The Adventures of Froggy

Croak

Wed, 09 May 2007 10:12:15 GMT

*CROAK*

I'm ill. It was bank holiday weekend over here (Monday off! Yay!) - but me 'n' the wife spent it all wrapped up on the sofa with various complaints including shakes, shivers, mild temperature, various snot and aching heads.

And it rained for the first time in over a month. For three days. Which is good, as the plants were starting to need it I think. Rain's gone now, but it's cooler than the 20-odd degrees (celcius) with clear blue skies and hot sun we've had since the wedding (!) Honeymoon period is over now, I guess... 8o) hee hee

It's also my final week in work - then I have a week off (during which we will sort out S's new visa in London) (and go to see a theatre production and generally do the 'London thing') - and then I'm in a new job!

I'm very excited!

Jump

Wed, 25 Apr 2007 10:16:31 GMT

Went to see Jump last night. I got free tickets from Wales Millenium Centre for the opening night. Jump, by the Ye-Gam Inc production company, is very successful in Korea for a couple of years and has just started branching out into an American and European tour.

All I can say is: What a fantastic show!

It is basically a Tae-kwon-do-based sit-com in which a 'typical' Korean family wake up, clean the house, train and eventually deal with two pesky burgulars.

There is the grandfather who leads the house and pushes the family to do their chores and training, the father (with the fastest feet in the East), his amorous but underattended wife (who has never met her match in a fight) - their daughter and her geeky boyfriend (who has magical powers revealled when his Clark Kent glasses are removed, making him transform into a cross between Superman and Casanova) and their Drunken Uncle. Also introduced are two 'Keystone Cop' style burgulars and an elderly narrator.

I went because I thought the mix of Tae-kwon-do, Kung Fu, gymnastics, comedy and dance would appeal to the many tastes of me, my wife, my friend and his wife. I'd heard the phrase 'fun for all the family' so I did think 'oh, maybe it's a bit TOO childish' - but, did my research and now I've been to see it, I can assure anyone reading this it will amaze and entertain you whether you are 4 or 84. The comedy was pretty clever and very well executed, you could follow the story and the characters easily despite there being no dialogue.

Some comic sketches echoed Buster Keaton, Laurel and Hardy and references to any Kung Fu movie or Manga cartoon you could menion . An excellent blend with Tae-kwon-do and Kung-Fu displays, fun narrative, stunning acrobatics, weapon play and music - all performed by some of the most amazing individuals bending and throwing their bodies in ways I only thought possible in the movies with the help of wires!

Their website is here and there is a trailer here - there are other trailers and whole sections of the show on the net, but I think some of them give too much away.

If it's in your town or city - Just go and see it, you won't regret it!

PopUps!

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 14:02:50 GMT

I hate popups (and popunders.) I have blockers gallore and the latest IE7 - and yet they STILL keep appearing!

When will we ever have the technology to destroy these annoying things once and for all?

DON'T CLICK HERE!

Censorship gone mad

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 12:17:26 GMT

From the following article at the BBC Entertainment news website...

Apparently, British Airways edited a small walk-on appearance by Richard Branson and a Virgin plane out of Casino Royale for it's inflight movie. How silly is that?

Maybe they'll edit American Airlines out of World Trade Centre, United airlines out of United 93 (OK, maybe they'll never show these films on a plane, actually...) - Well, maybe they'll edit Chitty Chitty Bang Bang out of Chitty Chitty Bang Bang incase people decide to build their own flying car instead of sitting, cramped up in an imperialist flying battery farm with only a tiny pillow and warmed up pizza for company for 8 hours??

I mean, I understand why they did it, but are they really that worried about losing customers? I can see the scene now - someone stands up in their seat in the middle of the flight and shouts "WHAT?!?! What are those planes with the red tails? You mean there are OTHER airlines I could be using??!? I want to get off now! Get the pilot to land as soon as possible!"

I love this world, but it embarrasses me sometimes.

BA cuts Branson from Bond movie

Sir Richard was seen in Superman Returns and TV series Friends

British Airways has removed a shot of Virgin Atlantic boss Sir Richard Branson from the in-flight version of the James Bond movie Casino Royale.

Sir Richard was seen briefly in the original film, passing through an airport security scanner, but can only be seen from behind in the new edit.

"Many films are edited in some way on board," said a BA spokesman.

