebrity to do this with me it could kind of count. I managed to get a few to agree but the pictures weren’t great – this however looked quite good:

Xmas Lights

Rob & Alex James turning on the JLA xmas lights.

I can take no credit in Blur reforming, but if you are stuck for an idea of what to get someone for christmas, Alex James makes a great cheese called Blue Monday which everyone in the office thoroughly enjoyed.

This last week was another dominated by things that meant i couldn’t do much to complete a few outstanding challenges, little things kept popping up like dinners to attend or people to go and see, I know I have a few to tick off like the lovely turkish girl who has bought all the waxing stuff to rip the hair from my body and many others.

that said I was happy to take this weekend out as one of my best friends was over for his birthday and I had a great weekend, Friday kicked it off with a Poker night for 6 blokes, I cooked the lamb and olive dish from my cookbook but with a little change that improved the recipe a little further, to help add a little more flavour in the early stages of the dish I fried some cubed pancetta with the onions right at the start – as a guest said, there’s not much that can’t be improved with the addition of another meat.

Saturday we went to a lovely restaurant called Chez Bruce where I thought I’d at least have a stab at one of the challenges that was set to me back in January but I hadn’t taken all that seriously. My mums challenge to me this year was to get married – I’ve met and kissed lots of lovely ladies this year but the waitress on Saturday kept bringing me great food and topping up my glass with divine wine, to me this seemed like a good template to base the rest of my life on so I  proposed to her… unfortunately she was already taken and I will have to go back to my normal life.

There was another thing that came up over dinner which made me really think about this year. I know when I set out I stated my goal is / was to raise £10,000 this year for charities and it looks like I might fall a little short, but every penny ihave raised will help people so I can’t be disappointed. At the table someone asked people to define their highlight of 2008, people said things like getting engaged, etc, etc… but I really struggled, I have had so many different experiences this year that it was difficult to focus it down to a moment.

I decided in the end on one little thing which was sending a text message to a bunch of friends, family and supporters which simply stated, There’s no more road left. Land’s End to John O’Groats was a great experience for me and will set a bar for what I do in the future, I have thoughts which haven’t fully germinated for things like cycling North to South Coast Australia or East to West Coast America – but there’s other things to think about.

I’m not sure how I will get an email out to everyone in the next couple of weeks so I should say it now, thanks to everyone who has set challenges, helped me complete them or generally come along for the laugh with me. It’s been lots of fun but not quite over yet.

Still much to fit in, and somehow got to buy some presents this week.

Happy Christmas and all that

Rob / Devani

Two Thousand and Great – Week 49

Dear all

Something went terribly wrong, I sat down yesterday and read the instructions once, read them again and then after a third check I set out to dye my hair and beard white for the month of December to pass one of my challenges.

This didn’t quite work out as expected – my hair isn’t a lovely shimmering white, it’s orange! I’ve become a ginger… I could blame the kissing red heads challenge where some latent redness has come through the newly white hair, but I think it’s more likely that my hair is too dark for conventional bleaches.

I’ll have another go tonight see if I can get it lighter, the goal is to get to white… Pictures can be seen here - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=86577&id=660945790

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Bell ringing is going well and I seem to be getting a bit better – I seem more comfortable in stopping the bell when required.

I arrived a little early again and in the church hall their was a dress rehearsal for a play that is being performed this week.  As someone who isn’t in anyway a regular church goer, is it strange to see people dressed as the characters from Wind in the Willows running around church buildings? As with much of this year I come to expect oddness.

As Sunday was Advent I asked whether there were special songs that would be rung to mark the event. For some reason I kind of assumed that there would be specific rings for Easter, Advent etc… but found out that the only time there is a difference is for Rememberance Sunday with the mufflers.

Tuesday saw my first efforts of ringing as part of a group, with a bell either side of me I had to follow the lead of another ringer, this seemed to go ok at first – but for some reason I started to slow down, it seems intuitive that to speed up again you need to pull harder and faster but to catch up you actually have to do the opposite. three bells should sound like three blind mice and in stages it did, but for the most part it didn’t and it was all my fault.

