I thought I would write a review/diary of T in the Park. I went there this year as a group of us from the band were working there. Good work Stu.

We got there fairly late and the staff campsite was already brimming with Scotch folk and some people that Stu knew. The Bens in the band were planning to share a tent. I wish I had taken a picture of the tent they were planning to share, because it is funny in a way only a picture can describe. If I just say "the tent was 'two-man' but could only fit two men if they slept a lot closer together than either of them could reasonably expect or should reasonably want to", that would be an accurate description but not really enough to be as funny as it was.

Throughout the pre-amble and journey and pre-festival chat I was referring to Scottish people as 'the Scotch', an idea from Lee and Herring origin. I was hoping that by saying Scotch enough I would manage to make one of the group use the word Scotch, preferably in front of someone Scottish, the resulting encounter hopefully being humourously confrontational. Stu put up some resistance, which probably came naturally after my previous failed attempts throughout the year to get the band to try "18 minute post rock jams" and "punk covers" using a similar technique. This method of repeating words or ideas in an attempt to get others to copy them has worked before - I had once managed to get one of my classmates to say "Plutto" instead of "Pluto" in front of the whole class. I was 11 years old.

The work was a twelve hour day of exchanging tickets for wristbands. It was long, cold and dull. It was a low point.

The next day, despite threats of more work, we got to enter the arena. Some of the posse were doing the thing of filling of their festival timetable with stuff to see for the whole time. I couldn't be bothered especially as T has a rather large arena to walk around - not quite as big as Glasto but bigger than Reading or Leeds as far as I could tell - so I just picked three bands that I really wanted to see and was lazy the rest of the time. It worked well.

The first band were Kula Shaker. I saw them. They played at T in the Park. Thats where I was. So I went to see them. They were good. This is a picture what I took of them.

Then the next band were the Go! Team. They were also at T in the Park which is where I was so I went to see them too. They were good. I didnt take a picture of them.

The last band was Sigur Ros. They were at T in the Park too. Which is where I was. So I saw them. They were good. This is a picture what I took when they took a bow at the end.

I saw other bands too and other stuff did happen.

That is my review of T in the Park 2006. Good eh? Will I return for 2007? Probably not unless theres some bands I really want to watch.

I think two is my lucky number. Witness these events.

Last week I won £100 on premium bonds. But not a single £100, I was sent two lots of £50 which technically means I won twice. Aces.

Today for lunch I ate some bacon, a fried egg and some baked beans. What was weird about this was that my egg had two yolks that came from the same egg. Normally I would be sceptical about that sort of thing, but to be honest I sort of looked at it as a good thing and appreciated the added value. Unfortunately I didn't manage to get a picture, but I have done an artists impression to give you an idea of what it might have looked like.

This next one is the oddest and it didn't happen to me but I read about it and I think that counts too. In Ohio there was a kitten born with two faces (on one head). Thats quite odd. In some ways, odder than having two heads, cos although two heads would also have say four eyes in total as well, each head would have 2 eyes whereas this kitten has 4 eyes all to itself giving it a wider field of view, probably an advantage over two headed creatures that have to share their eyes between them which would only have half each. And so on. It meows out of both mouths in unison.

http://www.nbc4i.com/news/9506448/detail.html

http://www.nbc4i.com/news/9527078/detail.html

My car broke down again. Not a disaster but pretty annoying. Car incidents have provided a lot of blog material for me, maybe because my car tends to go wrong when I am driving on my own and there is no one around to tell my new anecdote to. Its not really much of an anecdote - I was driving along and the exhaust decided to fall apart, bringing my journey to a rather noisy halt. Having a car has been good but to be honest its really fucking annoying sometimes, especially when it does stuff like that. If it never broke down again, I would gladly put up with its quirks such as the clock only working when the car is moving, or the radio display being broken or even the right indicator flashing twice as fast as the left.

To be honest, that reads more bitter than I actually am about it. I did miss the England game though which was annoying. Not nearly as annoying as listening to loud people asking what the score was on the train on the way back.

