Judgement Day

As I'm writing this I am now a fully fledged thirty year old. Tragically I am too poor to have a full on midlife crisis so have made up for it by joining twitter-@andynaylor81 if you're on it/care/can be arsed!Obviously this had brought to an end the purpose of my blog which was to tick of a list of challenges before I hit the big one.
Looking back at the last six months brings many emotions. Pride/ disappointment/ enjoyment/ pain but most of all a slight sense of achievement. Out of the 30 challenges that I set myself I managed to tick off most of them but have left myself a list of a few that got away:

Learn to Juggle/ Learn an Impressive Magic Trick

Purely due to having the coordination of a one legged weeble who's been on the sauce I found it nigh on impossible to master juggling two balls, let alone three. I vow to continue but i fear it may take some time. With the magic I was also scuppered by having such slow hand speed that no trick I could possibly learn looked any good.Paul Daniels I salute you.

BenchPress 100k

Ridiculously under estimated how heavy 100k is and underestimated how strong I am. End result not wanting to lose my body from the neck down and taking time to build up to the lift with my personal trainer Phil Stubbs.I'll be back.

Learn Basic sign Language

I'm actually doing ok with this but didn't want to rush it as I wouldn't want to undervalue a really difficult, important skill by cack handily attempting it on a stage.....plus I had trouble remembering most of the signs!

Learn More about the Middle east

To be honest a challenge that will probably take me the rest of my life to do!Didn't really narrow the challenge down enough to make a decent effort.Rest assured I have a couple of thick books to work through that should see me up to speed on at least the Israel/Palestine conflict before I'm forty!

Hold a Friends Baby

Selfishly, none of my friends who live in London have managed to spawn any offspring yet and it became a race against time and money to get down to my friend Harry in Ilfracombe to see his lovely new son Seth. Hopefully i will get down there soon and will post a picture of this challenge being completed.

Charity Shop Pub Crawl

One of the least impressive but likely to be the most enjoyable of challenges-anyone who's up for it I will be gathering the troops before the end of the summer to enjoy a little pint drinking/ charity shop visiting fun.


As you may have gathered by yesterdays facebook I have now finally managed to complete my skydive. I tried but failed miserably to look really non impressed in the photos and ended up looking like a slack jawed idiot. Good crack though.Photo below as well as snaps of the three course meal I treated Georgina to.

So as they say, that is about that. I want to thank everyone who actually sat down and read this blog, was really surprised by the amount of people who got behind me while I was doing it. Fankyoo!
Big thanks to Dai, Georgina, Tim Naylor, Gantie, John Ullyet, Ailwyn Cole, Chris Hatton at physical graffiti, Dan Lewis and everyone who came down to the show at the Memo.
Time for me to crack onwards and upwards then and actually have a stab at this writing game. I've chatted about it enough but still procrastinate and moan too much when I should be sat here typing and hopefully making someone take notice. Hope that if you enjoyed reading this you will continue to follow my articles as I upload them and thanks again for your time.

Naylor out. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Number 12: Get an article published

Going to have to use a bit of artistic licence with this challenge. My initial intention was to use my NCTJ in newspaper and magazine journalism to good effect and get me an article published. Since completing the course I have been narrowly denied on a couple of occasions. Heart breakingly having sold an article to the Wales on Sunday a week after completing my course, my interviewee asked for the article not to be run as his Mum wasn't happy with it. It was more than understandable as it was a very revealing article about personal family business and I completely understood his thoughts. However this didn't prevent me having a slight meltdown which ended up with me stubbing my toe after repeatedly booting a wall. From then on I have been able to write for a cracking new website called pale blue news but as yet am still to trouble a national publication. Probably due to the fact that when I should be researching articles I'm on here spouting about myself.Oh well!
Having had contact with the Wales on Sunday I sent them a brief description of the blog thinking that they might let me write up a small piece about it. Amazingly they were really interested in the blog and wanted to do an interview piece that was printed in last Sundays edition.Sweet!
I've scanned the article in and will hopefully get it uploaded to facebook at some point. Below is a picture of the article with my challenge number.Article published about me-done. Now, ten years until forty, reckon that's enough time for even a procrastinating idiot like me to get an article published somewhere....isn't it?!

Number 1: Do a Sky Dive

Most people have a skydiving story to regale the kids with. Usually in some exotic land, it involves a few too many beers the night before and then a " Booked it,packed it,fucked off" style adventure that ends with some frayed nerves, some awesome photos and a sense of achievement.
I however am attempting to skydive in the UK. A British skydiving story rolls a little bit more like this:
" It was mental! Got in the car about ten and drove down to a deserted airfield near Swindon. The skydivers who had been booked in at 9.30 that morning were still yet to go so about forty of us lay around on the floor of the centre.Some people watched the grand prix for a bit and we had a cheese burger each from the van.Then some guy told us it was still too windy and we went home.It was mental!"
Alas it falls to me to break the news that I will not be completing a skydive before I'm thirty.I'm re booked in for the 14th of July now which will be my third attempt and will fall two days after I hit the big 3-0.Oh well.
Cracking cheeseburger mind.