For my next effort I had to join a four bell ring – my efforts went from bad to worse and at one point I completely lost control of the bell, I had been concentrating so much on the person next to me I wasn’t completing the full pulls on the bell and it began to swing too low. this meant that it swang far too fast and was beginning to drop, I had to try and raise it again otherwise the rope would start flailing about wildly. i eventually got it under control again but it was a stark reminder I have only been doing this for a couple of weeks and have so much to learn.

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On Wednesday my office had a visit from a well known face and he has helped me a little further in the turn on the xmas lights with a celebrity challenge. I hope my efforts are enough to pass the challenge – I hope the person who sets the challenge agrees I have done enough to pass – all will be revealed soon.

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On Friday I set out to Make My Own Head for my final strange day of November – The intention was to make a papier mache model of my head and then paint it on Sunday. Something I have obviously forgotten over the years is quite how long papier mache takes to dry.

I bought some PVA glue and using newspapers I had collected over the week I sat down to cover a balloon. What I didn’t realise is that it was Sunday by the time it had dried. According to how it ended on Friday – my head is a damp gloopy papery oval.

On Saturday morning I watched Art Attack, and on the show it featured a papier mache tissue box holder, but some of the ideas used I realised I could transfer to my balloon head. Using strips of paper I began to build features, like a nose, brow and beard before sitting down to add another layer of papier mache. It’s still drying, and sometime in 2009 it might even be dry – when it is I’ll paint it up and show you all.

this is as far as I have got - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=86575&id=660945790

I did look for some fimo clay to try and make a small sculpture for this update but nowhere seems to sell it by me, Playdoh was the closest I could find and that really didn’t work.

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Away from challenges, I went to Winter Wonderland at Hyde Park Corner, which is fantastic. There is a German christmas market and a fun fair and tons of stalls selling German foods and lager. There were lovely trinkets and lots of great stuff to buy

I now own a hat that only works on bearded people, it looks like a strawberry – I like it, let me know your thoughts - http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2174984&l=e6822&id=660945790

I’m not sure how to describe WW, the day was lovely. The ice rink looked amazing, standing outside the fun house I was laughing so hard, there’s a maze  section with clear perspex walls, you could watch people walking around and then crash straight into the walls falling over. I’ll never forget as a kid saw his dad and just ran straight towards him before rebounding back off the plastic wall about 3 feet – genius!

One note of warning don’t bother with the ghost train it’s not all that. More photos of the day can be seen here - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=86571&id=660945790

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It’s getting so close to the end now, but if you have any challenges for me I’ll try and complete them before the end of the year.

Proposed Strange days for December

Dec 4th – National Dice Day

Dec 15th – National Cat Herders Day

Dec 20th – National Games Day

Keep on challenging me, I’ll keep accepting.

Rob / Devani

Two Thousand and Great – Week 48

Dear all,

I’ve had to make a small change to my weekly calendar, Tuesday is no longer a swimming night but bell ringing. My second lesson went quite well, I’m starting to build up a bond with my bell and slowly but surely gaining a bit more control of it. The bell I use is called Michael (I was told the reason why once but I can’t remember.)

It’s the second heaviest bell in the tower and weighs 9 cwt 1 qr and 10 lbs which equates to 474.5 kilos. 

Tuesday’s lesson started slightly differently to the week before, the bells were not up when I arrived which meant that I was tasked with getting the bell upside down and staying there. This meant I had to combine everything I had learnt the week before. I started with the down stroke trying to get some momentum into the bell slowly feeding out the rope as the bell swang higher and higher, as the rope lengthened I had to start applying pressure on the back stroke as well, this meant I was now combining the skills for the first time – properly bell ringing for the first time.

There is a surprising amount to remember how far to stand from the rope, how to pull your arms, where to catch so as not to end up pulled off the floor or end up with rope and carpet burns over your hands. Everyone has been very patient with me and are always offering me tips, they are a really nice bunch of people.