I was heading back for an interview in London. I managed to get home in good time so despite my car's best efforts, my plans weren't disrupted, although Midland Mainline now has rather a lot more of my money than they deserve.

More intriguing was the post-interview activity. I was meeting up with a couple of friends who were being very mysterious about the afternoon's activity that they had planned. I say mysterious, but they just refused to tell me until we got there, no other factor contributed to the mystery.

It turned out that they were going to a Fine Wines and Port Auction at Christies. I was somewhat confused at first but it was ace. The woman on reception congratulated us on our choice (I say our, I had no say in it but I claimed my share of the choice regardless) of auction to attend in probably the poshest voice I've ever heard ever. Thats right, ever (to use a lazy journalistic device). We then made our way through several big rooms filled with ludicrously valued items due to be auctioned that week, including a chair with speakers in the cushions and Dali's Rose on the back.

There was a tasting session of the wines and stuff on auction. A lot of old men who looked like they knew about wine were swilling it about in their mouth and spitting it out. And they were tasting wine too, haha. I've never been wine tasting before so I felt out of my depth but at least Keith and Hamish were too. It took a few tastes (of wine) before I had the courage to spit it (the wine) out in front of people but that just made it all the more satisfying. In the auction we bid on some whisky and won.

I was stopped by the police for the first time the other day. Me and my housemates were off to Attenborough nature reserve because Claire had a project that meant she had to go and check something there. Little did I know that I would fall to a similar fate to R Kelly's character in Trapped in the Closet. I too would be stopped by a police officer whose redneck wife was having an affair with a midget. I feel R's pain.

It was quite a nice day. I was going along a main road when all of a sudden up popped a police car that started flashing their lights behind me. I didn't actually know what this meant, having never been stopped before. I thought they wanted to overtake me, because I had done nothing wrong to my knowledge. In hindsight, the amount of time it took before I realised they wanted me to pull over must have only aroused suspicion. Rather helpfully, when I asked my housemates "What do you think the police want?" their response was "What police?".

I stopped. A female police officer marched over to my car and asked if she could "borrow me". I briefly had visions of the bit in Days of Thunder when Tom Cruise acts as if the police officer that searches him is a stripper (with hilarious consequences) and thought it might be funny if I did the same. These visions stopped when I saw she had a gun and kevlar vest. I can't remember if Tom Cruise's officer had a gun. I'm sure he made a joke about a gun though. I was actually really shocked that she had a gun at all.

Anyway, she asked me something about seeing my driving licence (which I showed her) and I made an extra special effort to answer in the most upper-middle class voice I could muster. I don't know why but I thought this would help. It seemed to. I was considering mentioning that I shopped at M&S and making the distinction between a 'supermarket' and 'food hall' and how this made me a better person but this didn't seem relevant. The officer said that there had been reports of a yellow car driving erratically in the area. To be fair, I had been slightly indecisive when choosing a lane to go in, but I had only been on the road for about a minute so its not likely that it was me.

My upper-middle class efforts paid off, as she then said that I was not the sort of badboy racer that they were looking for, probably because I hadn't told them to fuck off or tried to shoot them and could actually string a sentence together. Upon saying the words "badboy racer" all my housemates laughed out loud (or LOL if you will). This helped my cause. Despite this, I was slightly hurt and for a second I wanted to show her my windscreen washers with blue LEDs but thought better of it. I think it would have impressed her though.

We went our separate ways. At the nature reserve there were some kids feeding the ducks and swans. It seemed to be mating season because the swans were "attacking eachother".

Recently we finished off the tunes we recorded in January. Listen here. The band also had a gig in Birmingham recently and I was going to do a hilarious blog of the day with pictures but my housemate still had my camera and he was nowhere to be found on the day, so unfortunately no pictures. Apart from this one.

