The Police

Did you know that Merseyside police are now on twitter? I'm not sure why, it's the criminals that you want to be following really isn't it? Like if whoever robbed Dan's motor bike last week had tweeted:

'just seen a bike through a cat flap of an ally gate #opportunist theaft'

then we could have tweeted back 'it's probably not worth your effort it's broken at the mo #waittillnextweek'

Maybe the police could have tweeted 'whoever robbed Dan's bike please give it back' that would have been about as effective as them knocking on a few doors about 5 days later early on a Sunday morning.

I looked on the merseyside police twitter page and they tweet stuff like:

'Merseyside Police welcomes Stoke fans to the city for today's game. We hope you have a safe and enjoyable day. Follow us for more info.'

BORRING..... I want to hear stuff like:

'just banged up another crack head and confiscated his crack #partytonight'

or 'don't panic but there's a terrorist attack going on in adsa'

or 'board so just arresting random hoodies for no reason'

I put that last one in because Dan once got stopped and questioned by the police because he was running and wearing a hood- up. The police didn't take into account that it was heavily raining. Thankfully once they heard his radio 4 voice they let him go.

Almost 5 years ago I made this pretend police poster with Joy Farrington. We posted it all over wavertree as payback for them water bombing us. We made it the day before me and Dan went on our first date. looking back I wonder if my flirting techniques were a bit strange. I'm still proud of this poster though, and I was well chuffed when Dan ripped one of the posters down and a man said 'so you're one of them are you.'

Being Frank

This is Hannah and Frank, Frank has spent most of his life trapped inside a breeze block in a builders merchants, until he was rescued by the the lovely Hannah this week. And do you know what the most tragic part of this story is?....Frank is claustrophobic. Just imagine how it would feel blocked in with hundreds of other breeze blocks, being bought and sold for as little as £1.17. The best Frank could have hoped for was to be a corner stone of an important building, but thanks to the wonderful work of volunteers like Hannah who work at 'Jones for Stones' Frank has started a new and exciting chapter of his life at our centre.

Frank says "I really love it here at 'Jones for Stones', I get to try out new activities and hang out with other people like me, yesterday I went canoeing with another rescued breeze block called Frieda, and we really hit it off, we're going to go to laser quest next week. I know times are hard but if you can spare any cash to help 'Jones for Stones' with their valuable work that would be so much appreciated by all of us"

Inside every breeze block is a frightened man woman or child just waiting to be free. If you believe that breeze blocks shouldn't be bought and sold donate to 'Jones for Stones' now or contact us about volunteering in our center. Thank you.

Google Vs My Mum

I often ponder,
who is stronger?
Google or my mum.

Who knows more?
I'm not quite sure,
but this poem has been fun.

I wondered this today when I sent my mum a text saying:

'here's a chance to prove you're better than google: when I make a meaty risotto I use a beef stock cube, but what should I use when making a fish risotto?'

she texted back 'a fish stock cube of course.'

I did not know these existed. But anyway this isn't a blog about risotto. I think I could have got the same answer, without the sarcastic 'of course' from google. So in round one I would give Google 1 and my Mum 1 ...so they are equal.

When I look back on an incident last week my mum was winning against her competitor google. I had given an invoice to a school and they said 'does it include VAT?' and I thought 'I don't know what you're on about' but I said 'yes.' Then I rang my mum and said 'what are they on about?' she told me that you don't have to register for VAT unless your turnover is £70000. I'm sure I could have found this out from google but it probably would have taken longer and might have involved downloading a PDF and for some reason I find anything written on a PDF boring. So at the end of round 2 it's Mum 2 Google 1.

I wouldn't even be writing this blog without google ...but then again if it wasn't for my mum I wouldn't be writing this blog either so the mystery continues. Maybe I will do an experiment I could live for one month without google, and then live for one month without having any contact with my mum...and I could see which I miss the most.

whilst we're on the subject of my mum... people have been asking me if the story I wrote in creative writing class is based on truth. This is the first paragraph:

'The last time I saw my mother was 15 years ago, she was only wearing a stripy thong- unless you count the fact that she was covered from head to toe in honey. She was sitting inside a giant fiber glass bee hive swinging her legs. There was an almost defining sound of buzzing coming from the loud speakers. This was apparently modern art.'

This would be hilarious if true but I should point out it's not. However she did once do a dance with a mop in front of an audience in a park in Newburry.

Happy Mother's Day Mum.

