Two Thousand and Great – Week 26

 

Dear all,

Firstly I’d like to say a huge thanks to everyone that has helped me get to halfway and to everyone that wrote nice things to pick me up after the break in and the little morale blip that followed it.

I promised salmon pink trousers last week and I had all intentions of wearing them but I looked and looked through my cupboards and drawers and they’ve vanished, I haven’t quizzed Paul my housemate about whether he’s borrowed them yet but it’s more likely I did a spring clean and thought I’ll never wear those ghastly things again and chucked them out.

This meant I had to find a third Strange Day in June and picked a religious one as I hadn’t upset many believers in the last few weeks and felt that I’d somehow been letting the side down. June 29th is the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul which is celebrated with a feast commemorating the martyrdom of Rome.

To this end I decided to prepare and cook my own feast of Italian foods. Pizza for breakfast seemed a good idea when I woke up but it’s a bit different cooking one from scratch than going to the fridge to eat the previous days cold leftovers. As it was a feast day I decided elevenses were in order and set about making a plate of antipasti – since I have never met anyone pro-pasti outside of cornwall I threw myself into this with olives and meats, bruschetta and arancini and caponata then realised I was still full from breakfast. Despite being a big man I couldn’t cope with the levels of gluttony required for a feast day, I had to try and think of other ways to be decadent.

With nobody to peel grapes for me, I did them myself and found out i much prefer them with skin, why are peeled grapes a decadence if they taste worse? Being 2 o’clock and barely 2 courses down I felt a need to cook again. this time it was pasta with fresh basil and sundried tomatoes and my new favourite ingredient ever tomberries (pic 7) which are miniature cherry tomatoes (about a third of the size of a normal cherry tomato). All I can say is go out and buy some they are brilliant. 

The weekend away was lots of fun but I think I missed an opportunity to get the body waxing challenge completed. I looked at the range of spa treatments but never thought about ordering off menu so to speak – that said the spa ladies in their maroon type ninja outfits had taken my request for a little something extra wrongly I could be in transition now.

All wasn’t lost though at the hotel as a different member of the staff was a lot more receptive to a twothousandandgreat plea, as I asked for a kiss to get my pucker up challenge back on track…

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Because of a curtailed week and the works trip away I don’t have much to report – but on the back of my I’ve lost my list of challenges note in the last mailshot I have been given a couple of new challenges to complete.

This one is quite similar to the man of my dreams challenge but probably a bit tougher… Well actually described as the ultimate challenge by the person who set it:

Find my boss (JL) a wife – That simple thing would be worth £500… but it goes on, there’s a further £500 from JL if it’s a wife he wants to marry and likes (not sure those priorities are in the right order) and a further £500 from my other boss (TM) if the new wife will whisk JL off to the caribbean to retire.

I’ve known Jeremy for nearly 10 years now and if anyone is able to sell him it’s me… but it’s called the ultimate challenge for a reason, Jeremy has little foibles and traits that although endearing could make this less than easy but… I’ll do my best.

The second challenge was much more business related and should be far simpler, one of the best production companies we work with wants me to source them a new client and they’ll give a finders fee of £1,000 to the charity if I complete this. I need to hammer out the details but I think this one is very possible.

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More news soon, I need to go and sort through my records collection. It’s one of my club nights on Friday and as it’s American Independence Day and the halfway stage of Twothousandandgreat we’re going to have a little party and do things a bit differently. Music is going to come straight out of the US and lean heavily towards air guitar classics the kinds of soft rock, c*ck rock tunes that only the Americans can make. Aerosmith, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Bon Jovi, Boston, ZZ Top they’ll all be making an appearance. We’ve arranged drinks promos for classic American drinks like JD and Bud and hopefully a few people will come down in 10 Gallon hats and generally go a little bit mental.

Details of that can be found here

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Cheers again

Keep challenging me and I’ll keep accepting

Rob / Devani
www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat 

07941 281 968

 

 

Two Thousand and Great – Week 25

Dear all,

Sorry this email is so late, but hopefully all will be explained. Over this weekend, my offices were burgled and several things were taken some of which were keenly related to Twothousadandgreat and  I find myself a little deflated… All of the photos and videos I have taken this year were stored on my work computer. Obviously I had put some pictures onto sites like youtube / facebook but I feel like I have lost a big chunk of this year. 

Amongst the things stolen was the money pot which was being kept by the person who set me the pucker up challenge, every time I kissed a redhead I showed her the picture and she placed a coin into the pot with the pucker up sticker on the side. I know it only had about £30 in it but every one of those pound coins meant something to me. 