Daniel Craig's debut last year as 007 became the most successful Bond movie at the worldwide box office.

Sir Richard was given a cameo after supplying a plane for use in the film.

The British Airways edit also obscures the tail fin of a Virgin plane that was seen in the original.

BA's entertainment team vets films and television shows for flights on grounds of taste and suitability.

"We do reserve the right to edit films, and many films are edited in some way on board," said a spokesman.

Casino Royale was hailed as a reinvention of the franchise

Virgin Atlantic spokesman Paul Charles told the Associated Press: "We think passengers should see the whole film and nothing but the whole film."

The two firms have a history of rivalries and run-ins, stemming all the way back to Virgin's launch on the competitive trans-Atlantic routes in 1984.

Casino Royale made more than $450m (£225m) at cinemas last year, surpassing the previous best for Bond - $431m (£215m) for Die Another Day in 2002.

The 21st official James Bond movie is based on Ian Fleming's first novel about the spy, published in 1953, and shows how he acquires his licence to kill with its 00 prefix.

Jobs and Myers Briggs

Fri, 23 Mar 2007 13:46:42 GMT

I did two online personality tests based on Jung - Myers Briggs Topology (click here - Test 1 or click here - Test 2)

More info by clicking here.

I like these tests! It's been a while since I did one, but I always seem to come out fairly consistently even though over the years I feel my emphasis and experience have changed (and the relative strength values change a little accordingly) and according to Belbin I'm always a 'Finisher' at heart.. even though I do like making something new and , I will not lose interest in a project just because it's already in motion.. well, not usually, anwyay!

So, my results:

Your Type is
ENFJ

Extraverted	Intuitive	Feeling	Judging
Strength of the preferences %
33	88	25	44

You are:

moderately expressed extravert
very expressed intuitive personality
moderately expressed feeling personality
moderately expressed judging personality

I quite like being 'moderate' in most things - it leaves me more scope of more to go, I think. I don't think I work as an extreme personality type of any kind.

Although from the second test, I got this score:

You are an ENTJ

E=9 Extraversion
I=2 Introversion
S=9 Sensing
N=11 iNtuition
T=14 Thinking
F=5 Feeling
J=15 Judging
P=4 Perceiving

So I'm wavering between thinking and feeler a bit... But that makes sense, because that's the way I feel about it too. But the other parts of the test are fairly consistent.

Apparently, my ideal jobs include:

Social Service Group
Counseling
Psychology
Education (This suits my thoughts on retiring/moving into lecturing some day)

Management Group
Management (Cool - there's potential)
Politics

Science/Technical Group
Computer Programming (BINGO!)

Public Health Group
Physician (blah! Can't stand the sight of blood or guts...)

ENTJ - Business executives, CEOs, organization founders, business administrators, managers, entrepeneurs, judges, lawyers, computer consultants (BINGO!), university professors, politicians, credit investigators, labor relations worker, marketing department manager, mortgage banker, systems analysts, scientists. They are born to lead and can steer the organization towards their vision, using their excellent organizing and understanding of what needs to get done.

I feel sorry for foreigners

Thu, 22 Mar 2007 14:07:49 GMT

No, I'm not being racist, xenophobic (isn't that like a glockenspiel, but made of wood?) or anything - I was just thinking (not for the first time) about all the stupid pronunciations there are in the English Language.

I just found out that a shop I've gone to for years (John Menzies) in not pronounced 'John Men-Zees', but 'John Ming-iss.'

It came from the common question "Why is the leader of the Liberal Democrat party in the UK called 'Mingis Campbell' when you hear it pronounced, but written it is 'Menzies Campbell?'" (a good article is here, leading on to the BBC Pronunciation Unit Blog)

I am obviously not the first to notice this, so don't say 'tut tut duh! didn't you even know that?!' - but things like this sometimes wash over you until you start taking notice rather than just accepting how we say and write things. Especially English, because it's made up of so many German and French words!

And it's all down to that whiley character, the miscievious old 'yogh!'

It's an old Scottish/English letter which during the printing revolution of the 16th Century, it was slowly dropped and substituted by a 'z' because it looked like it a bit. And the pronunciation changed too - but the pronunciation is wrong these days. Apparently, some history of the letter also accounts the slight difference in the 'g' sound of 'singer' and 'finger'

When in the Netherlands I tried to learn Dutch. The spelling looks a lot like German sometimes (which is pretty easy to learn), but once they strung 3 or so letters together, it got complicated - especially because some phoenetics have no 'English phonetic equivalent' - you had to learn a few new Dutch sounds, and then for some 3 and 4 letter combinations, you had to blend them - almost 'saying them all together at the same time.'

