Stewart

Bucket list item 32: Go on a zombie experience day

I am quite fond of zombies. That is, in the sense that I like stuff involving zombies, not that I’m a zombie sympathiser.

One of my favourite computer games ever is Dead Rising, a zombie slash-em-up. I’m also a really big fan of the Telltale Walking Dead games, which have some of the most emotional moments I’ve ever experienced in a video game, as well as watching the Walking Dead TV show. Zombie entertainment is my not so guilty pleasure.

So, you can probably imagine how excited I was when my brother told me that he’d found a zombie experience day for us to go to for my stag do. In case you can’t imagine it, I can tell you that I had an excited face on.

He had been in contact with Zed Events who run an event at a disused mall in Reading. The mall is scheduled for destruction so you can only book it a couple of months in advance as they’re unsure when it’s going to be knocked down. There are doors with big Warning! Danger! signs on that they tell you to be extremely wary of as they are actually doors to lift shafts with a big drop.

I don’t want to give too many details away about what actually happens because I highly recommend you go. It was an amazing experience and even the most hard to please of us seemed to really enjoy it. It was really well executed. From the moment that you walk into the building after your safety briefing, you feel like you’re walking into a computer game. The actors really add to the experience, both the humans and the zombies – with some of the zombies having really chilling screams.

At the end you get to have some photos taken by the organisers (see the photo above) and then you can wander around taking photos of yourself and the zombies, who very impressively stay completely in character the whole time.

I highly recommend this as an experience to take advantage of whilst you still can!

My groomsdudes #6: my dude of honour

I have recently decided that my friend Louise is my dude of honour. She was the ringleader for ensuring that I hada hen do. This was so that all my female friends had a chance to embarrass me as well as my male friends. They (rather understandably) didn’t want to be left out of the fun of embarassing me.

Louise will also be a witness at our wedding, so I hope she has been practicing her signature. All of this means that she has earned a place as my honorary groomsdude.

I can’t remember exactly when I met Louise. It was almost certainly through mutual friends, and was definitely before her 18th birthday, as I remember going to her party down on Camber Sands. I had only been driving a year or so and it was an exciting adventure to drive down the coast with my friend Tom who most likely brought along a whole bunch of ska-punk cassettes with which to educate me with during the journey.

Generally we always seem to do cool stuff for Louise’s birthdays. A number of years ago we went to Paris for a day trip (although it rained and was generally a bit miserable). This year we went to the O2 see The Blink 182s who were kind enough to not only put on a show for her birthday, but also dedicated I Miss You to her.

One of my favourite memories of Louise is when we went to the silent disco at The Shard last year for her birthday. I was listening to the Bee Gees and was strutting, jiving and singing at her, whilst she was listening to T’Pau’s China In Your Hand singing away and air grabbing with the full intensity that the song requires. It’s difficult to explain how awesome it was just with words, but this moment alone made the entire evening worthwhile.

We first started spending more time together when we were both working at Saga, often having lunch with my brother and our friend Ron. We used to have a competition to see how much of the self-service desserts we could hide underneath custard whilst still only getting charged for one portion.

Louise worked in HR at that time, so she was able to provide us with all the gossip about what was going on. For the sake of all concerned, I should probably not repeat any of this gossip here. I’ve never managed to be able to acquire much gossip working in the accounts department. It’s a very gossip free kind of career path.

Many years later, the house next to the one I was renting with three other guys went up for rent and we managed to persuade Louise along with a few other friends to move in next to us. It was like being in Friends. We lived in the House of Boy and they lived next door to us in the House of Girl. We even took down the fence in the back garden so that the houses started to flow into each other, which was especially useful for parties.

Around a year after they moved in, we had to move out of our house and there was a space available in the House of Girl which I moved into. Whilst I only moved my stuff about five feet from the top floor of one house to the top floor of another house, in one of the most demoralising moments of my life, I had to take it all the way down two flights of stairs, a few feet along the street and then all the way up two flights of stairs again.

Some of my favourite memories are from the time living in those houses, with chaotic house parties and hanging out with good friends. One slightly less chaotic memory is how I was exhausted and had a really early night before I moved into the House of Girl. Natalie, one of my new housemates, found out about this, and decided that early nights were unacceptable and put in a rule about bedtime curfews. The first Saturday night after I moved in, Natalie was out and me and Louise had an extremely rock’n’roll evening of watching a film and having an early night. I felt extremely rebellious defying the curfew.

When I bought my flat, it turned out that Louise and Lisa had to move just before and we ended up living round the corner from each other so we got to spend quite a lot of time together. One of my favourite things about this was on Christmas morning we would all gather round their flat for a Christmas breakfast fry up and bucks fizz I’m a fan of Christmas and anything that makes it even better is always going to go down well with me.

Louise has been an invaluable source of advice when I have been dating which, over the course of our friendship, has been quite a lot. Her understanding of how females work was invaluable, as was her patience as I rambled on and on almost non-stop about my dating woes.

When I met Jo, Louise was able to tell how happy I was and was very quick to invite her to join in with group activities. This included an invitation to the annual viewing of Love Actually in November. There is pretty much no bigger honour than that.

I find Louise to be an inspiring person. She likes taking on challenges, such as when she persuaded a bunch of us that we should start climbing mountains and we foolishly agreed that it was a good idea. We have now climbed all of the three peaks and I feel very accomplished for having done so. When Louise sets her mind to do something, she is a very dedicated person. She has very strong feelings about wanting to make a positive difference in the world and she is very determined to do what is right for both others and herself. Louise is one of those people who has great qualities that I want to emulate, and I am proud to have her as my dude of honour.

