Going out

Fancy

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On Friday, we all went to a 21st Birthday, fancy dress party.

The theme was “Come As Your Favourite Movie Character”.  Of course, that also translates as “Come as whichever movie character you can get a reasonably priced costume for”.

We were given plenty of notice, so after much umming and arring, I eventually settled on one of my favourite characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe: Anthony Edward (“Tony”) Stark.

Over several days, I built myself an Arc Reactor – the centrepiece of my costume.  Of course it wasn’t a real arc reactor. The “real” one was made from some sort of Titanium alloy and was powered by a Palladium core. My version was made from MDF and a plastic milk carton and was powered by three AA batteries but, from a couple of feet away, it looked the part. I cut a hole in an old T-shirt for it to poke through and strapped it round my chest with some wide elastic.  It kept falling down as I moved, so I added an extra strap over each shoulder. It felt like I was putting a bra on, but it also felt strangely comfortable – I didn’t even know I was wearing it. And the reactor stayed in place.

Tony Stark also has dark brown hair and a small anchor beard. I have neither of those, so over the course of several weeks, I grew a beard. A full beard. Urgh. I hated it. How you hirsute types put up with it, I don’t know.

Then, with the aid of a bottle of Just For Men (other male hair dyes are available), Mrs M dyed it all.  It came out slightly too dark, but at least I no longer looked like I was aiming to go to the party as Father Christmas!  Some hair clippers and a razor gave the desired look… well, almost: I would have needed anorther two months to get my hair long enough.

I bought a jacket from Amazon, that replicated the one he wore in Avengers – Infinity War and a pair of replica glasses from ebay.  Funnily, no-one picked up that I had a Mk1 Arc Reactor but was wearing Infinity War clobber.

The kids went as Clark Kent and Lara Croft, whilst Mrs M went as Pepper Potts – Tony Stark’s girlfriend… a somewhat older Pepper Potts, who had let herself go.

But let’s face it, I wasn’t exactly portraying Tony in his prime!

There were a number of Blues Brothers’; several Ali G’s; a couple of Shaun Of The Deads; a Don Corlione; a Little Mermaid and a whole host of others that I can barely remember… because the bar served Estrella Damm on draught.

It was a great night, on a Good Friday.

Nerds Day Out

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Last Saturday afternoon, still tired from my Friday night out withy the missus, myself and a couple of mates met up in that London, for a day of nerdiness at The Science Museum.

The last time I had been there, was many years ago with the family. We didn’t stay long, that time, because it turns out my family  – unlike me – have no sense of wonder and lack any thirst for knowledge.

To be fair, the kids were only little at the time and could probably only take so much of seeing their dad get over-excited in front of a mock-up of the lunar lander.

But this time, there were no kids… apart from those inside three grown men with a combined age of 130.

For several hours we wandered around, marveling at this, that and some of the other.

It was impossible to see it all in just one visit, but we gave it a helluver good go!

The area devoted to telecommunications was probably my favourite (as you might guess) and I could easily have spent the whole day just in that section.

Once we’d had enough, we headed out onto the street and went in search of a pub that sold food.

The first one we came to was packed to the rafters – as one might expect on a Saturday night in that London. As was the next one, but luckily, just as we were about to give up on that one, a table became available and we grabbed it.

Many beers (and a couple of whiskys) later, having put the world to rights several times over, closing time arrived and we were turfed out.

We parted company and boarded our respective trains home.

I fell asleep on the tube and was fortunate to wake up just in time.

I then also fell asleep on the mainline train. Luckily for me, it terminated at Luton. It was the sound of the driver slamming his door on the way out, which woke me.

With BST arriving and adding a virtual hour to my watch, it was a long old day.

But, as Bill (and/or Ted) might say, it was most excellent.

Date Night

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Mrs Masher and I went to see a show on Friday evening.

Danny Baker is currently doing his Sausage Sandwich Tour around the UK.

I’ve long been a fan and always thought that pound for pound, the ol’ motormouth was the best radio presenter out there.

I say “was”, because he has lost his job several times over the years, and due to the nature of his last sacking, it could well be the last time he works in that particular media… one in which he has excelled, over the years.

Anyway.