Through the night I was given the chance to ring a few more times, I am slowly but surely getting more of a feel for the bell. The group make it look very easy, they have almost total control over the bells and are able to change the speeds and stop the bells at will, I have been told that this week I will get the chance to join in with a round, I’m learning so much so quickly, to get an idea of what the group look like in the tower there’s a video here: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=aEwxnEoZsK8 The man with the beard is called Tony and he leads the group (he’s also ringing Michael on this occasion).

As part of my homework I was given a few copies of The Ringing World to look through, it was like having my own round of Have I Got News For You’s missing word round – http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2143628&id=660945790#/photo.php?pid=2143629&id=660945790 I’m understanding about 5 out of 10 words at the moment when watching the group this might help to flesh some of the rest out.

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Homemade bread day was a bit different – I had a plan to try and and make some speciality bread that I had often seen in Carluccios. Basically they make a thin strip of bread which has one side covered in pesto, this is then rolled up into a snail shape left to rise and then baked.

The result is a great bread with gorgeous pesto running through it. My plan was to make a slightly more pizza type bread dough than normal bread mix and to try and make my own version. (to make a pizza type dough you add a little olive oil to a standard bread mix)

I prepared the dough and allowed it to rise a little, I then beat it back and tried tried to flatten the sections of dough to allow me a chance to roll flat. In a small bowl I had mixed some red pesto with finely chopped sundried tomatoes which I then spooned onto each bread strip and rolled the dough before placing onto a baking sheet.

The bread didn’t flatten particularly well so I tried a few different styles, whether making a doughnut style roll or a croissant type and then baked them for about 15 minutes in the oven. The rolls tasted great, but didn’t really have Carluccios’ presentation. I will try to make them again as I really like them and when I get it right it will be added to the cookbook.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=85279&id=660945790

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I had intended to celebrate false confessions day on Friday, but, in the end I didn’t (or did I?) – no I didn’t. I ended up at a friends film screening which was good fun, before heading home, I’d had the day in my mind for a while, but didn’t get the chance to confess to anything. At one point I found myself talking to people only in film titles (I have no idea why) but couldn’t find a way to confess to anything major. that said every cloud has a silver lining – As a fall back I’ve found this – Make Your Own Head Day on Friday – papier mache here I come! – http://holidayinsights.com/moreholidays/November/makeyourownhead.htm

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This week to my relief I found out that the school friend who had kind of mentioned she would consider letting me deliver her baby had got on with it all without my assistance. A little premature, Ronny is thankfully no longer hooked up to machines and appears to be happy healthy and getting stronger.

Congrats Nikki, I guess this is one of my challenges I am happy to fail.

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I was set a challenge earlier in the year which involved fishing – In the ’summer’ months this was lovely as an afternoon beside a lake allows you to get your thoughts in order and properly relax. As the car came to pick me up before 7am on Sunday in the dark with snow falling this didn’t seem such a good idea.

I have had a good stab at trying to catch decent sized coarse fish this year landing a few nice carp, roach and perch, but hadn’t caught much in the way of predator fish (the Zander which I caught in the summer hardly counts as it was so small) the main lake in Bury Hill does hold some lovely large pike and generously sized Zander. 

Arriving as the snow started to get heavier we made our way down the bank to a spot recommended by the assistant in the lake’s shop. One of the regular pike fishermen usually sets up in this place.

The snow was settling as we cast our rods into the water and then it began to warm up, this would usually be lovely but snow gets warmer it become rain and this isn’t anywhere near as much fun. 

Cold and damp, my fishing partner and I were contemplating giving up by about 1 o’clock when something fateful happened. He had a bite, his rod bent double for a few seconds and then nothing… this action though reaffirmed our belief that freezing ourselves in order to catch a fish was a good idea.

I befriended a robin* by feeding it some bread and maggots, but still the lack of action continued. Looking across the lake nobody was having any luck, people were packing up and leaving all over the place when I heard a little noise as my bobbin started to slowly drop down a few inches. There was definitely something playing with my line but would it go so far as to take the bait?

The quickest answer to this is no – after 6 and a half hours of freezing conditions we gave up, nobody had managed to catch anything on our lake and with hands like iceblocks we headed home. Personally I blame the cold snap which hit on Thursday, the water is usually good for pike at this time, once the weather has calmed down a bit we’ll be back. I need to catch a few more decent fish to pass that challenge.