Number 17: Do something nice for someone who genuinly deserves it

One of my favourite challenges so far simply because of the big smile wrapped around Dais chops,  when he walked in to the restaurant and realised what was going on. For those of you who don't know, Dai is my father and also one of the best lads I know. I owe the man millions of pounds in actual money and a lot more for the help, support and pints of beers he's given me over the years. Last Saturday I organised a surprise 59th birthday for him at a local restaurant and managed to get 36 people there waiting for when I wandered in with the birthday boy. Couple of pictures below of one of the three tables and the man of the hour himself:

A quality night was had by all and I hope that the intended result of this challenge was more than achieved. If this wasn't enough to make the man glow with paternal pride then later on he must have been bursting as I joined local legend Kate Evans in a helium soaked renditions of "Happy Birthday" and "Delilah".
Thanks to My brother, his girlfriend Leah and my Aunt Jude for all their help and the fatman again for his generosity with the wine. Happy Birthday Big Man!

Number 23: Get a good Tattoo

On paper this was always going to be one of the challenges that could go horrifically wrong.The fact that the title of this challenge is to get a "good" tattoo, gives away the fact that I do have previous experience of going under the ink needle. It gives me little pride to admit that during my misspent youth I managed to acquire a Chinese symbol on my thigh after five cans of super strongbow. The said symbol is supposed to mean" To Win" which I did actually manage to verify in Japan. While that put paid to all the lame, possibly racist quips like "I bet it says Sweet and sour chicken", it still did little to change the fact that I was lumped for life with a pretty rubbish tattoo. To be fair, after a while even my parents saw the funny side and I've grown to accept if not love it. Still, when I drew up the list for this challenge I saw it as perhaps a chance to redeem myself for what had gone before.Another bonus was the fact that a mate of mine who I went to primary school with now has his own tattoo parlour in Cardiff. I got in touch with Chris and in true Naylor fashion had booked myself in and sent a deposit without really considering what I was getting myself into. A month and a half later I was trundling down the M4 with Georgina actually feeling quite excited.
All that changed in a matter of minutes when I arrived at Physical Graffiti. It was great to see Chris, who despite being a lot more heavily tattooed didn't look all that different to when I had last seen him about fifteen years ago. Everything was going to plan and a photographer was on his way from "The Wales on Sunday" to record the event for an article they have agreed to write about my blog.I was ready to get inked up!
Then Chris brought the design over and I realised with a sudden horror that it would take up half of my back. As my Dad and girlfriend looked on I began to mentally breakdown as my brain refused to compute the fact that I didn't have to have the tattoo if I didn't want to. All I saw was the fact that I had to finish what I'd started, the photographer was on his way, I couldn't go back now. Sweat started to drip down my forehead and burn my eyes. Its ok I thought to myself. How often do I look at my back?How often does anyone look at any ones back?
If it wasn't for Georgina, I would still be in Cardiff getting tattooed now. Taking the situation by the horns she suggested that perhaps I should ask for Chris to sketch the tattoo a little bit smaller. It seems obvious looking back but at the time I actually forgot that was possible.I have managed to get through the report so far without actually mentioning what the tat was going to be. I always find it a little bit wank when people talk about tattoos. Its hard to make it sound as good as it does in your head. They are pretty subjective as well aren't they?One mans Sistine chapel being another mans love and hate!In a nutshell though my idea was two get the two faces of drama on my back, with a little quote underneath. If for no other reason that:
A) tragedy and comedy pretty much sums up my life so far
B) Its on my back anyway so I figured I wouldn't have to look at it much if I hated it.
Anyway after a lot of deliberation and an embarrassing chat with Chris I eventually clambered into the tattoo chair. My dignity was now completely gone,amongst the other painted warriors in the shop I felt like one of the boys from Hanson trying to mix with Motley Crue. Still Chris had the needle in hand and the photographer was ready. Thirty minutes later I was proudly checking out my new tat in the mirror. Challenge completed and the photos to show for it!

Big Big thanks have to go to the talented Chris Hatton at physical graffiti for the artwork, anyone Wales based looking to get a tattoo should definitely give Chris a shout. Also I must thank Georgina Barnard and Dai for holding it all together when lesser people were losing their heads. Last but not least here's a pic of my formal tattoo so that even if you think this one is crap...........it cant hold a candle to this:

Thankyou and goodnight!

Number 3/31 Go Vegetarian for a month

OK. The reason there are two numbers on this is because it may very well have to go down as my first replacement challenge. As you all know I fully intended to replicate a full marathon distance run and record the suffering in this blog. Alas tragedy struck a month and a half ago as due to me over training in ridiculously worn and rubbish trainers I seem to have battered my knee to oblivion. Having hit the heights of completing a ten mile and then an eight mile run on consecutive days I have struggled since to top four or five without my knee complaining. I must admit this has got me a bit down as it does feel like giving up but I suppose it comes down to pushing on and trying to do it and putting myself out of action for the considerable or leaving this challenge to be something completed as a 30 year old.I myself am trying to look for consolation in the fact that its my top heavy stocky/muscular build weighing down on the knee joints that has done for me and not the fact that...........I'M REALLY OLD NOW!
However to replace this challenge I knew I had to push myself and do something that would normally be unimaginable. To know me is to know that I love chicken and to know me for a long time is to know that my diet used to consist of said poultry and potatoes. The odd vegetable did find its way in but only on insistence and the fact  I knew they were good for me. With age has come a bit of maturity and with my girlfriend Georgina being of the vegetarian persuasion I could have quoted Jules from pulp fiction in saying
"That pretty much makes me a vegetarian!"
Except it hadn't. No, despite reluctantly admitting that certain dishes were adequate without meat and perfecting a quorn lasagne there were still quite a few times I would make Georgina wait as I happily roasted my choice of animal carcass before we could eat together. If I actually thought about it, before this month the longest I'd been without eating meat was probably about a day.
Enter replacement challenge number 3: Go Veggie for a month.

