Anyway, that’s not why I’m here.

It’s been almost a year since we lost our friend Hazey, he’s still the most prolific blogger on here, I think maybe we should stop when someone gets one behind him.

So we published his blogs as a book, we got together at the SOL in his memory, some of us (not me, obviously) did some athletic stuff in his name, and each of us carried on with our private thoughts, thoughts of how he may, or may not have changed us.

When we were talking about the book with Hazey, he told me about an email he’d had from a regular SMB poster who’d been so affected by his musings. I read the full email, and knowing who the poster is, formed a totally different opinion of him, it’s amazing how our board personas become what people know us by.

Someone else wrote to him last November and that person has agreed to let me quote the email in full here as a reminder of just what he meant to us and just what he contributed to our lives in those days last winter:

 Well, this is an interesting way to meet someone. I find it rather bizarre to say hello and, perhaps, goodbye all in one letter. I don’t even know what to say to you; I just know I must say something. Though it’s difficult, I’ll try to be on good behavior and use polite language, as I wouldn’t like to embarrass xxxxx  or for you to question his taste in women. ;-)

You know I read all of your posts, so I feel I’ve come to know you a bit. I really do look forward to my daily dose of shite and beauty, so eloquently intertwined within each blog. It’s a lovely amalgamation, Hazey. I was going to try to compliment the attitude that you’ve held through all of this and was thinking of describing it as graceful, but jeez…with the incessant talk of shite and c*nts, ummm….maybe grace doesn’t properly depict it. ;-) Just kidding, of course, as it is most difficult to offend me, especially as you curse with such creativity; it’s impressive, really. I will say, though, that your poetry is truly beautiful. I started copying and pasting it into a doc from the very first one. You are obviously an amazing man and you’re putting up an amazing fight; it’s very hard for me to believe that you might not actually win. If you don’t mind, I’m going to continue to refuse to believe that you won’t.

I know you told me not to cry. If you can’t stay, I can’t promise that I won’t cry for the dreadful loss of you, though I can promise some sincere tears of joy for you, too. Like you, I believe you’ll be going to a much, much better place. And you clearly deserve it.  

You know something that really strikes me, and I love this, is that you never have asked “why me?” I always hate when people do that. Why the f*ck not you? Not you, Hazey, but you know what I mean. Perhaps you’ve asked why so young, but never why not someone else instead of me. It’s wonderment to me, why someone such as yourself, who really “gets it”, should be denied a long and splendid life. You are a perfect example of one that deserves to remain, enjoying the magnificence of it all. It’s such a shame that so many people can’t appreciate life and the world and cannot see the vast gorgeousness before them. My pseudo theory on this one is that maybe that’s exactly why you; you get it. That’s it, you’re done here, you’ve got it all figured out so it’s time to leave this world to be with God. Seems as fair a guess as any, I suppose.  

I wish I knew you…. I do in a small way, but I mean really. You know something that is pretty sad, but true, is that I think maybe I know more about how you feel about life, love, nature and existence than most of the men I’ve known. I wonder why we (the men in my family and I) don’t know other each other better. That’s sad and scary and poses all sorts of serious questions to self. Have you always been open like this? Or was it instead once faced with your mortality you began to offer yourself up and bare it all? All the worthless self-consciousness and lame egotistical bullshit aside, here it is, like it or not. I should imagine that would be quite liberating; a totally honest and uninhibited life. Maybe I’ll take a lesson. 

Forgive me for saying it, but I cannot even begin to fathom how much your lovely Liz is going to miss you. I’m a stranger, and only know you through xxxxx  in this very small way and have for such a brief time, but I’ll miss you tremendously. The tears on my face at this moment are not at all tears of joy, but I’m selfish and I’m not ready for you to go. Nobody is, barring you. Xxxxx  and I want you and Liz to meet us in New Orleans for proper, face to face introductions and several large G & Ts!  

I know you say you’ve been a right c*nt many times and to many people in your life, but it seems to me that perhaps you’ve redeemed yourself in that you have given much to many during this time in your life. Lots of people say you’ve inspired them. I’ll agree that you’ve inspired me to kick my own ass and to quit being a whiny tit about much of the insignificant….all the small stuff that just isn’t worth the worry. I’ve always seen the world’s beauty; it’s in no way lost on me, but the pressures of life can really get to me sometimes. Quite the contrast when you compare it to no life at all, isn’t it? I’ve often been stupidly self-absorbed and caught up in the meaningless, so thanks for the kick in the head; it has certainly altered perspective for me. 

Well, Hazey, I know xxxxx  warned you that I would be tempted to write you a book, so you had to have been expecting this ramble. More simply put, I could have just said that I think the world is a better place with you in it so…. please don’t go.  

I found that very powerful. 

I don’t get across to the UK often so after the SOL get together, the next visit was in November, for a trade show and family get together. (And the Bolton game – less said about that the better) 

On the second day I was in London I decided to head out to Teynham on the train, catching the 9:40 from Victoria and settling down towards the back of the train in peace and quiet. After 90 minutes we arrived in Teynham and I started walking the couple of miles from the village towards the Deerton Natural Burial Ground where I figured I could carry on the conversations I’d started a year or so before. 

Upon arrival I had the overpowering need to take a shite and managed to make sure the door to the Portaloo in the field was held shut as I did what I needed to do, very quickly. 

Liz had provided me with a map of the field, a wonderfully tranquil place that will be so beautiful as the trees they’ve planted mature. 

As I crossed over to the far right hand corner of the field  I began to smile to myself, suddenly I could think of nothing to say. What on earth do I say to the man who’d brought so much laughter, and tears? 

So, as I walked up to Hazey’s grave, I said the only thing I could think of: “Hello Bonny Lad, sorry I’m late”

Some of the natives here have funny little ways. T & I and two friends were out for a meal at one of Houston’s “finest” (allegedly) restaurants last week. The restaurant was OK but the sommelier was particularly entertaining. A wee balding chap, he reminded me of Richard Gere’s lawyer in Pretty Woman, but very camp.

We ordered pre dinner drinks and I went for a G&T. The barman couldn’t understand my accent, or was deaf and asked me to repeat my order. I did and he looked confused. What’s a G? he asked. At this point, T translated for me and told him it’s Gin.

So he poured me a Gin and Tea!

 I was sent a meeting invite yesterday morning, the meeting title was “Fish Stories” I couldn’t resist accepting. When I arrived I realised straight away why the title. Most of the participants were colleagues from one of our other offices who had been evacuated from their homes. Yes, it’s hurricane time in New Orleans again.

Although most of their homes are without power, and our facility over there is closed, happily no one has been hurt and things seem to be generally intact.

I love that city, it has such a vibrant atmosphere and it’s just about back on it’s feet after Katrina (just about), so I was so sorry to see that 90% of residents were evacuated and a dusk to dawn curfew put into place.

Fingers crossed it will be back to normal very quickly.

And let’s hope Hurricane Ike stays out at sea.

Briefly, I'm in Frankfurt.

I endured a 9 hour flight from Houston overnight on Lufthansa, the food was good, and the seat folded down into a flat bed so when I say endured, I actually mean "slept through".

But now I'm in the business lounge of Terminal 1B at Frankfurt getting slowly pissed as I await my conection to Dubai. I can't understand why they booked my on this route as there's now a direct flight from Houston to Dubai with Emirates (great business class too) which is $1000 cheaper than they paid for this one.

Now normally, I'd make a week out of a visit to the UAE, visit friends etc. But not this time. My meeting was arranged at short notice and it's one of those I just can't get out of. So I'm staying less than 48 hours before another trek home to Houston.

Why? Simple. My daughter is currently in Charles De Gaulle terminal 2E on her way to Houston to stay with me for a couple of weeks. It's the first time she's flown by herself and I'm on the phone to her every 20 minutes making sure she knows where she's going and has everythig she needs in the way of boarding pass, pen, return ticket to show the awkward immigration occifer at IAH etc.

