After delaying it yesterday to order a takeaway instead, tonight we made a nice homemade pie for dinner. You literally cannot beat a homemade pie. Literally, there's been tests and stuff.
I mean, I bloody love Greggs, but comparing Greggs to homemade pastry-dishes is like like comparing McDonald's is to a nice summer BBQ. (i.e. you just can't do it)
I would love to make my own Greggs-style menu though. Homemade pies and that are bloody gorgeous, but to make your own Steak Bake and Chicken Slices would be something else.
In fact, my love for creating a homemade Greggs menu must've been so apparent to Gill at an early stage of our relationship that she decided to jeopardise any future we may have had to lie about her own kitchen skills, hoping they would be enough to whisk me away, never to look at another woman ever again.
I don't even think I had mentioned my desire to create Greggs from scratch at that point, but that didn't stop her one Christmas. Oh no.
Picture the scene; it was Chri
Posted Mon, August 30th, 2010 by  Mat 
After delaying it yesterday to order a takeaway instead, tonight we made a nice homemade pie for dinner. You literally cannot beat a homemade pie. Literally, there’s been tests and stuff.
I mean, I bloody love Greggs, but comparing Greggs to homemade pastry-dishes is like like comparing McDonald’s is to a nice summer BBQ. (i.e. you [...]
At what age do you suddenly gain loads of DIY skills?
Because at 27 I’m still very much out of my depth. It can’t be 31 either, because Gill didn’t do much better. But then maybe you have to subtract 5 years for girls as it’s usually a man’s job to fix up the house.
If [...]
You know, it doesn't matter what town or city you visit, certain shops are always the same. HMV is the same all over the country; if you're on holiday somewhere and you need a DVD or a new pair of headphones or something and you see a HMV, you know exactly what to expect. Other shops are the same; every M&S is the same no matter if you're in Chichester or Middlesbrough, Worthing or Wolverhampton.
I thought the same would apply to supermarkets, but I was wrong, because today I went into a Tesco that was rough.
Now it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to forsee a little Tesco Extra that's open till late in a dodgy part of town being rough, in fact that's almost to be expected, but the Tesco I went into today was a full-blown supermarket, and yet it had the air of a shop about to be the victim of a daylight robbery.
I couldn't quote put my finger down on exactly why it felt rough, it just did. There was a tense mood in the air, and the shop was unaturally quiet for a big supermarket.
The cli
Posted Sat, August 28th, 2010 by Mat
You know, it doesn’t matter what town or city you visit, certain shops are always the same. HMV is the same all over the country; if you’re on holiday somewhere and you need a DVD or a new pair of headphones or something and you see a HMV, you know exactly what to expect. Other [...]
Got a bit in trouble tonight.
After another incredibly stressful week a few of the guys from work decided we should all go to the pub next door to work for one. Just one, and we actually meant it this time, we really did.
So in another cliché-filled, drink-fueled decision, we decided to stay for more than the pre-agreed 'one drink', ad we actually had three or four! We're bloody mental we are. We really bloody are.
Thing is though, once you have one, you really do get a taste for it, and well, work had been tough and the conversation was flowing like a Flo-Rider in a flood, so we carried on gassing like it was going out of fashion and until I spoke to Gill on the phone realising I was four hours late for dinner.
WHOOPS.
We finished work at half four you see, which isn't uncommon for a Friday night, but in the past when Gill and I worked in the same building we just walked home together whilst I waved the guys at work off with a tear in my eye as they went to the pub and I cleaned up
Posted Fri, August 27th, 2010 by Mat
Got a bit in trouble tonight.
After another incredibly stressful week a few of the guys from work decided we should all go to the pub next door to work for one. Just one, and we actually meant it this time, we really did.
So in another cliché-filled, drink-fueled decision, we decided to stay [...]
Man it's been a tough day.
Work was so busy I didn't even have a lunch break, or any break come to think about it. We were so busy that I actually had to refrain from going to the toilet, scared to waste precious seconds that could otherwise be used to do work.
I could handle not going to the toilet (thank God for Shewees) and I could handle not having a break, but not eating? Oh man. That is my limit.
I'm sure I'm not alone in this, but I go really, really weak without food. And I don't mean being without food for days or even weeks, I'm talking minutes and hours here. It can get bad, really bad. Like if I'm out in town walking round the shops for instance, I get all zombie-like. Staggering about and falling into things.
And this is just because I haven't eaten anything for an hour - two hours tops.
The same thing happened today, I was so tired and hungry by the time I had got home that as I reached our flat and approached the front door I put my got out my wallet and got my bank ca
Posted Thu, August 26th, 2010 by Mat
Man it’s been a tough day.
Work was so busy I didn’t even have a lunch break, or any break come to think about it. We were so busy that I actually had to refrain from going to the toilet, scared to waste precious seconds that could otherwise be used to do work.
I could [...]
[There won't be any Scott Pilgrim movie spoilers in this blog post, I swear to God, man]
Saw Scott Pilgrim tonight. Right after work, too. And guess what? It was brilliant.
For those of you living under a rock that was chucked from the deck of a cruiseliner setting sail for India from the north-west coast of Australia by an angry Norwegian kid, Scott Pilgrim (vs. The World) is the films based on the comic-book series by Bryan Lee O'Malley, and has now been turned into a major motion-picture, directed by Edgar Wright.
