I got this short MEME from Faffajane who stole it from Smichen who borrowed it from .. etc, etc…

1. Has anyone ever kissed you and you didn’t want them to kiss you?
No.

2. Who’s your best blog friend?
All of them.

3. What’s been your most embarrassing moment?
Far too many to list, but a couple that come to mind are both to do with listening to my walkman on tube trains, one time I was listening to it and was very tired so I must have dozed off I then suddenly woke with a start and noticed that a lot of people were smirking and the guy opposite me was hold the newspaper in front of him with his knuckles going white as he gripped it hard and it was shaking as he laughed, I have no idea what I’d been doing while asleep but got off the next station anyway; on another occasion I was listening to Indians by Anthrax and at a certain point in the song the singer just says loudly and angrily “War dance”, unfortunately I was so into the song that I also said it loudly and got some very funny looks from the other people in the train carriage.

4. Do you have a girlfriend?
Yes.

5. What is your favourite boys and girls name?
Boy: Scott, Vincent and David.
Girl: Rebecca (Becca), Niki, and Rochina.

I thought I would start with just a small comment on the way I feel at the moment. I feel pissed off. I suppose I ought to explain that a little more. Firstly you need to be aware of the fact that I have a long history of computer problems, I would say that every computer I have ever owned and almost every computer I have ever used (including work ones) has gone wrong, after a while you can't help but start to think "Maybe it's me", and I don't think that has anything to do with my normal paranoia, it's just logical. Well, suprise suprise, our new computer isn't working properly and here's a brief run down of what's happened. I connected it all together and the speakers didn't work, I did what it said in the Windows trouble shooter and locked the whole computer up, it wouldn't open Window XP at all. We then had to contact a friend of Niki's who a computer expert and he asked us few questions and we ended up having to completely re-install Windows XP. Now the computer opens up fine, but the speakers still don't work. I've decided it's best for me to leave it alone (especially as I do have a tendancy to loose my temper with things and people of this nature which often results in things like lots of bits and no computer), and Niki is going to phone the company we got it from next week to complain and ask them what we should do. So, this episode, along with a few other minor things that have been getting me down lately (and also the weather), have left me feeling more than a little pissed off and unenthusiastic about things.

As promised here are some pictures of mine and Niki's tattoos. This is Niki's first tattoo (it's on her back, high up in the middle of her shoulders just below her neck), the first picture was taken just after it was done (sorry it's so dark, forgot to lighten it before I uploaded it) and the second picture was taken yesterday:

This is my new tattoo, I had it done (freehand) around the existing tattoo of the chinese symbol for good luck, again the first picture was taken just after it was done and the second one was taken yesterday:

Also as promised here is a picture of the Tascam 424 MkIII portastudio that I got off E-bay:

Well here it is, the moment you've all (well possibly at least a few of you) may possibly have been waiting for, the result of the competition that I set in my 100th posting. I currently (and this figure has remained static since the day I set the competition) have 3869 MP3's in my collection. So the winner with the closest guess is atu congratulations

Hopefully they will contact me to let me know exactly which prize they want, although I will contact them directly to let them know they've won.

Well, I suppose that's me for now, see y'all.

Don't forget that the competition I set in my 100th posting closes at midnight GMT tomorrow. If you want to enter all you have to do is guess how many MP3's I have in my collection. As I said before a prize will be given to the winner (see my 100th post for full list of prizes).

This is probably one of the last entries I will put on this site from my old computer, the lead for the new computer finally turned up so I can now put it all together and get it up and running, all I have to do then is spend a day swearing at the computer and NTL because it will take that long to get the internet connection sorted out, and probably at least two or three phone calls to the NTL customer services department, still I'm sure it will be worth it in the end.

As I sit here my right arm is stinging like crazy because I had a new tattoo done today, Niki had one done too, (photo's will be posted at a later date). It doesn't hurt having the tatto done, to me it feels a bit like having your arm shaved with a cheese grater, but afterwards it stings like it's been burnt which is great fun in this weather, and the sweat stings it as well. Still, my mum always said you had to suffer to be beautiful

Anyway here's another MEME, this time based on games, that I nicked from Old Niq's blog:

Trivial Pursuit - Is there one thing you don't know that a blogger could answer for you?
There are many thing’s that I don’t know and would like to, but I suppose the one that comes to mind straight away is “Does anyone know where I can find a photo of a tattoo with a proper tartan in it?”

Connect Four - Are there three (non-blog) friends you couldn't live without?
Yes (actually four but these are the first three that come to mind), Mr Kelly (one of my bestest best friends), Big Chris, and Sandy.

Monopoly - If you could start your own business, what would it be?
A combined Bar, Club, Rehearsal and Recording Studio.

Cluedo - How suspicious are you of people?
Sometimes quite suspicious but not always.