I'm worrying for nowt, probably, she seems to be having funspending my money, but I kow how CDG is and I don't envy her  that connection.

Happily, T will pick her up at the airport and they'll hang out together roud the pool for a couple of days until I get back.

I can't wait!

Greenfield Comprehensive in Newton Aycliffe is poorer from tonight.

About a week after I took her to Sugar Hill for her first day at school, my daughter has completed her GCSE’s and left school. She’ll go to QE 6^th Form in Darlington from September, but for now, she’s chilling.

Between shifts.

It really does seem like a few days since I took her to Sugar Hill school for her 1^st day, Between then and now her mother left, I spent 7 years as a single dad.

Happily, her mother and I are on good terms and when the time came, after being made redundant and having to move to Scotland to find work, the bairn was able to live with her mother and see me regularly and often.

So then I move to America.

I miss her terribly of course. From the day she walked from my house in Aycliffe to her Mam’s car, and every day since when we haven’t shared those father & daughter daft moments, I’ve missed her.

I get back 3 or 4 times a year and she comes across here when we can do it. She’s working at a local restaurant and saving. Saving for July, when I’m bringing her over here for the first time this year. Her and a pal.

2 sixteen year old girls living with us for 3 weeks, that’s going to be interesting.

The day before she arrives I have to be in Dubai for a meeting, so Tracey will enjoy finding gigs for the girls and talking bullshit.

I can’t wait to see her.

And now for more thunder………….

It’s been 7 weeks since it rained, that’s officially a drought, but this evening, just before dusk, it thundered, it poured, the plants came back to life.

We’d expected the weather,  it was in Oklahoma this morning when I watched the local news, heading south. They’ve had floods all along the course of the Mississippi, from the great lakes south,

So, in Houston this morning it's 100 degrees plus and we’re sweating.

After work, I hear a rumbling and I know we’re on our way. There’s a flash, a crack, and the heavens open.

As the storm grows, and my plants finally get their rainwater, the noise grows, it’s overhead.

The Bewick’s Wren that’s nesting in my hanging basket is spooked, he’s building his nest and flits about the garden, into the Pecan tree, which sheds a branch. The red bellied woodpecker is not pecking, he’s hiding in the tree. The squirrel, as usual, finds a bit of dry bark and holds tight.

Luna, who has always been frightened of thunder, heads for the wardrobe, I head outside into the rain. G & T in hand.

There’s a Robin, in the middle of the lawn, just soaking it up, he’s loving it.

After half an hour the thunder and lighting subsides, for a while, and my mood changes. I’m always slightly disappointed at the end of a thunderstorm, but we’re now bathed in the most wonderful golden light, The Magnolia tree in the front garden is in bloom and the flowers catch the sunlight and shimmer gold instead of white. The lawn suddenly comes to life and as I step into the golden sunset again, the temperature has dropped by about 20 degrees. There’s a warmth, a heaviness, in the air and I know another storm will be along later tonight.

For now, the Blue Jay catches the setting sun and glistens the brightest blue I’ve seen. Lu emerges from the wardrobe.

The storm has gone, for now. The light, the sound, the atmosphere, make me want to write, to pick up a camera or a paintbrush, and be creative.

I love storms, but T has just served up baked artichoke, and for now, my creativity is subdued, I must have dinner.

Even though I now live 6000 miles from home, I’m saddened, disgusted, angry, that we rolled over and let the black & whites outplay us in the 1^st half.

I still think we’ll be OK but we really should be beating teams like that. ;-)

My “N” key has come off my laptop so I have to hit the space where it used to be to get the letter n to appear, sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t so if this reads stragely, you’ll kow why. I could, of course, retrospectively put all the ns in, but that would spoil the fun.

Colours, or colors, as I’m over here. That’s what I was wanting to talk about today.

My back garden (yard, as they say here) is lawned, with a pecan tree in the middle, but not much colour. Yesterday, I wet to the nursery and bought a couple of hudred dollars worth of plants. So, in preparation for the family arrivig on Thursday, my fence is lined with flowers, red, white, red, white, etc.

My pecan tree has finally got some leaves on it so is showing a bit of green, at last, I thought it was dying.

I bought a book yesterday, I fact I bought two, but I’ll come back to that.

Birds of Texas, a field guide, is the first I bought. I have a couple of grey birds in my garden, but whe the sun catches them they’re the most wonderful iridescent blue. They’ve intrigued me since I arrived had I had no idea what they were. Blue Jays it seems, beautiful.

But as I was sitting outside smarting over our defeat, I noticed something on the tree: a red bellied woodpecker going about its day.

Common grackles have a blue head and a gold/black body, depending on the light. They also fight a lot in my garden, it’s obviously mating season. The Norther Cardinal is bright red, and lives I my front garden.

Then of course we have a couple of birds that aren’t indigenous, but were introduced into Central Park by the British I the 1890s and now cover the whole of the USA. Starlings and Spuggies may not be glamourous but hey, they remind me of home so they’re welcome around here. It’s like the revenge of the Red Squirrel by proxy.

I’ve been sat on my patio for a couple of hours and have just twigged that there must be a queue at IAH, or George Bush International Airport. For the last hour there have bee some very big, very low flyig aircraft over here. It’s rare that we see any aircraft at all in this part of tow, but to be able to read the writing on the side is almost unknown.

The other book I bought was “The Audacity of Hope” by Barack Obama. Rarely has a politician intrigued me the way this guy does. If he means what he says I very much hope he gets to the White House. BUT, what a crap title, I suppose he has to be inspirational and that sort of thing will appeal to the American public, but I can’t help thinkig it’s just naff.

It did, however, encourage me to read another book. One I’ve read before and ejoyed immensely.

If someone is going to call a book “the xxxxx of xxxxx” they’ll have to go a long way to beat the title of the book I’m about to start: “The Salmon of Doubt”

How I miss Douglas Adams.

Can’t sleep.

It’s been a good day, on the whole.

The morning was spent at the Richmond Arms drinking Bloody Mary and watching the mighty red and whites demolish some team from the Midlands.

A very good result.

I spent the game with a chap by the name of Martin, a Sunderland supporter from Hertfordshire who’s working in Houston and had heard the Arms was the place to watch the footy. It was pretty quiet. There were the two of us, some Man City supporters watching their game against Bolton and a couple of Americans in Newcastle shirts trying to work out the rules of the game and commenting on what was clearly a different type of sport to the one we know.

There was a third Mag in the pub, a proper one, and we got talking at half time. He was commenting on what we should do if we stay up, and accepted in good humour, our comments about what they should do if they actually manage to survive.

Happily, when Chopra scored, we made a lot of noise and the Mag came across from his part of the pub to see what was going on. He waited a minute or two to see the replay of the goal and moved back to his spot.

Meaning he missed Owen’s goal.

Ho hum.

I bought a grill this week, a barbeque to you and I. Three gas burners on one side and another gas burner as a “side burner”. T’s God daughter came for dinner so we decided to grill something and christen it.

It turns out she’s a veggie so we ended up grilling veggie burgers. We spent the evening talking about angry cattle and farming of veal.

I’m very much more concerned about what I eat since I moved here, given the crappy farming methods and the additives the put in everything, not to mention the GM food.

So I’ve REALLY made an effort to ensure I eat only organic food and never touch the chicken. Organic food over here doesn’t have the following it does in Europe so it’s not easy to find. Thank heavens for Whole Foods – the only shop I can rely on to get me good food. The do great sausages too, most unusual for this country.

Tomorrow I’m decorating my bathroom, or at least T is decorating my bathroom and I’ll hold the paint, I’m crap at painting, unless of course it’s on canvas, more of which in the coming weeks. I’ve been asked to put paint to canvas and produce a 6ft square work based on one of my photographs. I need to interpret it in a way I see fit and express my artistry.

