Indians, Mud and Buzz

helloooooooo time for a blog update.... and to catch up with what i've been doing. The blog serves as a great diary for me,... Sadly, I can#'t always put everything on a public blog which is a shame - i wish i could post more about feelings and personal stuff but i guess thats just the way it is ... still it's good to share as much as i feel i can.....

to re-cap the past two weeks.... i sank into a big depression a couple of weeks ago... which thankfully thanks to friends, support and time, i am coming through....

i find the biggest thing that helps with these things is to keep a real awareness and see the wide picture... and also to take great attention to the paths of the lives of others...

It was a huge effort to commentate on the game on the Tuesday but i managed it, despite not being able to hit my huge amounts of research before-hand....

The home game against fleetwood was the most important game i've commentated on so far... and it's now 3 wins from 3 games for me!!!! I must be a lucky omen!!! with fleetwood being the team we were trying to catch at the bottom of the play-off zone, it was a real important six-pointer... Again, a great massive pleasure to be able to commentate on it.

On the Thursday, Paula and family visited York - it was nice to see them although short and a bit rushed - that and the fact I was still really down.

On the Friday night, I went to a Cowboy party!!! Lexi's 30th birthday!! I was a bit nervous cos I hate dressing up haha.... but it was a laugh.

Saturday, I was out for over 10 hours -went to see To Kill A Mockingbird at the Theatre Royal then enjoyed a meal at the City Screen, stood looking over the River Ouse and talking for ages, before deciding to investigating the Park Inn, whose reflection we were staring at in the river. For a Saturday night, it was a nice place for me and James to sit and talk about everything under the sun until... well until there was no sun i guess.

Last week, someone from work kindly gave me 2 complimentary meal tickets for the Jinnah Restaurant - the new one which has opened on Cumberland Street - the street with the dungeons on... That was lovely, although I upset my stomach by risking some of the really hot stuff - haha i am silly!! whenever, i have the hot stuff, I always have to have a jug of water and take a big gulp after every mouthful and it makes people laugh haha....

We did our first run on Wednesday!!!! This is exciting and is getting me back to a good fitness level. We did 2.3 miles (i think) and plan to increase the distance every week. It was funny cos we'd decided to run out of town along the river (clifton/marygate way) .. It got really dark, and the ground started getting muddier and muddier.... As I was leading the way at this point, it proved very amusing as I was slipping and sliding about.. until I ended up in a big puddle so we thought it was best to walk for a bit!

I've had some fun radio shows.... Lately, some people have made really lovely comments about my show too... including Florence who is my number 1 fan and calls me each week to say how much she loves the show and for a chat.. That's what it's all about of course.

Thursday, I played snooker and Friday I stayed in watching the developments in the Libya situation!!!

Last night, was a two-pronged night... Had fun playing Buzz, with Christian, Elaine, Pauer and his missus.. it's a really good laugh.... then needed to be there to support Lexi through a difficult time from midnight for a bit.

Blog over - back to the laundry...

To Kill A Mockingbird

Whilst the studio was empty, I decided to take some photos of the newish hospital radio studios in all their glory. Sorry its a bit geeky. And the wonderful old vinyl players and CD players are out of shot to the right there.

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I'm reading about Harper Lee, the author of To Kill A Mockingbird. I find it fascinating to read about the personal lives of those who create beautiful masterpieces. Generally, in my case, I find they tend to be eccentric, individualist, emotional, often troubled, and shy or reclusive from public life. Recluses or semi-recluses whose work I have idolised include J.D.Salinger, Harper Lee, Rollo Armstrong, Erik Satie and Caroline Aherne. I use the word recluse very loosely indeed - and in these instances, meaning either shy from the public eye or talked about as being a recluse.

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To Kill A Mockingbird is one of my all-time favourite novels since reading it at school. Last Saturday, I went to see it at the theatre and this morning, I watched the film made of it, which features Gregory Peck. It's so moving in so many ways - Often remembered as a book about overcoming racial prejudice, the morals, metaphors and quotes work on many more levels. I love also, how it's power - the power to touch you, make you think, re-consider, make you cry - is almost ALL in the words.

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Harper Lee, who wrote the book in 1960 is still alive to this day. I was told she was a recluse (like one of the characters in the book) so I had to Wikipedia her, but it isn't really true. She just doesn't speak in public - however appears to have a close circle of true friends, including Gregory Peck who named his child after her... LOL.

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Very interestingly, the book is very much based on her own life. More so than I thought. Her father was a businessman very similar to Atticus, her childhood friend, Dill was based on her real best friend as a child - and the recluse who lived over the road is based on a real guy who really did creep out at night and leave presents in the tree-hole for the two children.