The challenge started off badly as I combined it with a week of intense physical activity and also hung around with Lee Gant. Whilst watching "The Godfather" and attempting to eat a Spinach Tortilla( an experience I will never, ever repeat) Gantie tucked into half a chicken. On a trip to Snowdon as I oozed blood out of a head wound my comedy chum consoled me by saying" Oh well, at least you cant eat any meat either!", whilst steaming into a cheeseburger.
Gant aside, as the month progressed I did actually quite enjoy it. Having to be a bit more varied meant instead of waking up with five minutes to go and slapping together a ham sandwich, I was preparing Mediterranean Vegetable wraps to take to work. Instead of nipping out for a beer and a burger and feeling like I needed to lie down for a week,I was veggie burgering it up and finding that they weren't actually so bad after all.
Georgina and I even got to share a few meals( meaning she could nick some of mine if she wanted!). Ok there were a few night after a jar too many that I would have stabbed my grandmother for a bit of fried chicken and saturday mornings aren't the same without bacon. Twenty nine days into the challenge though I was smugly sailing through and looking forward to my first taste of meat since April. Disaster obviously followed with my abortive trip to attempt skydiving. On top of a two day hangover, the news that the skydive probably wouldn't happen must have scrambled my brain. My brother enquired as to whether I wanted a cheeseburger from a nearby fast food van and without even thinking I said yes. It didn't even occur to me that I had done anything wrong until I was wiping cow crumbs from my upper lip.Nightmare!
I had dreamt about breaking my meat fast for twenty nine days. In my subconscious I saw myself at an all you can eat Brazillian BBQ, Tucking into the most expensive steak at a quality restaurant or waiting, mouth watering and stomach gurgling as some speciality sausages from the farmers market turned on the grill.
As tends to happen in life though the reality was rather more ordinary. I ate a cheese burger from a fast food van in a field just outside Oxford. Technically I didn't make it a month but I'm going with this principle.
February has 28 days.
February is a month.
I didn't eat meat for 29 days.
I didn't eat meat for a month.
It was just unfortunate I chose May.
Did the cheeseburger taste good? It was like eating heaven in a bap.

Number 9: Do 5000 push ups in a week.

A challenge that I actually completed a few weeks ago but negated to write up. Some of these challenges haven't been as hard as I thought they would be, some have been a lot harder. This was every bit as horrible as I thought it would be. I probably didn't help myself by attempting this task in the first week of May, a month in which i had also decided to give up eating meat. Doing over 1000 push ups a day on chicken breasts would have been difficult, doing it on bananas, humus and quorn mince was torture.
I had set myself a bit of a schedule of doing about a 1000 a day on most days but having two days with 500 thus stretching them out over a seven day week. This all went to shit when on the Wednesday thanks to a bad case of the sniffles I didn't do any at all, preferring to sip lemsip and watch My Name Is Earl when I got in from work.This left me in the ridiculous situation of having to churn out 3250 pushups on the last day.Picture below of a broken man near the end of this challenge.

I don't mind pushups. They are a cheap alternative to grunting in a fitness first and shelling out about a fiver per grunt. They are an exercise I can just about always manage to do whether I am at home, in the park or waiting for a bus when bored. However after doing 3,250 in one day it has been three weeks since my last push up and I honestly don't know when my next one will happen!The form of said pushups dipped dramatically during the week and if I was being marked on them by a marine I probably wouldn't have passed the challenge.I wasn't being marked though so you will have to trust in the fact that after six hours on the Monday night I crept to bed exhausted and with veins screaming out of my big bald forehead. Oh well at least I celebrated with a boiled egg and an apple. Just like Arnie!

Number 27: Make a fifty quid bet

A challenge that possibly doesn't jump off the List as being that much of a milestone to be achieved. In short if you don't like gambling or betting then this is possibly quite a stupid task to attempt. However if you've ever stood in William hill twiddling a blue pen and thinking maybe, just maybe this one is going to come off and planning what you're going to do with the money before you've even won it-then you know what its all about.
I came quite late into the betting game. Just two years ago up in Edinburgh I recall watching a WestHam Tottenham game with Gantie and being mildly amused by his agitated state,  as he agonisingly missed out on £150 quid due to West Ham being incapable of summoning a goal. With the beginning of the next season I took up the blue pen myself and found that the landscape of my Saturdays had changed. No longer was I casually scanning final score, now I was sat on my laptop, in a pub or even with my face pressed up against the glass window of Currys. Have Brighton equalised? Are Bolton still winning?Is that security guard about to ask me to leave?
Before people start thinking, where does Naylor get the money for this caper?I will level with you, I'm not talking about high stakes here. In fact before I completed the bet for my blog the most money I'd ever bet in my life was five pounds.It was that sum which gave me my first ever win which happened earlier this season. I had correctly predicted that Man utd would beat liverpool 3-2 and then forgotten all about it. Which saw me in the bizarre situation of walking round a photography exhibition of Chernobyl victims with my girlfriend and her mum, all the time getting frantic text updates on my phone from Gantie. Minutes later I'm expressing my horror at the harrowing images in front of me while also realising that I'm now £175 quid richer thanks to Dimitar Berbatov, Liverpools defence and an absent minded sunday afternoon flutter.
The rules on this challenge were simple, to get the stake for the bet I needed to make it from a bet. I didn't want to use any of my meagre salary on such a high risk gamble. I haven't got big enough balls for that. So it came to find me sat in the sunshine of highbury park with my beautiful lady friend on the last but one weekend of the season. As we enjoyed the surroundings of the park and witnessed Sonia Jackson from eastenders eating a twister(or five) I leapt into the air as thanks to Frank Lampard scoring a consolation for chelsea, Gantie was £700 quid richer, I was £120 quid richer and the challenge was on!
Now I didn't want to put the bet on online, If i was going to go out then I wanted the buzz of doing it to be greater. So it was I called in the third part of my gambling axis of evil-my father and good friend Dai Naylor. With dangerous Dai on board there was only going to be one place we were heading. So it came to pass that on Saturday 28th May I stepped into the Leicester Square Casino with the express intention of dropping fifty pounds on either red or black on roulette. picture below of me looking nervous and incredibly hungover pre bet thanks to ganties bday celebrations the previous night.