Not a clue where to start yet, but it’ll come.

It’s 3am and I’m snacking on corned beef and Branston pickle – yes you can get it here if you look hard enough, What was I saying about organic food? Oh, and a bottle or three of Speckled Hen, clearly I’ve gone native.

Thursday afternoon will see me jumping on a plane (well walking, I’d get chucked off if I jumped on it) and heading to the UK. I get to see my daughter for a couple of days, go to the game and get to the book launch, an evening I’m looking forward to immensely. Unfortunately T can’t make it, she organises a motor cycle club weekend every year and it falls on the same weekend, It’s a pity, she was immensely moved by Hazey’s ramblings and would love to meet his family. She even considered ducking out of the rally, handing the ropes to another committee member, and joining us, but it wasn’t to be. So I’ll say hello from her on Saturday.

When I arrive at Durham Tees Valley International Airport n Friday I’ll head up to Hamsterley to lunch with an old school friend. It’s good, as we approach 50, to know that we still can relate to the people we met at 11. Shaun, my friend has retired from the police and is contemplating either buying a canal boat or moving to France  and buying a cottage. Another friend of mine from school has retired from the police force and moved to France, there must be a pattern here. Shaun, if you’re reading this, remind me to tell you about Denise….

So I think I’ll get back to my book, On Photography, by Susan Sontag. She’s discussing why we take photographs, the word voyeur was about word 21 of the book, but she argues that time eventually positions most photographs, even the most amateurish, at the level of art.

I bloody hope so, there may be hope for me yet!

I often wonder just how I got to be where I am, and where I’d be had I not made a series of (sometimes very bad) decisions in my life.

It’s the first weekend of Spring, Good Friday, and I’m off work. T has ridden to Galveston to hook up with her God Daughter who is enjoying her leave down there, and I’m doing…. Well, not very much really.

It’s late afternoon, I’m sat on the patio with a G&T and my book.

I have the Sound Dock outside so I can listen to some music – Andy Sheppard, Learning to wave, and I’m enjoying myself.

I’ve been watching the life in my garden.

I’ll set the scene. My “garden” or yard as they call it here is about 70ft square, with a Pecan tree in the middle, to the east side there’s an oak, maybe 20 years old. The rest is lawn, and pretty poor quality lawn at that. 50yds behind my fence is a bayou, meaning I get all sorts of wildlife, mainly mosquitoes as company.

There are two squirrels chasing each other around the pecan tree, they’ve been doing this on and off for an hour so I guess it’s a game.

A large black wasp has taken refuge from the hot sun under the large parasol that covers my patio furniture. He must be well over an inch long, I hope he’s harmless. There are two birds flittering around the oak, they’re pretty dull when they’re stationary, about the size of a small crow, with cream coloured breasts – but when they fly their backs are a bright, almost fluorescent blue. The squirrels have just fallen out of the tree and are now racing each other along the fence and the telephone wire that runs above it.

I’ve had a number of butterflies here this afternoon too, large yellow ones, a couple of black & blue ones but the pick has to be a huge bright red one.

Upon my thinking that it doesn’t get any better than this, I think of “home” and of the girl I left behind. Now that tired old cliché isn’t necessarily how it sounds. I miss my daughter. Happily I’m able to get to the UK pretty often, including next weekend, when I come across for the book launch, to see her. But I wish she were here with me.

The point is though, I made my choices. After having being made redundant for the 3^rd time in 2003, I gave up custody to my ex wife, with whom I was, by then, getting on very well, and moved to Scotland and to a secure job.

One thing led to another and I eventually found myself transferred over here. The bairn, who is now 16, gets over to see me every so often too, so I feel like I’m broadening her horizons a bit. But am I just fooling myself? How much have I missed over the four and a half years since I left. We speak every day, she’s with my family most weekends for at least some time, but how much of a scar will her dad moving away leave? I hope I can look back when she’s out in the big world and think that I did the right thing. If I can, then her mother has to take a lot of credit for that. From what I’ve seen so far, she’s turning into a well rounded individual, and that’s about all I can ask.

My Mother, her man, Lynn Jolly (of the Jolly Buses) and my sister are coming to stay next month, they’ll spend some time here before we all decamp to my favourite US city, New Orleans. But their coming has catalysed me into getting my house sorted out, finally. Part of this has been a section of the house dedicated to my photography, a small gallery if you will, put together by Tracey.

Even if it is only at home, it’s wonderful to see my pictures on display in some sort of collections, she brings the best out of me that woman, sees things in me others, including myself, don’t. She’s encouraged me to submit some of my shots to a gallery locally who show local artists, I’m hoping that they find enough merit in there to exhibit, it’ll just be a one week thing but it will help me a great deal as I try to move to letting the hobby become the profession.

Enough rambling for now. I’ve been out here on the patio for a couple of hours, I put the parasol up when I came out and I now see a huge spiders web stretching from the parasol to the house.

See you Saturday.

Until I switch the sound off.

I expected TV advertising over here to be clever, subtle, to appeal to the sophisticated Americans.

It isn’t.

Every commercial break consists of being shouted at, or told that if I’ve ever been within 50 feet of asbestos I should call this number and they’ll sue somebody for me.

What’s more, if I call within the next 10 minutes they’ll double my purchase for only $19.99 I get $75 dollars value ( I have to pay $80 shipping and handling of course) and

REMEMBER, THIS PRODUCT IS NOT AVAILABLE IN THE SHOPS.

Except it is, of course, just without the shipping and handling costs. And if it weren't available in the shops, then why not? Surely it would sell more that way.

I’m not a big TV watcher, not even when I was in the UK, so I didn’t expect to miss UK TV and certainly didn’t expect to miss UK TV commercials.

I’m starting to build a collection of DVDs over here, I’ve bought Doctor Who (loads of it), Inspector Morse, Rebus, Cracker, even Coupling, which I thought was weak when I watched it in the UK but now I find I’m strangely attracted to. Actually I may be attracted to Kate Isitt but that’s another matter completely. But just about everything I buy is British. I watch House MD, too. That's American, but Hugh Laurie takes a great part.

Of course, the big night of the year for TV commercials here is Superbowl night. This is where the latest and greatest ads, and products, are launched.

Of all the ads in the breaks, timeouts, boring bits, there was only one that I thought was sophisticated in any way, and that was for Fed Ex.

At the end of it, as the voiceover delivered it’s final message, I found myself thinking : “I bet he drinks Carling Black Label”

Happy days.

* I hate Carling Black Label of course, but we don’t need to go into that do we?

Disaster for the Rockets

Yao Ming, the Rockets' talisman Chinese player, and probably the most famous Chinese sportsman on earth is probably going to miss the Olympic games after developing microscopic cracks in the tarsal navicular bone.

That’s a shame. He’ll have to concentrate on running his excellent Chinese restaurant for a while.

Last evening we watched the televised  Democratic candidates debate.

Firstly, I have to say that they got a VERY easy time from the host, and that someone like Paxman would be ideally suited to chair this.

The debate kicked off with some to-ing and fro-ing on health care, a subject very close to Clinton’s heart, she was responsible for it under Bill’s administration, and where the two candidates don’t differ much. That exchange lasted 16 minutes with Clinton making sure she made her point every time Obama made his. She did very well for the most part, but ended with a personal attack on Obabma which put her, IMHO, in a very poor light.

So after that, the debate moved on, with a question to Clinton. Her response: “Why do I always get the first question?”

As the debate went on, she was questioned about why she doesn’t make her tax returns public, and Obama was questioned about the support he’s been getting from the American Muslim Council, which, he pointed out, he’s denounced repeatedly. Hilary saw her chance and moved in for the kill, saying she’d previously rejected the support of the leader of the council and Obama hasn’t come out and said he does the same.

So Obama then rejected AND denounced it.