* http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=2143628&id=660945790
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I know this strange day isn’t on my calendar but I am going to celebrate it as an extra one as I believe in the concept – despite the fact that the Government keeps dropping interest rates (and now VAT) to try and boost consumer spending to get the economy back in order. Buy Nothing Day – www.buynothingday.co.uk/ Seems a fine idea. Take a look at the website – our culture of consumption needs to be looked at and initiatives like this can raise awareness.

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A few things to look forward to this week, Sunday sees my transformation into Father Christmas as I have to dye my beard and hair white. I’m going to try and give blood one morning this week, if only to get good pics for the blog of needles and the like.

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I accepted a new challenge today which isn’t going to be easy. Realising I have to lose some weight still to achieve one of my challenges, I’m no longer allowed to have any carbonated soft drinks until January 1st 2009. As someone who doesn’t drink teas and coffees etc, this effectively reduces my options to milk, beer, neat spirits the odd fruit juice and water. It’s a lot less to give up than things like NO-vember but it’ll still be tough for me. 

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One final thing, I hope someone can help me out.

As you might know one of my best friends lives out in Spain teaching English to the locals – one of his students has come to London to perfect her cockney rhyming slang and have everything she’s learned about English and Grammar totally confused by Londoners. She’s looking for a job and I said I would try to help her out.

Young girl (28) with basic – to good levels of English is looking for anything really – based North London she has retail and bar experience – if anyone knows of anything that might suit her please let me know ASAP.

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Rob – Soon to be Santa

Two Thousand and Great – Week 47

Dear all

There’s a new Sally in my life, I seem to have carpet burns on my hands… but it’s not a new relationship – On Tuesday I attended my first bell ringing lesson (my original start to this sentence wouldn’t have got past spam filters as it mentioned swinging and bell ends…)

I heard back from the CCCBR and they put me in contact with a local church with a team of ringers – turning up a little early I made my way up a tiny spiral staircase up the tower to the bell room. After a little background about the church and bells. Slowly but surely the ringers started to turn up. My lesson started by watching the group as they worked through a couple of routines. As far as I could work out everything followed the lead of the tenor bell, but this started to go out of the window when one of the team started shouting out numbers, by watching I slowly started to worked out that the person however many left of the tenor called first took the lead followed by the second number. So far, so easy but I still couldn’t work out who the others were following. eg 3-5 meant the third bell to the left from the tenor took lead and was followed by the 5th bell.

After this I was given my first lesson, it all started with the back stroke, with my hands cup below waist level right over left the bell was pulled down, the rope went slack  before rocketing upwards pulling my hands with it. Just before the top of the swing the bell achieves almost neutral balance hanging directly upside down and a slight tug sends it swinging down again. After about 20 or 30 repetitions of this – the instructor worked out the bell was too light for me and I got switched to a heavier bell where I actually could feel through the rope what was going on.

I watched the ringers perform some more routines called Two Bob and Ganzer (?) – ganzer seems to be the one you hear when a wedding is in the Church, before I was given my next lesson the down stroke, On a rope there is a large fluffy section which is called a sally, the bell was set in the up position (upside down) so a light pull started it swinging, the sally falls towards the floor as you make the back stroke and as it is going up you grab it to pull it down again to speed up or slow down the bell. 

You only get  a split second to do this pull as the momentum of the bell whips it away. A lesson I learned incredibly quickly as I didn’t release it quite fast enough leading me to get lifted slightly off my feet and have the rope screaming through my hands for a pretty impressive carpet / rope burn.

I was honoured to be able to go up into the bell room at the end of the session, (when bells are rung on Rememberance Sunday they put mufflers on them and I was invited up to see the bells as these were removed.) The bells are huge, and despite understanding a little about physics the stays and the balances they didn’t look big enough to counterbalance the whole bell. 

Bell ringing is a lot tougher than I imagined, but, i’ll do it and hopefully pass this challenge. The tower physically moves when the bells are rung and I can’t wait to go back this week to hear the bells at their full volume.