Scrabble - What's your full name (including middle names) worth in Scrabble? Find out here http://www.solfire.com/scrabble/
My score is 30.

Risk - What's the biggest risk you've ever taken?
Probably quitting my job after going through my rehab programme.

Frustration - What's your biggest irritation(s)?
Probably far to many to list but here’s a few:- Bigotry, being ignored, big heads, materialistic people.

Operation - What's been your worst injury?
Although I'm not sure that it’s technically not an injury I’ve had a heart attack so I suppose it would be that, but otherwise I suppose it would be a fractured wrist.

Chess - Which do you trust more, head or heart?
Neither really, but if I had to choose I would say head.

Game of Life - What one thing would you like to do in life?
Live.

See y'all

Alright I suppose like everyone else I better start off by bemoaning the fact that, unusually we have some hot weather in this country. I'm not a great one for the heat but hey, we have it for such a short time why complain, it will soon be over and we'll be back to the dull gray sky that we are all used to and moan about

Scott and Becca's party went well I suppose. It wasn't as bad as last year, and there were a few people there that I haven't spoken to for some time, so it was nice to catch up with them. But I still felt out of place, partly because of everyone else drinking and me not (it's strange but I don't feel like I want to get drunk and most of the time I don't even feel like I want to drink, but on ocassions like that I would just like to be like everyone else and be able to have a few beers like a 'normal' person), but also because it's a kind of alien feeling to be back in a house where I spent so many years with my ex and being surrounded by all the same people we used to see but knowing that I am no longer part of all that. Don't get me wrong I'm happy with Niki in the situation I'm in now but there are times when I think just how it could have been to not have screwed things up so much in my life and I would like to see how things would have worked out. I know that I can't live on regrets and guilt and wishes and the past, but just now and then it's very hard not to think about it. But I was glad to be able to be there for Scott and Becca, I love them both dearly and they mean more to me than life it self and believe me I know that that is true.

The flat is changing, Niki and I decided that we needed some more furniture, lack of storage space meaning that we have piles of stuff all over the flat and this does not sit well with my need to have things organised (not that I'm obsessive about it....much). So we've got a book case, a computer desk and a chest of drawers which came from a catalogue seconds shop, and an Ikea coffe table which we bought on e-bay for £5. Niki also bought us a new computer (we went to a place that makes them to your specifications which means that you can get a good deal of computer for not a lot of money), which should hopefully be fully up and running in a few days. The reason it's not already up and running is that there wasn't a lead to connect the monitor to the computer, now I know that I could have used the old one or gone to somewhere like Maplins to buy a new one, but when you've spent a few hundred on a new computer you kind of expect it to all be there in working order, anyway after some not exactly excellent customer service they are sending me a lead which should be here either today or tomorrow. The final piece of new (well new to me so it's newish, that's funny it don't look newish) stuff is a portastudio. Yes I bought a Tascam 424 MKIII Portastudio off e-bay for under £50, which I didn't think was bad. The only thing wrong with it is that the cover of the tape deck is missing, also there was no manual but I have downloaded one from the Tascam web site so that's not a problem. Once I've worked out how to use it I'll have to ask Old Niq round to have a play with it and my drum machine and stuff.

Well, I suppose that's about it for now, I'll just find a nice dark corner to sit in for the rest of the day and hope I don't melt. See y'all.

Nicked from Wulfweard the White who nicked it from Cartlionel, saw this a while ago and thought it was a bit different but haven't had a chance to do it until now (basically because I'm a lazy git), anyway here it is:

1) How would you spend an ideal day?
It would have to be a bright warm (but not too hot) summers day spent with Niki and selected friends at a music festival which would be rounded off with an evening chilling out with them.

2) Are you close to your family?
Not as close as I used to be.

3) What are your 5 favourite possessions?
My CD’s, my guitar, photo’s of my kids, my computer, and my stereo.

4) What's your worst fault?
Probably my lack of self-belief.

5) What have been the best 3 moments in your life?
Being there when Scott was born, the only gig done with Beyond Help doing our own material, and being at Becca and Jay’s wedding sober.

6) What are your favourite colours?
Red, Black, Yellow, and Green.

7) Do you feel like you have a home/belong somewhere?
No, not sure I ever have.

8) Do you like being alone?
Sometimes, but not often.

9) Is your silence ever empty?
No.

10) What are your 3 favourite works of art - textual or visual?
Swans Reflected As Elephants by Salvador Dali, I Am Legend by Richard Matheson, and It’s A Wonderful Life starring James Stewart.

Well it seems that because I put some rude words in it, and even though I then changed them to more inoffensive versions of those words, blog blocked my last posting from being listed. So this is just to let everyone know that in it there was a competition that is open to all.

