And.... we're back.

Good morrow to you, nice bloggers that sometimes check out my inane ramblings here on the interwebs. I am back and full of vim and vigour for writery type things and checking out all your groovy stuff that you have done and gone posted over the past month or so. I shall not bore you with the general hellishness of moving a fortnight before Christmas, in a rush, with a chest infection and two children under the age of seven. Suffice to say, I'll not be doing it again anytime soon and I'm sure there is some kind of therapy group I can go to.

Enforced Blog Hiatus

Hola.

You may or may not have noticed that I haven't posted for a while. This is due to the fact that we will be finally moving house soon and our place is currently bedlam. Boxes everywhere and trying to live day by day while waiting for a moving date. I thought it would be this weekend, but it looks more likely to be next now due to bits of paper not arriving at solicitors and so forth.

Quite frankly, this has been one of the most stressful times me and the family have been through and while lessons have been learnt, I will approach moving house next time better equipped mentally. I'm sorry I haven't been around to check in on your posts and comment, and once we are in the new place and internets are up and running, I'll be back on it like no ones business.

Take care, big love,

W.

Express Yourself - Post Five

Hi everyone, I was thinking a lot about this weeks post as I am a big music fan and wasn't sure I could choose ten or so songs for a real life playlist. As Dani mentions in her post this week, a real life playlist could take ages to do! I have eight or nine playlists on my iPhone that I listen to for all sorts of different things and getting all those down could take hours.

Resurrection Blogfest Post

Well Buongiorno beautiful people! Today is the day, Mina Lobo of the brilliant blog Some Dark Romantic's Resurrection Blogfest. Mina has been blogging for one whole year today and has asked a load of us to submit something from our first year of blogging that we didn't think had the "airtime" it deserved. So, I have picked this one. Hope you like it. It's a true story too.

Five Sentence Fiction - Candidate

It's FSF time again and this weeks post prompt word is Candidate. Here is my effort. Hope you like it.

Spooktoberfest Post

Wotcher.

The very lovely Dani and Jackie over at Entertaining Interests and Bouquet of Books respectively are currently hosting Spooktoberfest. Basically, its a spooky 300 word piece of flash fiction with five mandatory words which are: Ghost, Cobweb, Jack o'lantern, Cauldron and Razor. Sounds simple you might think, but you would be wrong! My first pass at this came in at 450 words and it was murder to cut it down. I hope you enjoy.

Five Sentence Fiction - Potions

Here we are again and a great prompt word : Potion. It's Five Sentence Fiction.

Five Thousand

Five Thousandth hit on my blog today. That's awesome and I'm grateful to all of you who have taken the time to stop by, read and comment.

You know who you are and you are thanked. A special thank you to Mark who got me into this almost a year ago. If you don't like it, blame him.

Rock on.

W.

Express Yourself - Post Four

Boungiorno all. It's time for the latest installment of Express Yourself, the weekly meme from Dani at Entertaining Interests and Jackie at Bouquet of Books. This weeks post is your top five monsters. There are all kinds of ways that this post can go, but I decided to go this way. Hope you enjoy.

Five Sentence Fiction - Flawed

Yes. I'm late to the game again, but as they say; better late than never. This weeks word is Flawed. 

Express Yourself Post Three

Hola. This is post three in the Express yourself meme hosted by Jackie and Dani of the Entertaining Interests and Bouquet of Books blogs. Very nice ladies they are too. This weeks question is "What language would you like to speak and why?"

Luca and Cecily

One of the books I picked up from my trip to Hay a couple of weeks ago was a book called Hex and the City by Simon R. Green. I'm currently halfway through and have just found out by use of the internets that it is book four in a series of twelve I think. It tells the tale of John Taylor, a kind of supernatural private investigator who works in The Nightside, a magical area of London unseen to normal humans where gods, magical creatures, legends and all other manifestations of the weird and wonderful go to move and shake, wheel and deal, live and unlive. It's good stuff. So good in fact, that the first three books are now on my Christmas list. Anybody out there like me enough to get them for me? Only kidding.

Anyway, inspired by the book I ended up scribbling away and came up with this. Hope you like it. 

Five Sentence Fiction - Detour

I'm actually a little early this week for five sentence fiction, which makes a change for me... This weeks word is Detour so I thought of this ...

Express Yourself Post Two

Hi there. This is my second post in the weekly meme Express Yourself hosted by Dani of Entertaining Interests and Jackie of Bouquet of Books.

This weeks question is: List five movies or books that cause the hair stand up on the back of your neck. Juicy I thought. Here goes...