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If I apply the same logic for how I became an artist eg. if I draw something and soemone else pays for it – I think I officially became a gigolo on Thursday. One of my favourite challenges of the year (to kiss 50 red haired ladies) was paid in full on Thursday, effectively meaning I was paid to kiss girls which equals gigolo…  (That said if I do bump into any more gorgeous red heads before the end of the year, I might still be tempted to use the charity as the excuse and pretend to still have a couple left to kiss to complete the challenge.)

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Today is the second of my November Strange days –  Homemade bread day – As I didn’t have the energy to get up at 4 am to bake before work I will do it tonight after swimming. (I’ve had to change my weekly regime to fit bell ringing in.) My plan is to try and make bread with pesto in, I have seen these in Carluccio’s but never tried to make them. I have an idea how to the pictures next week and the cookbook entry might tell you how it turned out. 

Today also marks the start of National Entrepreneur Week. I along with a group of friends have had a long term belief we could open a new drinks venue called the half a bar – the only draw back to this was the belief we could only Semillion – I’m doubting it’s viability… I will not even mention the restaurant idea (different more twisted friends this time) – that one really needs work. The premise is probably more tasteless than anything the kitchen might turn out.

I’m only saying this as the Dragon’s Den stars seem to come up to my work quite regularly and if amongst us we can come up with a good enough idea I am sure I can pitch it to one of them. If anyone has an idea that needs proposing send it through and I’ll see if I can get an answer. I might even be able to help out, lots of people keep telling me I won’t know what to do with my time next year, this might be a start.*

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Not long left now, but if you have a challenge please get them to me quickly as I need to plan these last few weeks.

Rob / Devani 

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PS> A few people might have seen one of these before.  

The Basic premise is – everyone on this mailing list is roughly the same age. If you’re stuck for in idea of what to buy someone as a christmas gift, we might be able to avoid blundering by sharing recommendations. if we all share our top 3’s of the year we can get an idea of what has been loved, liked and disliked in 2008 by people like us and possibly help come up with a top choice xmas gift for someone else. On my facebook group I have created a link where people can post theirs – http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?topic=6044&uid=7856163663

Here’s mine: Top albums of 2008 Sonny J – Disastro Noah & The Whale – Peaceful, The World Lays Me Down Los Campesinos! – We are Beautiful – We are Doomed Top Books of 2008 Joseph O’Neill – Netherland Is this supposed to be Funny – Dagsson (funny, but it’s dark.) Average American Male – Chard Kultgen (as above)

Over rated things definitely include Quantum of Solace – when I went to movies I remember that they used to have story lines and character development, this film lacked either and was therefore a collection of big explosions and action but nothing to engage you….

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* there’s also talk of a comedy / music / variety night in February in aid of Multiple Sclerosis which I have agreed to help out with in any way I can.

Two Thousand and Great – Week 46

Dear all

I was somewhat spurred into action last week as I realised there are only a few weeks left to try and complete a number of the tasks that have been set.

My week has been peppered with strange emails about vbell ringing and becoming a town crier along with advice on beard bleaching and many other things. The only email I have held back from writing was the one from an old school friend who mentioned she was pregnant and due in December – giving me a chance of completing the deliver a baby challenge. Seeing as I am scared of the word crowning, trying to get this email out has been tough.

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As far as challenges and preperation go, so far all I have learned about bleaching my beard  is it’s a bad idea, according to hairdressers ‘hair bleach is an irritant  and should only be used on the head, it could burn my face.’  Having listened to all the professionals I am going to ignore it and set about the beard with Jolen, which is used as a moustache bleach by darker haired ladies and thus more suitable to be used on the face. this could take a while but the result will make me look like santa claus (if only for a day or two before I go swimming and end up like the Grinch)

From my long column of emails I have found a church near to me that still uses human ringers. I am due to go along tomorrow night to meet the Tower Captain and possibly pull some bells. I have to say a huge thanks to the people at the CCCBR again, who have been really useful – I know that trying to pull at St Paul’s Cathedral was going to be a long shot but I still get to complete the original challenge.