I was flusher than I thought I was going to be due to triumphing with a £2 bet on the champions league final which handed me another forty quid to play with. Despite this I still admit to cowering behind dai with my hands over my eyes as about half hour into our casino session we decided it was time to drop the bigun. The wheel had gone to black the last six spins and I decided to go for it. The spin seemed to take forever but soon the little white ball was dropping into place on....RED! I kissed the top of Dais head and scooped up my winnings. I'd like to say that I rode the bet and banged another fifty straight on. I didn't though, we stayed for another hour and a bit but my heart or bank balance couldn't stand another high roll. As it was I left the casino thirty quid up and treated Dai and me to a taxi home.Challenge completed!
I will leave you with three quotes:

"If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;"

Rudyard Kipling


Gambling: The sure way of getting nothing from something.  ~Wilson Mizner
" If Afc Wimbledon beat Crawley then I'll win a tenner. Gambling is life"

Lee Gant

Number 7: Climb a British Mountain

The British mountain part of this challenge wasn't just a nod to the fact that economically I will probably never manage to leave these shores again. I mean it was mainly that but also because I do have previous mountaineering experience.Five years ago while a bright eyed young English teacher in Japan I scaled the mighty mount Fuji on the eve of my 25th birthday. Fittingly years later and now more of a bitter/journeyman English teacher I set off to Snowdon with one of the same people I had scaled Japans highest peak with, my good friend and one of Hulls finest John Ullyet. Making up the trio was of course the other half of London's most unpolished sketch act Mr Lee Gant.
The mood of the trip was captured instantly as having told the lads to be at Euston for half eight to catch the eight fifty train, I swanned up at about 8.47 myself having had to return home for my wallet. With Gantie nowhere to be seen, Mr Ullyet and myself boarded the train cursing the fact that the bumbling Leicester bred idiot had the tent with him. Visions of Gant sprawled under a pub table in crouch end wearing only hiking boots and crying flooded my mind as I turned the air blue.Then a familiar voice from behind me confirmed that he was on the train and the trip was back on. Edmund Hillary and the boys we weren't.
After an uneventful journey to Bangor we boarded the bus to Snowdon increasingly aware that we were leaving it a bit late to get up and down one of the highest mountains in Britain. The ominous blackening skies seemed to be frowning down at us as we arrived at the campsite and began what can only be described as a shambolic attempt to put up the tent. I cant really say anything as I didn't really do anything apart from hand pegs to Ullyets strong northern hands. A troop of experienced campers watched us and sneered as we eventually managed to get the tent looking a bit like the picture on the bag. Time was running out and it was 4.15 before we were on the right path to snowdon after two abortive attempts. With the climb estimated to take five hours up and down we were going to have to work hard to beat the dark.Picture below of me and John before the climb:

So it was then that our expedition began. The hundreds of normal people gaped at us in disbelief as we swaggered in the opposite direction to them and headed up the hill. The beautiful scenery was accompanied by some pretty tasty weather and we were soon all soaked to the bone and becoming increasingly dismayed by the fact that the peak seemed to be getting further and further away. There was also a bit of a dense mist settling in and by the time we settled down for a cup of tea in the halfway hut visibility was getting poor. This fact didn't stop Gantie and I from buying a postcard each and engaging in our usual abusive banter that we probably could have left till later. I'm not going to lie, the final stretch was hard, it was misty, it was freezing and  the going was getting hard. Digging in we kept the image of a well deserved pint in our heads and powered for the summit. At just after 6.40 we did it.I'd like to treat you to a picture of a beautiful shot of rural wales but to be honest it was so misty this photo could have been taken anywhere. It wasn't though, it was up the top of Snowdon, you can ask John and Gantie!