Worst of all on the computer I had the definitive list of all the people who had pledged money for the various challenges and the full list of tasks that I had been set. I know I have to do things like bell ringing, appear in heat magazine, live off the land for a weekend, get the full body wax, be a town cryer, the John & Yoko Challenge etc, but I am very worried I missed some. I have managed to get copies of most of my mailshots (thanks mum for keeping them) so I should be able to compile the full list, but this could also be an opportunity for people to come up with new challenges or make their current pledges even bigger / tougher / more fiendish. 

Last week I celebrated my second strange day in June with International Picnic Day on Tuesday. I started at  lunchtime when everyone in the office had Urban Picnics with picnic boxes inspired by America, Lebanon, Greece, France and many other countries to get the international element covered. That night a few hardy souls joined me to brave the elements to have a picnic in Hyde Park, I have to thank everyone who did face the cold and joined me as it was a lousy overcast night when the wind seemed determined to blow not just the food and bags off the tables but us as well. I would provide a link to the few photos I took that night but they were all on the computer which was stolen as I hadn’t uploaded the images. All I can say is thanks to all those who came along.

After last weeks plea for people to join me in a swim (to make up for the lengths missed whilst doing the cycle ride) I have had a few people offer to join me for a dip. One even suggested a great sounding venue the outdoor lido by the Serpentine. I have checked to see if there are any swimming related strange days as it could be an idea to get a bunch of people together and have a pool party.

This week sees my final Strange day of June – Wrong Trousers Day (27th June).  I’m supposed to be having a black tie dinner that night, I’m unsure how the bosses could react to me wearing salmon pick trousers… My other option was National Siesta Day 25th June but again taking a few hours off in the afternoon for a kip is still frowned upon in most UK firms.

One of the challenges I do remember which I have to start making inroads in was finding 2 lovely girls the man of their dreams – I know this as each of them independently contacted me last week to see how I was getting on. I’ll admit slowly at the moment, but I have written a huge list of criterion that I believe the men must pass before they can date these lovely girls. I’ll find a way of passing this challenge even if it kills me…

Something of an aside but I spent a lovely afternoon on Sunday playing rounders for a friends birthday. The last time I remember playing the game, I can only have been at primary school, but meeting some new people and generally enjoying time in the sunshine it was a lovely day. I will happily admit though it affected my swimming this week as my arm was still hurting the day after from all the fielding and throwing (It’s weird that despite getting generally fitter I still find whole parts of my body which aren’t getting worked despite the swimming and cycling.

I have to go and pack for the weekend (and find those strange trousers)

Next week marks the halfway point of this year and on Friday night I’ll be having a little celebration to mark this at Smoke in Tooting Bec (one of my club nights.) As it is also American Independence day we are theming the entire night around Americana – the music policy is going to be based mainly on American soft rock, c*ck rock and hair rock. for more details see this link

Keep challenging me and I’ll keep accepting

Rob / Devani
www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat 

07941 281 968

Two Thousand and Great – Week 24

Dear all

What a lovely week, I’m just hoping the weather holds for tomorrow when I hope to be spending International Picnic Day with some of you, my supporters in Hyde Park.

 

The picnic on Wednesday, should be fun. Basic idea is to meet near to Speakers Corner  (Marble Arch tube) at around 6:30 for some food, drinks fun and laughs.

For Londoners who can’t make it down but would like to join in there’s a great new food delivery outlet called up-box.co.uk who do delivery picnic boxes with flavours from around the world. If you are bored of going to Pret / Eat / Itsu or similar you could always join in the strange day without even leaving your seats…

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This last week I have been trying to make some progress on a few of the challenges I have been already set this year. One of the challenges I hoped to do this month is looking a bit tougher than I imagined. I have been talking to and emailing a very nice man called Alan Ainsworth who is the custodian of the bells at St Paul’s Cathedral who has deemed my challenge ‘impracticable’. Apparently the bells at St Paul’s are not suitable for a novice to ring, as they are particularly heavy and the regular team all have around 4 or 5 years experience before they are invited to ring at the Cathedral. 

I’m not giving up though. I will be back on to towers in my area to at least pass the original half of the challenge, I’m also hoping to find another St Paul’s as there must be loads of churches called that in the UK and I can claim the bonus on a technicality…

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On Saturday I was set a challenge that requires a bit of background. Ever since University I have had the nickname Bob Devani. You’ll notice on several of the emails I send out they end Rob / Devani.  The nickname comes from a horse. A few friends were in a bookmakers saw the name, thought it similar to mine and then somehow 13 or more years later it still remains.