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Last Thursday was my first strange day challenge in November Guinness World Records Day. I went out in the morning and bought a copy of the Guinness World Records 2009 and looked through it to see if there were a couple I could have had a stab at.

Some of those which looked interesting were -
Most eggs smashed on the head in one minute – 40
Most Tee Shirts worn at once – 224
Greatest weight lifted by beard – a 63.2kg woman lifted 10cm off the ground (but I thought that would probably hurt a lot)

Looking at a few others I spotted one which looked plausible:

The record for catching Maltesers thrown from 2 metres (6 ft 6 in) in the mouth in 1 minute is 19.

I found out that some of the desks in my office are exactly 2 metres long and this provided a perfect base from which to attempt the record. Despite not having practised (bar one thrown Malteser which I didn’t catch) and being slightly handicapped by choosing a partner, who by her own admission can’t throw, I think we did alright.

I managed to catch 12 Maltesers in my mouth and very nearly 2 more, the beard might actually have helped cushion some of those which arrowed at my face and given me a chance to catch them.

Being so close my throwing partner started to talk up more record attempts, using phrases like practise and trajectory. As someone who remembers one of my challenges involves losing 2 stone this year I might have to defer the chocolate catching for a few months. For Norris McWhirter type scrutiny you can view the build up here - http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=82798&id=660945790 and see a video of the record attempt here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CH28JZA8hAQ

When I got home I did try to break a few others – Unfortunately I missed out on the longest beard record by 5ft 3 inches. I failed the Most teeshirts worn by 191 (I think I was at a disadvantage by not actually owning the 225 teeshirts needed to be able to break the record and having them all at roughly the same size. xl or xxl. To really stand a chance of breaking this record the competitor needs to be an xs and then they have more chance (especially as bigger tee shirts weigh more) I might recreate this attempt when someone else is there to photograph me as I was struggling to extend my arms enough with all the layers to take good pictures.

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Away from all this and as it’s coming up to christmas I thought I’d show you a website which is fantastic:   http://www.top-mates.co.uk/

Sadly for all my friends they now know what they are going to get for xmas – but I wanted to share.

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As some of you might remember, I was talking about NYE  last week and trying to find ideas for somewhere to go, it’s going to be a bit odd as for me the highlight of the night isn’t going to be bells ringing but the sound of a pair of clippers and the chance to shave my face and head properly.

Seeing as the idea of doing this in a club was a bit of a non-starter a friend has actually decided to put on a house party with a hats, wigs, beards and masks theme. I have contacted a few people about it and hopefully I haven’t offended you if this is the first you’ve heard about it and wanted to join me there. Please send me an email and I can tell you details.

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Any lots to do,

Keep challenging me, I’ll keep accepting

Rob / Devani

Two Thousand and Great – Week 45

Dear all

I’ve decided I’m not a fan of magic. When you’re young and you see a trick it’s amazing, there is genuine wonderment, the who, how, where and when, hundreds of questions. As you get older you know that what you are seeing is a construct designed to fool you, if you spend a little time thinking about it you can sometimes work out how it’s done, (but it’s nicer that you don’t and suspend your disbelief to fully admire the illusion.) Truly brilliant tricks can still baffle and astound.

Friday as well as being Halloween was National Magic Day, my final strange day of October – I now wish it was a day I didn’t celebrate as I think I have ruined magic… Battling through hundreds of children in fancy dress and mums in velour tracksuits (which were possibly more grotesque and scary), I went to Woolworths to buy a magic set. I settled on a big boxed monstrosity ‘Mind-Blowing Magic’ made by a firm called Marvin’s Magic that claimed to have 125 different tricks inside - http://www.marvinsmagic.com/Default.asp/Page/Buy/Section/3

I know I do not need to explain why I wasn’t out on friday night but it might explain a few things (like the lack of new recipes this week for the cookbook or much of anything else.) On Monday night I somehow managed to poison myself quite severely. I generally have an iron constitution and my body handles anything that is thrown at or into it. Something went wrong, a simple meal of beef and vegetables ended up like something which wouldn’t have been out of place on Halloween. Food poisoning resulted in an inability to hold down anything more complex than dry toast and water for 4 days and the thought of going out for a night out in London surrounded by strangers in fancy dress getting more and more inebriated was totally beyond me.