Five Sentence Fiction - Pirates

Five Sentence Fiction is one year old this week. I haven't been doing it for that long but there is a list of all the prompt words here on Lillie's site. As a present to all of us that participate Lillie has given us the opportunity to post on any one word that have been given over the past year, so I have chosen Pirates and it goes like this....

Hay on Wye

This weekend the good lady wife and I have been lucky enough to have two whole child free days courtesy of my mam and dad. The reason that we are away is that a very good friend of ours called Sue has turned 50 and we and some of our friends have come to a converted barn on the Wales / England border in a small village called Abbey Dore to celebrate her birthday. It's quite frankly beautiful here, the barn sleeps 12, is ginagarous and has recently been totally refurbished throughout. It's dead posh.

Express Yourself

In a blatant attempt to primarily gain more readership and meet more writerly folk, I have decided to get into a new weekly meme called Express Yourself. There will be a different subject every week until the weekend of Halloween when the Spooktoberfest blogfest will be taking place. It sounds like a bit of fun and a great way to meet other bloggers.

Two nice ladies are running the meme together the first I heard of was Dani who has a blog called Entertaining Intrests and the other is Jackie who has a blog called Bouquet of Books. Anyone can sign up for it (they let me in and both followed my blog back in return) and basically you answer one of the questions per week. Simple eh?

Five Sentence Fiction - Devotion

Here we are again and so soon! You would think that this was a weekly writing challenge or something... Lillie has charged us with writing five sentences on Devotion. Below is my contribution. Hope you enjoy it.

Five Sentence Fiction - Zombies

Hi all. I'm once again a bit late in submitting, but it's Five Sentence Fiction time again and Lillie has given us a juicy one this week: Zombies....

Gigs

Last Friday, I went to a gig. Those of you that know me are aware of how rare an experience this is for me. My wife bought a couple of tickets to see an AC/DC tribute band in a local theatre in the town that I live in. Now, I'm a late comer to AC/DC or The Thunder from Down Under as I like to refer to them. But I need to give you some background.

It's a new dawn, It's a new day...

...It's a new liiiife... Well, for the blog at least. I decided to shake it up as I was starting to get a bit jaded with the standard Blogger stuff. And with the help of my good lady wife, who has more patience than me with these kind of things, Random Stream of Conciousness now looks like this.

Five Sentence Fiction - Awkward

Here it is lovelies. This week it is Awkward. 

Five Sentence Fiction - Memories

Hi everyone, here is this weeks installment of Five Sentence Fiction. The prompt word is Memories and I'm a little late to the game. So forcing the strains of a certain Broadway show tune out of my head, I'll press on.

Five Sentence Fiction - Faces

It's that time again Ladies and Gentlemen. This weeks prompt word is Faces.

Reunion Part Nine - Catching Up

Deepak walked in the door of the Toolbox. It was the in-between hours of Wednesday evening, which meant the days workers were strolling home to their respective homes after a "cheeky one or two" and the bar staff were trying to look industrious with only a few customers in the bar and the lounge empty. They chatted in hushed, almost reverential tones, like deciding who would be going to go for a smoke first, before the evenings rush that brought the darts team and the pub quiz players that sat in the lounge and would argue over the finer points of the Greek Mythology section that laid them low last week.

Five Sentence Fiction - Blush

Here we are again. It's FSF time and the prompt word this week is Blush. Deep breath, typing fingers on...

Five Sentence Fiction - Night

It's that time again you know. Five Sentence Fiction does exactly what it says on the tin. There is a prompt word (see above) and off you go. Five sentences of fiction please. So, here's how I roll...

Five Sentence Fiction - Distance

Time again for Five Sentence Fiction. This time the prompt word is Distance.

What was your childhood monster?

So, there is this lady called Christine Rains who writes paranormal romance novels. She is celebrating the fact that her new novel Fearless is available for download on Smashwords for free or on Createspace as an actual, real, physical book for $3.99. If paranormal romance is your bag (my wife certainly digs it) click the links and do Christine a favour. 

Five Sentence Fiction - Victory

Hi there. I'm quite enjoying this Five Sentence Fiction business. I'm planning to do lots of it as I find it's a really good way to practice capturing a moment in a few words. This weeks theme is: Victory, so here we go...

Five Sentence Fiction

Hello there.

I follow a blog called Writer in Transit which is hosted by a smashing lady called Michelle Wallace. Once in a while she will post exercises to stretch your writing muscles and one of these is called Five Sentence Fiction which essentially does what it says on the tin. This weeks challenge can be found here.