Still, my Dutch friends were still more flumoxed - for example, the letters 'ough':

How are you supposed to pronounce it again? Have you ever thought about it? There are FOURTEEN different ways (however, some are now obsolete):

1. awe: thought, bought, fought, brought, ought, sought, nought, wrought
2. uff: enough, rough, tough, slough, Clough, chough
3. ooh: through, slough
4. oh: though, although, dough, doughnut, brougham, Ough, furlough, Greenough, thorough
5. off: cough, trough
6. ow: bough, plough, sough
7. ou: drought, doughty, Stoughton
8. uh: Scarborough, borough, thorough (alt), thoroughbred, Macdonough, Poughkeepsie
9. up: hiccoughed
10. oth: trough (alt)
11. ock: lough, hough
12. oc[h] (aspirated): lough
13. ahf: Gough
14. og: Coughlin (also #5)

This (contrived) sentence includes them all:

"Rough-coated, dough-faced, thoughtful ploughman John Gough strode through the streets of Scarborough; after falling into a slough on Coughlin road near the lough (dry due to drought), he coughed and hiccoughed, then checked his horse's houghs and washed up in a trough."

And here are the numbers of which ones fit where:

Rough(2)-coated, dough(4)-faced, thoughtful(1) ploughman(6) John Gough(13) strode through(3) the streets of Scarborough(8); after falling into a slough(3) on Coughlin(14) road near the lough(12) (dry due to drought(7)), he coughed(5) and hiccoughed(9), then checked his horse's houghs(11) and washed up in a trough(10).

Also, I found this limerick:

Ough!

There once was a man called McGough
Who, out walking, tripped over a bough.
He said that, although
His leg hurt enough,
He didn't mind limping home to Middlesbrough.

and even a song, to be sung to the tune of "She'll Be Comin' Round the Mountain!" - click here.

So - this is a very complex language we have evolved. I mean, I have fun with my Canadian gf - and we have very little trouble understanding eachother when it comes to pronunciation - we just used slightly different words (not enough time to go into that here!) - but thanks to Hollywood taking over our picture houses and turning them into movie theatres, us Brits are pretty good at interpretting.

And yet, especially living in Europe, I've found so many Europeans have an excellent command of English and enjoy these differences. We even had a taxi driver in Cardiff explaining to us the finer points of tense and negation - things which I do, but have no understanding of - and his grammar was better than mine! I've learned a little about grammar and syntax (and semantics and context) from studying computer languages at University, but I am unaware of their correct application in my own language.

All I can say from my time working in Europe, it was EMBARRASSING how well the locals spoke English!

Even tho we made it pretty bloody hard for them to learn!

Mondays...

Mon, 12 Mar 2007 13:58:37 GMT

It's Monday again.

Still combatting with a new software system at work (hence mood = infuriated) - but paused for lunch now. Otherwise, I'd be throwing my computer across the office. Hopefully out of the window, landing 2 floors down... *sigh*

It was an active weekend, cleaning up the backyard, trying to fix the bath seal plus a few other minor DIY jobs and final wedding option choices.

We had a conservatory built last summer/autumn:


Before: (crappy old 'lean to' monstrosity, and old alu/wood windows)	After: (new windows, and conservatory (before decorated))

The work is great - but the builders left a lot of rubbish around the garden - cardboard and wrapping from the new windows and conservatory, old window and door frames, bricks and rocks - but also cigarette butts and food/drink wrappers! Plus a big delivery bag of sand! They've been promising to come and tiy up since the end of last year, but never have - so we have collected the rubbish up and will call them to at least pick it up. We've done the 'hard' work for them now - but we'll have guests around over the coming weeks, and we don't want the garden looking like a building site!

The amount of crap they left in the garden was amazing when it was all collected together! Certainly too much to take in the car to the local rubbish tip. This work was finished in September, and still noone has collected the construction waste/left overs! And, it should be their responsibility to 'make good.'