Anyway because of the lack of material for my intended blog I think I will write about the R Kelly 'album' called Trapped in the Closet. It is an RnB soap spanning 12 tunes with accompanying videos - R Kelly narrates and sings all the parts of all the characters. It is essentially a tale of guns and adultery with a surreal twist here and there. Highlights include R Kelly's interpretation of the white trash woman character's accent and a man called Tron. Part one is here and it is definitely worth persevering with later episodes. It is one of the funniest things I have ever seen. It might be worth noting that this will do nothing to change most opinion's of R Kelly (i.e. he is still a twat) but this can be appreciated on some levels.

This week I have won two things. I say 'I' but both of them were part of team efforts and if I am honest, I don't think my presence was needed for one of them definitely and probably both. I can safely say that neither will change me as a person. Especially as neither had any financial reward - or any kind of reward - you could mention. And neither was the result of having done anything particularly well.

The first triumph of the week came at a battle of the bands we played at the Walkabout bar in town, the triumph being that we won. It was an odd venue for bands as both times we played there (there was one round before the final) there was football on before it turned into what I only describe as a cheap but amusing hellhole that attracted rabble and scum. This particular night, Liverpool were playing Birmingham and beating them hard. Steve Bruce had his metaphorical pants pulled down (metaphorically) by Liverpool. It was hard to feel sorry for him though, its his own fault for buying a combination of fading stars (who were not the best parts of the good teams they were from), crap players and persisting in playing his son who is just not very good. In many ways (mainly metaphorical), he pulled his own pants down or just couldn't keep them up. I will try and work this analogy into common language, it reminds me of when Mick McCarthy being interviewed about a game and he kept on saying that his team had been 'spanked' but unlike me did not clarify that it was metaphorical and from thence the humour arose. More managers should talk like Mick McCarthy.

Anyway, like Liverpool we won (no metaphorical or real pants around ankles), our prize was a sheet of paper telling us that we'd booked a place into the next round in sunny Doncaster, hometown of Jeremy Clarkson and another Walkabout bar and probably more rabble. I am sure it will be just as exciting as Plinth's Leeds adventure. We didn't play particularly well but apparently not playing well and winning is a sign of champions. Hmm.

Cruising on the battle of the bands triumph I returned to work the next day to find that my department had been nominated for the Council's annual awards. I will be honest and say that I was somewhat surprised and it would be fair to say that if the department was the England squad, I would be Owen Hargreaves, bench-warmer extraordinaire. Thats not to diss Owen Hargreaves. I think he is good, and I wouldn't want anyone else warming the bench but he's not 1st team material and if he was then that would mean settling for an inferior bench warmer. My supervisor was most displeased at having to attend the ceremony which made the victory sweeter and certainly funnier.

I won't say the victories were undeserved but perhaps the level of competition was not what it could have been. What a week.

Obesity
Researchers at the University of Nottingham are looking at the possibilities of using cannabis to treat fat people. Not treat them like you would try and treat a child with sweets, but make them thin.

It seems odd - ironic even - that a drug reknowned for its capacity to give people the munchies and make physical activity extremely unappealing would contribute to making fat people thin. Apparently theres something else in it that can treat addiction but it is funnier to imagine lots of fat people sat there with a spliff and wondering why they aren't getting any thinner.

If I was a complete cynic, I would say that this research has been done on the following premises:
- the researchers are in fact post-modern comedians and are filming a hilarious reality based television programme on this ironic premise
- the researchers just want an excuse to test things on fat people
- obviously there will need to be a 'control' as part of research, for comparison. so they will also get to make fat people run (with hilarious consequences)
- the researchers have seen that bit with Emilio Estevez in The Breakfast Club when he was 'stoned' and used it as supporting evidence

I think I want to be on this research team.

Jobs
The internet filter at work has swallowed up job websites. It would seem there is no escape, unless I dip into my free time. Now with jobs gone they are virtually forcing me to play Championship Manager.