By this time Hilary looked very uncomfortable. She also comes across as defensive and even surly, almost as if she doesn’t want to make eye contact with her questioner.

Obama on the other hand has the air of someone who knows he’s going places. He seems confident, articulate, personable. He also seems to have very well thought out responses and policies. He was also being inclusive and complementing Hilary throughout, making it very noticeable when she made an attack on him.

I don’t have a vested interest in this, I don’t have any allegiance to either candidate, I don’t have a vote over here, so it’s interesting to look at this from the outside and try to be objective.

I have no idea whether this country is ready for either a woman or an African American president. Hilary makes a lot of being the woman candidate while Obama goes out of his way not to make his race an issue, I think he’s been very well advised on that.

So whoever the Democrats select may not end up as president, I noticed the Republican “candidate” John McCain spent most of yesterday reminding the American public that Obama’s “middle name is Hussein, did you hear that? Hussein” so he’s rattled too.

T says this is the most fascinating series of Primaries she’s known, and that the issues are actually being addressed, rather than the candidate throwing the most money at it winning. I have to say that the Democratic race is riveting. Fascinating stuff, however flawed the electoral process is over here.

On present showing, Obama will become president but, I have a friend from Scotland (actually the same guy who suggested I keep a journal of my travels) who came over here to watch the New Hampshire debates. He said after that, that Clinton came across very poorly, looked (and I paraphrase) surly and defensive whilst Obama looked collected and very competent.

Hilary won New Hampshire.

I think there’s a long way to go over the next few days, but after next Tuesday we’ll probably know who will be standing for election as president in November.

It promises to be a fascinating year.

I only have to come up with 10 for the year, and I’m stuck at 3.

I have to put together 10 Critical Success Factors for my job for this year, things that are over and above hitting my targets, that stretch me – a bit like being in medieval times and put on a rack really. Is it any wonder I’d like to do something a bit more creative?

We had a bit of a motivation problem at our manufacturing in Harahan, just outside New Orleans, and the new gaffer there, an old pal of mine from Edinburgh, decided it would be nice to tear down all of the out of date product posters that adorn the walls and replace them with something far more interesting and, hopefully, motivational.

So he asked me to spend a few days in New Orleans (shame!!) taking photographs of the people working in the plant and taking team photographs of each department.

I did that in November and they called me today to tell me that they’ve selected 160 pictures of mine for the walls. I call that a result.

More than that though, the company now thinks it’s a good idea to repeat the exercise at some of our other locations.

So, Jebel Ali, Moscow, Beijing, Amsterdam, will be getting a visit from me, and my lovely assistant while we repeat the exercise. My lovely assistant is also one of our Marketing Managers and needs some product / people shots for brochures and our annual report.

Nice one T.

Maybe I can write some of my “official photographer” duties into my CSFs.

Last night saw us at the Toyota Centre in Houston watching the Houston Rockets beat the Chicago Bulls by 110 – 97. They’re on a winning streak of 12 games.

Now I’ve never been a big fan of Basketball – ever since Sunblest Sunderland packed up and went up the road I haven’t taken an interest. So last night, in our executive suite, we drank crap beer, crap wine, ate delicious food and watched the game. Or rather, watched a lot of time outs (times out?) and much cheerleading and being told to “make noise” when the Bulls had a free shot.

The atmosphere at American sports is strange, I can see the attraction of the “event” but the sport gets lost in the middle of it all.

I don’t think I’ll be giving it another go. T was ,most displeased when the Rockets got a team foul and I tried to start a chorus of “the referee’s a wanker” apparently it’s just not done.

Actually, that can be CSF number 4: Entertain X number of customers in the Executive Suite without being thrown out for unruly behaviour.

I downloaded the latest Popa Chubby album from iTunes, Deliveries After Dark it’s called. If you like Blues-Rock give him a go. T once flew from Houston to Chicago to catch one of his concerts as a birthday pressie to herself, he ended up singing Happy Birthday to her. J

Anyway, the reason I mention him is that he’s playing a couple of gigs in North Shields in May – he’s well worth checking out. The new album is a bit rockier than usual but well worth a listen.

Now talking of Chubby, I’ve put a few pounds on since I arrived here. Not that many, but it’s getting noticeable. I was never the slimmest person around but I am starting to feel a wee bit unhealthy. So my daughter is busy devising an exercise plan for me. I’ve no doubt it’ll involve dusting down the hardly used treadmill that T bought a while back and maybe even getting on my bike. T joined a gym last month and is already feeling the benefit.

Which reminds me, I must listen to Deceptive Bends again.

Last night we went to a party. A couple of our friends had just got married, she’s 60 and he’s 72. We were probably the youngest at the party but we had a great time catching up with some people we don’t see often.

There was one couple in particular, she’s a good friend of Tracey. I’ve only met her hubby once but he seemed an interesting chap.

So we got talking, he’s developed an interest in photography and although he’s an auditor for a major pipeline construction company, sees himself as an artist. Sound familiar?

Anyway, the upshot of the conversation was that he and I are going to meet up to visit some of Houston’s excellent art galleries. The girls will enjoy that – they decided to meet at the same time and check out some of Houston’s bars.

I used to love living in Edinburgh as the National Gallery of Scotland and Royal Scottish Academy were a great place to spend a wet weekend, I’ve missed that quite a bit since I came here so I’m looking forward to going.

Anyway, that’s an aside, the point of this particular blog is this:

There’s a huge spiders web underneath the eaves on my house. T & I were sitting out here this morning struggling to see straight whilst drinking our morning coffee and I mentioned to her that I really should get rid of that web, but I don’t want to.

Someone I got to know very well, without ever meeting, once wrote:

“See me in the gnarled old tree, see me in the timid fox, see me in the bird above, see me in the wandering butterfly, see me in the frantic moth, see me in the downhearted beggar, see me in the swaggering business man, see me in the crushed blade of grass, see me in the carefree blowing leaves and most of all, see me in that spiders web. I’ll be seeing back “

Which brings me to the book.

A few of us promised Hazey we’d make sure his blogs were published, and I’m happy to say that through the hard work of a small group of people the book is about to be released..

OK, I admit it, this blog is a shameless plug for My Dark Friend, by Graeme Kerton.

Graeme's book  has been sent of to the printers!

The team collating and editing the book has finished their work. Pictures have been collected, the grammar checked has been, spulling has been corrected - including verifying the official spelling of cagoule.

A front and back cover has been decided upon.  And now, now its in the hands of the printers.

We should have proofs by early March with the book in print a couple of weeks after. 

Graeme had stated that the proceeds of the book should go to Liz, his wife, as he wanted to help with the setting up of an animal sanctuary.

It will be available for purchase here.

I have to acknowledge the work done by Andrew, Detta, Hazel, Pete, Pete, Paul & Jamie. I had to take a back seat as the work progressed due to work commitments but these people have worked hard to make Hazey’s wishes come to fruition.

I’m a soft old sod and I still miss his musings and wonderful take on life. I now sit sometimes in the tree in my garden contemplating life, the universe and everything. I didn’t allow myself that luxury before.

T and I were reading the final draft of the book on Thursday just before it was sent to the printers,

Some words his wife Liz wrote in the introduction made us smile (as something flew into both our eyes).

The last words of the introduction: “He died a very happy man.”

I do, and I am.

I’ve made a very poor career choice. Actually that’s not strictly true, I’m good at what I do, and I’m well paid for it, so in that sense it’s not a bad choice. I’ve been several times around the world, met hundreds of interesting people, met my girlfriend, had a lot of fun.

But getting up in the morning to go to work just doesn’t “do” anything for me.

In short, at the age of 46 I finally know what I want to be when I grow up!

This has been niggling away at me since 2003. I was sitting in an hotel (I always write “an” hotel but I never say that – most odd) in Stavanger with a guy called Alan Faichney just chewing the fat about some of the places we’d been over the years, and he asked me whether I keep a journal of my travels, as he does.

