Tired and ill but Xmas was good

I am being a typical man and am suffering from man-flu, as all men know this is a severe disease that is life threatening to the point of having an adrenaline shot by my side just in case.

Women are some how immunce to this problem and it merely manifests as a cold. Strange eh?

Well even though the hunt for sympathy continues I did manage to stay awake at Christmas around the folks with the help of the Guitar tab for 'Death Magnetic' as well as a Rubik's cube (which I managed to complete in the small hours of 27th Dec - yay me!). This of course was to distract me from the tat that passes as Xmas TV i.e. the tears and trauma on Eastenders, Corrie etc. as well as laughing at my Dad squirm as some guy swings around a girl with her head just missing the floor in 'Dancing on ice'.

Of course Xmas in the Rowley house-hold is full rich food that I am still trying to get through (Mom always sends us with a care package that can last a normal person about 6 months), so I will get back to watching quality TV (Beauty and the Geek) and thinking how to tackle the food mountain in the fridge.

Decembeard - more!

Okay, as work have a policy where you cannot access anything approaching fun or interesting (with the exception of http://www.wikipedia.org/) and more specifically Facebook/Blogs and other such stuff which makes publishing stuff on the internet easy, so I have created a website for Decembeard with the photos of the guys who are taking part on.

So... go to http://www.baumley.com/ and take a look!

And while you are there follow the link to http://www.justgiving.com/decembeard2_Oldbury to make a donation (or nab one of us if you see us and give us cash!).

Spencer's Birthday Party

Spencer's birthday celebrations kicked off with a Satsumo reunion from one of the (many) line ups. This was the 'Rich on guitar, Matt on bass, Dave on Drums, Spencer Guitar and Vocals' era.

You may be wondering what we are wearing - probably best not to - but at least the beard looks cool :-)

Then later on in the evening... Eclectic Blue;


Yes, for some reason the drummer goes barefoot.

Decembeard

After much thought I finally decided to get involved with a charity event at work, I am now two weeks in to 'Decembeard' which long story short is an a charity thing to grow a beard during December (See the beautiful pic above!).

This might sound easy - but I can assure you its not. The act is easy, i.e. don't shave, but I can say that I have had more insults thrown at me in the last two weeks than at any point in my life!

In saying that I had one person say that it suits me (thanks Rob) and one person say they like it, and they like beards (thanks Jan). I have also had my boss give me some Frontline (stuff for cats with Fleas etc. - Cheers Dave).

So please donate... http://www.justgiving.com/decembeard2_Oldbury

Fuel

Just wondering, recently, fuel has become cheaper - I'm looking at 91.9p.

This is a good thing, yes? Then why is it that every person is not at the pumps panic filling their vehicles to the brim?

Why is it then, when the fuel prices sky-rocket - and everyone is told 'There is no issue with supply, it's just the cost going up', that people insist on panic buying? like 'Oh my God, Fuel is 20p more expensive I've got to buy as much as possible'.

On reflection, I think that this logic should apply to other items that the government don't want people to buy. So lets reduce the price of cigarettes to 20p a pack, and a pint to 50p. People would obviously stop buying it so much and will solve all issues with Cancer and Liver disease. Genius!

Gigs, Gigs and more Gigs

I've been to a lot of gigs lately, so I thought I would tell you about some of them...

Queen and Paul Rodgers; Got the tickets for a bargain price of zero pounds. Cheap at half the price. Gig was pretty good, with an especially interesting way of getting the drum kit on the end of a 50 foot ego ramp while it was being played - all good.



Feeder: This one was at the Academy in Birmingham - this was a very strange gig. Okay, the desk breaks down three times during the gig and what would you expect from a professional band that have been going for 15 years? You've guessed it, the didn't have a clue. The funniest thing was the fact that the PA and on stage amps were actually working, basically their in-ear monitoring was knackered. They basically stood on stage and then left... without their songs they had nothing. The drummer eventually had a bit of a go at entertaining the crowd but with the rest of the band hanging around as though they were waiting for a bus it was laughable. The fact that they were so useless was actually entertaining in itself.


Alterbridge; This gig was down at Brixton Academy, and was my first time there. It was an amazing gig and an amazing venue.

Halloween

Okay, so I'm not doing fancy dress this year, or a party, so I decided to do a pumpkin instead...









You have no idea how difficult it is trying to take pictures in the dark!