My groomsdudes #5: The Lego-Jay to my Lego-Stew

I first met Jason when he moved down to Kent. We mainly became close when we went started at the same university a couple of years later. Even though we were studying different subjects (I was on a philosophy course and he was on an English course), I had taken an English module called The Tale to fill up my schedule, and we would often be getting the bus at the same time.

My earliest memories of us spending quality time together involve us skipping the lecture for The Tale, to instead go and play pool and video games (mostly the amazing Racing Jam which has the funkiest theme music known to mankind, and Time Crisis). We were pretty poor at pool and spent a lot of money attempting to complete Time Crisis until I ran out of coins and died, abandoning Jason to continue the quest alone and overwhelmed.

Jason decided that uni wasn’t for him, and we didn’t see each other quite as much over the next couple of years. However, when I finished my third year, I was looking to move out and there was a room available in the flat he shared with our friend Luke, which I snapped up as quickly as I could. This was the point when I started to think that I might be a grown-up; living away from home; my first full-time job earning what couldn’t have been much more than minimum wage. Surely this is as grown-up as anyone ever gets? Oh, silly naive past Stew.

My job involved me working shift patterns and would often be in the flat on my own during the daytime. Jason had a large range of replica weaponry. This helped to keep me sane. We lived on the fourth floor close to town and one of my favourite games was pointing a toy gun out of the window and pretending to be a world class sniper.

Me and Jason have recently shot real guns together. I am far from a world class sniper. He is a natural, possibly because he owned a million toy guns. He is able to hit James Bond in the eye from 20 paces.

I have many memories from the short time I was living in the flat (our landlord decided to sell around 6 months after I moved in); towers of pizza boxes; endless sessions playing Crazy Taxi; watching Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back around 1,000 times; the time that me and Luke were playing Championship Manager and he decided that as manager of Liverpool he was going to blow his entire transfer budget on the worst player in the game just to see what would happen.

One that for some reason sticks in my mind was spotting Bass walking along the road during one of my sniper sessions, pretending to shoot him and the calling his mobile to tell him he was dead. You have to take fun where you can when you’re stuck indoors on your own earning peanuts.

Whilst living together, we formed a band. Perhaps band is a loose term. We played music together. We did so with my brother and a couple of friends who used to crash over at our flat frequently. Not many of our friends had moved out of home yet, so we were effectively living in a bit of a party flat. It was natural for us to just start playing music together. The band was known as Werewolves Ate My Platoon, after a newspaper headline at the end of the film Dog Soldiers, although was generally shortened to W*A*M*P. I left the band before they played any gig to join another band in the hopes of gaining fame and fortune (Spoiler alert: I didn’t work). I am fully aware that I am a complete sellout.

Both of our bands played regularly around local venues and Jason and I would hang out and watch each other’s bands but over time we’d drifted apart due to various circumstances. In the last few years we’ve reconnected and started hanging out again regularly. We’ve even started doing music things together again, along with one of the other founding members of W*A*M*P. Jason has learnt how to play drums for this project in a ridiculously short length of time. Look out for The Cool Kids, coming to an open mic near you.

It’s been an incredibly enjoyable time for me. I haven’t played regularly in a band for many years and it has been fun and reminded me why I enjoyed playing music in the first place, and is possibly the most fun I’ve ever had playing in a band because it is with a couple of really great friends and we’re only doing it to have fun so there’s no real pressure.

A while ago, I told Jason he was going on a random holiday with me. There was a thing on a discount holiday website where you could pick some dates and the company would give you a random holiday. This is how we ended up going to Riga in Latvia. This was an excellent holiday. To tell him where we were going, I prepared a most excellent Powerpoint presentation. I even bought one of those clicker things to change the slides. I enjoyed doing this very much.

On this holiday, not only did we discover a mutual love for Lego minifigures (which has blossomed into visits to Lego exhibitions, talk of future visits to Legolands, and our long awaited and at present completely unwritten and unplanned Lego sitcom) but this is when Jason got to fire real life guns for the first time and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him happier.

Jason was asking me after this when our next adventure would be, so I made him climb a mountain. It may sounds like I’m bullying him, but I know what he likes. He likes climbing mountains. Even though he moans about it the whole time, it’s a very character building experience. I was amazed at how good he was at mountaineering. He puts it down to stubbornness and the fact that he’s decided to do it and isn’t going to back down from doing so.

I’m very much looking forward to our next adventure which I have promised him will involve no mountains and all of the Lego. I should be a bit kinder to him from now on. We’re hopefully going to be visiting Legoland Denmark next year, although like most of our great schemes, it is currently unplanned. However, once I’ve got this big party thing out of the way, I’ll have some more time to sit down with him and bash out the details. LEGOLAND 2018, BABY! WOOOO!

Please note: Jason is not as small as he appears in the picture above. It is a cunning use of perspective. He is actually person sized.

My groomsdudes: #4 The Statler to my Waldorf

I first met Paul during secondary school as I was good friends with his older brother, who I was also in several bands with. I got to know Paul a bit better when we were both at university in the same city, as were a couple of our other friends and I would drive us all to Canterbury on a Thursday morning as we all started at roughly the same time.