It struck me that I’d been to (at the time) 40 or more countries and the only record I had of this was some fading memories, many clouded or distorted by whatever the local beverage may have been (Mao-tai is probably the worst, but what on earth is the attraction of Gammeldansk?).

Now, as loyal fans of this occasional blog know, I’m not a writer, if there’s a mot juste to be found, I will miss it. Articulate is something that trucks do.

So I mulled over what Alan and I had discussed, I thought about buying a wee notebook and jotting down my musings while sitting on a train trundling through Eastern Europe or the Indian subcontinent, a sort of Michael Palin character, who on his retirement would publish the travel journal and whose public would be enthralled.

But it’s not like that is it?

My travels invariably consisted of a few glasses of champagne in the KLM lounge at Schipol, followed by a few glasses of wine on some flight or other, fighting my way through some airport – half the time sans luggage, an hotel(!!) some meetings and, if I got the chance, a weekend of sightseeing. But more often than not, that chance would not materialise.

It would be a bloody short book!

So, and there’s a point to all this I promise, in April 2004 instead of the lounge when heading through Schipol on my way to China, I headed for duty free. I bought my first digital camera.

Now I’d never picked up a camera with manual controls in my life and knew nothing of f stops, shutter speeds, the rule of thirds, or anything like that, so I bought a mid range thing with a fully automatic setting that I could point and shoot. I thought that taking pictures to record my travels would force me to make sure that sight seeing opportunity happened.

So there I was, snapping away and putting the pictures on line so my daughter and other family could see where I was and where I’d been.

But people started commenting on my pictures, and eventually I realised that I had an “eye” for creative photography that I’d never had an inkling of. (... of which I'd never had an inkling?)

So here I am 4 years, and 3 cameras later. The photography thing is just about taking over my life, I have a portfolio of many different types of shot, I’m told that I’m a highly competent travel and people photographer, I’ve sold a number of pictures, and I’m interested in it.

I want to give up the day job to be a professional photographer.

So the career choice I made in 1979, and reinforced several times since when moving jobs, was in retrospect, not all that bad, it was the catalyst for all this, but I’m certain I could make a good living doing what I enjoy.

Now all I need is someone to pay me megabucks to travel the world and take pictures…………..

What you will find however are references to what I’ve listened to since I woke at 1:30am. Unable to get to sleep again, I’ve resorted to sprucing up my presentation for tomorrow while I listen to all the latest hits on my iPod.

Sonata No. 14, Opus 27; Moonlight Sonata by Beethoven. Daniel Barenboim does it justice I think.

I’m writing this in Harahan, a suburb of New Orleans. I’m here for our Quarterly review, a regular meeting where we all get together and erm, review our previous quarter. A staggeringly exciting meeting will be endured by all before we share some culinary delights tomorrow evening, selected for us by someone in the New Orleans office with little enthusiasm for good food. Either that or taking some kind of revenge on those of us entrusted with making sure the quarterly numbers add up.

I recently recovered from a bout of amoebic dysentery which I managed to pick up during a visit to the Hard Rock Café in Beijing, I can really do without some crappy seafood tomorrow.

Loan Me a Dime – Boz Scaggs & Duane Allman. 12 minutes of sheer brilliance, followed by Bing Crosby & Louis Armstrong Gone Fishin’. What more needs to be said?

I flew into Louis Armstrong airport this afternoon, coincidentally. A short flight from Houston, which for a short while, I thought might not get off the ground. Pushing back at Houston they managed to break the towbar thing they use to push the plane. An almighty bang and the aircraft juddered to a halt. Oh well at least in didn’t judder to a halt at 35,000 feet.

Travelling Riverside Blues by Robert Johnson. He only left 37 recorded songs but each one of them is superb.

Between sentences I’m trying to concentrate on a SWOT analysis that I have to present tomorrow – I’m not entirely certain these things are useful as we think. Given that it’s me who’s thinking it up, and I’m more interested in listening to Travis, Why does it always rain on me, and thinking back to that wonderful wet night at the landfill, with Ruud Gullit knowing he was about to lose his job.

Delilah, The Sensational Alex Harvey Band – marvelous.

Andre Previn was conducting a concert a few years ago and one of the pieces was the bit of music I’m listening to now – Grieg’s Piano Concerto. The orchestra had to stop playing twice because the audience were giggling. He said he knew exactly what they were thinking and gave them a few minutes to calm down. All the right notes but not necessarily in the right order. Nice one Eric.

The thing about shuffling songs on the iPod is every so often I find something different turns up. I’d forgotten I had this but Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” speech has ensured that I’ll not complete my SWOT tonight.

If you have read this, and are still awake I commiserate. I hoped it would be a cure for insomnia.

I’ll insert a little disclaimer here, copied from New Scientist of 19 May.

Will anyone read this?

AND here's another quirky legal disclaimer that directly supports our view regarding the degree to which anyone pays any attention to this literary form. The bottom of a press release from i-to-i travel company reads:

"We've been arguing for weeks: does anyone ever read these legal footers? Our lawyers reckon that they do... Everyone else in the business is convinced that we could quote a passage from The Cat in the Hat and no one would give a monkey's!

So if you're honestly interested in this kind of thing or are desperately in need of a little sleep... read on. Any use of bad grammar, shoddy spelling or tired clichés should not be seen as an indication of our abilities as a company. This email is confidential... If you have received it in error, please notify us immediately at ............, delete it from your system and note that you may not copy, distribute or use its contents.

 So it’s 28 hours or so since I left T in Houston andset off for Xi’an in China. It’s been a long time since I was in Xi’an too, about 10 years. I wonder how much more of the terracotta army has been unearthed since I was here last.

 Ignoring the fact that I’ve crossed the International Date Line (no wonder Philleas Fogg was confused) I’ve been travelling far too long. It’s just after mid day here in Beijing, I’m waiting for my last flight of the trip and I’m fookinwell knackered.

 Korean Airlines from Los Angeles to Seoul wasn’t great. Even though I was travelling business I didn’t get my little toothbrush kit – most disappointing – I paid an extra $3000 for the toothbrush (at least my company did). To be fair to Korean, the service was pretty good and I chose (that’s right, chose) not to get shitfaced on the way across. Instead, I managed to watch 4 episodes of House, listen to Andrew Marr’s History of Modern Britain and catch up with the Guardian Newsdesk for the last 4 days. Aren’t iPods wonderful?

 So, dear reader, you find me in the Air China Domestic Lounge at Beijing Airport waiting for my flight to Xi’an. Beijing airport, the first time I was here, was a small cramped typically Asian place. Vendors selling food all over the place and an air of dilapidation throughout. A few years ago they built a new international terminal that really spruced the place up. Of course, with the Olympics here next year we’re now waiting for the new 3 terminals to open. Flying in today it looked as though they’re almost finished.  I hope they’re paying the workers a the going rate, it’s amazing how quickly these things have sprung up.

 I reflected for a wile during the flight (waiting for the thing to blow up as I do every one of the 200 or so flights I take every year) on how I would feel when I get home. Except, of course this time it was different. No longer the short ride in a Black Cab to Trinity, going out in Edinburgh in the evening and taking in the diverse cultures one experiences in the city I called home for so long. No, now it’s driving along the Hardy Toll Road to 610 then into the Heights. The hustle and bustle and racial diversity I find in the area I now call home is so different from what I was used to. Y’awlllll

 But you know what? Every time I’ve moved, every time I’ve travelled, since I left South Hylton in 1970, I’ve been amazed by what I’ve found. Been hypnotised by the diversity of life, enthralled by the differences in culture that are out there. And that’s something I wouldn’t swap for all the tea in erm..

 I’ve done over 60 countries in 13 years, I’ve loved every bleary eyed second of the experience. I’ve met hundreds of interesting people, fallen in love with one of them, experienced loads of different cultures.

