Time for a Quick One

Thought I'd post a quicky just to say that BT have ever so generously decided to completely knacker our ADSL service as well as our telephone line.

Having a completely dead phone for three weeks is one thing, but now they've given us half a dial tone but stolen the Internet! Completely unacceptable! ;)

I tell you, we'll both be wide-eyed, white as sheets, and shaking in the corner of the room by Sunday night ;)

I've still got a lot of stuff I'd like to write, just for the sake of keeping you all informed, really. Perhaps I'll write some of it up without having the distraction of the Internet around this weekend ;)
Of course, having said all this, it will no doubt magically fix itself this evening just to make me look stupid. And that's not something I need any help with, thank you very much! ;)

Bits and Bobs and Things to Say

Well, the last time I made a big list, I don't think I referred back to it after about the first day, so I'll try to keep this one short ;)

Right now, I have either started, or want to start, the following posts:

• Last Monday. This was my last (for the forseeable future) solo Relate session - no revelations, but I will summarise some of the 'generic' questions I was asked and my answers. Specifically: Decision about my blog and secrets (obviously, you know the outcome), stress, my parents, my wife.
  
• Last Tuesday. My wife went to the doctor's.
  
• Last Wednesday. A little more detail about what I told her and her reactions.
  
• Today (Monday). Her last solo Relate session; some things she told me afterwards.
  
• Getting engaged, and getting married (I can explain some of my thoughts here as I go, and was reminded I wanted to say about some of this by Northern Monkey's thoughts, as I said below).
  
• Ummm I think that's about it for now :)
  

I was going to try to blog at least one of these today, but it turned into a long evening :)

My wife had the car so she could go to Relate. I'd been planning on getting a lift with someone else from work, but he turned out not to be in. So I umm'd and err'd about how far to walk vs. getting a bus etc.
Eventually, I got a lift with someone else part way, and figured I'd walk along the bus route until I couldn't be bothered to walk anymore :)

Well, as it turned out, I walked the next two miles into town. Which, interestingly enough, was where my wife had left the car... Oh ho ho, and as I got to the car, it started raining... "Oh ho ho ho ho" goes my brain ;)

So, I...

Got in the car...

Drove off...

Turned around...

Left the car parked a few feet away facing the other direction! "Hah!", thought I, "that'll throw her!" ;) And continued home the next two miles on foot :)
In total, I made it home in about an hour and ten minutes, which wasn't bad allowing for ten minutes in the middle pissing about with the car ;)

Did indeed get fairly soaked, but just didn't care really :) I mean I wasn't going to be able to avoid it, and for some reason I just started humming "Summer Holiday" (oh dear, oh dear, oh dear ;)

Also happened to bump into our old trainee on the way. Was interested to hear he has a new job.

Oh, I was also thinking (well, remembered)... Some people say I'm patient. I guess it depends what I'm being patient about. I do hate waiting. I would rather spend 20mins walking than waiting for a bus :) (Er, or in this case, 1 hour walking instead of a few mins for a bus ;)
Well, walking is more fun anyway :)

But I do feel impatient when I end up "stuck" behind someone ambling along slowly.

And I hate waiting for computers! That is one reason I like upgrading mine :) I don't want to do something and have to wait! I want it done noooow! :)
I mean with computers it's those "short" (several seconds to a minute or two) "waits" that get me. Many minutes, and you can do something else. But short enough to not let you do something else irritates me :)

Anyway, speaking of waiting, my wife is upstairs waiting for me to come to bed in "just five minutes..." ;)

*cough* Oops :)

Before I Forget...

And 'though it rained,
I did not care.
For I was already wet.

Stuff like that kind of bugs me. So short, so simple. Is it a poem? Did I just make it up, or is it lines half-remembered? (Or half-forgotten, depending upon your perspective ;)

One for those of you (i.e. most of you ;) more cultured than I to answer, I think ;)

Anyway, I can't hang around here rambling at all you guys. I'm drained, definitely drenched, and desperately in need of a warm shower ;)

No comments about being both drained AND drenched. Anyone who has just considered such comments has clearly been paying too much attention to the sort of terrible cheese I come out with ;)

The Road Ahead

As I laid in bed this morning, I found myself thinking about the road ahead.

Over the last couple of days, it feels like my wife, probably a little 'threatened' by everything I told her, has been making a bit more of an effort. I can see that the little flicker of hope (which, to me, felt almost extinguished in July/August time) is still there.

So, as I find myself able to eliminate one set of worries, I have immediately conjured a whole new set to appear in their place ;)

I can now see the hope that we can walk up this road together and work on things together, and that they can and will get better.

In seven years, I have gone through varying degrees of happiness. Overall, starting pretty happy and tailing off over the years. But in the seven years we've lived together, there has always been at least one problem (e.g. sex) that has held me back from feeling "truely" happy.

One day, we will have reached the end of our road, and I ought to be happier than I have been in seven years. But then I will need to work out whether I am "truely" happy.

Well, I've waited this long, what's a little longer, eh? ;) Hopefully I can console myself that a part of me knows there's happiness at the end of that road, or I would not have held on for so long.