The New Death and Others - James Hutchings

About a month ago, something interesting happened. I received an email from someone I didn't know asking me to review a book. Now those of you who have existed in the blogoverse (is there a word for what we do that doesn't sound so twee?) for a while probably have had this happen to you before quite a few times, but to me this is a first, so after another email or two, I was presented with a copy of The New Death and Others by James Hutchings. I was excited. It made me feel important.

Reunion Part Eight - Michelle Goldman

Michelle Goldman didn't like running on the treadmill. Her reasons were threefold:

One, it made her sweat ("Feel the heat", her grandmother would say. "Horses sweat, men perspire and ladies feel the heat, bubbala"). It made her sweat and that played merry hell with her hair. It sent her expensively treated hair frizzy as all get out and her hairdresser Julian into conniptions.

Podcasts - Documentary of the Week

This weeks podcast is one of many I listen to provided by the BBC. Over here in Blighty, we are quite lucky to have a public service broadcaster that is funded by the television licence fee paid yearly by all owners of a colour television in the country. Now, those of you from overseas may baulk at the idea of paying for a licence to own a television, but generally the vast majority of quality programming made in Britain is due to the enormous amount of funding received by the British Broadcasting Corporation from the licence fee. The fee is about £120 a year, and about 50 million people pay it. Six hundred million quid a year is not to be sniffed at. That isn't all the revenue they receive either. Nice work if you can get it...Anyway, I digress. Please read on.

An apology

Wotcher.

I'll apologise now for the lack of blogging on my part for the past couple of weeks as I have had a whole lot of real life stuff go on. It's been my sons, mothers and my birthday over the past couple of weeks and on top of that I have managed to sell our flat and am trying to find somewhere else to live. The band have been gigging and rehearsing loads too, so not much time to blog it up all nice.

I intend to remedy that now.

Hope you enjoy.

W.

Podcasts - The Pod Delusion

This weeks podcast I wanted to talk about is called the Pod Delusion. I was turned onto this show by a good friend about a year and a half ago. The podcast is pretty unique in the many shows I listen to as it has many contributors and not one or two. So, Let me break it down for you....

Podcasts - We're Alive

Third in my series of podcasts I like to listen to is a drama set in an alternative present called We're Alive. Basically, the premise of the story is this. Michael, a NCO in the American reserves after three tours of duty in Iraq is now attending college. he is 27 at the start of the shows and the year is 2009. He receives a phone call from the commanding officer almost immediately after hearing a news report regarding riots in downtown Los Angeles where the drama is set. On his way to his station, he witnesses a pack of rabid people attack, kill and eat people running from the area of trouble. At this point, he realises that these are no ordinary riots.

Podcasts - Midlife Gamer

Here is the second post in my series on podcasts I listen to that I think you might want to too. Apologies for the lateness, but I have been working away from home this week and the days have been very long, so not a lot of  time for blogging has been forthcoming. Anyway, I digress.

This week I give you the very tremendous Midlife Gamer.

Two Thousand

Two thousand hits on this blog. That's fantastic seeing I have only been doing this for a few months and it's pretty much all Blogger, Facebook and Twitter mates. You know who you are and you are thanked.

Reunion Part Seven - The Room

There is a room in a house in Milton, on the nicer end of Cheapside about a miles walk from New Hill High School. It's mid morning on a sunny spring day. The house isn't much to look at, just a three up and three down terrace. These houses were formerly for the factory workers from the aeroplane parts plant just outside the town. The company went under in the seventies and the properties now were council owned. The area was nicknamed by the locals because if you were starting out on the housing ladder, you usually started in Cheapside. If you were buying there it was called West Milton. If you were renting though, Cheapside.

Let's get back to the room, in the plain house at the cheap end of town. The room is dark and windowless. It is lit by a lamp that sits on a plain office desk and the faint glow of computer screen. The tower unit sits under the table with the fan humming quietly. At the table sits a man. He is of medium build, with hazel eyes and light brown hair cropped close to the skull. He wears a pair of blue jeans and a white cotton oxford shirt with the collars buttoned down with a black Harrington jacket with tartan lining. He is average, you would walk past him in the street and not think twice.

Podcasts - The Smartest Man in the World

Inspired by another blogger friend of mine called Mina Lobo, I have decided to do a short post once a week about podcasts I'm listening to and thought you lovely readers might like to hear as well. Mina Lobo recently undertook the A to Z blogging challenge this year and posted nearly every day in April. As a result, she is planning to do "feature blogs" on a regular basis. So I thought "Anything you can do love..."

