Last night was our work Christmas party.

In a half shell, they’re the heroes four.
In this day and age who could ask for more?
The crime wave is high with muggings mysterious.
Our police and detectives are furious,
‘Cause they can’t find the source,
Of this lethally evil force.
This is serious so give me a quarter.
I was a witness, get me a reporter!
Call April O’Neil in on this case, and
You’d better hurry up, there’s no time to waste!
We need help, like quick, on the double.
Have pity on the city, man it’s in trouble!
We need heroes like the Lone Ranger
When Tonto came pronto, when there was danger.
They didn’t say they’d be there in half an hour,
‘Cause they displayed…Turtle Power!

Can you guess what we went as yet? Pictures to follow. Maybe.

I seem to have had this cold ever since we went to New York. That’s getting on for a month now, and I just don’t seem able to shake it. Every time I think I’m nearly there, progressing along the road to a snot-free existence I’ll have a couple of late nights or something and just relapse into it.

I woke up this morning so bunged up with phlegm that I could barely speak without coughing a gallon or so of the stuff up (so much so that when I phoned work to tell them I wouldn’t be there, they didn’t understand me at first).

So now I’m consigned to a day of drinking Lemsip, not watching daytime T.V. (its always painfully bad) and trawling the internet for something interesting to read. This is why I avoid sick days unless I’m feeling really crappy. They’re just so flinking dull.

Still, at least the music is making me feel better. I got a text message read out on Radio 1 this morning (something about the Thirteen Senses album being ace), and now I’m listening to Talk Talk‘s Spirit of Eden, which always cheers me up. Its a beautiful chilled masterpiece, completely unlike the synth-pop that made their name. You’d probably hate it.

I’ve got this mahoosive bag of Pick-and-mix sat in front of me.

I’m feeling ever so slightly ill.

But I can’t seem to stop eating them.

I R FAT BLOATER!

The National Rail website site is fantastic. You go to “Planning your journey”, type in your starting point and destination, the date and approximate time of travel, and press go.

It comes back with a selection of train times that will suit you. You can then choose a service, click a button, and it will send a text message with the train times to your mobile phone. Its an absolutely wonderful use of technology.

You can hear the “but” coming a mile away can’t you?

Its a wonderful use of technology, right up until you arrive at the station to find that THE TRAIN DOESN’T FLINKING EXIST!

OK, so maybe engineering works meant that the timtable go re-jigged or something? No, it wasn’t that – this train isn’t listed on any of the regular timetables up on boards all over the station. Perhaps its on the updated Winter Timetable then? The ones that don’t kick in until the 12th of December – about a fortnight from now. Pick up a leaflet, check it out, and… no, its not in there either.

I have no idea where National Rail got their information from. When I eventually got to the next station, I found that my connecting train (that I’d long since missed) never actually existed either.

All of which added up to make that brilliant use of technology completely and utterly bloody useless. Bah.

You know, those instant completely unexpected involuntary sneezes that really take you by surprise?

You take out a tissue, wipe your nose, happen to look down… EEUUWWW!!!!

There’s a crapload of thick gooey phlegm on your top. Oooh, look there’s some more on your trousers too. That really is a mingtastic phenomenon of the highest order. 100% gack.

The clocks have gone back, which means that to get a decent amount of riding in over the weekend, one has to drag oneself out of bed at a reasonable hour. 10:15am is about as reasonable as I get at the weekend.

After a bit of deliberation over breakfast, Brett and myself decided to go ride up Leckhampton Hill again today — after all, everybody else’ll be up there, won’t they?

No, they won’t. They’re all being lazy. They missed out on a ride that was cold, wet, grey and BLOODY FANTASTIC!

For some reason, the slalom course is one hell of a lot more grippy in the winter, so we rode that a few times. I had slight issues on the first run, including me running away from the bike as it slid out from under me in a particularly claggy berm. Once I got myself together though, I was having great fun.

I charged on through the middy puddle, sending cack flying everywhere!

After a couple of runs, Gary turned up. His DH-bike was in pieces spread across the workshop, so he had his XC bike with him. We did one more run of the slalom course, then with the light failing, we headed up and did a run down the rocky run from the trig point.

Wow. Why hadn’t we been up there all day? It was awesome! Start off on the field, then drop onto the grass, then hard on the brakes before swinging down into the rocky chute, and then it goes mental. I found my confidence and just went for it. I didn’t notice as I dragged my arm through a gorse bush — I was so focussed on not braking and getting the line right into the next drop. Down the next chute is ace – at the bottom there’s big rocks on both sides and getting through the middle is like threading a needle. I’ll let go of the brakes and fly through there then. I then backed off a bit through the nadgery bit, then let go of the brakes again for the run down to the ruins. I hit the compression at the bottom and took-off out of the other side, before charging on through the middy puddle, sending cack flying everywhere. Absolutely ace fun.

The light was fading fast so it was time to make a break for home. So down the old tramway we went, mud flying everywhere. I very nearly lost it in the s-bend trying to catch up with Brett. The front stepped out in the deep mud and I thought I was going to be lying in the mud before the berm caught it and somehow it all came together again.

You know you’re feeling confident when such an incident doesn’t slow you down at all — its only when you reach the end of the trail that you realise just how close you came to eating the dirt.

Then it was just a case of getting across town in the pouring rain without getting run over. Really must get me some lights…

You can find some more pictures in The Gallery.

Last week, whilst eating a bacon-and-egg sandwich, I managed to launch egg-yolk into my keyboard, necessitating a long and drawn out clean-up operation.

This morning, I was opening a bottle of Irn Bru, which unexpectedly did a fizz-whoosh thing and sploshed all over the very same keyboard. Another long and drawn out clean-up operation later and we’re back on track.

As Owen commented at the time: “You’ll be able to get a whole meal out of that thing soon!”

I was reading Stuart’s halloween post and felt I should probably tell you all about mine.

We got dressed up. We went out. It were gert fun. I haven’t got any photos of it yet, so I’ll have to describe my get-up to you and let your imagination do all of the hard work.

Inspired by Dangerous Dave B, we start with the classic Zombie/Axe Murderer look. Take one white shirt, and put lots of rips in it. Finish it off with surprisingly realistic looking blood-stains and smears everywhere. Add trousers with similar amount of rips, and (fake) blood dripping down your legs. Nice.

Have you got a nice picture forming yet? Good. Now lets mess it up.

Now we mix in an element of tango man. Not the bright orange element though &#8212 no, we went for the really very bright red look. Thats my entire head (including my hair), my arms and my hands. Bright red, as in pillar-box red. Ferarri red. Very very red.

Feeling ever so slightly intrigued yet? Good. Pictures as and when I get them.

Update: There’s now some scary pictures in the gallery.