We always used to drive past a sign on Stone Street which said “Caution: mud on road” yet we were never able to see any mud. It was the highlight of the journey, but then it was around 7am, so none of us were at our peak conversationally. At best we’d manage a few grunts at each other which passed for conversing.

It wasn’t until I joined the same rock’n’roll band as Paul that we started to become close. We were in the band together for maybe 4 or 5 years. When I joined the band, I was the oldest and the only one with a car. This meant that I was the designated driver for any gig that wasn’t in walking distance. Paul was usually the most sober of the rest of the band at the end of a gig and as such he would assist me with playing equipment Tetris to get all of our gear to fit into whichever vehicle I was driving. He would then be the most likely to stay awake to keep me company on the journey home.

Significant memories that I have of the journeys home include the band trying to keep me awake by shouting “STEW! WAKE UP!” at me, when I was clearly already awake, and singing along loudly to Christmas songs in the middle of summer. Oh, the larks we had.

As well as being my sober buddy when we were in the band, Paul was my drunk buddy when we were both single and looking for love. We would go out for a few drinks and lament our woes. There were times when we were both a bit too down about things, feeling like we would end up old, single and grumpy and I always thought we’d end up being a real life version of Statler and Waldorf, the two hecklers from The Muppet Show.

We were both playing for the same football team for a while (the second time I accidentally started up a football team, and again a story for another time), and at the same time we were both exploring the world of online dating looking for Ms Right. During training sessions, we would pair up and whilst warming up or doing circuits, we would discuss our tales of woe and all the experiences we’d been having.

I think perhaps the fact that we were chatting and not training might explain why neither of us are pro footballers. It’s either that or our ages and lack of skill. We’d inspire each other to persist with online dating, even when it seemed to not be going well and, in the end, it was the method we both used to find our partners.

Whilst neither of us may have been really good at real life football, Paul is exceptionally good at Pro Evo on the Playstation and I think has beaten me 95% of the times that we have played. This is despite an intensive training program that I put myself through, playing a season on every version of Pro Evo from the dawn of time. I think perhaps I just suck at computer games.

Paul asked me to be an usher at his wedding two years ago and I am pleased to be able to return the favour and that we have both found that happiness that we moaned to each other about being unable to find on several drunken occasions.

My groomsdudes: #3 the Sherlock to my Watson

I first met Bass sometime at secondary school. I forget exactly when. We were in the same year group but not the same form, so I think it was a while before our paths crossed. It was in media studies where our friendship started to bloom, with Bass enjoying lecturing me about films.

I’ve used a bit of artistic licence there. I can’t remember that far back at my age. I’m just assuming that he lectured me about films as that’s one of his favourite past times. He even does it professionally. Like, really for real cash money and stuff. It’s crazy. Along with our friend Luke, he produces the weekly Story Toolkit podcast.

It is genuinely really quite good if you have any interest in story writing, stories or listening to Bass rant about the recent Star Trek films. I often listen to it on the bus and it’s like Bass is sat next to me ranting about a film we have just watched, only it is even more difficult for me participate in the conversation than usual.

We started to become closer when I accidentally helped to set up a football team for the first time (a story for another day). Bass and myself will probably both admit that we were two of the weakest players on the team. As such, we got placed at full back – Bass at left-back and me at right back – for the majority of the time we played for the team. As far out of the way of danger as possible, yet still involved enough to feel that we were part of the team. I think this gave us some sort of full back bond. I still recall Alex McNeice attempting to explain a sliding tackle to Bass.

Whilst we have a lot in common and enjoy doing many things together, many of my fondest memories of Bass revolve around board games. We became really close when I started living on my own. He would often get me involved when he was arranging a gaming session which I really appreciated as too often, I would just be spending time at my flat on my own feeling isolated. He would introduce me to both new people and new games and I am grateful for both of these things.

One memory that I will never forget is when I got one over on him playing the Battlestar Galactica board game. I was secretly a cylon, which are the bad guys, and Bass was a human. I saw his secret mission card which said that he had to get a certain number of enemy ships surrounding the Galactica otherwise he would fail his mission and as a result, all of the human players would lose.

Seeing this, I started freely sending ships to attack the Galactica. The other players rightly got outraged, until I called on Bass to stand up for me because I knew what his secret mission was. He vouched for me and was 100% sure that I was human. The moment when I later revealed that I was a cylon and I had mind-mastered him all along was one of my greatest board game moments of all time.

Bass once showed me a video of the Shut Up and Sit Down review of Sherlock Holmes Consulting Detective. We are both big Sherlock fans and he has bought me several copies of the Conan Doyle stories, including one really beautiful version for Christmas last year. I have also bought him Sherlock themed gifts, including a deerstalker, a toy pipe and a magnifying glass. Upon seeing the video, I knew we had to play this game.

Consulting Detective was out of print and I searched for ages until I managed to find a second hand copy of the original printing which wasn’t on sale for a million pounds. There are lots of typographical issues, including some that send you to the wrong location in the game and might mean you miss an important clue. We loved the game nevertheless.

We were, also, quite shockingly poor at it. Like, really really poor. If we were actual detectives, we’re have been busted down to traffic duty within a week. We would often score negative points. There was one time when we played against a real life detective in the hopes that he’s struggle as well and we could feel better about how bad we were. He utterly destroyed us. Bass wrote about it here and it is quite an amusing read, including me having to try to convince him that his midget assassin theory is quite ridiculous.

