A lovely weekend

This weekend I have had an absolutely wonderful time and something happened that made me very, very happy.

Unfortunately I have been slapped with what passes for a Super Injuction around these parts, and a fate worse than incarceration will befall me if I share it with you.

So unless you know any MPs who feel the need to make a stand on a point of principle, you'll just have to wait until it leaks out on Twitter.

NDC

14,974 Days

Tomorrow marks the end of my 41st year on the planet. This is a huge surprise to me.

Not the fact that it's my birthday, as I've noticed they seem to happen around the same time every year and hence this time I was ready for it.

No, the thing that surprises me about this particular birthday is the fact that I've managed to accrue 41 of them.

In my twenties I was always genuinely of the belief that I would be boxed up and slowly reverting to my constituent parts before I was 30, based on my adrenaline addiction and a quite alarmingly under developed sense of self-preservation.Yet here I am. I survived 50mph rides on car roofs. I survived emulating my teenage hero Carl Fogarty. I survived some quite alarming parties. I even survived some pretty scary girlfriends' ex's.*

In my thirties I was far too busy climbing corporate ladders and generally having a high old time jetting around Europe persuading people to see things my way to notice my singular failure to be Pushing Up The Daisies. A friend took a good go at Throwing a Six on his motorbike and I sold mine as a consequence. It was replaced by mountains and I survived numerous miscalculations relating to both my climbing abilities and navigational skills.

So here I stand in my Forties. I'm glad that I was as wrong about my own judgement day as Harold Camping was about everybody else's because I've been having an absolute blast. The last year has been full of highs and lows, but right now I see the future as being somewhere I am very much looking forward to visiting.

NDC

* - If at some point in the future The Boy Wonder is reading this post, none of the aforementioned tales are true. They have all been made up for effect. You should not, under any circumstances, do any of these things. They are bad. 
Love, Dad.

Maslow

Today I feel truly loved.

No witty comments, no punchline, no smart-arsed remarks.

Simply that.

NDC

People say graffiti is ugly, irresponsible and childish. But that’s only if it’s done properly.

I love grafitti.

Not the brainless daubing of some feckless youth with time to kill and too little imagination to assasinate it properly*, but the kind of grafitti that has been considered, the kind of grafitti that catches you out, makes you think, makes you smile. Yes I know that it is, at a basic level, pretty much vandalism. Yes I know that it is illegal. Yes I know that someone (most likely me, via my council tax) will have to pay for it to be removed.

Despite all of these things I still love it. I love the idea that someone has been struck by a thought and has been so desperate to share it with the world that they have risked censure (and possibly a fine) to get it out there. I wonder whether the author/artist/vandal concerned felt the need to put paint to wall because they were concerned that the rest of society might be in peril without their sage words, or whether they just thought we could all do with a laugh.

Whatever the motivation, I'm glad the person who created (perpetrated?) the example I saw on my way into work this morning took the time to enlighten us all. Their insight worked for me on both humorous and philosophical levels. I take my hat of to him or her, I just hope with all my heart the comedic aspect was intentional. It said, in large capital letters on the side of a railway bridge, with stark simplicity:

LIF IS SHORT

And you can't really argue with that, can you?

NDC

* - There are exceptions to this rule. I used to drive past a bus shelter on which someone had written THEIR OWN NAME, realised they'd misspelt it, scored it out and then tried again. I laughed every single time I saw it, until the council spoiled the fun by painting over it.

Sticky Fingers

On Wednesday evening I had spare time. This is always a dangerous thing for me. The phrase "The Devil Makes Work For Idle Hands" could have been written with me in mind.

I could have done a million and one useful things. I had a pile of washing to do, I could have listed all the crap that I have to offload on Ebay, I could have got some actual work done. Hell, I could have spent time considering solutions to the current strife in the Middle East. I could have. But did I?

No.

Instead I sat mesmerised by this;





Now that the need to stay completely injury-free is gone I can resist no longer. Climbing shoes, chalkbag and lairy shorts have been located and stuffed into a rucksack. My outdoors partner in crime is up for it. Leicester climbing wall is making sure the local A&E is on speed dial.

I wish I could say that I will be recreating the athletic beauty and explosive power of those in this video but I suspect that the summary of my first climb in a long time next week will more likely be "Short on ability, long on entertainment".

Leo Houlding is probably not concerned.

NDC