"If you can't say anything nice...

... don't say anything at all" is what I was always taught as a child but it seems there are more and more people around these days who have never been told such a thing. And the large majority of them seem to be men.

There are also too many of these neanderthal types around who take it a step too far and rather than saying anything, they use their fists or weapons to get their point across but we won't dwell on these wastes of space here.


I have a friend who is a massive gym bunny and took a week off to give herself a bit of a rest. On returning to the gym she was asked if she'd "been on holiday cos she looked like she'd put at least 5lbs on" whilst running on a treadmill at the gym. A month later the same idiot seemed to think it was flattering to approach her mid workout to tell her how much better she looked for having toned up!

At work I was recently shouted at by an angry Scottish man for doing something I do everyday and that has been done for two and half years just to try and assert some authority over another person.

I have also been called a "f*cking lazy bitch" by somebody I had only encountered ten minutes before because I dared to say I was happy in my job and would be if I was still doing it in ten years time. I admit this has shaken me, partly because I feel he touched a nerve and maybe was right.

I find things have gone down hill and there is such a massive lacking in chivalry thanks to all the campaigning for equality. Women need to accept that we are no longer the fairer sex if we want the same rights in pay and want to be respected in male dominated jobs and cultures.

There is also a huge Influx of immigrants now whose culture dictates women are lesser beings. As we are told more often to become more multi cultural, this ideal begins to rub off on others and we begin to lose the standards the country was always known for.

A lack of jobs and reliance on benefits creates a culture of people who underestimate their own self worth so bitterness begins to creep in and is dealt with by putting others down.

I like driving in my car...

I've been a driver for eleven years or so now and was wondering, when did they stop making cars with indicators? Should I have retaken my driving test at some point so that I learnt the power of telepathy? When did it become a rule that you don't have to stop at red lights? And when did it become acceptable to park on double yellow lines or across somebody's driveway?

There is so much bad driving around now that I'm beginning to think that is the norm and the original rules are wrong. 


Speed limits are there for a reason but whilst I'm against speeding I'm also against the people who insist on dawdling along doing less than they are allowed to. Surely this is just as dangerous?

The worst offenders are the ones who are responsible for the safety of their passengers for a living. Taxi drivers. It's as if, when they get their taxi license they are being given the freedom of the road and they no longer have to abide by laws and rules set by the highway agency. They're worse than emergency vehicles which speed and weave through traffic when trying to get to a serious incident.

It makes me so mad that there is this huge lack of respect for other people and their safety so I'm all for traffic and parking wardens. I'd love the job of going around ticketing mercedes, bmw's, audis and 4x4's owned by people that are unable to park them and struggle to drive them. It isn't difficult to park between two white lines that have a distance between them big enough to fit a tank. It's bloody lazy.

And then there's cyclists. Never mind "drivers should have more respect for cyclists." It's the pedestrians who dare to cross the road whilst a cyclist chooses to cut through a red light, or the pedestrian who refuses to move out the way whilst a cyclist weaves along the FOOTpath who should have more respect...

It's a small world after all...

It really is in the mind of Walt Disney. Small and strange and living in a colonial time warp!

When most people think of getting married and booking a honeymoon they think of an exotic destination. Of spending two weeks in a sun-soaked bliss. Two weeks somewhere remote where it is just the two of you.

We're not most people. This may be obvious with us marrying in Vegas and having a photo of the wedding party taken on a rollercoaster. 

After a final day, and the first day as a married couple, spent shopping and watching basketball in a sports bar at the Mandalay Bay we caught the "red eye" to Florida. A horrific six hours later we landed in a rain soaked Orlando and grabbed the Disney Magical Express to our Carribean Beach resort hotel. Shattered and unimpressed we checked into our themed hotel, to be told our room wasn't ready but we were being upgraded to one that was.

Sadly, that wasn't as spectacular as you would imagine it to be. We were faced with a pirate themed room that had two double beds that looked like ships, stacked crates instead of drawers and a bathroom separated from the rest of the room by a curtain that featured a large skull and crossbones on it. How romantic!

I had an amazing time during the ten days spent staying within the Disney World resort and I would encourage everybody to go and visit at some point. I'd just discourage them from taking kids. It is not a place for kids! Everyday we seemed to encounter more and more unhappy, overweight families who were annoyed with each other and everything that surrounded them. Three and four generations of family were all trying to convince each other they were there for their children when all the time they were there for themselves but couldn't enjoy it because then it would show.

Thanks to the fast pass tickets you can get from staying in a Disney resort I feel we made the most of our experience and did everything that we possibly could. We saw fireworks and light shows at the major parks, including the hugely popular Star Wars fireworks to celebrate May the 4th. We did every ride and show we could get away with without having children with us. Some we did more than once. We saw all of the parades including the Magic Kingdom parade day and night. We had a day by the pool because, sadly, we couldn't find space to sit at the water parks. We swam with dolphins and watched Shamu at Sea World. We saw wild animals on the safari and ate at the Rainforest Cafe at Animal Kingdom before having our photo taken under the tree of life and getting drenched on the rapids. We ate way too much food and consumed more fizzy pop than is healthy.

And we left with the message that America is great and better than the rest of the world... f*ck yeah!

Going to the Chapel and we're, gonna get married...

I should apologise for the three month gap on this blog. I'd like to say those three months were a blur and that wedding planning and an actual wedding were the reason for them missing but sadly I can't. I can possibly pass May off as being lost in wedding oblivion but that's pushing it after the first 19 days.

In fairness I can't really blame wedding planning for taking up any of my time because honestly, it took up barely any. If you want a wedding without the hassle, go abroad and do it!