So I found myself in on a Friday night, faced with a big box of magic. All those who read Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell might wish to stop reading at this point as my experiences were nothing like those… having mastered a couple of the simpler illusions, cups and balls, dice tricks etc.. I went into the card tricks part of the box which is when everything started to go a bit wrong.

I was introduced to something called Svengali Cards and every card trick I had ever seen suddenly became incredibly crap, the book destroyed magic for me, I suddenly knew how tricks were done like getting cards to go through windows and stick to the other side, how to force someone to draw the card you want them to – I felt cheated… I was going to add a few videos of the tricks to youtube etc.. , but I actually got depressed by it all.

Loads still to do, speaking to a hairdresser this week about getting my beard dyed white in a couple of weeks. Someone else about getting all the hair in my body ripped out. etc, etc…

Also keeping an ear out for something good to do on NYE, several people have expressed an interest in spending it together, I think they all want to shave me or something. If you hear of anything good let me know.

Keep challenging me, I’ll keep accepting

Rob / Devani

Two Thousand and Great – Weeks 43 & 44

Dear All

Sorry for the lack of email last week I decided to take a quick break from everything and go and see a friend in Valencia which was lovely.

As the cold weather closed in it was nice to get a break. In my head I convinced myself it would be useful to get a bit of warm weather training before my 10k run but instead it turned out to be a series of long nights drinking heavily and eating gorgeous food.

The thing I love about Valencia is the Turia – basically there used to be a river that flowed through the heart of the city which no longer exists. Instead of filling it with housing and shopping centres they decided to turn it into a green space. 

It’s about 9kms long and has incredible fountains and stuff dotted through it, ancient bridges and masses of sporting stuff like football pitches and baseball diamonds, at the end there’s the ultra modern city of arts and sciences. Walking the Turia was lovely but it in no way prepared me for the run which I completed yesterday.

Way back in the spring I was set the challenge to race a friend over a 10k distance, when we originally agreed to race we both set out plans to do training runs and generally be in some kind of fit state to finish in a respectable time.

I even mentioned it in an email a couple of months ago and a friend from New Zealand who is ultra fit doing iron man triathlons and the like gave me a detailed training plan.

Unsurprisingly this didn’t happen, any thoughts of after work runs were washed out, so we headed down to Brighton yesterday in a nervous mood, worrying that the weather conditions actually made those in the lake district look positively balmy.

Armed with a sweat band and some vaseline (don’t ask) and brand new never worn before running shoes, we walked down the promenade getting drenched by rain and spray from the rough seas trying to work out why exactly we had got out of our warm beds in London travelled to the South Coast and were contemplating running in mud and along the promenade.

A little bit of an aside but, buying running shoes was an odd experience, I went to a speicalised running shop and selected a pair of trainers that looked a sensible price, shape style etc.. when the lovely assistant asked if I wanted to have a quick run in them on a treadmill. 

Being the morning after a night before I kindly turned her down but did ask what else they sold in the shop. Downstairs they sold swimming costumes, I had to ask whether they had a hot tub or pool, as it seemed they were going all the way to make you buy one item but not the other. It’s a shame as a quick dip could really have cured my thumping head.

Back to the run, we turned up with under a minute to go, meaning our warm up was slightly less than 30 minutes the organisers suggested, more a case of leap a fence and join the back of the pack than a planned set of sensible stretches and lunges.

That said we joined into the bunch and started our little run. I’d like to say at this point that in some kind of Herculean effort I really impressed, but with my breakfast starting to venture north at around 3k my running partner started to leave me behind. 

The weirdest thing was I didn’t feel at all comfortable, with the huge amount of people that were there, I couldn’t run properly having to take very short strides and basically waddle running like a penguin with thrush which was doing me in.

