JEDI July 2010: Day 4 - Mr Helper

Today the youth of our church up sticks and head for an activity-filled weekend away on the Isle of Wight. For reasons I have since forgotten, I find myself about to board the minibus with them as part of the six-strong team of leaders.

Andy is the church youth worker and main leader, and for the past couple of hours I have been aiding him with the final preparations, providing a taxi service for the collection of a needlessly enormous VW van, which then had to be loaded with everyone's luggage and equipment. It should be noted that the first thing Andy did upon attempting to drive the van was to stall it, though while we were loading up he did appear to become increasingly attached to it. It remains to be seen whether this will remain the case come Sunday night! While we were packing the van another one of our leaders, Ray, arrived with one of the community minibuses, so with another waiting on the Island we are certainly not short on transport.

Considering we are only staying for two nights, there did seem to be a good number of huge and heavy bags amongst the children's luggage. Personally I prefer to travel fairly light, and with the weather set fair I'm hedging my bets on not being caught out, with only two small bags of necessities in tow. I may have only needed one bag, were it not for all the tech and the accompanying chargers which inevitably make the trip also!

Although I am very much looking forward to the excitement and challenge of the trip, one downside will be missing Grandad's birthday celebrations this evening, for the second year running. Still, happy birthday 'Boilo'...75 and still going strong!

Anyway, we'll be off very shortly so I'd better get moving. Don't expect a post tomorrow due to the probable lack of time and internet at our accommodation, though I will try and scribble a quick note in the evening to type up upon my return. Have a great weekend everybody!

JEDI July 2010: Day 3 - Mr Jinx

Today's events have confirmed to me beyond any reasonable doubt that I am indeed a jinx - at least as far as church cricket is concerned. Over the past two seasons the team has competed in a grand total of nine matches, two of which we have won, with every other game ending is disappointment. To the same effect, out of the nine contests, I have played in seven and missed just two. Any guesses which two? See? Told you I was a jinx. (Either that or I'm simply not very good at cricket, which is just as viable an explanation, if not more so.)

Having said that, the efforts of the team in this evening's match did little to help my cause, as having been handed a rare opportunity to bat first in the context of what was originally an 18-over game, we managed just 37 for 9 wickets after ten overs. I had been entrusted with the score book, and the unrelenting rate at which wickets fell pursuaded me on several occasions that I must have made a mistake. Sadly, my scoring was completely accurate and this meant that the match had to be modified to two innings of ten overs, otherwise we'd have all been home in time for tea! For my part, I had come in at nine and defended the first ball before launching one towards the boundary. Unfortunately, at this point somebody decided it was their duty to ruin my day and appeared out of nowhere to take the catch. Thanks for that.

In the field things improved slightly, though I declined the chance to bowl given my dismal recent record and the tight run chase, preferring instead to stand wherever I was told to and make vain attempts to block anything that came my way. After restricting the opposition to 50 in their first innings, the team put in a much stronger batting display to leave a run chase of 53. This was billed as a potentially close affair, though the fact I was on the field meant the outcome was all but certain in my mind. True to form, the target was achieved in the final over.

In spite of my personal apathy the game was played competitively and in good spirit, with both teams taking advantage of the pavilion bar at the conclusion of play. My mood was improved through an enjoyable chat with another one of our players about subjects ranging from golf to greenhouse gases, though it was of course left to Dad and yours truly to wash up and tidy the pavilion. This was not aided by Dad shattering a pint glass all over the floor. Nice one pops.

Other than cricket I enjoyed a fairly quiet day today, preserving energy for a hectic weekend away as a helper with one of our church youth groups starting tomorrow.

As an aside, prizes have started to be distributed in our family world cup sweepstake, and who would have thought Uruguay would make the semis? Good news for Grandma, but bad news for Ernest, Lydia and Kaye, whose potentially strong picks of France, Portugal and Italy all bombed out early. Never mind guys...there's always 2014!