On a more positive note, we picked our vows, readings and food/drink for the wedding. I won't give too much away about the vows and so on, because I'd rather save those for the special day - but my mouth is already watering at the prospect of canopes at the cocktail party:

Buttered Walnut Bread topped with Creamed Farmhouse Cheese (V)

Smoked Welsh Duck on Hexagonal Bread with Balsamic Chutney

Marinated Lamb on Pumpernickel Bread with Smoked Chili Jam

Red Pesto on Bruschetta with Roasted Peppers and Shallots (V)

Mini Yorkshire Pudding topped with Honey Sausage and Red Onion Marmalade

Sweet Pepper, Goats cheese & Thyme Filo Tartlet (v)

Mini Filo Shepherd's Pie

Yum!

Maybe getting married isn't so bad........

Precious weekends...

Sun, 11 Mar 2007 11:50:32 GMT

Well, another precious weekend, spent almost entirely on DIY (Do It Yourself - Home Improvement, whatever you want to call it.)

Had a problem a couple of weeks ago with the seal around the bath leaking, and water cascading into the kitchen downstairs through the ceiling. Noticed it a while ago but didn't have a chance to fix it - but then the other night while siddie was having a shower, water started pouring out of the cooker hood while I was cooking! Not good...

So that, and tidying up the garden, took up most of the weekend. We had a conservatory built in the summer, and the builders still haven't bothered coming to clear away the debris! Last week, they even said they would, and didn't. I don't mind a little mess, but this mess included ALL the packaging for an entire set of windows and conservatory, old window frames, broken bricks and left over cement - some of which they just dumped on the grass!! Also - cigarette butts, water bottles, pie trays...! The work was excellent, but they just don't know how to tidy up afterwards. And that's part of the contract: 'leave it as you found it.' Not in this case...

Went out with mum on Saturday morning to order cake and flowers for my aunt's 60th birthday next weekend, and also a cake for our wedding party. Was nice to catch up with mum.

Also went to the Thai House Saturday night for dinner. Apparently, it's the oldest Thai house in the UK outside London at 21 years old. They have authentic dishes, using spices and some semi-fresh produce flown in from Bangkok every week. Plus the atmos in the place was great - all the waitresses were in authentic clobber, the place was packed, but not uncomfortable, and everyone was given plenty of time to eat and talk. A bit pricey (£55 for both of us), but well worth it as it was such a lovely experience.

Spent the last part of the evening doing final Wedding admin:

The ceremony - what vows, what words, what order will things happen in, readings (non-religious, as this is a civil ceremony.. but this means we may not be able to use the 'Irish Blessing' which I rather hoped we would), music etc.

The photographer - what pictures did we want.

Food/Drink menus - both at the cocktail party, and at the family-only do in the evening.

Phew! It took a few hours, but all seems to be falling into place now - just a few questions to answer.

A pretty successful weekend - good mix of work and play - but we are both aching all over now!

BORING DIY BIT...

So I bought a new bath/shower sealing product called BathSeal which seems to get good reviews from websites (I don't buy ANYTHING these days without googling it along with the word 'reviews'!) It seems to be the stuff you put around laminate flooring (infact, identical to the stuff I put around the kitchen floor last weekend! I compared them!) but this product has special bevels so that it fits into the corner of the bath, along with some heavy duty sealant to fill the gaps, stick it to the walls, and waterproof the whole shebang. So, hopefully this will last longer than the last 'stick on' type seal. We'll see!

Unfortunately, the previous seal damaged the tiles in the bathroom. Being as poor as I was when I moved into the house 5 years ago, I couldn't afford to retile the horrible PINK FLOWERY bathroom, so I thought I'd try tile paint. It gave a great result for about 1/3 of the price of retiling - and it's really hardwearing, but if you stick anything to it (like bath seal!) when you come to remove the seal, it pulls the paint off too...

However, I had this problem before, and I knew what to do - remove the paint from individual tiles by cutting around them with a craft knife and just scraping the whole tile that's effected, then repaint that one tile carefully in the usual way (two undercoats, two/three topcoats) and it will be as good as new! You cannot repaint part/half of a tile, because then the join is highly visible- but if you make sure the joins in the paint are where the joins in the tiles are, then it's almost unnoticable!

So, I had to replace the tiles all the way around the bath where the seal was - with two undercoats (4 hours to dry!), and three topcoats (6 hours to dry!) So, I was in and out of the bathroom while doing other things all day!