Shortly after this second photo, Mr ullyet succumbed to a bit of vertigo and in his words " Had to get out of there pal!" . The mercurial Northener was soon just a speck in the distance as he arrowed in on the pint and started descending the mountain double quick. Gantie and I eventually caught him up and we all basked in the glory of a job well done. Then with his customary awfulness Gantie exclaimed that
"No ones stacked it yet. It would be well funny if someone stacked it!"
Cometh the hour, cometh the man I stepped up and embarked on a spectacular fall that saw me fall head first into a gnarly mountain rock and bounce up with what I initially thought was a fractured skull. The boys had the good grace to not laugh for five minutes although I could tell gantie was biting his cheek. Here in all its glory was my injury:

Once my worst fear had subsided( I would have to get stitches and wouldn't be able to drink) we completed the descent and wandered into a friendly looking mountain hostelry. If we'd made a few misjudged moves earlier in the day then heading into the Pen-Y-Ceunant tea house certainly made up for that. As soon as we stumbled in our new friend Steven was pouring us three beers, popping TCP on my war wound and then putting our soaked clothes in his tumble dryer as we chilled out in front of the fire.I can fully recommend visiting Steven if you are in the Snowdon area, check out his website on www.snowdoncafe.com.

He's da man!

Here's Gantie and I with our aforementioned host.That's about that then for this challenge, big thanks to my fellow climbers and to Alan Cusack for the kind loan of his tent!Challenge Seven completed!

Number 15: Memorize 50 randomly selected capital cities

From first glance probably a bit of a weird one. The reason for this challenge was a bit of nostalgia and to prove a little point to myself. When I was younger I loved geography. Not geography that you end up getting taught in school that seemed to consist of different types of farming and words like fallow. I used to like learning about different countries and all the different capital cities. When I was eight I must have known every capital in the world and on my ninth birthday I even had a birthday cake that was specially made with a map of the world on it.You are probably thinking:
A) I bet you were beaten up regularly as a child
B) Not much of a challenge if you know them all already is it.
Alas, it came to pass that knowing all the capital cities in the world didn't really impress girls or all the cool kids in school. It became more about who could roll a spliff or look the surliest whilst drinking a bottle of white lightening. It breaks my heart when I look back now and see myself sat in my room looking at my big book of countries, as happy as larry.
Anyway you get the picture so for this challenge to mean anything I knew I had to go further and learn more than just the run of the mill capitals. Which is why most of April saw me wandering around repeating unpronounceable places in my head. Countries such as Madagascar, Liberia, Uzbekistan and Tajikstan and cities such as Antanarivo, Villnius, Abuja and Gaborne became as familiar to my addled brain as the names of the Thundercats. So it was then that I came to be tested by my good friend Laura Hill and filmed on my cousins IPhone, managing to name all fifty with a little help on the last one!If you want to see this challenge in full then check out the link below and remember.....we've all forgotten the capital of Gabon, once in our lives!
Challenge fifteen completed. This one belongs to a cleverer lad than me so I'll give him the glory in the photo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hfSpnchhxI

Number 5: Write to 5 people I admire

A relatively easy challenge then but one that caused me to put quite a lot of thought into as well as a couple of tears. Without wanting to sound like Sid Vicious, I have never really had any famous heroes as I always quite arrogantly thought I would be as good as them if I had a bit more luck. The five people I chose to write to aren't massive celebrities, but they have all affected my life in a positive way and made me think" why am I such a moaning arsehole".
In no particular order the people I wrote to were:

Jane Tomlinson's family
Bald blogger Adrian Sudburys parents
My Dad
My mate Ben
My Friend Andrew Marsh's parents

If you haven't heard of Jane Tomlinson then check out this link

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Tomlinson

Or read one of her books-The Luxury of time or You Cant Take it with You. I know for a fact if I got cancer I would sit in a chair crying for about two months and then hate the world. I very much doubt I would have the courage to leave a legacy with the time I had left. This is exactly what Jane and the next person I wrote to " Adrian Sudbury/bald blogger" achieved.

If you have a spare hour at all over the weekend then visit:

http://baldyblog.freshblogs.co.uk/bone-marrow-donation/

And read the archives of Adrian's blog before he died. I was feeling a bit whiny one day and read it and then cried for about half an hour. Heroes.

Number three on my list was my Dad which is probably a bit of a cliche but fuck it. I owe this man everything including about eight million quid which he has never made me feel bad for. Thanks Dai.

I don't want to bang on about my friend Ben because he is a private guy and wouldn't appreciate it, but he went through a lot last year and came out the other side having taken it all on the chin. Nice one Benno.

Last but certainly not least I wrote to my friend Marshies parents Julian and Carole. Marshy was killed a couple of years ago in a tragic accident at the age of just twenty four. The dignity and bravery that Julian, Carole and Andrew's sister  Claire have shown since this awful news has been immense.They really are three very special people. I know this wont help them at all but I just wanted to let me know I was thinking of them.

No big photo needed for this challenge but the most rewarding one I have completed so far.

Number 10: Run the 100m in less than 15 seconds.

One thing I learnt at Finsbury park athletics track yesterday morning was that 100m is a lot longer than it look on the telly, or in childhood memories. As I stretched out my pasty hamstrings and looked at the finishing line in the distance it began to seem less and less of a good idea. The plan had been to make a race of it and get five or six of us down there so that I could comfortably finish in the middle. As it turned out due to late weekend trips, distance from finsbury park and enthusiasm for the task it left just myself and my younger, fitter former international rugby playing brother to race it out. At least both our girlfriends were there to watch as well as our Dad. I face the risk of losing pride, the respect of my lady, the challenge and my fathers love all in one fifteen second swoop!

With timing being the main issue,the problem was having to give Georgina the responsibility for stopping the watch as I crossed the line. I know myself that stopwatches can play up, if she was to press the wrong button I could be left with the appalling dilemma of having to turn around and do the sprint again. This could NOT happen. So it was down to the kindness of Erran a sprinter who was training down at the track and agreed to jog(yes jog!) along beside us and press stop as soon as my feet touched the line. With all this arranged there was nothing left to do but assume starting positions, try not to look at my brothers superior leg muscles and just give it everything I had, once.