Reunion Part Six - Deepak Ghosh

Deepak lay back on the sofa, freshly lit joint in hand and naked as the day he was born. Looking out of the fourth floor window, London hummed and bustled in the night. Even at this late hour, the city was full of buses, taxis and groups of people moving from pubs to clubs to drink and dance the working week away.

DIY

I loathe DIY. It actually makes me sad. I'm completely pants at it. I have taken this week off to do a load of stuff around the house. I have been putting these tasks off for months, some of the tasks are stretching into the years. I can procrastinate for Britain. 

Reunion - Part Five

April 1988.

David Brook opened his eyes. He was lying on a wooden floor and he could smell burning. Pushing himself up on one arm he noticed that there was a sticky blotch on the floor where his head had been and then, with a wince he realised his head was cut above his left eye. In a fit of pique he wiped at the mark on the floor with his shirt sleeve and then stopped suddenly, not wanting to get his school shirt covered in blood and have to explain to his mother how it got there when he got home.

Reunion - Part Four

Micky Williams' day had been a long one. He had been on his last 12 hour shift at the hospital and spent most of it cleaning up cuts on drunk revellers. It was Saturday night and Sunday morning in town. He despaired of the so called "youth of today". He was only 40, but didn't remember his nights out on the town as a medical student to be so over the top. Most of his patients were full of alcohol, coke and God knew what else and with an average age of 22. As a doctor on the accident and emergency ward at New Hill Hospital, he saw the dark underbelly of the city and there were times he often thought he should take a cushy GP's job in the country. There was part of him though that refused to be so jaded.

Reunion - Part Three

It was ten minutes to show time. Jennifer sat at her dressing room table going through emails and letters from fans. Her personal assistant Fronq was sat on the couch reading from a sheaf of papers marked with a pink circle at the top left hand corner. His way of sorting the wheat from the chaff. Of course, everyone got some kind of response from her even if it was a signed photo and a standard letter of thanks. The things that Jennifer wanted to keep high on her public profile got a personal reply.

Faith

I have been meaning to do a post on this for a while. Faith and religion is a thorny topic at the best of times, but I feel that I would like to pin my flag to the mast on this issue, not just for me, but also for my kids. When they are older and want to find out about this issue, I want them to have my balanced (and uninterrupted) view.

Again, with the Singing

A few years back, I lost my job. My wife and I had not long been married and had recently bought a flat. It was awful. Along with the fact that I felt all kinds of worthless (getting the sack tends to do that to a man), I needed to find another source of income as soon as humanly possible. While I was single and living pretty much hand to mouth, I occasionally would enter karaoke competitions to win beer money and did ok. The odd fifty or twenty five quid here and there kept me from cadging cigarettes too much and allowed my social life to clip along quite nicely.

One Thousand

I had my thousandth hit on the blog today. The fact people have looked at this blog a thousand times quite frankly stuns me. Thanks for keeping interested in it and I'll endeavour to keep the content as fresh and interesting as I can.

May your gods go with you.

W.

Reunion - Part Two

Richard Blake couldn't sleep.

He turned over as quietly as he could so as not to wake the person sleeping next to him to look at the clock on the bedside table. It read 3.23 am. His body was slick with sweat which predominantly was to do with the fact that the air conditioning in the room was pathetic but also had much to do with what he and his partner had been doing not ten minutes ago. 

Reunion - Part One

Reunion

The invitation arrived on Tuesday. It was a single piece of card with the school photo of the year David Brook left. Underneath the photo was emblazoned "Reunion! New Hill High School Class of '89!" There was a Facebook group and an email address by which to RSVP.

Weirdness test

This is a test post as my Blogger has been misbehaving of late. The interesting stuff is in the archive. Go crazy in there. There is nothing to see here. Move along.

W.

The Versatile Blogger

My good friend and blog mentor Mark Kelly of The Open Hearth has nominated me for The Versatile Blogger award, which is nice of him. So, as I am currently enjoying some new traffic from his Blog Spot about my blog I thought it prudent and polite to get on the bus. 

Mark's site is mainly about Role Playing Games and also has some of his original writing on it. Currently he is writing a really good fantasy in short bursts that I think would make a great spoken word piece. I hope he goes for that idea as I would love to have a go at narrating it. As a result it has got my creative juices running and I might finally write the novel I have been thinking about for about ten years. Maybe I'll test some of it out on you lot. Anyway, I digress...