The other day I took my car to get its wheels re-aligned and balanced. I wasn't planning to (I was hoping it would fix itself), but I had given several people lifts recently and they had all commented on the shaking and some had suggested getting my car serviced. One of my housemates questioned my approach to car maintainance, which I have to honest, was sub-standard at best although I did very recently buy a 5ltr bottle of screen wash (not shaking related). Also, my car could no longer drive in a straight line, which is less of a hinderance than you might think but yes quite dangerous now I think about it.

Despite all of that, I think the incident that prompted me to get my car fixed was what happened when coming back from Leeds.

I had noted on the motorway that my car was veering off to the right. Ok, I thought, maybe it will fix itself by the time we get back to Nottingham. In hindsight, I can see that this was perhaps unrealistically optimistic of me.

I dropped the members of Plinth off at their houses. Nick first. So far, so good. Then Rachel. Her road is one of the many in Lenton that are lined with cars on both sides, meaning that there is only room for one car to pass through at a time, driving in the middle of the road.

There was nowhere for me to pull over near her house, so I just stopped in the middle of the road. As I did this, I noticed a BMW turn into the road coming towards me. Rather than act like a sensible person and wait at the bottom of road for 30 seconds while the dropping off was taking place, this BMW decided that the quickest way of going along the road was to drive right up to me and start beeping the horn angrily. And then turn on their full beam headlights.

I thought about beeping back but then I thought better of it because I am nice and also because in the eyes of the passer-by this would make me look as bad as the BMW driver. I tried inching towards the BMW in an attempt to hint that they should reverse (with subtle overtones of 'you should have waited where you were for 30 seconds' this was difficult to communicate and I don't think they got that particular message). This just resulted in more beeping and I also became very aware that the BMW was full of 4 very angry looking men who could quite easily just get out and (I assume) use violence if they wanted. I couldn't be arsed with that. I had just spent 3 hours trapped in a car with Nick.

Anyway, all this beeping and angry faces left me with only one realistic option. It looked like I was going to have to reverse. So I stuck on my full beam headlights (two can play at that game, you BMW driving dickheads) and put on reverse gear and started reversing. The BMW rather intimidatingly inched forward every inch I reversed.

It wasn't as simple as that. My veering car meant that reversing in a straight line proved really fucking hard. It eventually got to the point where I was about to hit a parked car. The BMW was still inching forward. But I had to straighten up by going forward myself. The BMW beeped angrily, but after a few beeps it was clear that the two of us were not going anywhere unless the BMW backed off and let me straighten up. So it reversed. I cheekily attempted to reverse the roles and inch towards the BMW but this resulted in more beeping and angriness. They reversed a few feet but that was all I was going to get.

Still, I was pleased with this. I had turned the tables somewhat and hopefully this little stoppage showed the BMW driver the futility and ridiculousness of him attempting to go down the road rather than wait for me. I doubt that, as it would seem that he had started something he had to finish and kept right back at me. Tosser. Well, the joke was on him in any case. He thought his beeping technique and penis-extension car could get his way on the road, but my shit yellow car that couldn't go in a straight line showed him. Striker! Although more Peter Crouch than Thierry Henry.

I had to do the straigtening out by forcing the BMW back a few feet 4 times in total. If he had waited at the bottom of the road for 30 seconds he could have got to his drugshouse far quicker (I assume that is where he was going, he didn't look as if he had a proper job to buy the BMW with) and I would not see a BMW and think "that driver is a cunt". The whole manouver of me reversing must have taken a good few minutes and certainly tested my patience and had me wishing my car would go in a straight line. However had my wheels been straight, I would not have got my small revenge in forcing the BMW back a few times (without beeping) and I also probably wouldn't have got my wheels re-aligned so perhaps some good has come out of this.

After all the reversing was done, I drove down the road, dropped off Edd and then went home.

At the garage the fella who I assumed was the manager looked like a stereotypical British gangster. Greasy hair, big coat, wrists loaded with jewellry. I didn't see a medallion but I am sure he has several. While they fixed my car I read a playstation magazine that was there. I don't own a playstation. The magazine wasn't very interesting.