 I’ll stop travelling someday, not yet, but someday. In the meantime I’ll keep on taking it in. and every where I go, I’ll find somewhere showing the Sunderland game.  I watched the Manure game in KC’s Sports Bar in Houston with T and one of her girlfriends. Her pal was completely taken with soccer (no apology – we all know the origin of the word by now Shirley?) and is now starting to take an interest. One more for the cause.

I wish I could express how enthralled I am by all this travel. If T were here she would put it into words for me, of that I have no doubt – she’s far more eloquent than I. but as she’s tucked up in bed at home, no doubt snuggling Lu, I’ll put it into Lu’s own words….. 

WWWWOOOOFFFFFF!

We arrived in New Orleans on Friday, about an hour late due to the inclement weather at the airport in Houston, but looking forward to spending some time in one of our favourite cities. It’s our 5^th trip to New Orleans post Katrina and every time we go the place is more like it used to be. Even since our last trip in October there are more places open – life in the city centre is very much back to normal.

We were staying at the wonderful Le Pavilion hotel on Poydras St. We’d got a great deal on Hotwire for flights and accommodation and although the hotel is 15 minutes walk from the French quarter, it was just too good a deal to turn down.

Friday afternoon was spent in our usual haunts, the Abbey bar on Decataur , the Gumbo Shop for some Shrimp and Okra gumbo, and into the House of Blues for their happy hour. Sitting in the courtyard we watched a chick called Lynn Drury. She was a bit folky for my taste but writes her own stuff and we enjoyed her.

On Friday evening we’d booked a table at one of our favourite restaurants, NOLA. Last time we were there, in October of last year, we were looked after by a young guy named Gregory who had just started as a junior waiter. He was a really jovial black guy, 21 years old, about 20 stone, who clearly knew his food and looked after us very well. So this time, after enjoying Hickory-Roasted Duck with Whiskey-Caramel Glaze, Buttermilk Cornbread Pudding, Haricot Verts-Fire Roasted Corn Salad, Natural Jus and Candied Pecans (again) we asked if Gregory was still around, and if so we’d like to have a chat, as he was one of the reasons we’d gone back. It turns out that Gregory is now a manager and is still doing his thing very well. It’s always good to see someone getting on in life who’s really good at their job. Although neither of us was about to order a dessert, a huge selection of sweets arrived at our table for us to share, courtesy of the establishment. Nice touch, we’ll be back!

We started Saturday with:

• A Hangover
• A couple of huge Bloody Marys for breakfast and A plate of Jambalaya at the Alpine.

We were served by a person of indeterminate gender whose name was, allegedly, Candy who is typical of the characters we meet in this city.

We’d decided to hire a couple of bikes to see a bit more of the city, so  we descended on Bicycle Michael on Frenchman’s in the Marigny and hired a couple of mountain bikes. We know the city pretty well and cycled around the Quarter and the Marigny, stopping off at one of our favourite bars, the R bar on Royal St., one of the filthiest “diviest” (is that a word?) places I’ve ever seen in my life but great fun. Painted black throughout, they have a couple of old airline seats in there, a barbers chair and a (real) rusting hulk of a motorcycle, being ridden by a skeleton, on top of their chiller cabinets. The clientele look very dodgy, but we’ve never had a problem in there and found everyone to be very friendly. ( We haven’t stayed at this place before and I just sent T the link to the R Bar and the images of the rooms, her response was “You’ve GOT to be kidding, but the bar is such a shithole”)

Saturday evening saw us eating at the Orleans Grapevine – another top notch restaurant with knowledgeable staff, great food and one of the best bottles of Amarone I’ve had in a long time.

I'm just going to rewind for a moment though, because the images of New Orleans that will stay with me this time are from our cycling on Saturday afternoon.

We’d decided to head out of the more touristy parts of the city and ventured in to one of the “projects” – the buildings are much like the rest of the Marigny but in a poor state of repair, and inhabited by the poorer, black, population. Now everyone warns us against going in to the projects as this is where the crime rate, especially the murder rate is high, but we did it anyway. Almost without exception, everyone on the street waved or spoke, and were generally very pleasant, although it was clear they didn’t have much to do as most of them were sitting on the street.

What struck me about this part of town was the number of houses that hadn’t been re-inhabited after Katrina. Many of the houses will probable never be inhabited again, and although New Orleans as a whole has recovered VERY well, some parts will never be the same. Very sad to see.

There’s a British photographer called Charlie Varley, who has a website www.varleypix.com which includes many Katrina and post Katrina images and is very much worth a look.

Tracey read a book once, written by a guy called Chris Rose. He’s a columnist on the Times-Picayune newspaper in New Orleans and his book was a collection of his articles immediately following Katrina, it was very powerful stuff and Tracey cried every time she picked it up.” I urge you to read it if you can.

It’s called “One dead in Attic.

St. Swithun was a Saxon Bishop of Winchester and legend says that as he lay on his deathbed, he asked to be buried out of doors, where he would be trodden on and rained on. For nine years, his wishes were followed, but then, the monks of Winchester attempted to remove his remains to a splendid shrine inside the cathedral on 15 July 971. According to legend there was a heavy rain storm either during the ceremony or on its anniversary.

This led to the old wives' tale that if it rains on St Swithun’s Day (July 15th), it will rain for the next 40 days in succession, and a fine 15th July will be followed by 40 days of fine weather.

However, according to the Met Office, this old wives' tale is nothing other than a myth. It has been put to the test on 55 occasions, when it has been wet on St Swithun’s Day and 40 days of rain did not follow.

I think I mentioned before that we’d had 43 consecutive days of rain here. Well that sequence came to an end a week or so ago, for 1 day.

Since when it’s rained every day. My office is on the west side of Houston and looks over towards the city. I watched a fabulous cloud formation pass by this morning, some of the blackest clouds I’ve ever seen. Have a look at this...

I’m winding down a bit today, it’s been a hectic week of meetings, presentations and more research into the US oil industry. Tomorrow T & I are off to New Orleans to party for the weekend.  We’re booked into NOLA restaurant for dinner on Friday, last time we ate there T said it was the best duck dish she’d ever had - Hickory-Roasted Duck with Whiskey-Caramel Glaze, Buttermilk Cornbread Pudding, Haricot Verts - Fire Roasted Corn Salad, Natural Jus and Candied Pecans.

They have big, brick, wood burning ovens that give a unique flavour to their Creole & Cajun cooking. Wonderful stuff.

We’ve decided to hire a couple of bikes on Saturday and cycle around the French Quarter and the Marigny, a much more interesting part of town. At the risk of repeating myself, I think NOLA is a great city with a fabulous atmosphere, we always enjoy our trips there and I’m sure this weekend will be no different. Weather permitting.

There’s a plaque on a wall in NOLA outside a building that used to be the headquarters of the Banque Des Citoyens De La Louisiane. The bank issued ten-dollar notes, labeled "Dix" (French for "ten") on the reverse side. The notes came to be known as "Dixies" by English-speaking southerners, and the area around New Orleans and the Cajun-speaking parts of Louisiana came to be known as "Dixieland".

Amazing what you learn!

You’d be surprised who reads these blogs. I am. I was contacted the other day by a lady from Houston who had read my blog about unconventional gas and was researching the same subject. She was also a keen photographer and left me a very nice message in my photography site guestbook. At least I know I’m not talking to myself ALL the time.

Oh well, that’s lunchtime over, off to one of our other offices this afternoon, down in Stafford, just to the south west of Houston, weather permitting.

I thought the British were obsessed about the weather but it’s headline news on the local TV stations here, and we can get detailed weather forecasts for our part of town from a number of websites, my favourite being this one.

Obsessed!

So imagine my surprise when I realised that T uses Time Lord technology every day.

Now she’s being pretty reticent about this. Despite buying me a sonic screwdriver for my birthday, she claims to know little of the machinations of Gallifrey and the Time War but you know what? I don’t believe her.

