Happy New Year

Happy New year all. I'll keep this brief as i'm not feeling too well this weekend.

Posted via email from mindspace's posterous

Firework Display

Those that know me will know that my friend Andy and I do a firework display for family and friends every year.

This year, we’re taking it to the next level. We’ve got permission to use a field in Hampshire and have a 25 minute display planned including 58 rockets, numerous mines and barrages and a huge finale piece.

The whole of his street are attending along with some of my family for what promises to be a proper street party :)

Here’s a plan of the firing layout lovingly created by Andy if you’re interested.

If we manage to get any photos, I'll put them on my Flickr page.

This made me laugh

I was saying to someone yesterday how the worst bit of living by myself is the constant washing of clothes, to which she replied “welcome to the woman’s world!”

Someone sent me one of those e-mails full of light hearted pictures today and one of them particularly made me chuckle

Tame Squirrels

My wife and I took our youngest daughter to a local park the other day to look for autumn things. We happened upon a squirrel and we were surprised how tame it was. It came right up to us and ate an acorn from my wife’s hand. We were looking for conkers but didn’t find any as the squirrels had beaten us to them.

Moving on

After a few weeks of looking about, I've found somewhere new to live and I'm moving in at the end of the month. My wife is staying in our house and I'm moving into a three bedroom house. We're having joint custody of the children so they can pretty much come and go as they please in either house.

On one hand, I'm glad to be moving on. On the other, i'm shitting myself as i've only ever lived with my parents or my wife. Add to that the pain in the arse that is finding new furniture.

Oh well, I suppose it has to be done.

I'll post some photos as soon as i've taken them

Restoring my faith in humanity

About 6 months ago, I happened across Throwboy. They had come up with the idea of making a set of pillows that look like the dock icons on OS X. At this point they were just trying to find out who'd be interested in buying them. A few weeks ago, I got an e-mail saying that they'd begun making them and was I still interested.

Much as I was, the cost was prohibitive being that I have to find a new place to live and so on. I e-mailed a simple reply saying that I couldn't afford them right now as I was in the process of separating from my wife.

The reply that I received near bought a tear to my eye:

Adam,

I'm very sorry to hear about your current domestic situation. That really sucks... for lack of a better phrase. Let's just say I can relate what you're going through and if it's alright with you, if you give me your mailing address I would like to send you a free Finder icon pillow. You will not be billed in anyway, and I hope it's a pick-me-up in a dark time.

As we say in the states, "bro's before ho's."

Thanks, Adam. Hope to hear from you soon.

Kindness like this was just what I needed and I feel I should make some effort to pay it forward/back/sideways.

If you read this and feel so inclined, visit Throwboy and buy a pillow from them. They make fantastic looking pillows and to top it all off are lovely people.

Tears are actually welling while i'm writing and I feel like a proper big girls blouse now so i think i'll leave it there.

UPDATE:

The pillow arrived and it's fantastic!

So long and thanks for all the fish

I'm not normally one for spilling out emotional stuff in blogs but I figure that's kind of what they're for so here goes.

After 13 years together (10 of them married) my wife and I are separating. She told me a few months ago that she still loved me but was no longer in love with me. It was a shock and I didn't take it well. We tried to work it out but (for reasons I don't particularly want to air here) it didn't work out and we agreed to call it a day.

We're aiming to stay friends for the sake of our three children but I guess only time will tell on that front. Telling the kids about the separation was also very hard.

The thing that freaks me out most is the idea of moving out as I've only ever lived with my parents or my wife :S