Despite how poor we are at detectiving, Bass is and always be the Holmes to my Watson. He will be performing MC duties at our wedding and I’m hoping that he busts out some phat rhymes or whatever the kids say these days. That’s what MCs do, right? Although, I’m also hoping he doesn’t do a mic drop as I think we have to pay for any damages.

My groomsdudes: #2 My brother

I first met my brother Dan when he was born. We didn’t really communicate too well at first. I was 4 and used very basic English. He mostly just screamed. Over time, the communication in our relationship became more of a two-way thing. Now I can understand most of what he says, except when he is talking about web design. At that point I just smile and nod.

Our interests largely overlap, similar to my interests with my dad. The three of us all love music and sport. My brother and I also share a love of games; both board games and computer games. When we were younger we would spend many hours on whatever gaming system we had at the time, either attempting to beat the other one or getting impatient waiting for our turn on the game.

One specific memory I have is that we were playing the latest version of Madden when the news about 9/11 was coming through. I guess everyone remembers where they were when they find out about stuff like that. Nowadays, me and my brother are more likely to be playing board games in a larger, more sociable group.

One advantage of having a younger brother was that I was able to inflict my musical tastes on him. Several artists that he loves would have come about from overhearing and borrowing my CDs. I then had a Mini Me to take along to gigs when no-one else wanted to go, which was quite often as I was a bit of a musical snob when I was younger and seemed to like a band more if no-one else had ever heard of them.

I’m sure most brothers fight, and we were no different. We’d fight about stupid, unimportant things. Things that are long forgotten about. We were competitive. We could both be stubborn. We’d both think that the other was wrong, or a stupid idiot or whatever. Now that we are “grown-ups,” we are slightly more mature and we have grown past this. These days we a lot more supportive of each other.

In recent years, we have generally only fought when we’re playing co-operative games and both believe we have the best idea about what to do. Obviously I’m right, but sometimes I have to humour him and go with his idea.

We even worked together for a time. We both turned up to a recruitment day at Saga, only finding out a few days before that the other would be there. We both managed to get jobs working in the call centre. One benefit to this was getting to spend more time together, as we had both moved out of home by that point.

We would hang out either during breaks or at the weekends we were both scheduled to work, as you would be able to sit anyone in the office rather than your designated desk. This resulted in the only song that we’ve ever written together, the infamous hidden track on my band’s second album. Thinking about how successful that collaboration was, maybe we should consider another.

Despite the fact Dan is my younger brother, there were definitely times when he had to look after me. I can recall several times when he had to assist me home after I’d had one too many lemonade. I can’t recall very many occasions where it happened the other way round.

Dan will be my best man, returning the honour that he gave me when he married my awesome sister-in-law 5 years ago. Before his wedding, I was unsure if I would ask him to be my best man if I ever got married. It would allow him to get revenge on me for the speech that myself and Mikey (his other best man) had planned, which focused around finding the most effeminate photos of him possible and talking through how we’d thought he was gay whilst drawing a graph penis on a whiteboard. Comedy gold.

After that day, there was no choice in my mind that he would be my best man if I got married. Partly because I’d never been so nervous in my entire life, and partly because I was proud that he had bestowed the honour on me and wanted to do the same for him.

Dan and I don’t look too alike, and when he met people, he would often introduce himself as “the younger, more attractive brother.” You can’t say he wasn’t confident. He was always a lot more confident in groups of people than I was. Whilst I always played music, I was happy being at the back whereas Dan seemed to enjoy centre stage whilst acting, and even won awards for doing so.

A few weeks before we got engaged, I got a text from Dan asking when it was going to happen as he had a great speech planned. I’m not sure whether that is a good or a bad thing. I will find out a month today.

My groomsdudes: #1 Dad

I first met my dad when I was born. We didn’t really communicate too well at first. He used English. I mainly just screamed. Over time, the communication in our relationship became more of a two-way thing. Nowadays, I’d say we understand at least 60% of what the other one is saying.

I am very much like my dad in very many ways. One way is looks. When I was around 25, I was a little freaked out when found a photo of him looking identical to me when he was around 25. It made me wonder if I was actually a time traveller. We both had a very similar haircut and a very similar face. Now, over ten years later, we both have a very similar lack of hair and a very similar face.

Me and my dad share many of the same interests too. I didn’t notice how much so until I was having a job interview a while ago and was asked to list my interests outside of work. I started talking about my love of music, which I think has been given to me from my dad playing records from as early as I can remember and from me borrowing his guitar and hitting it randomly. We may not always have the same tastes in music, he’ll often talk to me about musicians I’ve barely heard of from approximately one million years ago, but we both have a love of music in general.

After mentioning music in my interview, I started talking about my love of sport. I think that this was given to me from my dad taking me along to football matches from around the age of five. I would be the annoying kid always asking his dad how much longer was left because it was cold, and because non-league football isn’t always exciting to a small child.

I remember one of the first matches I ever went to was Folkestone Town v Kings Lynn. I’m not sure how I remember that fact. It’s not really an important one. I didn’t know where Kings Lynn was until I just Googled it. I mainly remember someone in a seat near to us shouting “Come on you whites!” and every time I would try to shout “Oranges” over the word whites. I was quite a confrontational 5-year old. I am less confrontational these days, except when I play board games. My dad probably used stronger confrontational language, although I’m sure he moderated it when I was younger. As I grew older, he probably moderated it less; as I grew older, my language probably became closer to his.