The film (and I'm guessing comics too) tell the story of Scott Pilgrim, a 23 year-old kid who likes videogames, is in a band, and has a gay room-mate. He then meets a cute girl who who likes but to go out with her he's got to defeat her 7 evil ex-boyfriends.
The film was brilliant for a number of reasons, but as I'm not a film reviewer, this next bit will be poorly-worded and ill conceived.
Firstly, there are literally (not literally) a million computer game references in
Posted Wed, August 25th, 2010 by Mat
[There won't be any Scott Pilgrim movie spoilers in this blog post, I swear to God, man]
Saw Scott Pilgrim tonight. Right after work, too. And guess what? It was brilliant.
For those of you living under a rock that was chucked from the deck of a cruiseliner setting sail for India from the north-west coast [...]
I saw him, there, by the clingfilm. There, on his own.
Maybe I should say hello. No, no. that would be silly. Plus I'm hungry and I want to go home. Yeah, that's the best thing to do right now. No need to spark up conversation now just for the sake of it. Best to wait until we can both commit to such a thing.
Yeah yeah, I'll leave it for now. I'll say hi another time. We don't even know each other, save for pictures on the internet. Me going up to him now as he passes the greaseproof paper just past the eggs would be madness. Madness!
Madness? No, this is Morrison's.
I thought about going over to say hi, I really did, but it was just easier to turn away and stand at the till listening to my music than attempt to start a conversation with someone I've never even met before. We hadn't, you see, met in real life.
We had spoken online; on forums, on Twitter and Facebook, but we had never actually spoken to each other in real life. Never even met, let alone spoken.
And yet I had seen
Posted Tue, August 24th, 2010 by Mat
I saw him, there, by the clingfilm. There, on his own.
Maybe I should say hello. No, no. that would be silly. Plus I’m hungry and I want to go home. Yeah, that’s the best thing to do right now. No need to spark up conversation now just for the sake of it. Best [...]
Back to work today which can be stressful enough after a week off, but today was also the first day I had to walk to work, alone. You see I only work 15 minutes away from my house which is good enough, but not only that, but Gill works at the same place, too. Well, I say works, I mean, worked.
Gill still works at the same college as I do, it's just that she now works from another site, meaning those lazy walks to work together holding hands and skipping along the grass are now long gone.
On the plus side it means I can catch up on podcasts and listen to albums for an additional hour every day, so, every cloud...
I know it's silly, and I know we're in the minority of couples who get to walk to work with each other, but I actually quite like it.
When I first moved in with Gill all that year-and-a-half-ago, we never saw each other at lunchtime. "Man, we see enough of each other as it is!", we used to say to people. People always asked us if we met up at lunch, but we didn't. But, recently -
Posted Mon, August 23rd, 2010 by Mat
Back to work today which can be stressful enough after a week off, but today was also the first day I had to walk to work, alone. You see I only work 15 minutes away from my house which is good enough, but not only that, but Gill works at the same place, too. Well, [...]
I've spent literally all day designing our wedding invitations today. Well, all day from the moment I woke up, which was about 10am.
After my initial reluctance to anything wedding-related, the moment I could do something which required the use of my laptop and/or the internet, I was all over it.
Also, our wedding invitations are going to look AMAZING. I'm really glad we're designing and making our own invites; initially done as a cost-saving measure, I'm actually quite happy we're making them ourselves.
Our wedding is going to have loads of personality, and us making our own invites is just another way of showing this.
We've got loads of other fun things planned for the wedding, again mostly cheap things designed to be nice, loving and fun, whilst remaining cheap as possible. It's not like we're paupers with barely enough money to eat, but wedding's cost the earth, so you've gotta save money wherever possible.
Sorry it's bit of a short one today, been totally busy what with the invit
Posted Sun, August 22nd, 2010 by Mat
I’ve spent literally all day designing our wedding invitations today. Well, all day from the moment I woke up, which was about 10am.
After my initial reluctance to anything wedding-related, the moment I could do something which required the use of my laptop and/or the internet, I was all over it.
Also, our wedding invitations are [...]
I'm back in Leeds now, and coming down with a major case of the post-holiday, post-Fringe blues. Luckily I didn't have too much time to wallow in my own self pity as myself and Gill were off to visit Gill's family in East Yorkshire.
We had to leave early this morning so we got there in good time to spend the day with Gill's parents, brother and wife who were up from London, and her other brother who leaves for a new job in China on Monday.
Although I say early - our original set-off time was due to be half eight this morning, hardly getting up at dawn - but after a busy, tiring (but utterly fantastic) week at the Fringe, along with staying up until 2am playing Crackdown, I was too tired to get up.
Plus, I thought that by staying up late, even though I was back in Leeds, I was wringing out the very last bit of my holiday. Going to sleep in my own bed would only mean it was over, and we were back in regular weekend mode.
Hell, I even had a few beers - although try as I might, I couldn't
Posted Sat, August 21st, 2010 by Mat
I’m back in Leeds now, and coming down with a major case of the post-holiday, post-Fringe blues. Luckily I didn’t have too much time to wallow in my own self pity as myself and Gill were off to visit Gill’s family in East Yorkshire.
We had to leave early this morning so we got there [...]
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