Seeing as this is my blog and none of you were there I could say that I swept past my brother and waited for him to trundle home. As the picture above shows although  that wasn't the case, I was not in any means disgraced and most importantly I crossed the line in the time shown below:

That's right, make way Usain! If the Olympic champion should somehow become five seconds slower and start hanging around finsbury park on a morning that I didn't have a hangover...............I reckon I'd have him!
Challenge completed and the knees held on magnificently!Pic below of the sprinters post race!

Thanks again to Tim Naylor for getting up on a Saturday and sprinting despite having a cup final to play later. oh yeah and also for easing off a bit at the end.Cheers bruv!

Biting off too much....

Ello, Just wanted to update in case it appeared I had given up on the whole thing and moved to a small cottage in dorset to see out my days. Had a big weekend planned on Saturday as I was due to be attempting my marathon. However two weeks ago disaster struck as I was slogging through the fifth mile of a training run and my knee completely gave up. It was a harsh reminder of two things:
1) I have shown scant respect for how hard it actually is to train for a marathon. I figured if pensioners can run them dressed as Polar Bears then I should be alright.I barely got past twelve miles without shattering my joints.
2) I am actually getting near the age when some people have to retire from football forever. I could push on and have a crack this weekend but would possibly have to add number 31 to my list as: Have corrective knee surgery.
So that means that knees allowing I'm due to be hitting finsbury park athletic track this saturday for my 100m sprint.Im looking to get in under fifteen seconds and was feeling quietly confident but would now except 14.99 seconds just to get it done. Got a few of the lads involved to push on the pace and possibly carry me the two miles home as my knee caps have slid off.
So hopefully after some rest and having bought a new pair of trainers( my old trainers were three years old and had no heels left. Apparently this is bad) I will live to see another long distance sprint.Will keep you posted on whether this happens in time to complete the challenge.If not suggestions accepted here for a replacement one!

Number 14:Get my Palm Read

Another challenge completed then and not the most physically taxing of my list. The idea of getting my palm read occurred mainly because a mate of mine Aliwyn, is a top notch palm reader, and also because I thought that at the least it would be very interesting. I meet Ali at a pub in Holborn and she fills me in a bit on the science of palm reading. Basically I realise that shes not going to tell me the exact date of my wedding or next weeks euro millions numbers, rather the possibilities that lie ahead for me,
I must admit that I was relieved to find out I have a strong life line and barring any tragedies I should be able to at least see out this blog. Ali was also able to tell me that my line riddled hand ,that I had often been mocked for as being like a pensioners,  simply meant that I was bursting with energy and creativity. The biggest results of the reading were:
A: I have a feint but readable success line, which many people don't have!
B: I am far too sensitive to ever be a murderer!

So as long as I keep chipping away at the writing lark there is every chance that I may end up doing it professionally one day. In these troubling times for the British economy it was also good to hear that i will always find steady work.After finishing the reading and letting it settle in I actually felt really good. Until I realised that I have no excuses. If the palms had said that it wasn't really my fault I could have resigned my self to a life of self loathing and special brew. The palms have spoken and I have a success line to live up to, one more episode of Scubs and I'll get cracking!Photo below of me and the talented Aliwyn Cole.

Six challenges completed, twenty four to go and now just 110 days till Thirty.

Number 26: Make a Baked Alaska

Some might have looked at this particular challenge and either wondered, Whats that all about? or that's not very hard?depending on their knowledge of North American Ice cream/meringue based cuisine. I have been fascinated by the idea of putting ice cream in the oven since I was about seven years old. A friend of mines step dad used to talk about cooking baked Alaska during his time as a chef in the navy. At the time I thought this guy was a hero. Due to my child like sense of wonder I was willing to over look the fact that this man was responsible for my mates parents messy divorce. He had put some ice cream inside a meringue and put it in an oven, and now he was imparting his knowledge.Who cares if he was an adulterer! I cant remember a lot about what he said, I think it was something about having a really hot oven, but the memory has always stayed with me.

Now twenty two years later I was poised to do the unthinkable myself. I was going to put icecream in the oven!Continuing the Dad based theme, I was cooking with my dad Dai. As a trained medical professional he was just who I needed by my side for this most challenging of culinary tasks. Things were all going well before it came to oven insertion. The process of creating the Alaska involved using a sponge base and using a slightly smaller blob of icecream on top of it. Next I had to create my own meringue which consisted of four egg whites whipped up and mixed with sugar. Despite almost getting "whippers cramp" I accomplished the task and things were looking good. Pictures below of the creating:

So in the oven it went for the prescribed four minutes. I would love to add a picture below of a magnificent looking baked alaska, with bronzed meringue cut into to reveal solid icecream. Alas, while the meringue duly browned it didn't cover the icecream and ended up looking a bit more like this:

As Dai said before eating half of it in about two minutes " We couldn't have tried any harder. So there you have it then, challenge 26 completed if not with any real cooking finesse. Is baked Alaska hard to make? yes. Is it a good idea to put icecream in the oven?no. Did |I eat it all? yes. Anyway it was a nice distraction from all the running I've been doing as I am training hard for my marathon challenge which is coming up on April 16th. As always thanks for reading and remember if you ever get told a story of sea based cooking heroics by your mates stepdad then ask him for some more detailed cooking instructions.