My dad is sort of a local celebrity. One of the things most people know about him is that he has a football chant for him. If there is ever anything for me to aspire to, it’s that. In fact, I should probably add that to my bucket list now. Ok, that’s done.

My dad became a local celebrity largely through the fact that he was a sports writer/editor on our local newspaper. As you can tell from the fact that I am currently writing a blog, I enjoy writing too. My dad had a column called Touchliner in which he would write about whatever is on his mind. He would literally write what was on his mind, before he’d put it through any sort of sense filter. I’m not sure that anyone aside from him ever understood the entirety of any column he wrote.

Not all of our interests overlap. I love cooking but my dad’s speciality is a microwave meal. However, I still remember asking him to make me toast when I was ill, as he would always cover it with more layers of Dairylea (my toast topping of choice, still do this day) than had any right to be able to fit on a piece of bread.

My dad was always very patient and always willing to help me out even at my moments of greatest stupidity. There was the time when I phoned him around 9am and he left work to drive me to university because I had missed a bus as I hadn’t bothered to read the timetable and I’d attempted to catch a bus that didn’t exist. In hindsight, I was clearly doing university wrong as any other student would have taken that as a sign to go straight back to bed.

A few months later, after I had passed my driving test, I had driven up to uni but had accidentally left my lights on all day. When I came out of my last lecture around 7pm to find the battery dead and I called my dad who very kindly drove up to Canterbury to rescue myself and a friend from the Poltergeist of Park Wood.* He also brought a toolkit so that I could remove the battery, take it home to charge and replace it the next day.

These were just two times when he saved my metaphorical bacon within the space of one year. There are countless other times he has helped me out, although most of the other involve fewer examples of my own stupidity and so the stories aren’t as interesting.

There are also lots of great stories about my father doing things which one might class as stupid, too. One favourite story of my sister’s is how he tried to use the phone as a remote control for the TV when he came home drunk one evening. Who hasn’t tried to do something like that after a tipple or two, though? I won’t mention any of the numerous times he’s managed to fall over.

My personal favourite story is when myself and Jo were out for lunch with my parents and I was talking about DIY that we were doing. I asked my dad if he had a jigsaw, as I wanted to borrow one. He thought for a moment before replying that he didn’t think so as, whilst he enjoys puzzles, the problem with them is that they take up a lot of space. This misunderstanding is the reason that I have been buying him jigsaws as presents ever since.

My dad has always been there for me when I need help and advice. One of the best pieces of advice he gave me (which admittedly I have ignored on several occasions) is to always stop drinking when you think you won’t remember it the next day. As I get older, this is a piece of advice I have started to heed more often.

* Note: for any UKC students, this is something I just made up and is nothing to fear.

Mr Anderson

Hi. My name is Stewart Cork. At least it is at the moment. It’s going to be changing in seven months time. Let me explain to you why.

The short answer is that it’s because I’m going to get it changed by deed poll. The more correct answer is because I’m getting married (yay!) and will be changing my name when I do so.

Myself and my fiancee are quite liberal minded and believe that men and women are created equal, albeit with different dangly bits. Traditionally a woman would take her husband’s name upon marriage. To us, this feels a bit too much like a man is possessing the woman. A woman is giving up her name but the man is giving up nothing. Whilst some elements of our wedding will be traditional, there are others that will not and this is one of them.

It is important for us that we both have the same surname as a symbol of our union and so we have both opted to give up our inherited surnames. We have picked something new because double-barrelling and combing our names in other ways didn’t sound very good.

The surname we have opted for is Anderson. This is my grandmother’s maiden name and it is also a traditional Scottish name. As Jo is half-Scottish, this felt like a nice way to honour both of our ancestries so that it still felt like a link with our pasts in the same way that our current surnames do.

There are other bonuses with this. One is that there is an Anderson tartan which I will be wearing on
our wedding day.

Another is my hope that I will gain the nickname Neo after Keanu Reeves’ Mr Anderson in The Matrix.

A letter to Santa

I finally got round to writing my letter to Santa this year. As I might have missed the last post, I’ve decided to type it up in the hopes that he sees it one way or another.

Dear Santa,

I know I only write to you once a year. I really should try to keep in touch more, and I can only apologise for this. However, it is a two-way relationship and you can feel free to stop by any time for a cup of tea. If you let me know in advance, I’ll get those cookies you like.

It’s difficult to stay in touch tough – you seem to get busier the older you get and I can only assume that you’ve had to get the elves working even earlier this year with the world’s population continuing to grow. I’ve lost touch with a few people that I used to be close with. I say this every year but I will try to do better at keeping in touch.

I think I’ve been quite good this year. I have been giving more to charity and I’ve been trying to help others when I can, so I’m hoping that I’m on the nice list. Therefore, I’ve got a few special things I’m asking for this year.

Whilst 2016 was a good year for me personally as I got engaged, it wasn’t too great for the rest of the world. Let’s start with the big one – politics. With the results of the EU referendum (is Lapland in the EU? I don’t know), Donald Fart winning the US presidential election and the murder of Jo Cox MP, it seems like the right wing – specifically the extreme right – is on the rise.