JEDI July 2010: Day 2 - Mr Overambitious

To all who didn't have the faintest clue what was going on in yesterday's post (that would include me then), a belated warm welcome to the second year of Journal Every Day In July. This is a month-long blogging challenge which, as you can see, I have already failed, having missed the first five days of the project. However, fear not, as from this day forth you can follow me, along with my good friends Beth and Lydia as we cast an eye over the many (potentially) exciting events of the month to come. If you still have no idea what I'm rattling on about, I would suggest taking a look at my first post from last year, and should you still remain clueless then we must conclude that you are a super spesh space monkey and send you back to Bebo with haste.

I made a special effort to be up at a reasonable time today, as looking back at previous blog posts the night before had made me aware that my recent trend of rising at 10am was not helping to make the most of the day. Mum and Dad were therefore justifiably surprised when I arrived downstairs at just gone 7!

Today's itinerary included a trip to Hythe with Lydia to buy such essential items as nail varnish, as well as birthday presents for Grandad. We also attempted to drop in on the Boilos to collect Lydia's keys but their house was vacant upon arrival and we assumed they had gallivanted out for the day. It was therefore onwards to Tesco car wash, and with the Jalopy making its first outing in nearly two weeks after the first the holiday and then a flat battery, a good scrubbing was long overdue.

Lydia and I had brought a picnic lunch with us, so we drove out to the forest and ate in the car park opposite Beaulieu Road Station. After several days spent indoors it was nice to be out and about, even though the many days of recent sunshine had given way to cloudier conditions.

Unwisely, I had earlier arranged to play badminton with Jonny P at 3pm, just a few hours before my two-hour club session at 7. I went into the first match full of confidence, though this quickly evaporated upon realising that my low stamina would always prevent me from moving up to a higher level of play. While Jon and I played out fairly even games, when it came to executing winning shots he was evidently shaper than me. Definitely something to work on, as badminton is undoubtedly my strongest sport and upping the fitness levels would certainly improve my all-round game. After a 5-1 tonking (albeit with several tight games) it was home for a light tea and the news that Ernest had bullied his way back from Manchester in time to collect me for the 'second round'.

In the DP Badminton club we play doubles games, so the going is a bit easier. That said, there are still some very good players among the 10 or so that turn out each week. On this occasion we welcomed two new members and, as usual, I remained on court almost solidly for the entire two hours, playing both with and against virtually every other player. Despite feeling that too many of my smashes were hitting the top of the net, I didn't think I played too badly overall and it was encouraging to have commented that both me and Ernest had tangibly improved our games since joining the club.

By the time 9 o'clock came around I could definitely tell that I had played three hours of badminton in one day, and for this reason bed is now currently very high on my agenda!

Night all!

JEDI July 2010: Day 1 - Mr Late

"Knock knock."

"Who's there?"

"Dominic."

"Dominic who?"

"Eh, what...? No, it's not a joke. It's Dominic here. I'm sorry, I got held up - holidays n' stuff, you know how it is. Please let me in."

"Oh, I'm not sure we can allow that, Sir. JEDI July participants must be dedicated time-keepers, and you, I'm afraid, evidently appear to lack this fundamental quality."

"I know, and I'm sorry, but..."

"There's no point in arguing, Sir. After last year's dismal showing the JEDI Council launched an enquiry into your work, with the verdict being that you are entirely unsuitable for inclusion in this project. Your posts are named with little imagination, the content itself is dreary, your grammar is cumbersome and that's before we even mention the length..."

"Please, Sir! It's not my fault. I was young, naïve and slightly spesh back then, but I'm much wiser now. Please give me a second chance, I'm begging you. Lydia will have my guts for garters otherwise."

"Hmm...you are very pursuasive man, Sir. I shall have to speak with my superiors. You promise not to mention dust or rattle on for ages about tedium?"

"Yes, of course, indeed, no problem, affermative..."

"It appears you may have to work at it...Tell you what, if you were to give me a ride in your courtesy sleigh then we may be able to strike a deal."