Plinth went to Leeds to play a gig for this rock idols thing. I have to say I was not particularly enthustiastic about it and left long before the end but it was alright. I have finally got through to looking at the pictures off my camera.

I was driving. Unfortunately this meant I had to leave the camera in the hands of other band members. This was most unproductive and uncreative as this picture shows.

Loser.

Plinth in the bar. It was alright. I think this was pre-performance.

I tried to recreate an emo picture in absence of good photo taking moments but it wasn't happening. No magic this time.

Recently there has been a flurry of activity around YAIH, the band I am in. Mainly from the recording we have been doing. But we have also decided to get band t-shirts. We're all going to have shirts that have a lyric or often used phrase on it all with the same colour scheme and font etc. I got mine today and felt duty bound to model it.

It suddenly struck me how emo this t-shirt made me look. It is black and snug fitting and my current hair length complements this style. I took the photos with this look in mind.

Here are the pictures I took:

This one was ok. But I felt it was a bit too normal and that I could coax out something better. I had only just started so in any case the best was yet to come.

I went for the happy approach but this didn't seem to convey the right feeling. In any case, my eyes are most certainly not sharing the emotion of my mouth.

There is a lot of angst in emo music so I also tried the angry approach. I couldn't help but feel that this approach might create an awkward first impression.

Back to square one. Although you can actually see the shirt reasonably properly now. However, I had other tricks up my sleeve (not literally, the sleeves are too short to hold decent tricks)....

Aha! I had my hair parted on the wrong side! Once I flicked my hair over to the opposite side the magic started happening...

Look at that magic.

And again. Jackanackanory.

So yeah, if any of my band are reading this, thats what the t-shirts look like.

Here are some stories from my day

Mouse

There is a dead mouse in the office. Totally rank. It died behind a wall panel so it is smelly but unremovable for the time being. The picture not of the actual mouse, its just a mouse.

Lunch

Today I went for a Boots lunch rather than an M&S lunch. The meal deal costs £2.99 but they let you pick almost anything so I found all the most expensive things of each category (sandwich, drink and snack) and had those. I thought I was getting a good deal at first but then I realised that my usual M&S lunch costs me less than £3 and is nicer so while its a good deal at Boots its not really a universally good deal.

Music

At work I have been listening to Girls Aloud. Their new album is really good, apart from the ballads which are shit. While I am not particularly fond of reality TV talent shows I think Girls Aloud - and their producers and songwriters - are well ace. Personally I think those sorts of shows are all about the big audition shows at the start. The rest seems like a convoluted exercise to justify holding those auditions.

I don't know which one is my favourite. I don't think I have a favourite yet. I am sure they are equally lovely.

I hope you liked those stories I might write some more soon. Bye

I think these things are well shit but I am so bored today that I think I will do one. The list of questions is taken from quite a few other people's blogs.

1.What did you do in 2005 that you'd never done before?
Got a fulltime job.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Did not make any. No.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
No

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No

5. What countries did you visit?
None

6. What would you like to have in 2006 that you lacked in 2005?
A good haircut.

7. What date from 2005 will remain etched upon your memory?
7/7. Graduation day. Other events left me with mixed feelings about the day. At least Americans can remember this day without ruining it with their dating system. Unlike the 9th of November.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Graduating. Although steering Plinth to rock idols round 2 was no mean feat.

9. What was your biggest failure?
There were some pretty ropey blog entries.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
No.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
New guitar. Peavey Wolfgang. Ace.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
The bassist in Your Awesome Intergalactic Heroes summed up one drunken evening with the following: "I don't remember the next three hours but I wasn't clothed for any of it". Hahaha. Class.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
See answer to 12.

14. Where did most of your money go?
To other people, shops and the taxman.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Glastonbury.

16. What song will always remind you of 2005?
Do You Want To? by Franz Ferdinand.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? happier
ii. thinner or fatter? thinner
iii. richer or poorer? richer

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Drugs. Exercise.

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Sleep. Using the internet.