Well, this is my 100th blog posting and I thought I'd make it a bit special. So as well as writing about the things I've been doing lately I'm setting a competition, I'm going to ask a question and give a prize for the winner (that's if anyone actually bothers to enter).

Anyway I'm going to start of with what happened yesterday. As I put in a earlier post Niki and I went to see the filming of a TV show with Marcus Brigstock in it and when we were leaving the director told everyone that if we logged on to their web site and entered a code (which he gave us) we would get priority tickets to another TV show filming, which we did and we did. This meant that we ended up last night in the Jongleurs club in Camden watching the filming of a pilot for another new TV show. This one is going to be called 'In The Hot Seat' and is introduced by Phil Jupitus, it's basically a chat show with celebrity guests mixed with a imporov comedy show. As Phil Jupitus described it, "it's like Friday Night With Jonathan Ross fugged Who's Line Is It Anyway and this is the bastid child". There are a team of four improv comedians, one of whom was Steve Frost (who if you don't know the name has been around for ages, he was on Saturday Night Live and also guested in The Comic Strip and The Young Ones), who act out events from the lives of the celebrities being interviewed. The celebrities on the pilot were Anneka Rice and David & Carrie Grant. I know it may not sound too fantastic but it was a really good laugh. One of my favourite lines was when Phil Jupitus was talking about the rehersals they had been doing during the day when they had made up a celebrity to be the interviewee and they chose Heather Mills, at one point they were talking about Paul McCartney's reaction to her life before they were married and how bad he had taken it, and he said that at one point the line "it's his own fault for marrying a fugging pirate" came out. After the show we stayed in the club for a little while and were basically the only 'ordinary' people there all the rest (with a few exceptions) were conected with the show. When we left we were going to get something to eat and I noticed that at a rather posh resturant/bar just down from the club (you could tell it was posh because the bouncer was wearing proper trousers and a shirt & tie with his black bomber jacket) the bouncer stood up straighter and looked all expectant as we went past, it wasn't anything to do with us but just the fact that we were walking down the road with Anneka Rice and David & Carrie Grant All in all it was a good night and I think that it was a much better show that the other one. Anyway here is a picture of me in the queue outside Jongleurs:

The next thing is that I've been buying myself some stuff to try to do so music things. I've now got myself a Korg guitar tuner (very necessary, especially for someone like me who can't do it by ear), I've got a new mic, a Marshall VT-1 Vibratrem pedal, a Danelectro Milkshake Chorus pedal and a ZOOM Rhythmtrak RT-123 drum machine. I'm going to find out about PC based recording software but I'm also looking at portastudio's (have decided that I can't afford digital so I'm going to have to go for an older analog model) but I can't make up my mind which way to go. Anyway here's a picture of the gear I've bought:

OK, other stuff. It was my kids birthday's yesterday, yes they both share the same birthday but there's ten years between them. That's been so much fun over the years. Anyway I think they both had a happy birthday, they came over to see me on Monday night and I gave them presents and cards and we had a good time. Happy Birthday to both of you There is a party going on for their birthday's on Saturday at my ex's which I'll be going to, I don't think Niki will be able to go because she's working. Jay and the band are also playing at Dagenham Town Show on Saturday so it's going to be a packed day

Alright, the moment you've all bee waiting for, here's the competition. After much hard thought about what I should ask to make it absolutely fair and not give anyone any kind of advantage I decided on a guessing game. Who ever can guess by next Friday how many MP3's I have in my collection (and I promise that I will not add any to it before that date) they will win a prize (in the event of no one getting the exact amount it will go to the person who guesses nearest, and in the event of a tie I will contact the people and ask a tiebreaker unless they wanted different prizes in which case they will all win, as long as there are not more people than prizesD). There is a choice of four prizes on offer, in no particular order they are:

1. Book - Peter Cook & Dudley Moore "Dud & Pete - The Dagenham Dialogues"

2. CD - The King Rat CD

3. A hank of hand spun Nickerjac yarn (kindly donated by Niki)

4. A mystery prize.

So it's up to you if you want to have a go and win one of those prizes. If you do post your answer as a comment by mid-night next Friday and I will post the name of the winner next Saturday.

Well, that's about all I've got to say so see y'all

Alright, I've decided to try this new bloody editing thingy again just to see if it's me or it that's useless

I really have very little to say. I have been trying hard to post entries on my blog regularly but at the moment I'm finding it difficult to find things to post and I'm getting bored of doing MEME's and stuff like that. I suppose it's all part of my general feeling of being a bit empty and flat at the moment. So my blog posting may well drop off a little for a while until I can find stuff to post about.

I suppose that's about all I can say right now.

I have tried to post someting on here three time now and everytime it says there are errors that mean it can't be published and when I try to go back and change things the post is blank and everything I've typed has disappeared.

I FUCKING GIVE UP!!!!

I am really not in the mood for this shit so I'm off!

