---

Half a pound of Fruit and Nut

Sitting marking coursework on a sunny evening is tedious and boring.  My wife's treat for me - half a pound of fruit and nut.

Ain't she great? 

Food that's good enough too... make you bleed?

Saturday morning... I lifted the 'wrong' jar of curry sauce in Tesco.

Friday evening... wifey cooks with the aforementioned jar. It turns out to be a little hot. So hot, after a few mouthfuls we have tears streaming from our eyes and our noses are running.

Ten minutes later, my wife is horrified to notice my nasal drip has turned red!

Yes folks, my wife's cooking gave me a nose-bleed! 

The weekend and meeting 'Satan'

Friday... ah, what a day. Off work, for an all-day meeting in Belfast and then on to the Balmoral Show. For the uniniated, imagine every farmer in Northern Ireland under one roof in the middle of Belfast. Well, we didn't have to imagine as we were there.

The plus sides - spying on my father-in-law who was there manning a non-agricultural stand and the free toasted Nutty Krust. We also got to see an awful lot of well-endowed prize-winning bulls.

The negatives - well, who would have fancied we'd come across Satan, as portrayed in 1970s British Horror movies?

Night out with the in laws

Last night we went out for tea with my wife's brothers and their wives.  The girls talked about our niece/nephews, about holidays, about doing things to our homes.

The guys talked about YouTube.

I was proud of finding the Blockbusters Hand Jive while bros-in-law got all excited about Look And Read and The Boy From Space, a BBC schools' programme about a boy (who looked like an extra from Village of the Damned) who came from space. Does what it says on the tin. We (wife and me) watched some today - quite freaky. No wonder bro-in-law had nightmares. Oh! Oh! Oh! - does anyone remember Knightmare? We talked about the Diet Coke + Mentos experiment (search YouTube for 'Coke')

We wondered what sort of people copy old VHS tapes to their computers, just to put on YouTube. We wondered what sort of people record them and their mates sitting round eating Rich Tea biscuits, just to put on YouTube.

So class, what interesting stuff have you found on YouTube?

It's Just Not Right

Some things are Just Not Right. Putting water from the hot tap into a kettle is one of them. Yes, I know it gets boiled but that's beside the point. Hot tap for washing, cold tap for drinking. Period.

Unfortunately, my wife does not see it the same way as me. She uses the hot tap for the kettle - hence my previous post.

To put my feelings in context, recall the scene in Rain Man where Charlie (Tom Cruise) tries to get Raymond (Dustin Hoffman) to cross the road with a 'Don't Walk' sign clearly visible. Every fibre in Raymond's body screamed NOOOOO!

Putting hot water into the kettle, a device that is designed to take COLD water as its input is up there with:
- Putting non-rinsed plastic containers into the recycling bin;
- Wearing navy with black;
- Peeing in the swimming pool;
- Voting for Ian Paisley;
- Listening to Chris Moyles;
- Eating cabbage;
- Considering my grandmother (or mother, or sister) 'normal', in any sense of the word;
- Ulrika having sex with Sven;
- Anyone having sex with Sven;
- Putting raw and cooked meats together;
- Admitting, in public, to liking Star Trek or Cliff Richard;
- Using the 'Comic Sans' font;
- Michael Jackson being white;
- Michael Jackson being left with children;
- Telling Victoria Beckham she can sing;
- David Beckham classing Tom Cruise as his biggest current role model (it's true!);

So, dear reader, what things to you are Just Not Right?

How do you make tea?

Please reply to this - it won't take long! When making tea, do you:

a) Fill the kettle from the cold tap, and boil?

b) Fill the kettle from the hot tap, and boil?

many thanks...