The show started at 19:30, so we knew that getting there after work was going to be a bit tight. The heavy rain that day didn’t help, with the motorway traffic delaying things before we even got started.

As it was, we arrived with exactly one minute to spare.  We walked in, were shown to our seats and, as we sat down, the lights lowered and Danny bound out on to the stage.

It was amazing how he talked non-stop throughout, barely pausing for breath as he regaled us with anecdote after anecdote from his life story.

Only one thing let it down, in my opinion: it was too long.

It started at 19:30, as I say. We had a short interval of about 15 minutes or so, halfway through, and then it continued, finishing at 23:15.

Wow! That man can talk!  It was interesting and it was funny and well worth the price of the tickets, but toward the end, we were all getting a bit tired and bumsore, I think.

Of course, being that late, all the restaurants had closed and we were famished.  We checked in to our hotel and the proprietor told us that the kitchens were closed. He suggested McDonalds would be the only place open at this time of night.

We walked to McDonalds… just a few minutes away, to find it had closed at 23:30 due to ‘routine maintenance’. We’d missed it by five minutes!

So, two beefburgers with chips, from a snack wagon parked in the town square were purchased, and we sat eating it in our hotel room, with two chairs drawn up against the dressing table.

I really know how to show a girl a good time.

Quantumania

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Last night, the kids and I went to the pictures, to see the latest Marvel film – Ant Man & The Wasp: Quantumania.

Ant Man has never been one of my more favoured protagonists from the Marvel cannon, but I do like Paul Rudd’s portrayal of the character and I did enjoy the previous two efforts, so this one was always going to be on the cards for us.

Also, this is the first film in Phase 5, so whoever the big bad guy is in this one, he’s also likely to feature as the big bad guy in all the films that Marvel release over the next couple of years.

He’s the new Thanos.

Of course, ‘he’ could be a ‘she’… I’m not saying.

But, unfortunately, this film just didn’t work for me.  It was too silly (yes, I know all Marvel films are silly, but this one was a little too much for my tastes) and it just didn’t hold my attention.

In fact, I fell asleep half way through and missed a big chunk of it.

Also – as is to be expected in a film like this – there was a lot of CGI. It was good, but it didn’t feel as well done as in some other films – I’m thinking here of the recent Avatar- Way Of Water, where the CGI was done so well, that I didn’t feel I was watching animated characters.

Overall, I enjoyed most of what I saw though and I’m suitably impressed with the new bad guy. It’s enough to give me hope for the future releases in this phase of the MCU.

Easyrider

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Yesterday, myself, Son and a mate went down to that London, to visit the MCN Motorbike Show at the ExCel.

There were lots of nice motorcycles to look at and drool over and plenty of clothing and accessories to help you part with your hard-earned.

I didn’t buy anything. It wasn’t for want of trying though.

I quite fancied a new leather jacket. I don’t need one… just fancied a new one.  I saw a perfect one on a stall selling jackets, trousers, gloves and all sorts of motorcycling apparel.  I say the jacket was perfect, and it was, except… it didn’t fit. It was a Large and it didn’t fit.  So I tried an XL and then an XXL with no joy.  The owner of the stall found me an XXXL in another style and that fitted OK, but I didn’t like the style.

So instead, I decided to get some earplugs. The foam ones that I currently use are a bit rubbish. There was a stall at the show that was making custom made earplugs from silicone rubber. I’d heard of these before and they are supposed to be very good, if a little pricey. In fact, I baulked somewhat when the guy told ne they were going to be ninety-four quid for the pair, but he offered me a  “Show Price” – effectively 10% off –  and I went for it.

Using one of those things that the doctor uses to look into your ears, he checked both mine then declared that he was unable to make a mould of my ears as both had wax in them, which would need to be removed first. Bugger. Not sure how I’m supposed to do that… with the current pressures on the NHS, it doesn’t feel right making an appointment just to get my ears syringed.

But overall, it was an enjoyable day out. Though not as big as the NEC show in Birmingham, it was still a fair sized show, and we managed to get round and see everything in about four hours or so.

My one complaint, would be about the parking.  It was easy to find and there were plenty of spaces available but, there was only one option for length of stay: 24 hours… which cost £25.00.  We only wanted four or five hours, but had to pay for a full day.  Bit of a rip off, ExCel.