One of the people responsible for giving me this nickname challenged me to find the original Bob Devani, meet my namesake and have a picture of me kissing the horse in order to pass the challenge… Having a housemate that works for the Racing Post meant I was able to track down the owners very easily. I feared that it would have belonged to a huge faceless conglomerate, but happily found the horse belonged to the Plunkett family (some of you might know the lovely Alice Plunkett who often pops up alongside John McCririck on Channel 4 racing) I wrote to her on monday and this morning received a replied that unfortunately my namesake is no more. So we’ll have to go back to teh drawing board with that challenge.

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If anyone wants to challenge me and can’t think of anything I received an email from my sponsorship co-ordinator at McMillans this week as they are holding an event at West Ham Utd on the 6th July where they will be having a giant Zip wire and abseiling event. to take part I need to raise a minimum of £150 to take part, so if anyone does fancy the idea of me walking down the side of the Bobby Moore Stand let me know.

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My fundraising page for the cycle ride closes in about a weeks time, I know of a few people who said they were going to sponsor me on this challenge – obviously my mail page will be open all year but I wanted to flag the ride page was closing in case anyone still wanted to donate to that.

www.justgiving.com/robdanavell-cyclechallenge

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Speaking of the cycle ride, whilst I was doing the journey I missed a few of my twice weekly swims out. I was speaking to Mark who set the original challenge and in order to make up for the missed swims I need to take someone along with me on 4 occasions to balance out the ride. If anyone would like to go swimming let me know. Whether it is in a lake, pool, river or the sea drop me a line and we’ll go…

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I started thinking this weekend I should have a logo for twothousandandgreat which I can add to these emails and my fundraising pages, I tried sketching a few things but nothing looked good. The 17th August is Logo Day and as such I would like to invite people to design a logo for this strange day which will put up on a gallery on the 17th August and we can get group members / supporters to vote on their favourite entrant and I’ll provide a prize.

By next week I should have a date on the John and Yoko challenge and I should be able to provide details of one of my TV based challenges, it should be a laugh. 

Keep on challenging me, I’ll keep on accepting

Rob / Devani

http://www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat

Two Thousand and Great – Week 23

 

Dear all

A weird and wonderful end to this week, and a novel new way of setting a challenge.

Two weeks ago a colleague and I met a creativity expert who had started a number of online and mobile businesses, eg. the software which allows you to read books on your PDA or mobile phone and the technology inside pre-pay machines which allows you to pay for things through your mobile phone.

When he left I gave him a copy of my card, which accidentally had my sponsorship details on the back, I got into work the following week and noticed that he had made a donation to my fundraising efforts. Last Wednesday he came up to the office to meet the full team and to try and teach us a few creativity techniques. I felt kind of guilty about someone making a donation without me having completed a challenge, so I have made one of the exercises he did into a challenge for me to try and complete.

One of the exercises he ran with us involved everyone being given a book with 2 words already written inside of them – mine had the words BANK and MARBLE written on the first page. We had to come up with a sentence / idea which linked the 2 words together. Mine came out as a challenge which was to play a game of marbles against Andrew Bailey the Chief Cashier of the Bank of England. I think the only way I will feel comfortabe accepting this mans money is to try and complete this little task.

Friday night was one of my club nights. Despite it being quite a quiet night in terms of people through the door, everyone who came along was treated to one of the finest sets I have heard from the Liggers DJs in years. As warm ups go for the festival season they are ready to go and the Knees Up Mother Brown tent at Bestival won’t know what’s hit it. I managed to get another kiss for my red head challenge (I’ve worked out I am up to 32 now…)

During the night one of the DJs told me he had a couple of spare tickets for the Red Bull Flugtag in Hyde Park the following day and wondered if I wanted to go along. I missed the chance to go last time it was in London and everyone I knew who went said it was a brilliant day out.

I made a few late night texts (sorry to anyone who was woken up at half twelve – I was kind of drunk and had no idea of the time) but managed to find someone lovely to join me for a giant picnic with 80,000 other Londoners and 41 crews of madmen throwing themselves headlong into the Serpentine. To see some of the teams click this link 

Top crafts on the day were the Millenium Falcon machine and the Cullinan Bird which flew an incredible 39 metres

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In last weeks blog I mentioned that Richard and I used to go fishing, we also for a short while shared an interest Warhammer 40K and role play games. I never really bought into the whole role play fantasy and stories stuff but do remember spending an extortionate amount of money on small lead figurines which I spent hours painting and then never actually playing with. Looking back it does seem a very odd way of wasting time and money. (In my mum’s loft there are probably boxes of colourful lead figures that have never done anything except get painted and put into protective cases.)