Still, it's done, and the final coat should dry over Sunday night, and I can fit the new seal on Monday night - since then, I've had to time the coats so that we can have a shower in the morning, temporarily sealing the bath with a combination of cling film (film food wrap) and masking tape (so as not to damage the other tile paint - cellotape also can damage the tile paint if left on too long.)

Rikcy Gervais - Fame

Fri, 09 Mar 2007 12:28:44 GMT

Last Night - Went to see Ricky Gervais live, in his new comedy tour Fame.

Ricky was supported by Robin Ince, a regular contributor to BBC Radio 4 comedy programmes and good friend of Mitch Benn (an excellent musical comedian.)

Robin was very funny, cerebral (my favourite kind of humour these days) and creative. He also struck a chord with me with his observations on modern life, about 'the young of today' (when shouting abuse from a car, don't forget to tailer the length of abuse with the speed of the car, otherwise the bystander cannot hear the abuse properly), about the state of current comedy (eg. Why are jongleurs (a comedy club chain here in the UK) comics always doing sets on drug-taking, when it only appeals to about 25% of the audience?) and many witty observations. Tough gig, warming up a room of 4000 people, but he did it.

Rick himself came on to great fanfare, smoke, lights, music, a crown and cape, a huge 'Emmy' statue, and his name in lights. All to be taken tongue in cheek.

His show was the usual 'lecture' style (he doesn't really interact with the crowd unless there are hecklers or people being noisy), but there was no 'multimedia' this time, such as his slide and lectures about animals in his previous tour. It's a shame, because although he can hold the audiences attention, it would have been more effective and given more variety.

His material was scripted and followed a good thread about the trappings of fame and/or celebrity and what it means to him, and the general public - once again, you almost think you get an insight into the real Ricky Gervais, but there is so much misdirection and lampoonery, that you are left wondering once again what Ricky is really like.

It was funny, professional, but not hilarious. And I think some parts of his act were a little too un-PC, but I think this was the point. By being very un-PC, it reveals how silly and over-PC we can be sometimes.

Still, he's a very talented man along with Stephen Merchant (his co-writer), but I think his material is best performed as an ensemble piece with other actors, to add light and shade to his material that just one person cannot pull off on their own without coming off as too narrow-tracked or inconsistent. For instance, he needed an Office full of people to get across the full gamete of human life and it's interactions.

I love Ricky's work, and he is funny, groundbreaking and witty. But I've seen much better live gigs.

Still, was a nice night out with siddie_v and my best mate, tho his wife coundn't make it, because she was at home being ill and pregnant, poor luv. Morning sickness has really hit her, and she's unwell too - so decided it better to stay at home; But, to be honest, I don't think she missed too much!

Hot Fuzz

Thu, 08 Mar 2007 11:48:53 GMT

Last night - Went to see Hot Fuzz last night at the local cinema last night.

Every Wednesday in the UK is 'Orange Wednesday', a scheme where Orange mobile phone users can text (SMS) the word 'film' to the number 241 and they text you back with a code which you give to the cashier and they sell you two tickets for the price of one! £4.25 for two tickets - not bad!

Still maybe expensive when compared to other countries tho (siddie_v is often choking at the price of movies, rental, hotel rooms, pizza houses, restaurants, bars etc.).

Anyway - the film; Really enjoyed it! Even more than I thought, despite the positive critical acclaim it's received.

It is about a London Cop - Nick Angel (Simon Pegg) who is used to a piece of the action - being transferred to a sleepy westcountry village (ie. rural, middle of nowhere) for being too efficient and making the rest of the London Met Police look bad.

So, he arrives at the village, paired up with a hapless partner Danny Butterman (Nick Frost), where daily highlights of police work include cake, going to the pub and tracking lost swans.

However, very quickly a number of mysterious 'accidents' occur, which Nick does not accept are merely accidents - and so the plot unfolds...

And to be honest, it was a good plot. For a comedy film, anyway; There are a few intentionally obvious redherrings, and some more subtle ones to keep the story interesting. The pace is fast (the editing a little over enthusiastic in the earlier scenes for my liking, tho) and the jokes are funny without being too silly - but the main thing is that the comic timing is excellent.

The interactions between Simon Pegg's 'Nick' and Nick Frost's 'PC Danny Butterman' are excellent, with the characters really developing throughout the film, and you really get the impression that Danny would have become an excellent police officer if he hadn't been held back by his overbearing father, Police Inspector Frank Butterman (Jim Broadbent).

