Andy’s Blog

For the longest time, whenever a census came round or a questionnaire required filling in, I always wrote “Christian” in the box labelled “Faith”.  This was always unthinkingly and without giving much consideration as to what this meant.  I wasn’t muslim or hindhu, I had very little idea what it meant to be agnostic and I thought I believed in something; so couldn’t be athiest.

However over the last couple of years I really started to think about faith and what it meant to be “Christian”.  The problem was in the fact that I just didn’t believe there was some omnipotent being ’somewhere’ in space watching everything I did.  I also believed that when I die, I would be worm food, rather than transcend my body into heaven - and what was wrong with that?  Worms need to feed too!

I started to, privately, label myself as agnostic.  I thought I believed in something, just not the faintly ridiculous God that would be preached to me on the odd occassion I did go to Church (baptisms, marriages, deaths, etc).  In fact on a number of these occassions I felt I had wandered into a Monty Python sketch;

Ooooh God, you are so big,
so absolutely huge,
Gosh, we’re all really impressed down here, I can tell you.
Forgive us, O Lord, for this, our dreadful toadying…

However, in the past month I have come to the realisation that I am neither of these but am in fact an atheist.  There, all said and done!  So I can happily walk around without having to justify ridiculousness such as intelligent design, extreme pro-lifers, women and homosexuals being some form of ’sub-human’, and the list goes on…

A lot of these views have been cemented (notice the boldening, it was only a cementing not a conversion) whilst reading “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins, which I found to be a bloody good read, when not wandering into the realms of Fundamentalist Atheism in some places (..also I think he is bidding for entry into the Guiness Book of Records for the most use of the word “zeitgeist” in one of the chapters).

Anyways, I have now “come out of the closet” as it were and trying to understand how this plays out with the work I do with the Scouts… after all, the main promise for the scouts is;

I promise to do my best, and to love God

How can you love something that does not exist?  Interesting times (..and my longest post to date!)

I hate not being part of the “in crowd”, and in that vein of vanity I have re-created my facebook account.  I did have one previously but, deleted it after getting swamped with emails and games, quizzes, pokes and a multitude of other things I didn’t understand.

So…. I am trying it again with a more “open” mind, but with a warning given to me by a very wise man;

“I used to have an open mind, but my brains kept falling out!”
Mr F.

I have gained my Black & White Belt in Karate!  (Yes I do know that the cartoon is of Hong-Kong-Phooey, and yes I do know he did kung-fu not karate - however I thought putting a piccie of The Karate Kid would look a little weird…. that and I LIKE hong-kong-phooey!).

This now means that I am teaching new students in the noble art of self defence, or at least attempting to.  Trying to get a mix of 28 adults and young children to punch, kick and strike ‘funny’ poses whilst shouting “KYAAAAAIII” is probably not as easy as it sounds.

Please be assured that this blog, when it does get updated, will not be a litany of wise sayings and thoughts based on the teachings and study of ancient Japanese warrior arts… just the usual ramblings of an aging idiot.

Do you know, one day I will actually remember to update this thing on a more regular basis!  I suppose the underlying issues that I have are;

• An inability to write good prose
• A very hum-drum life
• An inate laziness, which is becoming more ‘inatier’ (I love creating new words!)
• …Zzzzzz

The mystery is over, and the deed done; I have resigned from my current employer!  Too many reasons into why this needed to be done, but even so it is not something that is easily or gladly done, rather as a thing of last resort.

That said I have a new job awaiting me in Northampton, MUCH closer to home, with more money and benefits… so I definitely have something to look forward to.

More later..

Next week should prove to be interesting as the natural conclusion to some things will come to fruition.  Mysterious eh?  All will become clearer sometime next week.

Just thought I would share this little gem found on the BBC News website, which has both been making me titter all morning, but also highlights an important message which is oft overlooked;

Badass Wombles!

It is becoming one of my pet niggles of late, telling both my boys to “Talk Properly!”.  They have started, especially my youngest, going around talking with an American accent and using American terms for objects.  Now whilst I am not ‘Anti-American’, I am also not American and neither are my children.

I have something of a ‘BBC English’ accent, e.g. no regional accent what-so-ever, and I am fiercely proud of my Britishness and the ‘Anglo-Spanishness’ of my little ‘uns.  Although I am in no way  in favour of the ‘Britishness’ rubbish they are trying to teach children in Schools  nowadays, I do feel that we should promote and celebrate our own unique character.

Anyways I need to stop before those nasty little BNP‘ers come to my door with tears of joy in their eyes thinking that I support their even nastier policies… yoikes!

Enjoy the clip </Little Englander Mode>

For those of you expecting a blog full of exciting life experiences, tales of major trials and tribulations and daring-do’s….. you are in for some major disappointments! Sir Ranulph Fiennes I ain’t!

The major crisis of this week? The failure of the tumble dryer to produce anything coming close to heat. Bit of a problem when trying to dry clothes, especially important when you live in the UK where the ‘big yellow warm ball’ doesn’t appear in the sky very often.

The amount of grief from ’she-who-must-be obeyed’ on what time to take off work seems a little excessive and over reacted, but that’s the joy of marriage!

*Sigh* one day I will join the SAS and develop somewhat more of an exciting life!

I am up in sunny Glasgow today for a meeting with one of our major customers.  Unfortunately the lady who does the flight bookings decided that I needed more time to ‘acclimatise’ so landed me here at 8am for a meeting that won’t start till 1pm.

I think I am starting to get the DT’s from too many shots of Latte’s whilst waiting in a nearby hotel!

This blog isn’t yet a year old and already it’s on its seccond entry regarding earthquake experiences!  At a few minutes to one this morning both me and she-who-must-be-obeyed sat bolt upright in bed as the whole house vibrated, pictures fell off shelves and a DEEP rumbling noise like an underground express train shook us out of sleep.

“what the hell….” both on our lips as the vibrations and noise lasted another 10 seconds, and then silence.  A quick run around the house; kids still in bed and asleep, no truck embedded in the side of the house, no starlight winking back at us instead of artexed ceiling.

Definitely one of the strongest quakes I ever experienced.  Although I had to laugh at all the pics of toppled chimney pots on the BBC news website.  Not because they are funny in themselves, but when compared with pics I’ve seen from the American or Asian continents in similar circumstances - then these do seem a little  ridiculous.