She didn’t bat an eyelid when I bought the DVD of the first Tennant series, and if it really was the first time she’d seen it, why didn’t she ask about the Tardis?

I asked her yesterday if she still had my wallet that I’d asked her to look after the night before. She told me it was in her handbag. Now this is where things came to me. Millions of them.

You know that episode of Doctor Who where the Daleks have a pod that uses “Time Lord Technology” and when it’s opened a million Daleks come out? Well T’s handbag uses exactly the same technology. I have never seen one like it.

It took me several hours to find my wallet in there, although I did stop to give directions to some poor old chap with his horse and cart who’d fallen into the bag in the 1860’s and got lost. He was most grateful, and told me to look out for the crew of the Marie Celeste who he’d met in there some years before.

I was also a little surprised to find planes flying around int here until I realised she'd spent some time around Bermuda a few years ago, it all started coming together.

Why do women insist on carrying their lives around with them, it’s not like they need 6 lipsticks 5 tampons (not this week anyway) 5 matchbooks (she doesn’t smoke) about 100 business cards from people we’ve met over the years and will never speak to again, a handful of pens, some more make up, a collection of nail files and emery boards, 3 packs of mints,  a couple of hairbrushes, two phones, one of which hasn’t worked for months, 3 pairs of shades…. You get the idea.

Oh, and my wallet.

Why she’d want to camouflage her Tardis as a handbag is a question I haven’t yet asked her, but a 1960’s British police box would be far less conspicuous.

At my age, they decide I need a bath!

So there I was, 115 years old in your terms, drenched under a hosepipe in the back garden. I showed them though, I do a mean “laying down on the grass and not getting up for anyone” trick. I’m almost 6 stone too so my ‘mother’ can’t lift me and shampoo me at the same time. She needs to get my, ahem, Uncle, that’s the guy that came to live here with the strange British accent who sometimes forgets my name and calls me Rowell, to lift me while she shampoos me.

It’s a decent life here really mind. I’ve been asleep and I get to lay around all day and while they’re at work I have the run of the place, or rather we have the run of the place. I have a pal who comes to stay, a Black Lab / Pit-bull cross called Cosmo – she’s only 40, and she’s a brute. I can chew absolutely anything and she gets the blame.

Usually I don’t bother though, she chews enough for both of us.

I’ve had arthritis and a dodgy tummy since I was a pup so I have to take lots of tablets – they think I don’t notice them mixing the tablets with my breakfast but sometimes, if I’m feeling like it, I sort out the tablets from the good stuff, take them to the other side of the kitchen and spit them out. What fun!

I was a vegetarian dog for a long time but the old girl found some dog food that agreed with me a few years ago and I’ve been on that ever since. They mix it up with the flavours as well so I love it.

The guy with the strange accent promised me a new football at the weekend, I love footballs, I can chew away at them until I here that wonderful Pop…Hiss sound, then I can get the black liner out of them in no time at all, that tastes yummy. Well he brought me a new football but it wasn’t a real one – it was round!! What the hell is that about? I showed him. I got in the pool and wouldn’t come out. Hah!

I wish I were a few years younger, there’s this rather splendid British Yellow lab a few doors down who keeps strutting past my window. I bark at him and flirt a bit, but I’d have shown him a thing or two in my day.

They’ve been at work for ages. I love it when they come home, I can get my jaws around each of their arms in turn, they seem to love that, then I can trot to the cupboard and get a slipper, if they’re lucky I let them catch me so we can play, they can never get it off me.

Aren’t squirrels a pain? We have a family of them that live in our garden, they can’t seem to hear  how ferocious I am from behind this window, but when I get outside they’re off like a shot. One fell out of the tree last summer – it just made it with it’s life.

Well all this dictating has taken it out of me. I think I need to sleep a while. Cosmo! Get off my bed.

From my last Blog:

"It rained in Houston for 42 consecutive days until Saturday, some days I’d swear I was living by a river, not a gently sloping road. When it rains here, it rains. We regularly have 4-5 inches in a day and many of the roads near us are often under a foot of water. On Friday, we got a call from T’s friend saying she’d had trouble driving up our street in her Land Cruiser. So we decided to set off for home early, in the 2 seater Crossfire, to give ourselves a better chance of making it home. Well we made it, the roads were flooded, but a bit of sensible driving ensured we got there unscathed. As we turned into the street we were greeted with the sight of a very large mature tree lying across the other end of the road. It had clearly been struck by lightning and had fallen – right on top of a postal van. I managed to get a couple of pictures of it before checking no one was hurt ;-) "

The pictures:

I thought it survived remarkably well.

North America has run out of Oil & Gas. Well that’s not strictly true of course but they’re using it far quicker than they’re replenishing it and consider the Gulf of Mexico – the principal oil producing area, to be in decline. As far as gas goes, they’ve found pretty much all there is to find around here so they’re turning their attention to “Unconventional Gas”, that is, tight gas and coal bed methane. Which is why, for the last week or so I’ve been trawling the interweb and talking to people who know about these things, to research how to apply my company’s technologies and services to developing these Unconventional plays.

I’m part of a team focused on developing our services and I got the short straw – concentrating on North America. I guess, having worked everywhere EXCEPT North America until last year, I’m not at all qualified to contribute to other regions. However, it is interesting and I’m well on my way to developing a strong business case for our guys to take to the E&P companies.

I’m in the wrong business though, I read a presentation this morning given by Petrohawk Energy where they looked at the Gross Profit Margin of the US Independent Oil & Gas companies. 3 of them have a GPM greater than 90% and a further 14 have a GPM greater than 80%. Nice work if you can get it.

My weekend was spent, in addition to researching unconventional gas, chilling! On Saturday, we lunched at our favourite neighbourhood Mexican restaurant, Teotihuacán. Now I’m not talking about the greatest pre-Columbian city in the Americas, nor the culture that grew up around it, but a pokey little place in the Heights that serves some of the best Mexican food around, and a perfect frozen Margarita in a pint mug. A wonderful way to kick off a Saturday.

It rained in Houston for 42 consecutive days until Saturday, some days I’d swear I was living by a river, not a gently sloping road. When it rains here, it rains. We regularly have 4-5 inches in a day and many of the roads near us are often under a foot of water. On Friday, we got a call from T’s friend saying she’d had trouble driving up our street in her Land Cruiser. So we decided to set off for home early, in the 2 seater Crossfire, to give ourselves a better chance of making it home. Well we made it, the roads were flooded, but a bit of sensible driving ensured we got there unscathed. As we turned into the street we were greeted with the sight of a very large mature tree lying across the other end of the road. It had clearly been struck by lightning and had fallen – right on top of a postal van. I managed to get a couple of pictures of it before checking no one was hurt ;-) – I’ll put them on here if I think on, they’re still in the camera at home.

There’s a wonderful website called hotwire.com, it’s one of those that does discount travel and hotels. Normally when you research the hotels though, they give you a class of hotel rather than a hotel name – they claim they can offer cheaper prices that way. T & I have used them a few times and their hotel classes are usually spot on. So we decided to have a short break in New Orleans next weekend and Hotwire gave us the flights and a 2 nights in Le Pavilion Hotel for a grand total of $261 each. That’s about £255 for the two of us. I don’t think I could afford to miss that one. New Orleans is a wonderful city, quite unlike anywhere else I’ve been, with a unique atmosphere and a party philosophy. A friend of mine from Edinburgh is in the process of moving there after transferring jobs, and he was concerned about the high murder rate. He spoke to a local police chief who said that it’s criminals killing criminals and that they’re almost doing the police’s job for them. That’s reassuring.