I must say, the least effective (nay, boring!) part of the film for me was the action sequences towards the end! They seemed a little slow in places, but I started to realise that this was probably only when you compare it to the fast pacing of the jokes and visual gags in the rest of the film! They were still very good action sequences, if a bit long in places, making this a great homage to cop buddy movies. Importantly, it is well crafted enough to not come off as just a crappy spoof!

Also, the cast is excellent - many current and rising stars in British comedy and film: Jim Broadbent, Billy Nighy (Pirates), Timothy Dalton, Edward Woodward, Martin Freeman (the Office), Steve Coogan (24 Hour Party People, Alan Partridge), Olivia Coleman (excellent comedy actress), Bill Bailey (my favourite stand up comedian), Kevin Eldon (he has provided backbone supporting characters to so much British comedy), Stephen Merchant (co creator of the Office, with Ricky Gervais) - to name but a few.

Well worth a look.

Not sure how well it's going down on the other side of the water, but I'm sure that after all the NYC gangster hood type cop movie action we've had to put up with over the years, it's about time our Settler and Colonial friends learned a little bit about things here in Britain; Not all cops are hyper intelligent detectives, sexy and invulnerable! Some just carry out a day-to-day job which is important to maintaining order and peace. But - they rise to the occassion when there is an emergency.

Tonight - I are mostly going to see Ricky Gervais live in his show called 'Fame' in Cardiff CIA.

I'm not sure his show will be as good as his previous live shows, as he's an 'international megastar' now, and this show 'charts' that success and the trappings of celebrity - but it will be great to see the portly little funnyman millionaire genius in the flesh!

Testing testing... 1 2 3

Wed, 07 Mar 2007 17:12:31 GMT

OK... so I have one of these Journal Things now... All the cool people have them, right?

Well, I thought it might be fun, my wife-to-be has one, some of her friends, computer game developers, journalists, celebrities, all united by the act of dumping their innermost thoughts and brain contents via a keyboard onto a harddisc on someone else's computer. Quite worrying...

THE PAST

I used to keep a diary as a teenager, which went along the lines of either:

"January 1st - I decided to journal my life, my experiences, my successes, my failures - so that future generations may gain elightenment and achieve success and happiness through these pages. Read on and experience the annotated progression of a legend in the making."
followed by:
"March 17th - Auntie Lucie's Birthday"

The other type of impression my diaries gave were revealled as I read back over my entries a year later; Those insightful, interesting observations about my life, my friends and my family were... well... just.. utter GIBBERISH!

Poorly made observations, ill informed prejudices, unfounded insecurities, confused argument.

THE FUTURE

I think this Journal will be different.

It will be a mixture of both of the above.

Tardy AND Rubbishy - maybe with a little bit of 'pointless' thrown in too...

But hopefully a bit of fun, too.

The main thing you need to know about me: I like comedy.

I subscribe to humour. I indulge in idiocy. I revel in chuckles. I jump feet-first into jocularity.

This is not to say that I don't take life seriously, far from it - but I do find that comedy as an experience and an artform is very settling to my soul. If I've had a bad day then a clever sitcom, or a funny tv panel game, or an amusing radio show will cheer me along. It has got me through some hard times before, and also keeps me company through these pleasant times.

THE NOW

Well, I guess that's my introduction done. As for me:

I was born in Bath, England, UK - but have lived since the age of 3 in Caerphilly, South Wales, UK (about 14 miles from Cardiff, the capital of Wales.) I consider myself 'Welsh.' I live with my girlfriend (soon to be wife) and her/our cat called Pru. Both are very cute and great company. If a bit cranky in the morning.

For 8 (or more) hours a day I am a computer programmer - I write computer games for casino and arcade markets for a Dutch company; But I am not a spod, geek, nerd, dweeb, or whatever you might call it. I had some good friends at Uni who made sure the we found (and maintained) the correct work/social balance, so I am just as happy talking to a person whose face is not made of pixels using my voice.

In a short time, 1st April to be precise, I will be married to my Canadian girlfriend. I am looking forward to it, and have no doubt that this is the place I am meant to be. We met when we were both working abroad (I was in Tilburg, the Netherlands, she was in Brussels, Belgium) and a friendship became more than a friendship, and since then has blossomed into a supportive, fun and loving relationship.

And, more importantly, she doesn't mind my feet.