Early October

In the whirlwind of work, study, family, food, sleep, friends, music, rain, shorter daylight hours, lectures, laughter, and life, things feel so different.

Im sat in a classroom at 4 pm, it's early October. Over the summer, when there was very little to do, I felt very different. Pretty bored, calm, and thoughtful. Now, things never stop. I have virtually no time to quietly repair and reflect, I am just caught up in the whirlwind. My feelings have become so rich, so heady and intoxicating. Sat in a bright classroom while it grows dark outside and a light rain falls, I feel a tired excitement and joy bubbling beneath the surface, shot through with a weariness and a mild dizziness. I'm strangley aware of my sagging shoulders and the hair lying on my forehead and face. Im in a world of words, words on the projector screen, words on the whiteboard, words on my computer screen, words in the air, words from the lecturer, words from the students, words on the book on my desk, words on the cigarette packet on my mate's desk. They're all bouncing off my brain, which is choosing and absorbing them in spite of me. And still my undulating swelling and falling dizzy feelings are rolling around in my head and in my stomach. I feel like a pebble in the tide, and strangely enough, Im kind of enjoying it.

Bookmarking A Good Day

Today was a good day. Me and a load of students lay out on the grassy slope orchard that leads from the main college building down to the canteen, and we just studied for hours, hanging out and chatting. It was way hotter today that it has been for weeks, and we all sat down on the grass in the blazing sunshine for ages, about 15 of us, all barefoot, and some of us studied, some climbed the trees, others just sunbathed, and we were all hanging out, joking, laughing and having a good time. It will be a good memory. When we got hungry we just picked apples and pears right off the trees and ate them, and after a few hours we decided to go down to the river at the bottom of the hill. We crossed the road, jumped a fence, walked the field, and went down to the water, where some of us paddled, and a bunch of the lads got topless and waded into the river up to their necks, made loads of noise, wrestled, and just generally had a good time.

Later tonight me and Sydney went down to the common room where we all just hung out for hours, talking and joking with the crowd there, and batting a blue balloon around for hours. Me and Sydney came back up to the flat with an all over good-feeling from just being around a great group of friends.

Definitely a good day I want to remember.

Sydney's Childhood Life-Plan

Sydney (my wife) wrote this when she was 8.

It is extremely cute :)

To see it full size, just click the picture.

Sydney Witing.
Sundown Oct 5 1995


My Job


When I grow up I might want to be a loyer. 
To be a loyer I will need to have a jug.
I might have to sometimes wark in a cort room.
Of cors I will need a jury.
I will need clients.
Every loyer needs lots of school.
I will need a prosacuter.
When I become a loyer I will mostly just help people.
And I will help people that are geting soed.

Teacher's Notes - I hope you will become a lawyer, Sydney! I think you'd be very good at that job! :) Mrs Major.


Translation Key

loyer = Lawyer
jug = Judge
wark = Work
cort = Court
soed = Sued

The Books I've Read This Year

These are the books I've read cover to cover this year since last September...

The Booklist

The Making Of Methodism
A Preaching Workbook
Embodying The Word
Theology The Basics
Mission Shaped Evangelism
I Suffer Not A Woman
Evangelism That Really Works
Beyond Anger
Threshold Of The Future
Tend My Flock
What's The Difference
Love Wins
The Problem Of Pain
The Life And Work Of A Priest
Harry Potter And The Philosophers Stone
Harry Potter And The Chamber Of Secrets
Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban
Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire
Tina Fey Bossypants

(and there's been loads of others I read chapters from, or half of).

First Week of Autumn

This is a poem I wrote in 2003 when I was 20, watching the first week of Autumn start to materialise outside my bedroom window in Richmond. It's not poet laureate material, but hey, it's a nice memory.

It's started raining hard through the tired sunshine
A few brown leaves somersault past my window
Caught up in the high winds

The trees are turning red and yellow
In retired memory of the summer
The night air is early
        and feels like Christmas is coming
The sunlight reaches the trees sideways
A small yellow leaf tumbles and blusters
Head over heels down the road
Autumn settles snug in his seat
And the sky above is blue.

Some Awesome Childhood Compositions

Rooting around in my folders, I found two ridiculous but amusing 'poems' which me and two friends wrote at school aged 14ish... These are so goofy, they still make me laugh out loud though. This is pretty much what comes of watching waaay too much Monty Python.
And here they are.

Ode to Moose

Oh ye awesome Moose

Yea, ye make stupid noisesome pestilence,

But thy majestic horns doeth get entangled in tree.

Ye art tracked down, for sooth,

And thy almighty name would be takeneth in vain,

But ye hold strong,

And ye ram thy horns into hunters rump.

Alas! Thy prey doeth need plastic surgeon,

But legendary Moose will prevail,

Faint heart never won fair Moose,

And thy noble antlers art stucketh in gorse bush,

ha ha ha ha ha.

The Pigeon Poem

O yea ye wondrous Pigeon

What feathers lie upon thy flesh?

Ye big fat piece o' lard are ye,

And coloursome are ye.

Yea, ye fly o'er abundant hills,

But yea, ye lose caliber,

Thy rhythmic flaps wit' many a coo

Ye are but yayself an handsome bird.

O'er many a mile yay're eyes doeth hast seen,

Beholding thy nest art the furrows of ye're eye lids

And ye fall off branch,

Into cow pat.

Arr.

Holmesian Deduction in Theology

Weigh the evidence in the balance of probability.

Bend theories to fit facts, not facts to fit theories.

When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.