20. How did you spend Christmas?
With family.

22. Did you fall in love in 2005?
No.

23. How many one-night stands?
None.

24. What was your favourite TV program?
Extras. Spooks.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
No.

26. What was the best book you read?
Music of the Primes. Its about prime numbers. I am a geek and I like these things.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Girls Aloud.

28. What did you want and get?
Longer hair. A degree.

29. What did you want and not get?
Kylie at Glasto. The implemenation of my new system that would make democracy work and make the world a better place in general. New wiper blades for my car. A robot.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Met up with friends. 21.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Entering Metro Joe in the Eurovision Song Contest (and either winning or scoring less than 1 point). Or getting paid to write my blog.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2005?
Comfortable and lazy.

34. What kept you sane?
I have not shown any signs of deteriorating mental health. My lifestyle does not need an element dedicated to keeping me sane.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Kylie.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
I was surprised to learn that David Cameron likes the Smiths.

37. Who did you miss?
Kylie at Glasto.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
All of them. Apart from the pricks.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2005.
Sales is for pricks.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
"Heavy words are so lightly thrown" - What Difference Does it Make? by The Smiths. Not really summing up my year. I can't really think of a lyric that can live up to that task. But that one's a good lyric and I like it.

Cast your minds back here: http://www.blog.co.uk/index.php/christov/2005/12/03/dave~358342

There has been a new chapter in this saga - the end of an era, some might say. Today, Dave called me by my actual name, which is Chris. This was totally unexpected because neither I or anyone else in the office had corrected him as far as I know so this was unprompted.

But what do I do now?

Do I call Dave by his actual name?

Or do I put him through a few more weeks of Dave as revenge for all those days when I was 'Richard'?

Perhaps I should turn the tables and start calling Dave 'Richard' instead.

I was back at work today. This was something of a shock, mainly because I woke up at 8am after spending the past 10 days or so waking up at around 2pm. I am not proud of this lateness or the way I didn't even set a time to get up, other than "first Neighbours o'clock". Shameful. Sometimes this clever plan fell through because I wake and there would be no Neighbours (e.g. Christmas eve) and I would not know what to do. Despite having got up about 6 hours earlier than usual, I am feeling normal.

I drove back to Nottingham yesterday. Three points made themselves clear over the course of my journey. Firstly, I hate people who drive too slowly. No excuses to drive slow on the motorway, its big, there's hardly any bends, even my 1.1 litre Clio does 70-80mph easily and its also really boring so you might as well get it over and done with. Secondly, driving behind a gritting lorry is scary. Because grit goes everywhere, at speed. Thirdly, driving in the dark when theres only your headlights and cats eyes is also quite scary.

Christmas was ace. Especially on the guitar front. I cannot wait to get a picture of my pedalboard. It is totally ace. Totally. Cynics will say it is pointless, but I say cynics are pointless.

New Year was also ace. We went to a jazz night. There were some bands and a buffet as well as music and drink. I am not a huge jazz fan but it was a good atmosphere and I could certainly appreciate the music of the bands if not actually like them. For some reason my main memory of this night is this: the records the dj was playing kept on skipping. I later observed that in between changing vinyls, he was holding on to the records with his mouth. He must have been getting teeth marks on the vinyl or something because a lot of records skipped. Poor show. I sound quite negative about this but at the time I thought it was really funny and if anything made the event more ace.

Don't chew your LPs or 45s, kids.

As I was crossing the road today I noticed that there was someone on the otherside of the road wearing exactly the same clothes as me. Not literally the exact same clothes - that would be awkward to say the least and questions would certainly be asked. Our similar choice of attire was slightly awkward in other ways though, particularly as we both noticed this and judging from the expression on this other fella's face, did not know what to make of the situation.

I was dressed reasonably normally, so this encounter was not as funny (or improbable) as if I wore a catsuit for my day-to-day casual wear for example.