We were engaged for over two years but halfway through I had a wobble and cancelled the first wedding that was booked in favour of skipping off to Vegas.

I was beginning to feel there were too many family politics and too much expense in doing something that included everyone and pleased everyone but me. However, thousands of miles away I still ended up with people I'd have left at home. That makes me sound ungrateful, but I can assure you, I'm not. I'm glad those people were able to come and share our special day and I appreciate the lengths they went to to be there. It's just frustrating when you invite two people and they feel the need to bring an entourage.

Anyway, the wedding was perfect. Not entirely perfect but we had the most amazing day with a ceremony that wasn't as cold as expected, a gorgeous venue (even if it is in the middle of a highway at the end of the Las Vegas strip) and a bit of a pub crawl with the people who mean the most to us.

Getting married at the Little Church of the West is highly recommended. You have a half hour time slot in which you and your intended meet in the car park, sign in at reception, get told what to do a lot by a photographer, have a short ceremony and pose for lots of photo's which you then get to view and purchase before being sent off into the world of newly married bliss. At which point we went to the 'Welcome to Las Vegas' sign and had loads more photo's taken by a complete stranger who's job it was to make sure people queued politely.

From here we headed to Hard Rock cafe for a three course meal, really strong cocktail and heart felt speeches. Then it was on to the Brew pub at Monte Carlo for some British beer before we a selection of us ended up on the Rollercoaster at New York New York. *Apologies to everybody we pushed in front of in order to get the whole group together and shame on the two Americans that crashed our photo* Sadly Coyote Ugly was too busy for some of our impatient group so we didn't stay long enough to enjoy the entertainment before catching the tram back to Mandalay Bay and going up to the Mix Lounge. A great way to end a wonderful day.

Back home two weeks later and we finally got to celebrate our special day with all the people that couldn't make it/ weren't invited but still mean a hell of a lot to us.


*none of these photographs were actually taken by me

Maybe tomorrow...

...I'll actually go to a gig and not end up standing behind some idiot who insists on talking the entire way through the band we have all paid good money to go and watch. 

Sadly, the prat and his obviously very knew girlfriend who I had to endure at the Empress Ballroom were the worst I have ever come across. Maybe I should have been a little less British and polite and told them to just jog on rather than letting them spoil my enjoyment of an 'intimate' album preview.

Anyone who's been to a gig at the prestigious Blackpool venue will know that unless you are front row or on the balcony your best chance of a view is to stand on the step at the back. Being teeny tiny, this is always my choice. 

As it was an album preview there were a lot of new songs that many people were not familiar with. As this couple chose to talk through everything that hadn't previously been released as a single I can only assume their tickets were freebies.

This was the set list:
We share the same sun
Superman
A thousand treesGraffiti on the train
Iindian summer
Live n love
Wouldn't believe your radio
Bartender and the thief
Been caught cheating
Maybe tomorrow
Catacomb
Mo ones perfect
Vegas two times
Violins and tambourines
Could you be the one
Have a nice day
More life in a tramps vest
Just looking

Local boy in the photograph
Roll the dice

In a moment

Mr writer

Dakota

Due to an unseasonably cold and snowy March it was touch and go as to whether or not we would make the gig but thankfully we did and we had an amazing time.

I'm a Belieber...

Actually, I'm really not.

I don't understand this young man and what direction he's trying to take his life in. It's not long since I last posted a blog about him but in a few months he's really excelled himself at being a first class prat.

Not only is he still turning up hours late for concerts and seemingly not caring how this affects his young fans, but he has been seen dancing outside his tour bus whilst wearing a onesie. Onesie's are only ever to be worn in bed. They should never be worn in public, unless you are a newborn baby. 

He has also decided he no longer wants his pet monkey and has told German authorities to rehome it in a zoo. Which they have now done. How very irresponsible. What's more irresponsible is that he now owns another monkey. wtf!?

From one irresponsible event to another that is actually mildly amusing, the time he got caught speeding around a housing estate by some athlete built like the hulk who he ran and hid from! That's how big a man Justin Bieber is, hiding behind his money.

He's been caught spitting at his fans and now wants the photographic evidence of it banned from the internet. He has been caught smoking suspicious looking cigarettes. He has been in trouble for underage drinking in clubs and then for causing mass brawls with other club goers. He has also had a brief relationship with a Las Vegas lap dancer and still, for some inexplicable reason, all this moronic behaviour hasn't stopped Selena Gomez following him round like a puppy.

Me and My Monkey...

The Justin Bieber meltdown seems to be continuing in spectacular fashion as the air-head teen has now landed himself in trouble for smuggling his pet monkey from America to Germany without it's legal papers. 


How the Hell!? What the Hell!?

To begin with, how does somebody get a pet monkey? And secondly, what possesses you to take it on tour with you?

Have the parents of child stars learnt nothing form Michael Jackson!?

It's seven years since this young singer, song-writer, producer, musician and actor (his description, not mine) burst on to the scene with  a you tube video of him performing other people's music as an enthusiastic twelve year old. But it seems the seven year itch has well and truly caught him.

In recent months Bieber has been dumped by a Disney starlet who made him cry, attacked several photographers, turned up late for his own concerts upsetting his army of child fans, has been thrown out of a nightclub for trying to take his underage mates with him, has been photographed smoking something he probably shouldn't, has been accused of assaulting a neighbour and has been booted out of one of the poshest hotels in Paris for "unruly behaviour"

And if further proof was needed that he isn't right in the head, he now compares himself to jay z...

So the tour is still continuing around Europe and the boy is still on his mini meltdown turning up two and a half hours late for yet another concert and throwing tantrums because he now wants his pet monkey back.