A Walk In The Woods

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Every other weekend, I have to drive my daughter into work.  So much for getting a lay-in.

I always take the dog with me and on the way back, we call in at Kidney Wood, just off J10 of the M1

It’s a lovely little wood. It doesn’t take long to walk around, but it’s somewhere different to go.

I have been calling in there for nearly a year now, but I have never met anyone else as we walk round.

No-one.

Not a soul.

Until today.

A chap came walking towards us, as we ambled along the western path.  He had two dogs with him, who were friendly enough, but I don’t know what make they were… I’m not very good with dog brands.

Of course, we stopped and chatted briefly – as dog owners do – and I took an instant liking to him… in part because he had a small radio in his pocket that was quietly playing classical music.  I mentioned that he was the first person that I had ever met in Kidney Wood.  He smiled. “I think I’ve met you here before though.”  He pointed to Saber. “This is Simba, isn’t it?”

Well, maybe he has met us… that was a pretty close guess.

“It’s Saber.” I corrected.

“Ahh, that’s right. Well, if it wasn’t you, then it must have been your wife, I met.”  What? He knows I’m married?

I explained that was fairly unlikely, as Mrs M didn’t even know where these woods were.

“We live in the Bramingham area”, I said, “Maybe you’ve been over that way?”

“Nah, that’s too far for us. We never venture over that way.”

We bade farewell to each other and walked on. I mentioned it to Mrs M when I got home and described the chap and his dogs, but she didn’t recognise him at all.

I hope I bump into him again, as I’m keen to know whether we have actually met or whether he is just a really good guesser.

Monte Carlo Or Bust

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I have just spent the past week in Monaco

Which was nice.

We went there to celebrate H’s 18th birthday.  It was his choice.

Yes, I know it’s a place favoured by the rich and famous and I’ve seen the photos of the luxury yachts in the marina and the fast cars parked outside the plush restaurants but, when you see it with your own eyes…

At one point, we hired a guy to take us on a walking tour of the F1 circuit, which was most interesting.  Not only did he regale us with facts about F1, it’s races and it’s history  within the principality (“See that tyre mark there? That’s where Schumacher misjudged the apex in 2013* and hit this wall”) but also with plentiful facts about Monaco itself.  He pointed out the world’s most expensive apartment – a steal at only 260,000,000 quid and gave us the low-down on the best places to eat for a reasonable price.

Of course, in Monaco, “reasonable” means something different to what it does here.

But, it was certainly interesting to see how the other half live.

* I can’t remember if that was the actual year.

Tea… It Wasn’t To Be

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I was out on site yesterday, auditing one of the teams. I’d taken one of the new starters from the office, to show her the ropes… and the pipes.

It’s fair to say it was a bit nippy out and after two hours, we were both frozen.  We finished the audit and changed out of our PPE.  “What now, back to the office?” she asked.

“Hell no!”, I replied. “Now we go find somewhere to get a cup of tea and a wee… and not in that order.”

Google Maps showed there was a Tesco Superstore just a few miles away. “Follow me!” I said, jumping into my car.

She dutifully followed and soon we were on the North Circular heading toward Tottenham… or somewhere.  “GPS signal lost” said my phone, matter-of-factly.  I looked at the screen and it showed me as being stationary… which I very much wasn’t.   After a couple of minutes, it regained the signal.  “Please make a U-turn” it said.  I’d obviously missed the turn off.

I turned round at the next roundabout. “Stay on the A406 for one mile”, it said.  Half a mile later: “GPS signal lost”. Aarghh.  I phoned G who was driving behind me and explained what was happening. “I wondered why we were going round in circles”, she said, ” You follow me instead”.

Five minutes later, we pulled into the car park of a huge Tesco Extra. “That’s a relief”, I said, “I thought we were never going to get here. I’m gasping for a cuppa.”

The café only had a small queue of people, but even so, we still queued for about twenty minutes before we reached the till. By then, I was parched.  “I’ll get these”, I said magnaminously. “A tea, a coffee and two fruit scones, please”, I said to Jacky on the till. She tapped it in.