I dropped back further from my running partner but finally found some space and could run, being taller than most of the others my longer strides meant I caught up and then had the same problem. This made my run slightly odd, I seemed to be able to run in bursts and then have to slow right down.

In the end I think I resorted to a tactic that everyone else does which is to find an attractive girl / boy and follow them admiring the view (of the sea  you perverts!).

Some of the messages that people wrote on their cards which were pinned to their outfits were really inspiring – at this point I am kind of glad i didn’t put the message I had originally written on my card. The opening sentence was I am running for….. my initial idea was to write Jamaica, then it got switched to THE BUS. childish I know but common sense got the better of me and I ran without a sign. I knew why I was there and so did the people I went with it seems almost odd to have to fill that card in.

I’d love to say it was a barnstorming finish but I was beaten around the course by a couple of girls in butterfly outfits so I am fairly sure Seb Coe will not be calling me up for London 2012. The day was great and resulted in another nice donation to the charity which is what really counts.

At the end I received a silver medal which is odd because I think that meant I came second – Cancer Research UK must have an incredible system for working out who finished where, I guess I was second in my weight / height / baldness and beard class… 

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For the more culinary minded of you, I have added another couple of recipes to the cookbook – the oft mentioned Lamb in Olives has finally made it’s debut. that can be seen here:

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Wednesday 22nd was Rainmaking Day and a possible strange day but seeing as it was hammering down when I landed back from Valencia I decided against picking this as a day to celebrate…

Thursday 23rd though was a day I set out to celebrate ‘National Mole Day’ – this wasn’t another rodent / animal based challenge but an attempt to see if I could finally understand the basics of chemistry. 

A mole to break it down to it’s simplest level is a basic measuring unit. It equals the atomic mass of a single molecule measured in grams.

This might help - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_(unit) or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mole_Day

I sat down and looked at a couple of websites / text books / worked examples which tried to explain the equation and how to formulate a mole (very important) and I still don’t get it. 

This might not seem that big a deal to 99.9% of people but I studied chemistry A level and this is the main building block of chemistry – it’s akin to not being able to use vowels in an English exam –  if you can’t understand mole calculations everything else on the syllabus is useless.

When exams come around people always say it’s not as hard as it was in my day and the like but this is maths and it can’t change, I could try and  learn it forever but still not get it. To everyine who does get it and get their A stars well done, you’re a far brighter cookie than me.

Friday will be my last Strange day of the month, it was going to be tell a story day (today – which I am kind of doing here, but I don’t think this counts.) So I will attempt to do National Magic Day and maybe recreate the lost illusion of water into wine from Holy Experiment Day back in March.

Any budding magicians that wish to join in please upload a video onto Youtube and let me know the links and I will share the joy.

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I still haven’t drawn the person who purchased the artwork from John & Yoko but it has spurned an idea from one of my supporters. 

I am going to try and create a number of Twothousandandgreat christmas cards. I don’t know yet whether they will be of me with the white beard or drawings but if you fancy some one off cards to give to people for a good cause let me know.

Design ideas will go up shortly, but any suggestions welcomed.

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My current thoughts for Strange Days in November are:

Nov 6th – Guinness World Record Day

Nov 17th – Homemade Bread Day

Nov 21st – National False Confessions Day

But these as ever are subject to change.

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Loads still to do but keep challenging me and I’ll keep on accepting.

Rob / Devani

Two Thousand and Great – Week 42

Dear all

Very short email tonight, a proper one later this week I promise….

Sunday was my first strange day of the month; Cookbook Launch Day, and I had an absolute blast!

Thanks to everyone who sent in recipes, I have so many to cook and add to the collection, but it’s launched and here’s the start of it.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=77039&l=78ebe&id=660945790

Really looking forward to the lamb with olive tapenade, that will be added later this week. there’s on;y a few meals here as I was busy cooking away and taking pictures but then realised I had to eat all the stuff being made as I had no room to store anything in the freezer and instead of throwing food away i will cook on later days and add the recipes as I go.

I have much news on challenges to give out including the possibility I might get to set a stadium record (but more will be revealed on that later)

Keep on challenging me and I’ll keep accepting

Rob / Devani