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Every time I look at the author of a great piece of art, I find they are writing their truth, near enough. Like they say, there is nothing more beautiful than the truth.

Commentating

To bring the blog up to date, I've had a nice gentle weekend this weekend. Saturday shopped for birthday presents and running gear, sorted out a mess at the bank, listened to the footy and then went out in the evening for drinks. Today, went to Clare's for a nice roast and have spent the evening frantically cleaning the house.

I want to talk about my new commentating role.. but first to catch up on another couple of things.

1.) The job I am quite settled in now and it's going okay - and above all, it feels great just to have employment in this day and age - I know I am lucky.

2.) A couple of weekends ago, I enjoyed a great trip around some of the sights of York for Residents' Weekend... Firstly visited York Dungeons' (we were the first people inside lol)... It is fantastic - a lot better than I thought it would be - and the series of guides that take you through it are excellent.... The top of Cliffords' Tower, which I've done before - great view over York... And the Army museum - which is right in the centre of York and I had no clue it even existed - and its massive!!!

I'm loving the new commentary role for Hospital Radio - commentating on York City's home games - and right now it's my favourite thing in my life - as well as the commentating, I'm enjoying preparing before-hand - simply because I love reading about football!! So far I've done two games - 60 minutes in the first one, and a full 90 minutes in the second one (with a co-commentator of course - we switch around to share it)

I've also been lucky enough to commentate on 2 wins! The second one being a memorable 4-1 win over Wimbledon. The next game is this Tuesday - against Fleetwood who we are chasing down for the play-off position so it's going to be a really big game!!!

I am hoping to do a good enough job so that I can commentate on the further 5 games in March and the 3 in April before the season ends (unless we get into the play-offs!)

As for the role itself, it's really really enjoyable - getting to watch the games from a great vantage point whilst genuinely sharing my excitement and emotions with those listening in the hospital. And of course, it fulfils a childhood dream.

This week is really busy and I'm getting a bit stressed out over it already - and on how I'm going to fit everything in!

Monday I prepare for the commentary, Tuesday I commentate, Wednesday I have my show and we're hopefully meeting in the pub to plan our training schedule for the run, Thursday I'm really really hoping to get off work - so that in the morning I can catch up on sleep and then Paula is visiting in the afternoon and evening :-)

Friday is Lexi's 30th birthday which involves dressing as a cowboy and barn-dancing/ceilidh-ing!! Should be a lot of fun!!! I'm looking forward to it, although a bit stressed about fitting everything in this week!!!

Finally, I have started doing stuff to the Web site www.yorkhospitalradio.com - long overdue!!!! I'm putting weekly updates on there - 3 are on already.

Dalby Forest

Fallen trees. The photograph comes from the trip to Dalby Forest last weekend. On Saturday, there was a Met Office warning for severe gales and a Met Office warning for heavy rain - however, there was only the occasional spot of rain, and even more amazingly there was no wind whatsoever. After being prepared for a battling walk against the elements, in fact there was for most of it complete silence - a miracle after two days of crazy winds.

In fact, the winds of the previous two days brought down so many trees (on top of some deforestation), that it was truly incredible. As we trod a popular path through the forest, the entire path was laden with recently-uprooted trees - so the walk became a fun scramble.

Altogether we walked for 6 hours and probably around 12 miles. I'm walking with Andy and Lexi who are good friends, and we all love walking and being out in the peace of the countryside.

In addition, we have planned to walk most months and I'm really looking forward to these. Future walks include the Howden 30 (30 miles!!!), possibly two of the three peaks..... and the big one which is the Lyke Wake Walk.... This is my BIG challenge for the year - it is billed as the 24-hour walk - and although I think it is more likely to take around 20 hours, it's still going to be a massive challenge. The walk takes you from the western edge of the moors - over by Northallerton and the A1!!!!! to Ravenscar on the coast!!! and so it takes you along the top of the moors.

In addition to the walking, me and my Wednesday team at hospital radio are going to start running each week - building up to September - when we're going to do a long charity run - we haven't clarified this yet - but I think we're going to run the length of the model solar system on the cycle track - and back!!! It takes you from about Bishopthorpe to Riccall and back I believe.

I sadly couldn't afford to enter the Great North Run again this year.

More Editing

More editing and lining up the quotes this afternoon, while listening to the football.... Been thinking a lot about how to build up the characters too.

Still looking at an aim of finishing at the end of 2013 - although the important fact is that I'm always making progress, rather than a specific deadline for the end.

Editing Session

Manipulating a 300+ page word document is hard. Thankfully, there's good software packages out there that break it down and make it easier to order/structure etc... Aside from reviewing those, I've been working at editing the document in its current form, and typing up sections from scraps of paper I've made notes on. Quite time-consuming, but I'm gonna take a break for now, head out and do more later.