Number 24: Give Blood!

A short and sweet one then as apart from losing a pint of my own claret, this was probably the easiest challenge yet. I rolled into a primary school in Kentish town( that was where the blood donation was being held...I don't just wander round primary schools on the weekend.)feeling a tad apprehensive. I don't have a problem with needles or the sight of blood but tales of feinting after giving  filled my head as I took my place in the queue. It wasn't helped by the table of "zombie" looking types munching on crisps and biscuits who had just donated. A friend who I haven't seen for a while happened to be at the table himself. This is a bloke who cycled to Paris for a laugh one weekend and goes to the gym more than I sleep but he was looking decidedly washed out. I was also taken aback by how medical the whole set up looked. I don't know what I was expecting but in my strange little mind I supposed I had pictured swanning in with a halo wrapped around my bald bonce, getting my finger pricked, and then gliding out, safe in the knowledge that I was a good,good person.Obviously the process of draining a good pint of blood takes a little more effort and after being tested for anemia( I'm already in the clear for aids, Result!)I was processed to wait for a bed. For those squeamish people amongst you look away now, here are a couple of snaps of me pre/post donation:

There we are then, job done!A pint of the finest Naylor juice donated and ready to roll. The actual procedure was very simple and just involved lying down for about five minutes.I was actually proud of how sufficiently manly I was after the blood giving and after a couple of biscuits I was soon sipping a lager with no side effects at all. On a serious note a bloke I chatted too told me that although over 10,000 pints of blood are needed every day only 7% of the people who are elligible to give blood actually do it. Get on it!

Number 4: Swim in Hyde park lake in Speedos

Number four ticked off then and despite a serious amount of genital shrinkage and the embarrassment of having to put on a swim cap I have come out the other side unscathed!Before and after photos posted above.
As you can see by my lobster  like complexion,  it wasn't warm in there.The more experienced old timers in the changing rooms were happy to inform us it was about four degrees. Arriving at Hyde park this morning I was feeling a little bit apprehensive. It was March, It was fresh water, I was going to go in wearing a tiny little speedo. At least I wasn't alone in this adventure though. My erstwhile camera man, partner in dole and "friend" Lee Gant was on hand to offer support. When I mentioned my worry of a shock induced heart attack on entry to the water he said:
" It's actually worse for young people to have a heart attack cos the hearts beating more. You'd be dead within seconds."
Nice one. Our arrival at the Serpentine swimming clubhouse caused a bit of a stir. The gaffer of the club seemed a little hostile and met our enquiry as to where the sign in book was with some brutal sarcasm.
"It's the book that says sign in on the front" he sneered. Don't rest on your laurels with this gagsmith about Ricky Gervais!
The majority of the other members were lovely though, one old dear even lent me her spare swimcap which I was informed was a necessity if you were going to go in. Imagine my horror later on as Gantie went in aunatural after I had taken the plunge looking the a buff member of the coccon cast.
Speedo on, I timidly made my way on blotchy corn beef legs to the water. With the swans waiting there was nothing else to do but get in. I lowered myself in and braced myself for pain. If I'm honest it was absolutely horrible but not as bad as I'd built it up to be in my head. I managed two pathetic widths, all captured on video which i will upload here soon. I lowered myself in and now wish i had gone for the dive although in doing this later Gantie did nearly give himself a self inflicted skin graft due to the shallow water. Getting out of the pool I felt aglow and ready to take on the world until I remembered I was wearing a skin tight speedo and that my penis had shrunk to the size of half a wotsit slumbering on two funsize maltesers. Not to worry though, Challenge number four completed! My only regret is that I didn't nick the swimcap.

Number 25: Host my own pub quiz

Challenge number 25  has been well and truly ticked off, as last night I hosted my first pub quiz at the Marquess tavern in Islington. Having done a bit of stand up and considering myself to have quite a loud voice, I naively assumed that doing a pub quiz would be a doddle. Half an hour into last nights quiz as a red faced Irish man was screaming into my face "whats a fucking Dingbat?", I was beginning to reevaluate that assumption.
My journey into Pub Quiz Mastering began a couple of weeks ago. Whilst scouring the web for any job that would enable me to keep eating, I came across a job description that didn't make me want to kill myself on first read. The next night I'm sat in a pub In Holloway road with Dave and Mike the men behind define entertainment. Basically the lads have set up quizzes in pubs all around the smoke and are doing that well they now need to take on some help. They were satisfied I fitted the bill and for me it importantly ticked off a challenge as well as paid a much needed bit of cash. I mean how hard could it be really. The lads prepare the quizzes, I steam in at 7.45 and let em have it.
The first thing I realised about pub quizzing is that it is quite a serious business to some. A lot of the quizzers in Islington last night were expecting Dave, a genial, relaxed Australian and not a stressed out little Welsh bald bloke who had brought his Dad for support. Whether it was the ten minute wait while I hyperventilated trying to play a song clip or my mispronunciation of the French word for black pudding, some of the punters let me know that I needed to step up. I've never questioned the answer to a pub quiz before but I suppose I was always too arseholed to care by the end anyway.
Halfway through the evening I was starting to flag but then it picked up.I started to throw in a gag or two, the elderly couple who I'd heard say I was badly organised began to smile, the drunk men in the corner stopped challenging every question and the young team who lost by at least twenty points offered me some Monster Munch. They had excepted me! The sneering group of intellectuals who had made me repeat a question four times, started to melt a bit. A table give me two of their milky ways from winning a prize as they could hear my stomach growling. Best of all a bearded old man who had won a hundred pounds treated me and my Dad to a pint.At the end of the quiz I sat a broken man:

But a happy man. Task 25 achieved and some lessons learnt:

Always read the questions through before you do a quiz.If you don't understand them and you are the quiz master, it doesn't breed confidence.
Mother Theresa is from Albania not Austria. This is important.
"Fat kids are harder to kidnap" is quite possibly the best name for a pub quiz team I have ever heard.