I was hoping you might be able to do something about this? Maybe not remove all these people in power (although if you can get rid of Darth May, that would be excellent), but make people generally more tolerant and caring of other people, animals and the environment, then that would make me exceptionally happy. Less authoritarianism and more tolerance would be great. Perhaps you got some conservative MPs George Orwell’s 1984 for Christmas last year? If so, can you please remind them that it is a dystopian novel and not a handbook on how to govern.

Next up is celebrities. Now, I’m not much of a celeb spotter. I don’t know who at least two thirds of the humans on I’m A Celebrity are, but the rate at which they have been dying this year is ridiculous. I know that death is a natural and inevitable part of life, and also necessary otherwise your poor elves would never have a day off. But the rate at which people – cool people – have been going is ridiculous. Could you ask death to take someone that people don’t like once in a while , such as Piers Morgan or Katie Hopkins?

Anyway, I know all of that is a lot to ask, and some of it is probably outside of your control, so if it can’t be done, then some new socks will be fine.

Yours sincerely,
Stewart Cork

p.s. I know that I’ve been arguing quite a lot with people on the Hythe Residents Facebook page. I hope that hasn’t got me on the naughty list. I’m just trying to stand up for all the people that need housing against the NIMBYs. You might not have that problem in Lapland as there’s a lot of space there.

2016 Reading Challenge

Natalie challenged me to do the 2016 reading challenge on 9gag

I love reading and I love challenges, so here goes! This required me to read 42 books. As I read over 60 last year, albeit aided by the fact I was spending two hours a day on a train, I thought I should be able to manage it!

I only just managed it with a few weeks to spare. I found that it forced me to read books that I perhaps wouldn’t have read otherwise, which is a good thing. However, having to find books that fit certain categories meant that my pile of books to read (which is currently about 3 feet tall) didn’t get much smaller. As such, I won’t be doing a similar challenge next year as I want to try to get through as much of this pile as possible.

Below is a list of all the books that I picked and which category I picked them for. However, I will just list my 5 favourite books (in no particular order) that I read as part of this challenge and why.

Iain Banks – The Wasp Factory
I know people who have liked Iain Banks/Iain M Banks for years. I can’t believe it took me so long to read one of his books for the first time. I borrowed this from the library and it was so good that I bought a copy from a charity shop straight after so that Jo can read it too. You really get into the mind of the character, and it is really engaging. The ending really surprised me as well, and it’s always nice to get that engaged and still to not know where it is going.

Nathan Filer – Shock of the Fall
This was recommended to me by my sister-in-law and she picked a good one! It was partly inspired by the Wasp Factory – which Filer notes at the end of the book – and I had been able to tell that as I was reading. It was a very powerful book, and out of everything I read this year, was the most difficult book to put down.

Khaled Kosseni – The Kite Runner
A lot of people apparently hated this book. It was a book chosen as one about a culture I did not know about. The story involves a boy who moved from Afghanistan to America as a young child and goes back as an adult to deal with a problem. Again, I loved how you totally get into the mind of the main character. All of them are well written and you really start to feel for them. A great thing for a book to make you do.

Caitlin Moran – How to be a Woman
This was a book written by a celebrity, and is not a how to but an analysis of feminism and the problems that are still faced by women in society. It is also funny. I enjoyed reading this for both reasons.

Agatha Christie – Cat Among The Pigeons
I didn’t realise this was a Poirot book until I was part of the way through it. It was frustrating at times, but this was only due to dramatic irony. Christie is obviously a world class crime writer and I really enjoy whodunnits.

And the award for the worst book I read this year is tied between James Dashner – The Maze Runner and Kristen Simmons – Article 5. Avoid both at all costs.

A book based on a fairytale – Vivan Vande Velde – The Rumpelstiltskin Problem. Read while on holiday between 24 September and 1 October.

This was interesting. A guy who found problems with the story of Rumpelstiltskin and rewrote the story several times to deal with the problem. It was nice, but difficult to read all in one go due to the stories being so similar.

A National Book Award winner – Let the Great World Spin. Started on holiday between 24 Sept and 1 Oct. Finished 3d October,

This was really good. It is written in about 15 sections, each of which is from a different person’s perspective. They don’t all tie up neatly. Reading the second one, I was very confused about how it could possibly link to the first as it changed completely. Nevertheless, it was really good, really enjoyable.

A YA bestseller. Suzanne Collins: Hunger Games. Started 19th Jan, finished 3rd Feb.

I had wanted to read this for a while. Even though it is just Battle Royale. Which apparently the author had never heard of when she started writing this. It was engrossing and easy to read. Went through the 450 pages in no time when I had a chance to read. Will definitely be reading the others.

A book you haven’t read since high school: Lord of the Flies. Started 10 February, finished 17 February

I studied this for GCSE English and remembered enjoying it. It turns out I didn’t remember much of it. There’s so much that I’d forgotten and so much that I am sure I wouldn’t have understood fully when I was younger either. This was quite enlightening and might even tempt me to re-read Wuthering Heights which is my most hated book.

A book set in your home state – HE Bates – The Darling Buds of May. Read during November

Apparently this is set in Kent, although I didn’t notice any references during the book. It was quite short but pretty enjoyable. I’d forgotten pretty much everything about the TV show so wasn’t sure what was coming. There are questionable morals within the book but it is really well written and easy to read.

A book translated to English. Jonas Jonasson. The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden. Started 10th May. Finished 24th May.

I had read the 100 Year Old Man Who Climbed out A Window and Disappeared which I loved. This was possibly even better. The style of writing is really easy and fun to just dive into.