"You drive a hard bargain, my friend, but luckily for you I'm a desperate man."

"You may therefore proceed, but I'm warning you - step out of line and you'll be out that door quicker than you can say 'cheese roll'. Got it?"

"Cheers, thanks, sorry, cheers, sorry, ta, thanks, sorry, ta, cheers, thanks, sorry..."

Welcome to JEDI July 2010.

Apologies and Updates

Greetings, faithful readers.

I have to confess, though you have no doubt been faithful to me throughout these long winter months, I have without any question neglected you. Worse, up until the last few days, I barely even considered the idea of writing a new blog post. For this I apologise profusely.

Joking aside, I can't tell you how great a feeling it is being able to write this without an overhanging guilt that I should be otherwise occupied tackling coursework, typing up lecture notes and the like. The last few weeks have been pretty manic with many deadlines to meet and exams to prepare for. Thankfully, my first semester at university has now drawn to a close and with it I have a much-anticipated week off in which to catch up with the so-called 'less important' matters in my life.

My last blog was, of course, posted on the final day of July, bringing to a close the JEDI July project I had shared with L, Ern and Beth. Six months on, it's great to be able to look back on the summer in such good detail and the blogs serve as an exellent record of what turned out to be a very memorable month. Sitting here strangled in the dark depths of winter, they also provide a good deal of hope for the months ahead!

With university now dominating my day-to-day activities, life is no longer the luxury that played out back in July. In hindsight however, having faced up to the change in circumstances and settled into new surroundings, I am glad that things have finally moved on. Life stalled a little during my third year at college, and it's good to be back on track in full-time education.

Uni has, so far, been hard work but great fun, and I feel very fortunate to have a place at such an excellent institution. I have learned a lot this first term made some good friends, though it's still great to have the best of both worlds and be able to nip home whenever I feel like it!

The jalopy continues to run smoothly, pub quizzes are still regularly attended (and failed) and Ernest continues to grace our humble abode nigh on every night. Some things never change!

JEDI July: Day 31 - The last one

All I can say at the moment is PHEW! No, not because we have finally reached the last of the 31 JEDI July blogs, but because for a few minutes there I thought the project was about to fall at the final hurdle - 11.57pm is cutting it fine to say the least!

Although not nearly worthy of the great occasion that is the writing of this final blog post, today was still quite fun. Me and L decided to get an airing in Lyndhurst, where my new digi camera took its debut photos and ice creams were consumed for the umpteenth time this month on top of the hill at Bolton's Bench.

Then, in the evening, I met up with the 'lads' at the pub for a pre-birthday drink in celebration of Jonny and Matthias' upcoming 19ths. Many games of pool were played with much jollity and it was all very good fun, although it was said pub night that oh so nearly prevented me from getting home on time to do this final blog!

Still, all's well that ends well, and what ends in this case is an excellent JEDI July. It's a month that will certainly live long in the memory and, although at times a challenge to write, this blog will hopefully serve as a lasting tribute to a wonderful July 2009.

In a final act of tribute, it's amazing what you can do with a simple roll of wrapping paper and a little JEDI imagination...


Happy JEDI July, dust fans!

JEDI July: Day 30 - The one with the pub quiz

So here we are on the penultimate day of JEDI July...a day which, much like the rest of this week, has been in the most part nothing to write home about. I got up fairly late and, as Mum and Dad were both at work, I had a pretty lazy morning, the height of activity being the highly draining task of - get this - marmiting some toast!

Dragons' Den on iPlayer got me through to midday before Mum phoned asking if I could pop round the shops to get some stuff for lunch (as our cupboard resembles that of Old Mother Hubbard at the moment). Today's weather was sunshine and showers and, typically, I found myself caught in the latter, but made up for it by purchasing some lovely big white baps, sensations crisps and a small treat in the form of maltesers.