So if you are in the Islington area on a Tuesday night, roll down and give me support. Don't enter the quiz though.If you win and they find out you know me, we will both get buried in Hackney marshes.
Slaters xxxxxxxxx

Number 29: Do some volunteering Pleased to be able to tick off my first challenge as I am now officially a fully trained volunteer with Victim Support. It is something I have talked about doing for years as having been a victim of crime myself years ago, I always felt I might actually be of use to someone. Of course,the idea first struck me when I was contacted by victim support as a 17 year old. The volunteer sounded lovely but was clearly an elderly lady. Now, after having completed equality and diversity training I realise I was possibly being very judgemental by assuming that this caring, kindly spoken old lady would have little experience of street fighting. I could be very wrong but I wondered what advice she would offer me on how to get down the shops without being pelted with eggs and bricks for being a grass. Twelve years on I am now in the position to use my empathetic, listening skills with the kids but fear I may now be the out of touch adult on the end of the phone. The beauty and tragedy of Victim Support though is that they don't offer advice. As a volunteer you listen, listen and listen and then pass on some practical information. A valuable service indeed and probably for the best as I do have trouble with realising when to dive in with my opinion and when to keep it buttoned. Anyway, here is a photo of me with one of my victim support training books and the number 29 scrawled on a piece of white paper. Get in there! Of course with David Cameron ushering in the Big Society, I'm sure everyone will be volunteering soon. Whether you want to help victims of crime, keep your local library open or even ensure things are still ticking along in the surgical wards of the local hospital. I fear if I ever have to go under an anesthetic again, the last thing I will see is a chirpy volunteer flicking through a book on heart bypasses as all the surgeons have been laid off. Sweet! One in the bag, 29 to go!

30 things to do before 30

In exactly 150 days I will be 30. I will be considered old enough to be nearing the end of my career if I was a professional athlete, more than old enough to become a Father and little bit too old to go to Magaluf dressed as a Smurf. Before I embrace man boobs and going to Ikea every Saturday I have set myself thirty challenges to tick off. I will be happy to get to July 12th healthy and with all my limbs intact but if I can do this it may slow down my descent into middle age and crown green bowling. Have just worked out that it amounts to doing a challenge every five days so I had better get cracking. I will complete them in random order and try to record some video or photo evidence to upload on here. The challenges are:

1. Do a sky dive
2. Learn more about the middle east.
3. Run marathon distance.
4. Swim in Hyde park in speedos
5. Write to five people I admire.
6. Learn how to juggle
7. Climb a British Mountain
8. Sleep rough for a night.
9. Do 5000 push ups in a week
10. Run the 100m in less than 15 seconds
11. Learn basic sign language
12. Get an article published
13. Grow something and eat it
14. Learn one impressive magic trick
15. Learn and remember the capital cities of 50 randomly selected countries.
16. Bench press 100kg once
17. Do something nice for someone who genuinely deserves it.
18. Do a charity shop pub crawl
19. Watch the godfather trilogy back to back
20. Cook a three course meal and get marked on it.
21. Learn one impressive magic trick.
22. Hold a friends baby
23. Get a good tattoo
24. Give blood
25. Host my own pub quiz
26. Make a baked alaska
27. Put a 50 quid bet on
28. Make a video for my song male pattern bald
29. Do some voluntary work
30. Do a one hour stand up show based on this list

I ummed and aahhed about trying heroin but thought it would be a bit pricey. If you're reading this and can juggle, are up for climbing Ben Nevis or Snowdon, want to run a bit of the marathon with me or have a certainty for the bet give me a holla.

Thanks for reading, have a good Saturday. Slaters xxx

Hello

Alright? Welcome to what I hope will be a waste of neither of our lives, rather a bit of a laugh and an opportunity to share a bit of writing. I have had an account on here since 2008 and haven't actually written anything, hence the title. I have always feared blogs a little bit, mainly because they can sometimes sum up how self involved people have got these days. I will endeavour to always write something entertaining and amusing up here and steer clear of updating you on my eating habits, opinions on things I'm not really informed about or intention to self harm.
I am currently looking for a job so the regularity of these updates will differ according to whether I'm interviewing, desperately looking for work or weeping into my duvet and watching Scrubs. I am 30 in five and a half months and that will probably be a recurring feature of these updates.At the moment I am working on a list of 30 things to do before I hit the big one and will post it on here as impetus to actually tick a few off. Most of you will know who I am and what I do but if you don't I aspire to write and perform sketch comedy, have a girlfriend who is far too fit for me and I am male pattern bald.
As you can see the background for this piece is a lovely, bubbly pint of lager. It's not ironic, I do enjoy the taste of lager and will probably have one later.
Cheers for popping in, hope I can brighten up a lunch break or two at some point. Slaters. xx