“Are you paying by cash or card”, she asked. I opened my wallet and pulled out my debit card, with a flourish. “It’s ready for you now,” said Jacky, nodding her head toward the card reader. Now, I know they call it ‘contactless’ but I always physically touch the card to the reader… that’s just the way I roll.  I tapped my card atop the device, just noticing the price of £9.55 as I did so.

Just as my card made physical contact, the reader went blank and the till turned off.

The lights also went out, plunging the whole store went into darkness, save for the emergency lighting.

“Did I do that?” I asked Jackie.

She shook her head. “No. We’ve had this before.  Several times”, she said, with a sigh.

With the power off, we couldn’t have our tea and coffee.  “I think that transaction went through though”, I said, “so how do I get my money back?”

“It didn’t go through, otherwise I would have got a till receipt”, said Jacky, confidently.

“But there’s no power… the tills are dead… you wouldn’t get a till receipt.”

“Well, there’s nothing I can do until the power comes back on”, she said. “Last time it took three hours.”

G and I decided to abort our coffee stop and head back to our respective homes.

I checked my bank account when I got home and sure enough, the transaction had gone through.  I won’t bother trying to get it back as it will likely be more bother than it’s worth.  Tesco can keep it. Maybe they can put it toward getting a new power supply installed.

I know £9.55 isn’t a lot, but every little helps.

Guten Nachmittag

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Which of course means Good Afternoon, in German.

And also in Swiss… because they speak German there.  I never realised that before, but I know it now, having just spent several days in Switzerland.

Wow! What a great place to go visit.

We stayed in the Hotel Monopol in Lucerne, which was quite lovely, but we also hired a car, so we could do a bit of sightseeing.

The day we chose to go sightseeing, it pissed down with rain. All bloody day. Right miserable, it was. But we had a car and we had waterproof jackets, so we took a circular drive from Lucerne to Interlaken to Thun to Bern and then back to Lucerne.

The scenery was stunning. Probably. We hardly saw anything through the mist and the rain.

But occasionally, the rain would pause and the stunning backdrop of the snow-topped mountains would appear.  Even a trip to the local pet food shop afforded fantastic views.  I daresay, the locals have got used to it by now, but as we don’t have any mountains in Luton, Mrs. M and I  were in constant awe of the vista.

Now, I know that Switzerland is famed for it’s watches, but as we walked along the main drag in Interlaken, I swear, every other shop was a watch shop.  How they manage to keep going, with so much competition, I don’t know… especially as nearly every shop we looked in was devoid of customers.

The following day, the weather was much, much better and so we decided to go up a mountain.

The train station was a minute’s walk from our hotel and so we caught a train which took us on a 15 minute ride to Alpnachstag.  There, we boarded the cog train (the oldest in the world) which took us on a thirty minute , very steep ride, 7000 feet up  to the top of the Pilatus mountain. The views from the top were tremendous.  After a couple of hours of looking around and taking in all the scenery, we had some lunch and headed back down  again… this time via cable car, which was a lot of fun… though Mrs. M found it a bit nerve wracking.   At the bottom, we found ourselves in the town of Krien.  A ten-minute walk to the main street allowed us to catch the bus back to Lucerne.

For our last day, we took a drive into Zurich and spent the day wandering around there before driving to the airport. We even managed to bag a Geocache, keeping up our record of having found at least one in every country we have visited.  Well, almost.

With so much to see and do, it’s a really lovely country to visit… if you can afford it.   Eighteen quid in the pub for a pint of lager and a pint of cider!

And a meal for two of us in a restaurant, was easily  a hundred quid or more.

I have never been anywhere so expensive!

Must be something to do with all that Nazi gold they have stashed away.

Going Out

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Sitting in TGI Friday’s last night, munching my way through a 10oz sirloin, I looked out of the window and watched as a large man, clad in a long black coat and wearing a black fedora, strode through the crowds, his head slightly bowed to hide his face and his hands thrust deep into his pockets to keep them from the chill air.  Incognito, he passed through the crowd without recognition from anyone.

Apart from me.

“Dara O’Briain just walked past”, I said nonchalantly to Mrs. Masher, who was busy tucking into the world’s largest plate of spare ribs.

“That’s handy”, she said.

It was indeed handy, as we had tickets to see him in his ‘So… Where Were We?’  tour: the Milton Keynes leg starting in just over thirty minutes.

