Dangers of an Idle Mind

We left at ten minutes to nine in the morning. The city took sympathy on us and did its best to let us out painlessly, unlike when we had arrived seven days earlier. There is no other city I have seen where the skyline does so much to define its nature. At times it seems so compact you could imagine it is inside the glass dome of a snow-globe, just waiting to be shaken up. As we drove down the Kennedy, the monumental buildings increased in size as we passed by their feet, until we got to Sears Tower. Then faster than they had grown they fell away again. The Kennedy became the Dan Ryan and the soullessly named US Cellular Field appeared on our right. After that it was foot down and head for Indiana. We turned 90 degrees at the bottom of Lake Michigan, the sun shone and the lake was sparkling blue in the distance. We left Illinois via the Chicago Skyway. Sounding futuristic and romantic, the reality is the heavy industrial iron design of the bridge never allows you the feeling that you a...

After Saturday I decided to look up the definition of anticlimax . It said: 'An event, period, or outcome that is strikingly less important or dramatic than expected.' And given the definition I guess the end of the world not happening could be classed as a bit of an anticlimax. The calendar did roll over to a new number (see picture) which I am assuming means 100. If that is the case then we must assume the end of the world is probably 900 days away. So the apocalypse is officially rescheduled, by my Hyundai, to a new date of October 26th 2010. I'll try and remember to remind you the day before. Couple of other points. There a fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist Muslims but you never hear of fundamentalist Atheists Last night on the TV news the new reader said that Ford were recalling thousands of their trucks ‘because of problems with their ho’s’ does Eliot Spitzer have a Ford then? In professional and school life we are taught there is no such thing as a stupid...

Just checked the calendar in the car and it reads Feb99th so just wanna wish you all the best for tomorrow. I have noticed that the calendar changes at 1pm Eastern so you Brits have got a bit more time whilst the Californians have 'til about 10am. Anyway enjoy it - I was gonna video the end of the world but I'm not sure I can be bothered. (Confused? See here and here and here ) <Enter stunningly witty and clever tagline here> Bazza

Boarding the plane in London it was hard to miss the festive bunting and banners that the crew had placed all around the aircraft. ‘Happy Retirement’ was the theme of the day. Now I don’t know about you but in any film or book you watch or read, when it is someone’s last day, well you know what happens – they die!!!! They never make it. From Catch 22 to Ed McBain, they die. So when the purser announced it was the final trip of Captain Bob, the pilot, it was all I could do not to scream “We’re doomed. We’re doomed!”

Somewhere over South Eastern Canada the blue outside my oval window became grey and the plane flew on. On my iPod the Thievery Corporation filled in the aural space with rich, compressed full-range sound. Out of the window I looked upwards and there was grey. I looked back and there was grey. I looked forward and down; grey. And the plane droned on. Thievery Corporation became A Girl Called Eddy, Ivy then Embrace and the plane flew on – still enveloped in grey. The iPod started on Massive Attack and I wondered if we would ever see anything again. What if ATC had forgotten about us and we had no place to land. Would we spend eternity suspended in bleakness? Was this what happened to pilots – they didn’t retire they are just held in an endless holding pattern? When the New York suburbs did suddenly appear they were alarmingly close and were followed almost instantly by the hatched markings at the start of the runway. The ceiling must have been less than 200 feet. I hope pilot Bob got ho...

Last ‘my kids’ story for a while – I promise. Back in 2002 I took Spud to his first major sporting event. It was a Cubs against the Cardinals baseball game at Wrigley Field. Spud had been playing Backyard Baseball, the PC game, for a year or so and knew enough about baseball to follow what was happening on the field. It was a bright and warm August afternoon as the Spudster and I settled into our seats, which were behind home plate about half way up the second tier. Spud was 6 and had never been to any type of big sporting event before (closest was a single A game the year before). It was a great experience, we did all the things kids love about baseball games. We had cotton candy, soda, peanuts and I even got him the ubiquitous foam claw. The early innings passed with Spud getting acquainted with the mechanics of a ball game. The peanut throwing, Wrigley’s skanky toilets etc. but we soon settled to watch the actual game. Almost immediately the Cardinals star batter stepped up to the p...

Every parent has a s tory of h ow their children have embarrassed them and here is mine. Back at the end of the summer in 1996 I lived in a small village in Essex, England. That summer had seen the Olympics in Atlanta, an explosion over the Atlantic of a Paris-bound TWA plane and England were beaten by arch rivals Germany in the Euro 96 semi-finals. Oasis and Blur dominated the UK airwaves. By September 1996 my family consisted of my wife, a two year old boy referred to as Moochy and a six month old who become to be known as Spud. Oh, and a nameless Goldfish too. Moochy was as cute as any two year old ever was. He had a shock of white hair and big blue eyes. Overall he was a pretty happy kid. The only concern we had was that he was having some problems with talking, most of the things he was saying were pretty unintelligible but at least he was trying. The story takes place one Sunday afternoon. Spud and his mother were both taking an afternoon nap and I decided Moochy and I should do ...