Black Notebook

Sixty One Nails

My friend Mike has got just his first book deal. If you like fantasy fiction I'd recommend you buy a copy of his novel Sixty One Nails. I'm not a huge fan of fantasy, but my opinion of the genre changed after Mike shared the drafts with me over the course of eighteen months. It really is a great book, out in November, so get it on your Christmas list now.

The National Health Service

Number two child is going into hospital on Wednesday to have her ears and breathing sorted out. As parents, we're very fretful, as it's the first time she has had any sort of operation. We took her to the hospital today for the pre-operative checks and some kind of administrative cock-up had occurred which meant that they weren't expecting her. My heart dropped, because I was convinced that we would be sent home from what was clearly a fully booked clinic and that we would also be bumped from the operating theatre slot on Wednesday because the checks had not been done. The staff had other ideas. After a ten-second moan directed at their local administrative team they squeezed us in and treated us superbly - they explained everything to number 2 child using photos and simple language and then explained it to us (using similar methods). The next hiccup in the process was the need for a hearing test, which also had not been sorted out in advance. The audiology clinic was wedged with people but within fifteen minutes they found us a slot, the test was done, and we have all the bits of paper we need for the operation to go ahead.

The NHS gets a lot of bad press but I think they did a stirling job today and I'm grateful for their professionalism and good humour.

No more eating worms

After six months of "sitting in the garden and eating worms" I have taken off the dust covers of the Blacknotebook blog and am going to use it again. I have no real plan, other than publishing bits and pieces that interest me and using it to build up my confidence to get some of my creative writing work published.

New Year

I am not a big fan of New Year's Eve. It has always felt like a "false dawn" to me, an artificial break point between the old year and the new. I dislike the artificial bonhomie that it generates - particularly the "mailing list" SMS messages you get , post midnight, from people who have drunk too much and realised as they scroll through the address book in their mobile phone that they haven't spoken to you for the best part of a year. "Hope to see you next year" is usually the last sentence, but it is a throw away comment, it's not meant seriously. I can guess which friends will find time to see us next year. The same ones that made the effort last year. I don't meant this to sound negative, I'm just recognising that as my life has changed and the demands of a young family and running a business fill my life, my social circle is shrinking to a core group of people that actually make the effort to find time to see each other.

Despite that, I did enjoy my self because we kept it low key at Blacknotebook Towers. There was just three of us in the house and we spent most of the evening sitting around a log fire in our garden. It took us about thirty minutes to get the fire started and we nearly gave up, because the kindling would just not light. Eventually, we managed to get the mixture of fuel, oxygen and ignition in the correct proportions and the air was filled with sweet smell of applewood logs beginning to catch. Another fifteen minutes later and we had heat - lots of heat. The evening was bitterly cold and I got to experience the odd pleasure of the front of my body being roasted by the flames and my back being chilled to the bone by the icy air. I was so consumed by watching the flames flicker and spit (what my friend calls "Natures Television") that I missed the clock hitting midnight completely. It was a good forty five minutes before I realised that the New Year had actually started. I had also missed five text messages on my mobile.

"Nevermind", I thought, as I put another log on the fire.

A Walk in The Woods

I have been spending too much time indoors over the last few months and felt a real need to get out into the outside world last weekend. It was time for a family outing to the woods at West Stow and a meandering walk in the drizzle. I normally hate the rain, but was so desperate for fresh air that I managed to keep my moaning in check for at least an hour. The day was punctuated by a reckless murder of crows, a beautiful oak tree and the discovery of a piece of Victoria industrial architecture that I fell in love with.

Back in Black Notebook

After a period of consideration I have decided to reinstate the site.