But overall, we'll just have to wait and see what happens...

It's September. SEP-TEM-BER!

I noticed this when I went to the supermarket after my first solo Relate session. Euch. I thought last year they had returned the ridiculous run up to Christmas to a far more reasonable amount of time.
On the other hand, I wasn't very "happy" with last Christmas. It sort of crept up on me. I think it got real busy at work running up to Christmas, so I couldn't have much time off either over Christmas, or the random days off leading up to it.

I do like a good few days of completely random wandering around town TRYING to think of ideas for people. Never really get any, but at least I try ;)

Blogging in the Bath

Isn't technology marvelous? :)

I mean here I am, taking a soak in the bath, playing MP3s on my PDA, and typing (well, tapping) up a blog entry ;)

I'm not a huge fan of baths, but I always take ages in the shower(20mins is VERY fast for me - 30-45minutes is more likely average!), and right now I just couldn't be bothered to stand up for that long ;)

Well, it's been a busy week (and it's only Wednesday!), but I'll try to summarise some of it soon. I've also had ideas on a couple of rambly posts that I've not got around to writing yet.

This is rambling too, but not on any specific subject. It's a subtle difference, but a difference nonetheless ;)

Right, I think I'll stop now before my hand gets tired waving my thingy around.
(By which I mean my PDA stylus!! :-P)

Thank you all for your kind and thoughtful comments recently. They have all been very much appreciated, and sometimes really helpful, too :)

Told my wife...

...Everything.

"I am quite curious," she said, "as to what you've written, but I think you're right that I might not like it."

"And," she said, "I wonder what blog template you used."

Hahahahaha...

Phew.

One Reason I Love Being a Programmer...

See now, one of the things I love about being a programmer, is that if I have to do something boring, tedious, and repetitive on the computer... Most of the time, I don't have to! :) I can write a program to do it for me! :) I mean ok, it takes just as much time to write the program sometimes as it would do to actually just do it, but it's a lot less boring ;)

I mean, for example, some years ago, I found myself needing to do something like open a few dozen files, change "Written by Bob" to "Written by Fred". Ok, that's not hard to do, but it is a little dull.
So instead, I wrote a program which simply asked you to select a folder, asked you what text to look for, and what text to replace it with. Bang! It then goes off to each file in that folder and replaces the text.

I tell you, the number of times that program's saved me so much time in the years since I first knocked it up! :)

I think that's how the truely useful inventions come about. You can't just sit there and think, "Hmm, what would be a good thing to invent."
Things tend to need to have a reason to be used. Something to make life easier or more fun/interesting. And if you think of something that will make your own life easier or more fun/interesting, the chances are, there'll be a whole bunch of other people in the same boat.

Of course, just now, the "program" (well, it only had one line of code) I knocked up in two minutes wasn't exactly "useful" in the classical sense of the word. Neither did it specifically go out of its way to make anyones' life "easier". Although it was fun/interesting ;) Well... Perhaps. ;)

I mean if Bob (or was that Fred?) is going to leave his desk unoccupied for five minutes while I'm in the general vicinity and waiting for another computer to reboot... Then, well, he shouldn't really have left his computer unattended like that, should he. That's just asking for trouble. ;)

Ok, it's simple, but grabbing a picture of the screen and sticking it in a window that doesn't actually do anything takes about two seconds. So all of a sudden, it appears that clicking that Start button does nothing. Word won't close. The keyboard doesn't respond. Ho hum.

Oh, and bizarrely, all of a sudden, double-clicking seems to display some really strange error message... ;)

Good Luck Iona!

I remember that September 15th is the day Iona was due to get married.

Good luck Iona. I do hope you live happily ever after :)

Relate - Sessions 1, 1.5, 2, 3, or 4, and 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5

That's only two I have to talk about, but it depends on how you look at it as to what their session "number" is ;)

1 - as it was my first completely solo one
1.5 - as I had half the first one with this therapist prior to this full one
2 - as it was the second with this therapist
3 - third meeting with a psycho-sexual therapist
4 - our fourth meeting with Relate

The second one of these two I mentioned my wife had today.

So that's got the same first four reasons, plus #5, as it'll be our fifth meeting in total.

lol, was just thinking I keep going to refer to her by name... Maybe "Mrs Monkfish" ;)

Hah, look at that. What a lot of ramble without having said ANYTHING ;)

So, my meeting was yesterday, and my wife had one today as there had been a cancellation she could nip into the place of.
I (perhaps obviously) don't really know how my wife got on in hers (you aren't supposed to specifically talk about it, as they're asking about history and stuff in these first meetings, so don't want one person's recollections muddling the other's, etc.)
I'll be back in next Monday (so that'll be a total of 2.5 hours I'll have had alone with her), my wife the following Monday (2 hours), and the Monday after that (phew :) will probably be both of us. 'Course, I guess it depends how much my wife has to say though! :)

I think my initial bits are probably taking a little longer, as I have said about my blog and... everything. Now I've got that bit "out of the way", she ought to be able to concentrate on the questions she actually wants to ask a little easier ;)

I had been thinking about telling my wife about my blog and everything for some time anyway, but the Relate Therapist (I'll call her "RT" for short) said I should work out what I will be happy to share so that she knows what she can bring it up in the meeting(s) that we have together.

