Gallery Test
I’ve upgraded my blog to Wordpress version 2.5, so I thought I’d test the built in gallery function with a few photos from a recent stag do my brothers and I went on…
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- Dave ‘Babraham Lincoln’ Hunt – the stag!
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- The brothers grim!
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- Me as a Cowboy
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- Stat as a Sportsfan
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- Al as a redneck trucker
Do Not Adjust Your Monitor!
‘The Middle Of Yesterday’ is no more, I’m now blogging under a new domain name; ‘www.jamesdclarke.com’. I’ve decided to switch my blog over to a new domain name – my own name!
I’ve done this for a couple of reasons, firstly because it’s becoming harder and harder to get your hands on good dot com domain name, and secondly in an attempt to build my online profile/brand – something that is becoming more and more important these days (or so I am told), especially when using the internet to make a living as I do. There’s a lot of James Clarkes with an ‘E’ out there – so I decided the time was right to bag my name whilst I still could.
Hopefully my Mom will be pleased about the ‘D’ for Douglas as I was rather ashamed of my middle name as a kid. I remember vividly the only time I got a proper slap around the face from her – I was 10 or 11 years old and we were in the car on the way home from my birthday party at McDonald’s (I was too young to know any better then), my two best mates were in the car and grilling me about my middle name. I was tight lipped, however my Mother (ever the protagonist) told them both, to which I quickly yelled “you bitch!” and SLAP, there it was!
So, I apologise for calling you a bitch Mom, but you shouldn’t have wound me up. I hope you like my new domain name!
In Dad We Trust!
My ‘little’ brother turns 18 at the end of the month and we’ve decided to put on a big party to celebrate. The plan is to hire a venue for late February (so Al is over 18 and can drink legally!) and put on a mixture of live music and food, along with some drinks and some DJ spun tunes.
As part of the live music four fifths of my band ‘Scrat’ will be performing. Myself, both my brothers (Stat & Al), Dicko and Steve will be making up the numbers, however there’s a slight line up change (and a name change) whilst Dave sits it out and prepares for his wedding and we’re going to be joined by a very special guest…..my Dad!
Now, Fishman (as we affectionately call him) has a history steeped in rock ‘n’ roll. He played in several bands when he was in his 20’s back in 1970 something, including the infamous ‘Mantis’ who were once paid by a promoter not to perform the second half of their set during a gig at a bingo hall! In fact, Dad confessed last night that Status Quo were ‘in his psyche’ – so he’s definitely the right man for the job!
Last night was our first rehearsal and I haven’t had so much fun for a long time. Not only was I playing music with both of my younger brothers, but my Dad was playing too! It was awesome! We decided to start off with a few covers and threw in some golden oldies that Fishman would know in the form of ‘Teenage Kicks’ (Undertones) , ‘Rockin’ All Over The World’ (Status Quo), and ‘Summer Of ‘69′ (Bryan Adams) – which we were informed (somewhat ironically) by Dad was the year that he left school – perfect!
To our collective surprise Dad picked things up really quickly considering he’d not played guitar for 20 + years (did I mention he was playing his custom built 70’s Fender Tele copy, fresh from the loft?!) and before long we were rocking! He even began to let rip with some Clapton-esque riffage over the end of ‘Summer Of ‘69′ and at one point had us all in tears after attempting a Pete Townshend style jump mid-song, which ended up with Dicko burst into laughter!
So that was our first rehearsal, it couldn’t have gone any better. I really can’t wait for Dad to get back from his week long holiday so that we can get back to rehearsing for the gig…this is going to be brilliant!
Christmas 2007
I’ve just posted some photos of Christmas so far – our second Christmas starts tonight as Jordan is back and expecting a visit from Santa, then tomorrow we have 16 people coming round for food…should be fun! Have a great New Year’s Eve everyone!
Check out my photos on my moblog here.
I’ll Be Home For Christmas
And so another Christmas Eve is upon us! Steph is (as usual) working a stupidly long shift at work, you have to feel sorry for her…she left before 7am this morning and probably won’t be back until 7pm. Jordan is off to his Dad’s later today and coming back just before New Year’s Eve so we are without him for Christmas, something Steph really hates.
We’re planning on having two Christmases, one tomorrow and another on New Year’s Day when Jordan returns. In a way he’s lucky because he gets two Christmases, which when you’re 8 years old means twice the presents, twice the fuss and attention, and generally being spoiled twice! Last night he got a bit upset that he wouldn’t be with his Mom over Christmas, so having to alternate between two separated parents does have it’s downsides, although he’s pretty well adjusted and doesn’t really know any different, so it doesn’t really bother him very much from what I can see.
Tonight Steph and I plan on staying at home together, we may have a few family members visit but it’s going to be a pretty low key affair, which will be nice. I’m going to make a concerted effort to turn all the technology off and just sit and chat whilst sipping mulled wine, and maybe watch some crap TV while we’re at it.
Tomorrow morning we’re seeing Steph’s family; her folks, grandparents, sister, brother to exchange presents, then later in the day we’lll head over to my folk’s house for Christmas Dinner and more present exchanging etc. My brother is staying with my folks at the moment as he’s recovering from a recent operation (not the best Christmas present) and I’ve not see him since he had the op on the 17th, so we’ll have chance to check out his scar! And check he’s ok!
On Boxing Day we’ll no doubt have a quiet and lazy day until the evening when we go around to Mike & Nicky’s to see the rest of the family; cousins, aunts, and uncles etc.
Then it’s back to the daily grind for Steph unfortunately. She’ll be back to work and I’ll have no work and no child to look after…I’m not exactly sure what I’m going to do with myself, but hopefully I’ll be out and about visiting people instead of being stuck in front of the computer! Steph has 3 days off over New Year so she’ll get a bit of a break then. We still haven’t got any definite plans for New Year’s Eve, we’ll have Jordan back so it will no doubt be something local and it’s going to have to be pretty low key as we’re expecting 15 family members at ours for food on New Year’s Day (Jordan’s Christmas Day) so that’s going to be rather hectic!
I can’t wait!