I’m slowly getting used to the American way of life, and their quaint little ways, you know what I mean:  erbs instead of herbs, baysil instead of basil, their weird counter intuitive ways of doing things, and their very much counter intuitive way of using a calendar. I drive past flashing signs saying something like “Expect Freeway closures 7/13/07 thru 7/22/07” and I can’t take them in. I get as far as the first date being physically impossible then usually have to swerve to miss the car in front because that’s been driven by a Brit too and he’s slowed down to decipher it. But happily there is an exception to this rule, and it’s good to know that the British way of doing things is reserved for that one day they keep to celebrate the tax on tea and all that. Between July 3 and July 5, nestles the 4^th of July. Hey Ho!

I’ve said it before, and I’ve no doubt I’ll harp on about it again, but the standard of driving in this town defies belief. Driving to work this morning along I10, in torrential rain and not a little flooding, I’m being tailgated by some tosser in an SUV. He could have been no more that 6ft behind me, at up to about 50mph on the good sections. Every morning, I switch on Channel 11 news (that’s the local Houston TV station) to be greeted with road kill – and it’s not hedgehogs. Mind you, there are just as many shootings on the news every day too – usually people killing intruders, so there are no charges, but regularly, policemen shooting drivers who have failed to stop, or someone coming out of a bar getting into a fight and ending up dead.

And they just can’t see it!

OK, rant over.

On Saturday, with the full blessing of my beloved, I attended a photography workshop intended to improve my proficiency in lighting nudes. It was 5 hours of bloody hard work, but well worth it. I came away with about 600 pictures, some of which are, frankly, garbage, others are much better. I particularly enjoy the silhouette type shot, and this is one that I took on Saturday

My muscles ached like hell on Sunday morning, I’d spent several hours crouching to find the best angles – I can only imagine how tired the model must have been. I processed the pics on Sunday and T liked them a lot so she’s decided she'll model for me. Which is good. Actually, I think it’s just an excuse to get her Harley into the pictures.

Yesterday was spent chilling!! Down to the Red Lion for lunch, some wonderful Yorkshire puddings, followed by an afternoon in front of the TV with a couple of large Bloody Marys. I decided last night that T had done enough cooking for a while so I spent a couple of hours making a curry. They don’t really do curry here, so it’s always a bit of a novelty for T when we have one. Anyway, it was good, hot, but rather tasty. Unfortunately, it laid heavy on my stomach all night and I get the impression if I were writing this any later it would resemble one of Hazey’s blogs about poo.

There’s just been a big shunt on the Beltway outside my office. Will they never learn?

Biggio got his 3000.

So tonight I’m going to be at a very anti climatic ball game, still, why not?

I spent 4 hours of my life on a training course today – it was one of these web based things where you dial in to a conference call and see the instructor’s desktop on your screen at the same time.

The idea was to enable me to become an instructor on our company’s Learning Management System. What annoyed me though was having to complete a number of self paced courses as a prerequisite for attending this one. These self paced courses took me over 12 hours to complete and consisted of showing me how to use hyperlinks, fill in a form on line and use message boards and chat rooms. Clearly I’d never done any of that in the 11 years I’ve been using the internet.

So this morning, having completed all that, we were subjected to this goon showing us how to do it all again, this time interactively.

FFS!  

But now I’m free for an hour before having to give a presentation on the “Byzantine Management Structures of Chinese Oil Companies” I’ve decided not to use PowerPoint for this one, instead I’m going to use some pins and a ball of string. I think the presentation is slightly mis-titled, unless I’m supposed to be talking about the Greek Speaking Roman Empire centered around Constantinople and their interaction with the Shang Dynasty’s attempts to keep pace with the demand for oil to power their Woks.

I do believe that PowerPoint could be the most irritating piece of software ever written. Why do I need some twit to list some bullet points on a screen and then READ THEM OUT LOUD TO ME. Like I can’t read them for myself. Presenters (and yes, there are some good ones) would be much better served by showing pictures of naked ladies and just reading from their speaker notes. That way instead of nodding off I’d give the presentation my full concentration.

Talking of naked ladies, I’m a bit of an enthusiastic amateur photographer and my local club have arranged for me to spend the day tomorrow at a studio in Houston taking photographs of naked ladies. It’s a “Glamour Nude and Fine Art Nude” workshop. I’m not really interested in the glamour bit but I’ve tried my hand at the “fine art” thing in the past and I really quite like it. On Saturday I get to use a professional model and get a professional photographer (that’s a work safe link by the way)  to guide me through the lighting side of things so I’m looking forward to it.

While I think on, they don’t have Woks in China, at least not in the areas I’ve been, they have Gwoh! One of my Chinese friends was most amused when I called it a wok, but he was far too embarrassed to tell me why.

Oh, one more thing. I mentioned the other day about our friend Greta who has had an unwanted erection since Saturday. Well last night it went down - unfortunately he's been told that it'l probably never work again. Oh Dear!

So this guy has hit the ball 2997 times in his life.

We’re on Biggio watch here. The Houston Astros 2^nd base man, Craig Biggio, is approaching 3000 lifetime hits and some people around here, T included, are getting very excited. So excited in fact that we’re off to watch the ball game tonight, and tomorrow night, in the hope that we’ll witness this historic event. Cor!

Unfortunately, despite the legendary feats of the great man (the consensus seems to be that he should have hung up his, erm.. bat? a long time ago) only one team in the US major leagues has won fewer games this season that the Astros. So far they’ve won 32 and lost 46. Not good. They play virtually every night and regularly draw crowds of 35-40k to the impressive Minute Maid Park (I’ve no idea who sponsors the place). It was built on the site of the old Union Station and includes the old station frontage. Whenever Houston hit a home run a half scale steam engine runs back and forth along a stretch of track on the top of one side of the stadium. It hasn’t been running much this season.

I got very drunk last night, which was surprising as I only had a single Margarita at the Mexican restaurant around the corner. T said I was incoherent before I finished my drink and I can’t remember leaving the place or getting home. I was in bed by 8:30. I think someone must have spiked my shrimps.

I sit here with Sun Tzu’s “The Art of War” on my desk. The most important work on strategy ever written, it is said by some. My version is translated by a guy called Gary Gagliardi, but I’ve read other translations on the interweb which differ greatly. Now I have some knowledge of Mandarin but not of ancient Chinese so I’m rather reassured by the fact that Gagliardi has studied these other translations and rather than simply amalgamating these, has gone back to the ancient Chinese, spent 30 years studying Tzu and come up with what may (!) be regarded as the definitive translation of the work.

When I was in my teens and early 20’s I followed a much different path to the one on which I now live. I was following what I believed to be a calling to the Anglican priesthood. Unfortunately (or fortunately as I now see it) the more I read of the historical aspects of the church – from the early church through the formation of Roman Catholicism and the breakaway of the Anglican church under Henry VIII, the more I became disillusioned by the vested interests which had been pursued in the compilation and translation of the original books that went into, or got left out of, the Bible.

I was sitting in a bar in New Orleans with T a year or so ago, they were filming a movie called Déjà vu outside so we decided to hang around and talk to the crew – T is responsible for a $1 million exhibition booth rebuild and is very much into set design so was interested. I digress, the only other person in this bar that morning was a middle aged guy keeping himself to himself when a bunch of rowdy Aussies descended on us and, all in good nature, proceeded to make tits of themselves. So T and I got out of their way and sat at the end of the bar with this other guy. It turned out that he was in town coordinating the campaign of a prospective mayor of New Orleans for the forthcoming elections. But he was interested in my recent move from Scotland as he had family over there, and we talked for a long time before the conversation moved on to the compilation of the Bible and the machinations of the Council of Nicea held in 325 AD, which in my humble opinion is about where it all started to go wrong.  Perhaps if we were to look again at the original works, and take Gagliardi’s approach, people like me, who switched off completely from all forms of organised religion, would awaken from the "sleep of ignorance" and follow the Noble Eight Fold Path. I’ve long had an attraction to Buddhism, I think when I’ve finished my strategy lessons I’ll read some more about that.

Go Go Biggio!!