This was nicked from Old-Niq who nicked it from Nixie.
RED – ANGER
1 Are you currently mad at someone? No, things yes but people no.
2 Which of your family members has the worst temper? Probably me.
3 Have you ever thrown something at anyone? Yes, and hit them and ment it.
4 Does your face turn red when you’re angry? No, I don’t think so. I’ve never gotten angry whilst looking in a mirror so I can’t be sure.
5 When you’re mad do you prefer to stare angrily or yell and scream? Both depending on what or who I’m mad at and why.

ORANGE – EXCITEMENT!
1 Has anyone ever thrown a surprise party for you? No.
2 Are you easily excited? Not since I was about 12
3 Which of your friends is most excitable? None of them as far as I know, we’re all far too old for all that kind of stuff
4 If you won a million dollars what would be your first thought? Now I can finally be out of debt for the first time in my adult life
5 If you could have anything right now, what would it be? A way of having my heart operation without having to wait to loose weight

YELLOW – SELF DISCOVERY.
1 Name. Andy
2 Where were you born? Kingsmead Estate, Hackney, London
3 What’s your goal in life? I’m not sure I have one anymore, these days it’s more a matter of making to the next day
4 Do you want to have children? Already have 2, too old for any more now
5 How do you want to die? I’m not really sure but I do know that I don’t want to be in pain and I don’t want to be alone

GREEN – OPINIONS.
1 Want to have sex before your married? Did have many times, I don’t think it’s a bad thing at all
2 Gay marriage? I have no problem with Gay men and women getting married if it’s what they want
3 Lower the drinking age? Definitely not, in fact maybe it should be raised to 21
4 Capital punishment? No way, our justice system isn’t good enough to be anywhere near infallible enough to risk putting the wrong man to death (but then I don’t think any justice system is)
5 Abortion? Definitely, it should be available to every woman if they want it, but there needs to be counseling before and after to help them make the decision and deal with it
6 Recycling? It’s a good idea but I don’t think it will solve much unless it’s done on a global scale and is done by everyone, including big companies and governments.

BLUE – DREAMS.
1 What was your latest dream? I don’t remember, I know I had one recently but can’t remember what it was about.
2 Have any of your dreams come true? No, if they had I would be rich and talented and living in the lap of luxury with a huge breasted brunette
3 What was the weirdest dream you’ve ever had? I’m not sure, I’ve had a lot of weird dreams. I suppose it would be one of three, either the one where I stabbed Old-Niq with a bread knife, the one where I was walking through East Ham talking to someone and noticed that everyone in the street was going through baskets of human body parts outside the shops and then eating them, or the one where I was dressed in just a very big t-shirt and I was pushing a small plastecine rugby ball end over end along the corridors of my old school.

PURPLE – LOVE.
1 Straight, gay, Bi? Straight (although I have tried Bi, didn’t mind it and would never say never again)
2 Do you love someone? Yes
3 Do you have a crush? Depends what you mean by ‘a crush’, I fancy other women but they are all fantasy women (celebrities and the such-like)
4 Who is the best hugger you know? Probably Niki as she is the person I hug the most
5 Do you believe in love at first sight? No, lust yes but not love. I do believe that you can feel a special attraction to someone from the first time you see them and that can grow into love, sometimes very quickly, but I don’t think you can really love someone until you know something about the person they are inside.

Yes it's time for me to plug Jay's band A13 once again. If anyone is anywhere near Dagenham, Romford, Rush Green or the surrounding areas on the 15th of July, A13 have got a slot on the Dagenham Town Show in central park (behind Barking and Dagenham Town Hall). For full details check out their my space site (there is a link in the list of My Favourite Web Sites).

So we made it back home from Sutton. I didn't go to youth club with Niki as I've been getting more and more down for the last couple of days and with the heat and everything I just couldn't face it. So I came home early and flopped down in front of the TV. I have no idea really why I'm still feeling so down or what it is that keeps pulling me back down, I'm hoping to hear from these counselling people soon and maybe get some help with it that way.

We have nothing to do really for the next two days so we should be able to chill out for a bit

Can't relly think of much to write here despite the fact that I can't sleep (yet again) so I'm going to fill the rest of this entry with some silly stuff.

HOW GULLIBLE ARE YOU?

I took this on line test and apparently I'm only slightly gullible. You can get a certificate when you complete it as well. Take the test.

WHAT CARTOON ARE YOU?

Here's another on line test I've taken, acording to this I'm 'Family Guy', I don't really know what that says about me but hey, it's all just a bit of a laugh I suppose. Take the test.

ORIENTAL TRAINING DANCE

I have no idea why but I find this clip really funny and the thing is the more I watch it the funnier I find it, maybe I've just weird. By the way to get the full effect you'll need the sound on. Watch the clip.

Well taht's about all I can think of for now so see y'all