After lunch Mum and L galavanted off to Lymington. I was originally going to join them before I heard of the tedious shopping which they had planned, so in the end elected to skip it. My laptop and I therefore spent some more quality time together before Dad arrived home. At this point my eyes were starting to strain after staring at the computer screen for so long, so I decided to take a quick breather and go for a drive.

This took me first to Calshot, where I had hoped to catch P&O cruise ship Artemis passing the spit, but unfortunately didn't quite make it on time. I therefore decided to head for Eling, a mysterious place between Totton and Marchwood which I had heard much about yet only visited on a couple of ocassions many years ago. It was a pleasant drive along the waterside in the now constant warm sunshine, however no sooner had I found and arrived in Eling then a quick phonecall home confirmed that it was time to turn round and come back again - an offer which I simply couldn't refuse with chips waiting in the oven!

Despite running out of time to go exploring, the trip had served its purpose in clearing my head. This was important as, following tea and test cricket TV with Dad, Ernest arrived to take me and Lydia on our first pub quiz outing at the Bold Forester. Apparently the event has been running every Thursday evening for six months, so it was definitely time for us to get our brains in gear and at least give it a go. Ernest bought the first round of drinks and copious crisps, we found a table amongst 8 or 9 other teams and, following much discussion, decided on a name - 'The Dullness' (catchy, eh?!).

The quiz itself comprised of three rounds of ten questions, as well as bonus interval rounds, a celebrity picture quiz and music teasers in between the main questions. The pictures were completed pre-quiz and, having identified 7 out of the possible 10, team Dullness entered into the first set of questions high in confidence. Unfortunately, things began to go downhill from this point, and half marks on the first round kind of set the tone for the remainder of the quiz...

In some cases correct answers were mulled over and then not written down, our knowledge of British Prime Ministers was scrutinised with embarassing results and, despite Lydia's inspired identification of Jeremy Clarkson as the 'who am I?' answer, 'The Dullness' finished on a measly 43 out of 85 - in other words...last place! In spite of this gallant failure, we found ourselves amongst the prizes by scooping the wooden spoon carton of mini creme eggs, which to me seemed more worth our while than the top prize bottle of chardonnay!

An unsuccesful punt on the challenging 'snowball' maths puzzle concluded a thoroughly enjoyable evening and plans are already afoot to repeat the exercise next week in order to - crazy as it sounds - come away empty-handed!

Plans are also afoot for the final fling tomorrow as JEDI July draws to a close. The day itself looks set to be another quiet affair, but its corresponding blog will, I hope, turn out to be something special. One thing I can guarantee...it certainly won't be short!

JEDI July: Day 29 - The one with the soggy sunset

It's amazing to think that in just two weeks' time I will be under the canvas at Soul Survivor - hopefully without the threat of being flooded out of the tent like we were last year. July has proved a pretty poor month weather-wise, though the damp conditions did provide some rather dramatic photo opportunities whilst out on a rare drive with Ern this evening.

With Lydia out on driving practice in Jalopy, I suggested that we pop down to Calshot to see Southampton's latest cruise liner, Celebrity Equinox, heading out of port for the first time. Sure, the ship has a naff name and at first glance appears little more than a floating apartment block, but at least we could say we had witnessed the maiden voyage of the only new cruise ship to visit the UK this year.

Celebrity Equinox had almost reached the spit by the time we arrived, so we were fortunate not to have missed it altogether. The castle area was already littered with cars as many others turned out for the landmark event, regardless of the angry-looking clouds circling overhead. Ern snapped away with his camera as the ship swam gracefully past, using the zoom function to great effect in spying on the privileged first set of passengers! Unfortunately I had left the house in a hurry and had forgotten to bring my new camera on its inaugral outing, though we had a good time reviewing Ernest's efforts once the ship had moved past.

As other cars filtered away the heavens opened. Ern continued to point his camera in every direction in search of atmospheric shots as we made our way back along the spit, though an attempt to capture a spotlight through raindrops on the windscreen proved slightly above our combined photographic ability. The castle and colourful beach huts were snapped against a slaty-grey sky and, after briefly pulling up beside Lydia and Dad in the bedgraggled car park, we found the contast between a hazy setting sun, orangey-pink cloud streaks on the horizon and the leaden scenes behind to good a photo opportunity to miss, even if it did involve braving the torrential rain beneath Ernest's golf umbrella!