To me, it's kind of like this, easiest to hardest:
1. Tell her I have a blog
2. Tell her all my other worries (I actually don't remember what we've talked about in conversations in the last few weeks... if only I had made notes somewhere... oh... well, I can't be bothered to look then ;) But still, explain, make sure she understands.
3.
4. Actually have her READ my blog.

4 seems kind of difficult. The bit I worry about with that is how unnecessarily hurtful some stuff might be. Like, sometimes I just come here to vent, to get it all out and feel a bit better. I wouldn't mind her knowing anyone I know, or anything like that. I'm just not sure reading all everything I write when I'm hurt and stuff sometimes would be constructive.

She'll probably feel better about some stuff for knowing about my blog, and me having the chance to explain it and everyone and everything. I mean, take now, for instance. I'm sitting here, typing away to myself... And I suspect she's wondering what I'm typing, who I'm talking to... how worried she should be?

But, I mean, I started this to have somewhere to talk about my fears of marriage. Well, ok, I did that bit, and now I'm trying to make it work. So, I guess that's why her knowing about it "in theory" doesn't bother me too much - I am trying.

Hmm... Perhaps I should drop a future potential "Hi honey" here? ;)

RT mentioned, as I had previously feared upon occasion that perhaps Relationship Counselling may prove to be more appropriate. I guess I don't mind that too much, except I hope there's not another big delay in getting the ball actually rolling there.

Bits & Bobs

Phew, long day.

Will post about Relate later. Re-later? :) Relate-r? :) Oh dear. ;)

Errrm. Errrrrrm. What was I going to say?

Went for some petrol afterwards (as you do), but there was a queue, so I hopped into the supermarket to see if it had cleared by the time I came out. Picked up a *coughmicrowaveburgercough* and some flapjacks for me tea :) (Knew I didn't fancy much by then, as it was 7:30 already) Gave the Mrs a bell, and she asked if I could pick her up a bottle of Dr. Pepper. Ooh I tell you that's a struggle... 89p for a tiny bottle! (Oops sorry, sounded a bit Franky Howard there)
But then saw 6 cans on BOGOF for £2.39. Oh dear decision time there ;) I mean 12 cans for £2.39 is clearly better than 1 bottle for 89p... I went for 6 Dr. Peppers and 6 Lilts, as they were also in the deal :)

Meanwhile... Started downloading Windows Vista RC1 (Release Candidate 1 - theoretically feature complete, they just need to "tune" it now, in time for it to "go gold" next month or so, to be on store shelves late January) a short while ago. Blummey, it does make me appreciate the speed of connections these days sometimes... 2.5gb to download and it's 85% through already.

I'm sipping my Lilt and slowly munching through this burger atm. It's been a long day.

And Vista has hit 95%... :)

As I Gazed Up at the Sky

This picture, unfortunately, does not do it justice.

The moon was full and bright, and the clouds raced past, illuminated by its light.



Every cloud has a silver lining,
Every rainbow has its pot of gold,
And every winter has its snow.

Good luck, Hanni. I hope you find your path and heal your hurt.

Nobody won the prize...

...Although Suzie was right in assuming that the date of 4th September was relevant.

Well, actually, 4th September in itself had no relevance at all :)

However it did mark our six month anniversary. Interesting way to spend the evening, huh? ;)

And I didn't even let her pick up a Chinese on the way home from Relate!

Tsk ;)

Although you know what? We still haven't actually got around to sending thank you cards to people who came to the wedding or gave us gifts.

My excuse (although, I suspect, it may be just that - after all, we really should have done it if only for common courtesy if nothing more) is that I don't like to think about it.

Right, Here We Go!

There's the first of our regular meetings done.

6:15 Monday evenings, for the record.

LOL, sorry, what a line. Just watching an episode of Coupling at the same time.
"I thought I'd gone to his house to, y'know, heal our spiritual divide. But it turned out I was just gagging for a shag!"

*cough* You'd have thought I could avoid completely irrelevant rambling in a post like this ;)

First time we'd met this lady. Had a 30min discussion with the three of us. Then my wife went and waited downstairs while just the two of us talked for 30mins.
I did in that time manage to admit that not only did I perhaps some worries other than just the sex now (although I didn't really say anymore than that - be fair, was only 30mins! That's a lot to come out with in so short a time!), and that I had a secret blog that my wife doesn't know about.

Next week it'll probably just be me again for an hour, and my wife won't even go.

The next two weeks after that will then probably be my wife without me.

Phew! :)

I was in the shower this morning...

When it suddenly occurred to me that today is the 4th September.

My Wife & I

Suddenly remembered this pic recently :) Well, nobody can say I haven't posted a pic of myself or my wife now ;)
Took it a couple of years ago at Fountain's Abbey in Yorkshire. This was taken on our old digital camera, hence the picture is a little grainy. But still :)

Update: following Dianne's comment... We did have some fairly mixed weather too, which did require an emergency duck under a tree ;)