I only mention this as on Sunday I was invited along to see how the world of role play has evolved. I was invited along to ‘monster’ in a Live Action Role Play event. I had to make my way down to Sutton for 9am to meet Andy, Martin and Lucy who were also going to be involved in the adventure.

Sitting in the living room watching them get the last of the equipment ready, I started to get a small idea of what I was letting myself in for – I’d never heard someone ask whether they needed to pack a spare sword before and it’s something I doubt I’ll hear again.

As we set off in the car I was given a huge book full of the rules Labyrinthe, from what I could tell my role would be to repeatedly get struck with rubber swords and clubs, if possible hit back with my own rubber weaponry, but in general to be sometimes literal cannon fodder for the people on the ‘adventure’ -  the role of the monsters is to improve the game for the people who have paid lots of money to get dressed up and hit people – much like a Milwall fan but with slightly more emphasis on chainmail.

Turning up in a car park for which the word dogging was invented, we waited until the referee arrived. I must say that the depth of work that had gone into writing the scripts and stories was incredible. The six ‘monsters’ were given the opportunity to read through the script and get an idea of what to expect. Working out who amongst us would fill which role whether -  orcs, humans, undead or amongst other things a giant lizard  – 5 people doing the conga whilst trying to claw or spear the adventurers.

Between each incident in the story we would have to run infrotn and get changed into a new costume, at each stop we were given new information to do with how strong each monster was and what skills we had and all manner of other information to retain – spells auric colours etc… (I didn’t really understand then and still don’t now).

Retaining at least a modicum of this information would be fairly simple in a normal situation but when it’s 28 degrees you’re under layers of nylon and furs and someone is beating you around the legs and body with foam clubs, trying to remember the precise words you needed to stop them hitting you on top of trying to keep a count in your head of just how may times you have been struck in order to die in a spectacular B-movie fashion at the right time gets quite taxing.

It was like getting a window into an entirely different world, at one point some of the other ‘monsters’ started talking about other ‘dungeons’ they had been on and the characters they were playing. I’m pretty sure most of the words they were saying were English, it was just imperceptible. (I think after this conversation we had to pretend to be undead people, at this point I wasn’t acting, my brain was so befuddled by what I was listening to I think it did switch off leaving me in a perfect zombie state – about the only time I was praised for my acting abilities!)

I am not sure how everyone kept going, the heat was intense and the adventurers were variously dressed in leathers, chain mail armour, cloaks and hoods. After six hours of romping through woods the entire adventure seemed to suddenly end. The group doing the adventure were offered some kind of swap deal for some magic beans or similar, they refused and then everyone turned back to the cars and relative normality.

Most late Sunday afternoon pub drinks I go on the conversation tends to focus on sports and music. This group were more interested in debriefing their game, recollecting what they had been through, where they had done things right and wrong and the next events they were going on. It appears that most of the adventurers are going out and role playing every weekend, sometimes for 3 days in a row.

They obviously love what they do and have found a group of people that totally understands the world which they are inhabiting for those few hours. The costs involved seem huge to me, with everyone paying to go on the adventure and all of the equipment which can’t come cheap. I was glad they gave me a chance to join their adventure, I think for the first time this year, my beard was of use as I didn’t appear out of place. I took a few photos of the adventure here and a short video during the game when all of the players had been told to close their eyes. 

Not sure what this forthcoming week holds but if it’s as odd as the last one it’ll be lots of fun.

Keep on challenging me, I’ll keep on accepting

 

Rob / Devani

www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat

Two Thousand and Great – Week 22

Dear all 

I finally feel like I am getting back into things. After the ride. I went through a week in the doldrums, where getting motivated to do challenges just seemed too much. 

I think this started to change when I received a new challenge by email, which is a cracker (excuse the pun) – I have been challenged to turn on some christmas lights somewhere in London. I have to be the official person that is turning them on – or at least be on the platform if it is one of the huge London streets which are usually switched on by celebrities (and or Peter Andre and Jordan) 

Thursday night was brilliant. The bar where I host a couple of night each month were hosting their annual Casino night. The venue had tables for Craps, Roulette, Poker and BlackJack, with professional croupiers etc… The guys were great explaining to novice punters like me just why we were losing all of our dollars on the games. 

In order to play you had to buy into the games with fake dollars, £3 bought you $100 or £5 = $200. I knew that the US dollar had been hit by the credit crunch but even this level of exchange rate seemed a   
little harsh. 