We had to wait on our opposite sides for a short time while the traffic went past. During this time many things were running through my head. Was this fella secretly stalking me and imitating me, eventually intent on stealing my identity to perform strange deeds? Should I acknowledge our mutual taste in clothing and congratulate him on his choice of jacket, jumper and shirt combo? Should I prepare to defend myself from accusations of being a copycat (obviously wrong, although if applied to my blog there is reasonable grounds for copycat accusations)? Maybe I should devise some kind of hand gesture that acknowledges the matching clothing but at the same time avoids awkward conversation?

In the end we crossed the road without verbally or sign-languagingly acknowledging eachother. But he knew he was copying me.

Yesterday I had to drive my car. It gets more exciting: we were going to a rehearsal room. Unfortunately I couldn't park outside the room so we had to unload all the stuff and I had to find a place on some dodgy side street to park.

While I was parking up, about 12 of the native council housed youths emerged from a hole somewhere and proceeded towards me and my car. They were wielding sticks and hitting things along the way. This wasn't really an issue and certainly was not the weirdest thing.

The weirdest thing was when returning to the car after practice. By now it was dark. From a distance I could hear what sounded like an argument. When I turned the corner, this was the scene that presented itself*:

There was a crazy woman stood near my car just shouting stuff. I couldn't make out what she was saying but she sounded angry which is why I thought it was some kind of argument, probably between some local Gs. She was looking across the road but upon closer examination she was just staring into thin air. I'm finding this hard to describe, but its similar to a crazy woman (nicknamed 'Sinner') who used to stand in Epsom high street and shout lines of the bible out at passers by. This was not an uncommon sight in Epsom as there were quite a few mental hospitals in the area and they let them out quite often.

Anyway I got in my car.

She kept shouting.

I started my car.

She kept shouting.

I put on my Darkness cd.

She kept shouting.

By now I had twigged that the shouting was most likely a constant fixture and that I might as well just drive off as there was nothing I could do to stop her being crazy. I thought I'd better just let her get on with it.

In other news, I left my jaffa cakes at the rehearsal room. Lame. M&S ones too.

*She probably didn't have a forked tongue. I didn't greet her with a 'yo!'. I think she definitely did just go 'raah' at least twice.

At work I have to talk to people. Sometimes it is part of my job and I am forced to talk, such as when answering the phone. At other times, it is merely to be polite and maintain a good working atmosphere. This is where Dave comes in.

Dave is not his real name and the reasons for this will become apparent very soon.

I see Dave around 2 or 3 times a day. This is either when I arrive at work, when he leaves work or very occassionally when he makes himself some tea (the tea making facilities are in the same office as me). When we meet he says hello, goodbye, would you like some tea etc, to which I reply hello, see you later and sometimes yes. The twist is, he ALWAYS calls me Richard. The astute amongst you may have seen my log-in name or profile and deduced that my name is Chris, not Richard.

However, the time to correct him (i.e. the first time he did it - he just walked off and I was left looking confused) has long gone, and he never hangs around long enough to start a proper conversation so I never get the chance to correct him. Other people in my office have noticed this too but they haven't said anything - if anything was said it should really be from me - and to be honest I think they think it is funny. Additionally, I don't really feel the need to start a conversation with him purely to correct him on my name as I don't really have any desire to chat with him. Our working relationship is just fine without the chat in my opinion. And calling me Richard does not harm it in anyway whatsoever. But it is annoying. Surely now you can see my dilemma.

Rather than correct him, I have decided on another tactic. I will call him Dave. But, Dave is not this fella's name (and from thence the humour etc). I was inspired by Only Fools and Horses' character Trigger, who calls Rodney 'Dave'. Now, I will challenge this fella to a standoff. He can call me Richard and I will call him Dave. And when he stops me to correct me, I will stand up and say "But NO! You can't correct me DAVE! If anything I should be correcting YOU! My name isn't Richard at all! I'm Chris. Everyone knows I'm Chris. I've been Chris all along! You didn't know that? Well you must be a bit of a thickie then. What are you Dave? A thickie, that's what. Now call me Chris you bastard."

I don't think I will say any of this really. I am too nice.