These visual weather treats were in marked contast to the rest of the day which, like Tuesday, had proved fairly mediocre. The only real event of note was my weekly visit to Nanny's, where our hour of catch-up chat was accompanied, as usual, by tasty treats, this time in the form of melt-in-your-mouth cheese crackers and a strawberry jam tart. Nan was keen to hear all about Mum's birthday and the secret cake baking (she was in on it too!), while we also discussed last Saturday's Saints match and Sunday's family picnic with plenty of mirth.

My procrastination excuse of the day was retrieving my old box of diecast car models from the loft and, dull as it may sound, I spent a pleasant couple of hours looking on the undersides to find out the make and model of each. This brought back many happy memories of 'garage' games from my school days - and, boy, does that make me sound old! Lydia even challenged me to a series of races on the kitchen floor, with my Ferrari F40 proving unbeatable against the stellar line up of a Porsche 911, a Jag XJS, a Bugatti EB110 and an Aston Martin DB7. Oh what it was to be a child...!

Just two days left of JEDI July...will I manage to catch up on time? Find out tomorrow!

JEDI July: Day 28 - The one with an unwise pudding

Today has been the opitomy of averageness. That's not to say it's been a bad day, just that nothing really set it apart from any other...hence a title which suggests scraping the bottom of the imaginative barrel.

The pudding to which I refer is a block of very tasty-looking vienetta ice cream which Lydia and I bought this morning in Waitrose, only to discover on return home that our freezer was quietly defrosting on the patio! Lydia's plans for a post-pasta pudding were in peril, so a grovelling call to the Boilos was required and the vienetta was soon recovering in Grandma's freezer.

I had driven down to the Boilos' in Jalopy and whilst I was there I took the opportunity to have a peek at the progress of their new bathroom, which currently resembles an unkempt builders yard. The floor is comprised solely of MDF, the shower is simply a hole in the floor and the new toilet lacks an accompanying sink, while most of the walls are covered in plaster and the door stands off its hinges, propped up against the airing cupboard. Overall, not a pretty sight! Come the end of the work Grandma and Grandad should be able to enjoy a swanky modern wetroom, but for now tradesmen will continue to stampede up and down the stairs for at least another week!

Whilst in Waitrose Lydia and I had also bought giant pretzels and jam doughnuts and as these weren't likely to melt in a hurry we enjoyed them for lunch. The afternoon was spent thinking about doing lots of stuff (eg catching up on missed blog posts!) but actually achieving very little, which regrettably seems to be the direction most of these run-of-the-mill days take.

Having helped Dad move the freezer back indoors I drove to the golf course to join Ernest, who had brought a work friend along for a tonk round the nine hole. Before I arrived they had a go on the driving range to get their eye in, though fortunately for me this seemed to have the opposite effect as both Ern and mate Chris (who was indeed 'a good laff') suffered pretty poor rounds. I had been on course for the coveted 'bogey round' of 38 before stuffing up the final hole to finish on 40, though this was still some way ahead of the next-best score of 57!

On the way home I dropped in on the Boilos to pick up the vienetta and was treated to an update of the afternoon's events in the bathroom, as well as two rice cakes, a glass of orange juice and some money for my savings account...so definitely worth the visit!

Tomorrow looks like another day of averageness, so perhaps an ideal opportunity to catch up with those blog posts...?!

JEDI July: Day 27 - The one with the new camera

Today me and L braved town in order to seek out a new digital camera to replace my defunct old friend CX7530, which finally gave up the ghost during Saturday's football trip.

This is the outcome - a 9.2-megapixel Kodak M320:


I hope I've made the right choice - the three years and 11,000+ photos of loyal service by its predecessor is a lot to live up to. Welcome to the family, M320!