After successfully losing the equivalent GDP of Bolivia at Craps and BlackJack, I took a seat at the Poker table. Having played a few hands with friends I had a fair idea of what to expect, it was quickly apparent that the explosion of late night poker on TV had turned everyone into experts – despite nobody ever having played the game. This made the game very different to normal, people were going all in with nothing in their hands, making the game less of skill and more of idiocy – (I think by winning far more hands than I lost, ipso facto I must be an idiot.) 

Playing long into the night, I had managed to build up a fair pile of chips. My housemate who was watching proceedings reckoned that the winner was going to be between me and one other. With the poker game   
finished,  I took one final gamble and went over to the BlackJack table for the last hand of the night. 

The final cards were already half dealt but one of the players said if I could match his bet on the table I could  play on his hand. Sitting on a seventeen we had to wait as the croupier turned her cards. Thankfully we won and I had managed to win enough chips to triumph on the night. 

The night was brilliant as the venue was also giving away food from their lovely new tapas menu and samples from the revised and much improved wine list. If you do get the chance to pop in, I’d recommend the mixed sausage and put lentils dish and the Tinpot Hill white from New Zealand which were both great. 

On top of the food and entertainments, the management at Smoke decided to donate all the money that had been spent on dollars through the night to my fundraising efforts this year. I have to say thank you to all the management and staff at the venue who have been so supportive, with the casino night and cajoling people to chuck their change in my cycle ride bucket. 

To see photos from the Casino Royale night click here

On Saturday I went fishing with a few friends and had a lovely day out in the sunshine. I mentioned in my blog how I used to go fishing with Richard and his father regularly when we were growing up. One of the things I forgot to put into the blog was that George – started to formulate a challenge for me to do with fishing. I can’t really remember what the full extent of the challenge was but it involved catching various fish to a certain specification. I made a good start to the challenge catching 2 sizable fish with a carp around 12lb and a tench around 3lb and my first ever Zander – granted it was barely bigger than my thumb, but after 20 + years of fishing I was so happy to have landed one. 

This said we were all put to shame by my friends daughter who was on her first ever fishing trip. Whilst the three adults concentrated on trying out clever tactics, Poppy’s biggest decision was whether to go with a red, yellow, pink or white maggot. The adults combined total of fish was about 15, Poppy’s 35… 

I ended the week by completing one of the first challenges that was set to me this year – Shear a sheep. 

I went down to Deen City Farm in Colliers Wood where I had arranged to do my challenge. When I got there I met Marcus Latter who is a teacher at Nescot College in Epsom. I have to say he was fantastic talking me through all the theory and what to do when I got my hands on the sheep. I had a fantastic day, over 4 hours we sheared 10 sheep – I was able to shear 9 of them (the other was a wild sheep that wasn’t normally the type that would be shorn) and watching Marcus battle through the thick coat I was kind of glad not to be involved in that one. 

The shearing was great, having a sheep’s head popped between your legs whilst you shave down the shoulders was a very odd experience but another great footnote on this increasingly strange year. 

A few photos from the event can be seen here or a short video here.
 

I have to go now, I’m trying to complete the bell ringing challenge this month and to confirm a date for the John and Yoko event next month. 

Keep on challenging me and I’ll keep on accepting. 

Rob / Devani 

http://www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat

Two Thousand and Great – Week 21

Dear all 
 
I’m now back to some semblance of normality, but I am very aware I am running out of days for this months Strange Day challenges… 
 
I never made it down to the cheese rolling on Monday – and given the weather I was kind of glad I didn’t (although it would’ve be fun to do a mud slide that long) 
 
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Casino Royale Thursday 29th May 08 – Smoke Bar Diner 

Smoke (the bar where I host a couple of events each month) are holding their annual Casino Royale night with Roulette, Black Jack, Poker etc… this Thursday and following my cycle ride and other twothousandandgreat related adventures they want to donate a percentage of the profits to my charity this year – MacMillan Cancer Support. 
 
It’s a lovely excuse to dress up and recreate your bond fantasies… (I’ve always fancied being Octopussy – but haven’t got the legs for it) The tickets are £10 and the night is run by professional croupiers and casino gamers. Pictures from earlier Casino Royale nights can be seen here -   If you are interested in going let me know and I will buy tickets. 
 
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As we’re getting close to halfway through the year I’ve noticed I am getting  a backlog of challenges and need to start ticking a few of them off quickly  - there’s going to be a lot happening over the next couple of weeks and months – watch this space. 
 
Sheep shearing is on Sunday from 11am at Deen City Farm – If you fancy coming along to see me wrestle my fears with farmyard animals, details of how to get there can be found here: 

 
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Keep challenging me, and I’ll keep accepting 
 
Rob 
www.justgiving.com/twothousandandgreat