We finished our food, hurried over to the theatre, paid an extortionate amount of money for two drinks and then seated ourselves in  our rather excellent seats up in the circle (I heartily recommend seats AA 9 and 10 ).

For the next two and a half hours (with an interval) Dara entertained us with stories of his knee operation; mistaken identities; his attempts to get a free fancy toilet ; home schooling during Covid lockdown and so much more.  His interactions with the  audience were superb – gifted as he was, with a front row that consisted of Rolls Royce aircraft engineers, Formula 1 engineers, Data Analysts, a bloke who worked with a supercomputer and a family business devoted to Karcher jet washers.

Much of the second half was taken up with his tale of how he found out he’d been adopted and the lengths he had to go to to find his birth mother: a strange subject for stand up, but, as you’d imagine from a raconteur such as he, it was delivered with facts, emotion and a huge dollop of humour.

It was an excellent show.

Catch it if you can.

Come Fly With Me…

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… or not.

Mrs. Masher and I have just got back from a dirty long weekend in Madrid.

We only had a couple of days to see the sights, because two days were taken up with getting there and getting back.

I know we all marvel at how aviation has made the world smaller… and it has: it only takes two hours to fly from London to Madrid.

But, either side of the flying bit, there is a whole load of shit to put up with.  Getting to Heathrow airport first thing in the morning is no easy task, I’ll tell you, what with the traffic and then the parking and having to catch the shuttle bus.

Then there is the endless queueing: queueing to check-in;  queueing for Passport Control; queueing for security; queueing at the gate and finally queueing on the plane to get your seat, while people with too much hand-luggage try desperately to squeeze it all into the overhead locker.  And, what is it with that? Every airline states that each person is permitted to take on a single piece of hand-luggage, small enough to fit into that measuring thingy that everyone ignores, at the check-in desk.  But, you always get these people stuck in front of you, as they try to squeeze their regulation sized hand-luggage into the overhead locker along with a rucksack the size of a Renault Clio – which, for some reason, was invisible to the check-in desk and the flight attendants when the passengers boarded the aircraft. And, once that’s all been forced in and the locker has been closed, they’ll produce two  large plastic carrier bags with the words “Duty Free” emblazoned across them, full of vodka, whiskey and Toblerones, which have to somehow be squeezed in there too.

“One piece of hand luggage”, my arse!

And when you land at your destination, there is the same again, as everyone jumps to their feet as soon as the Fasten Seat Belt light goes out and then they stand in the aisle with their luggage for ten minutes.  Then there’s Passport Control; Luggage Reclaim; finding the car rental place and filling in a dozen forms in triplicate.

It all takes an age.   We left home at 7am and didn’t reach our hotel till 5pm.

By then, we were exhausted and needed a holiday.

IYGDTTWT…

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Regular readers of this drivel (you know who you are) will be aware that I spend a lot of time in our local woods, walking the dog,  and that – as per my last post – I sometimes find myself in various situations… I mean, who can forget last year’s shenanigans with the hormonal teenagers or the County Lines encounter?  Or even the petty arsonists?

This year has been less eventful, but there is nearly always something going on.  This year’s theme appears to have been camps, with groups of kids building them from fallen branches tied together with string or washing line. Some of them have been quite expertly built.  I particularly liked this one, though it must have taken some effort to get that sofa in there!

And this week, someone has been trying to improve everyone’s disposition, by placing motivational sayings around the woods.

It hasn’t worked for me.

However, I am always quite buoyed when I find stuff and this week – on the same day –  I found a very useful 13mm ratchet spanner (which went straight into my toolbox)  and a USB Lightning cable… which can go to my daughter, as she is the only Apple fan in the house. It’s amazing what people drop, when walking.

 

Earlier this year, I found a USB charger pack, which – being 5V – has proved very useful for powering some of my Arduino projects. I was actually considering getting one anyway, so this find has saved me about thirty quid.  And a week later, I found a set of Google pixel earbuds which retails at over 100 quid! Cleaned them up, sanitised them (plenty of that stuff in the cupboard, thanks to Covid) and they work perfectly.

Annoyingly, I’ve not found any money, so far this year. Last year, I found over seventeen pounds.

Even so, I think I’m doing OK:  it seems walking the dog can be quite lucrative.