Customer Feedback

Virgin media just emailed me to ask for feedback...at last my chance to vent years of fustration. I gave them a score of 1 for customer service and zero for chance of recomending them to a friend. when asked to explain my answers I wrote this:

"I originally gave you the score zero but then I changed it to 1 because I did eventually get to speak to a real person and I have a vague glimmer of hope that my bill problem might one day get sorted. I put 0 for how likely I am to recommend you to a friend because, straight after my conversation I was filled will frustration and had to go out for a run to calm myself down. I also posted as my facebook status 'I hate virgin media! Even more than I hate HMRC.' So it's not really just that I am 'not at all likely' to recommend a friend I'm actually actively against you as a corperation and would happily dissuade anyone from signing up for your internet packages. "

I wish I'd added that they should move their call centres to Wales because when our car got written off by an idiot and the insurace company couldn't do anything I was strangly not annoyed with them. I think that's because you can't get anoyed with a welsh person.

End of a Era

Today at the age of 26 and a quarter, I am announcing the end of a 12 year long bikini wearing era. After trying to swim a km once a week for the last 6 weeks or so I have finally decide to stop wearing my bikini that is made from triangles the size of cheese triangles. I bought a proper grown up woman's swimsuit that sucks in the tummy. It's got polka dots on it and it's pretty. I try and swim 40 lengths in 35 minutes which I feel is significant progress considering that my personal goal a few months ago was not to get my hair wet.

After believing I was 7 1/2 stone for the past decade I was a bit surprised to discover that I am actually 8 1/2 stone. Annoyingly my excuse about not weighing enough to give blood will not work anymore (you have to be 8 stone.) I got sent a letter asking me to give blood today, and that's partly what prompted buying a new swimsuit, I want to get in shape or those blood sucking leaches that are the NHS will guilt me into donating. I already became a organ donor last month but that will not satisfy them. I'm giving everything but my eyes, I know I'll be dead but I don't want someone else wandering around with my eyes after I'm gone.... that's creepy.

I definitely don't want to give up my body to science either. I don't want some first year med student poking around and laughing at my dead naked body. I wouldn't mind giving up my body for art though, I wonder if there's a form to fill in for that? I wonder if you could get paid in advance for it? I almost donated my baby teeth collection to an artist once. Then I decided not to, you never know when there will be an emergency and you'll urgently need a pot of your own baby teeth.

My Favorite Gingers

This blog is dedicated to my 2 favorite ginger friends who are both amazing Bex and Josh. (also I have a ginger sister she's nice too)

I'll start with Bex who I've know since I was born:

This is us and our snowman back in the day. We grew up as next door neighbours, until I was 6. One memory from this period was of us "running away" we decided on the cunning cover up of ''we're pretending to run away" we packed clothes and cornflakes in a big suitcase and set off for our journey after maybe 20 minutes I fell over and we had to go back for a plaster, and we must of decided not to continue the big run away plans.

When I was 6 Bex moved a few miles away but 6 months later we ended up moving to the same street as them, we started a new school together and pretended we were sisters. People genrally believed us. I actually find it hard to convince people that I'm not related to other random gingers sometimes.

We weren't as close in secondary school Bex was two school years above me, and therefore it was socially unacceptable for us to make any eye contact during school hours. Once she was in sixth form we hung out a bit more. I got a bit of street cred from getting lifts to school in her old banger car. I got the role of 'cd walkman holder' -she had one of those things that plugs into a car tape player and we always listened to 'Niccleback' or 'Puddle of mud' on the way to school.

She went away to uni and we weren't in contact much for a few years but it's quite weird how similar we have become as adults. We both share a love of climbing trees, silly games, fancy dress, traveling and setting fire to things. Last July she was my bridesmaid and this July I'm going to be her bridesmaid!!! She told me this at her surprise engagement party at the weekend... then we had a wrestle in the lotus position whilst I was wearing a monkey mask, and she accidental punched me in the face and gave me a nose bleed it was funny.

This is me and Josh:

We lived together for 2 years in uni. He taught me how to spin fire poi, I taught him unicycling, and he was the one that inspired me to do community art stuff. We had a lot of funny times together back in the day when we lived life between 10am and 2am. On Sundays we had the Sunday night question which was a deep philosophical time when we discussed things like 'Do male lady birds ever feel a bit camp?' he came out with great sentences like 'That's illegal with a capital E!' we pretty much spent our whole time on the beach or in the park I never remember it being cold or rainy in those days. One he put a life size manikin that he found in a skip in my bed.

He converted me to liking tea because he loved it so much that he said we couldn't be friends on a deep level if I didn't drink tea. One day (before I liked tea) I wanted to show him how much I respected him as a friend, but as he didn't really do hugs, I downed a whole mug of tea for his enjoyment even though I hated it. After that I gradually started to like tea.

Today Josh is setting of on a tricycle ride around Europe for a year meeting up with some circus type people in Berlin and travelling with them for a while. He's a proper legend. He has a blog too you should follow it: http://wildgooseartventures.blogspot.com/