A romance set in the future – Kurt Vonnegut – Slaughterhouse 5. Started 19th September. Finished 23rd September.

Not set in my future as such, but the future from when this was written. It was a bit confusing. I had only read one book by Vonnegut before – Welcome to the Monkey House – but I liked it so much that it made it onto my list of favourite books when I wrote it in 2014. I had recently read it, so that is probably why it was on there. This seemed different to me, although I’ll probably re-read it at some point to try to fully digest it as I did get a wee bit lost.

A book set in Europe – Milan Kundera – The Joke. Started 31st October. Finished in November.

This was a bit difficult to follow at first due to the changing perspectives but once I got my head around it, it was really good. Kundera has a good grasp on how to write a satirical novel. It was also a little frightening that a joke can be taken so out of context and cause so many problems for one person. Quite relevant now Darth May has enacted her snoopers charter.

A book that’s under 150 pages. Thomas Pynchon. The Crying of Lot 49. Started 22nd April, Finished 29th April.

This is a book that inspired Radiohead who I was obsessed with when I was at university. I have been intending to read it since then but only just got around to it. It’s good. It’s not what I was expecting, but it’s good.

A New York Times bestseller. Nick Hornby – Slam. Started 1st September. Finished 3rd September.

This was so easy to read. I love Hornby’s stuff and initially I wasn’t sure if I’d get into this one but after a few chapters I was hooked and blasted through it. Lovely stuff.

A book that’s becoming a movie this year. Marvel: Civil War. Started 18 February. Finished 23rd February.

I love comics! Yeah! A way to get an extra graphic novel on this list. I only started reading them properly a few years ago, and then it was primarily Batman. It’s nice to read a wider range, although I get lost by all the characters and stories that there are.

A book recommended by someone you just met – Upton Sinclair – The Jungle. Started 17th October. Finished 31st October.

This was recommended by a guy in Foyles who looked at the other two books I had in their 3 for 2 offer and helped me find something which he thought I would like. It was really interesting to see a depiction of how the working poor lived in early 20th century America. There are a lot of similarities to problems that are inherent in the culture these days and it is disheartening to see that over 100 years later, we haven’t – as a culture – managed to solve them yet.

A self-improvement book. Nigel Watts – Teach Yourself Writing a Novel. Started 18th July. Finished 23rd July.

I have been wanting to write a novel for quite some time. I’ve had the outline of an idea and this helped motivate me to do some more work on it and gave me ideas of the technical things to think about.

A book you can finish in a day. Neil Gaiman. How the Marquis Got His Coat Back. Read on the morning of Friday 22nd April

I love Gaiman’s style. It really draws you in. I don’t think I’d read any of the Neverwhere books before but it wasn’t too difficult to understand what was going on. I recommend for an hour long read.

A book written by a celebrity. Caitlin Moran. How to Be a Woman. Started 29th April. Finished 10th May.

I really enjoyed this. I like to think I’m liberal and egalitarian but it was great reading this to get more of a female perspective and all that.

A political memoir – Barack Obama – The Audacity of Hope. Started 12th July. Finished 19th September.

This was enjoyable, especially so because it was written before he became the candidate for President. It filled me in on his previous life, and some of the workings of the US election system. The bit when he met Michelle was also quite cute.

A book that’s at least 100 years older than you. William Shakespeare. Taming of the Shrew. Started 6th June. Finished: 7th June.

We saw this on 11th June. I read it in two days in advance. I enjoyed it, although the male/female dynamic in the play is awkward.

A book that’s more than 600 pages. Leo Tolstoy. War and Peace. Started 3rd January. Finished 15th July.

Full Blog Post as it is on my bucket list.

A book from Oprah’s Book Club. Gabriel Garcia Marquez. 100 Years of Solitude. Read during November.

I had read this when I was much younger. It was difficult to follow with all the Spanish naming conventions and everyone having very similar names. I liked it though, but I lost the flow of the whole novel at times.

A science-fiction novel. HG Wells – War of the Worlds. Started 23rd July. Finished 2nd August.

HG Wells lives down the road from me. Or he used to. His house is still there. And I guess it’s not literally down the street. You have to go round the corner as well. I’ve wanted to read this for a long time – ever since I heard the David Essex soundtrack back when I was around 8, and I finally got around to it. I really enjoyed it. I felt it was a much easier to read than The Island of Doctor Moreau which I had read earlier this year. Two thumbs up.

A book recommended by a family member. Nathan Filer. The Shock of the Fall. Started 11th August. Finished 16th August.

I asked my sister-in-law Hannah to recommend a book and she picked this. It reminded me of the Wasp Factory which I had read a week or so previously, and I discovered that in the interview at the back, he mentioned Iain Bank’s Frank. It was good, and the first book to make me cry in a really long time.

A book that is published in 2016. JK Rowling. Harry Potter – all three Pottermore Presents books.

These were fun if not the extra stories that I was hoping for. It was nice that some character details were filled in, and it was cool to hear some bits from JK Rowling on the decisions she made in writing the books. It was also nice to have a recap of some of the key story points (as they tie in with certain characters biographies) shortly before going to watch the play in November.

A Graphic Novel. Chuck Palahniuk – Fight Club 2. Started 20th July, Finished 22nd July.

It was interesting, if a little odd at times. It was maybe trying to be a bit too meta and to push the conventions of graphic novels in general (such as being able to read what people were saying). It also didn’t really show how it got from the end of the original novel to this. Not bad, but not great.

A book with a protagonist who has your occupation. Rosy Barnes. Sadomasochism for Accountants. Read while on holiday between 24 Sep and 1 Oct.

There aren’t many books or stories with accountants in at all. The only other one I can think of is The Producers. I quite like my job. I’m good at it, but I’ll be the first to admit it isn’t very exciting or interesting to people who don’t do it. The idea of taking accountants and putting them in a fetish club scenario was quite amusing. I quite enjoyed this book. It was good holiday reading.

A book that takes place during summer. The Great Gatsby. Started 16th August. Finished 23rd August.

I read this for the first time last year. As soon as I finished reading it, I thought that I wanted to read it again. This gave me the perfect excuse. It was better second time around, definitely. I did struggle every time a character said “of” and not “have” to not then rip up the whole book, though.

A book and it’s prequel. James Dashner. Maze Runner and Kill Order. Started 4th October. Finished 17th October.

These books are so badly written. I really don’t know what to say about them. The most annoying this is that there are a few interesting ideas but there is never any payoff. You never get to understand what has caused this world to be. That’s on top of all the poor storytelling, lack of emotional connection with the characters. I am annoyed by the person on Goodreads who suggested these two books for this challenge.

A murder mystery. Agatha Christie. Cat Among The Pigeons. Started 15th March. Finished 21st March.

I didn’t realise this was a Poirot book when I started reading it. It was enjoyable yet frustration. The employment of dramatic irony just made me want to jump into the book, shout at characters and tell them what was going on!

A book written by a comedian. Simon Pegg – Nerd Do Well. Started 3rd September.

This was another autobiography and I found it really interesting. There were some fiction bits in amongst the anecdotes which were ok but I found superfluous to requirements. The discussion about decisions made whilst making some of my favourite TV shows and films was enjoyable and there was also a lot of discussion that would be more suited to a film studies lesson – which I enjoyed.

A dystopian novel. Kristen Simmons. Article 5. Started 23rd February. Finished 11th March.
This was easily the worst book I’d read so far. It made me hate the main character which is never a good state to be in. It was similar in style and target audience to the Hunger Games but didn’t grip me in the same way and was much more poorly written.

A book with a blue cover: Ray Bradbury. We’ll Always Have Paris. Started 28th April. Finished 10th May.

A book of short stories, some of them were brilliant and engaging.

A book of poetry. Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Started 14th January. Finished 19th January.

I read Bill Bryson’s Shakespeare biography over Christmas. Whilst going to a performance of every one of his plays is on my bucket list, I hadn’t paid much attention to the poetry before. I was quite surprised. It was more engaging than I expected it to be, and also it was interesting to note that not everything rhymed when it was supposed to, so it showed how much the English language had changed in the last 400 years.

The first book you see in a bookstore. JK Rowling – Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. Read 5th – 10th December.

This is probably the first book everyone sees in any bookstore for the latter half of this year. Each book shop seems to have about 50,000 copies of it.

This book is the script to the play. I didn’t want to read it until after I had seen the play. This was a good idea, because the script on it’s own isn’t anywhere near as good as seeing the play, and I can understand why some fans weren’t too impressed by it. I didn’t like the time travel element but this is mainly because I don’t like time travel but I understand what it was trying to do. I think I’d have preferred a new story entirely but enjoyable nonetheless.

A classic from the 20th Century. Brideshead Revisited. Started 2nd August. Finished 10th August.

I had no idea what this book was going to be about but the name had always intrigued me. In feel, for some reason it felt like an English Great Gatsby. Unlike some classics, I found it quite easy to follow and enjoyed it.

A book from the library. Iain Banks – The Wasp Factory. Started July 29th. Finished August 2nd.

I can’t believe I hadn’t read this before. It is awesome. If you’ve not read it, I recommend it. The way it reveals information piece by piece is very well done. It’s a really well written and well structured book. And the end. Did not see that coming.

An autobiography. John Cleese. So Anyway… Started 27th May. Finished: 14th June.

This only really goes up to the start of the Pythons. Enjoyable, you really get a sense of who John Cleese is.

A book about a road trip. Terry Darlington. Narrow Dog To Carcassonne. Started 21st March. Finished 20th April.

Technically a book about a boat trip. A retired couple who – against pretty much all advice – sail a narrow boat across the channel and to the south of France. Enjoyable and stylistically the writing reminded me a bit of how my dad writes.

A book about a culture you are unfamiliar with. The Kite Runner. Started 23rd August. Finished 1st September.

About Afrghanistan and a boy who leaves to go to America and returns a man. A lot of people said they didn’t get on with this buy I’m not sure why. It pulled at the heartstrings well and while some bits seemed predictable, there were twists and turns. I found this easy to read and would definitely recommend.

A satirical book. Voltaire – Candide. Started reading 23rd September. Finished early October.

I read this whilst on Holiday. I’ve forgotten what I thought about this.

A book that takes place on an island. The Island of Dr Moreau. Started June 20th. Finished July 18th.

I picked this partly due to it’s significance in Orphan Black. It was good, but at times I struggled to get into it.

A book that’s guaranteed to bring you joy. Bill Bryson. The Road to Little Dribbling. Started 12th September. Finished 19th September

I assumed this would bring me joy as I’ve really liked Bryson’s other work and I like his writing style. It was still amusing in places but he has turned into a bit of a grumpy old man now.