Spent the last weekend in Newcastle, ostensibly to visit the Uni with Mat but it also gave Helen and I an excuse for a weekend away somewhere we hadn’t been before.

Rather than what would have been a five hour car journey we elected to let the train take the strain, which was a lot more relaxing.

The first shock on reaching Newcastle and stepping into a taxi was that they speak a different language up there and we had left our phrase book behind! The taxi driver was just incomprehensible.

While Mat looked round the Uni, Helen and I sneaked off to check out the town. Compact is how I would describe it. We were easily able to work the length and breadth of the city, taking in all the sites, without too much trouble.

They clearly like bridges in Newcastle with about five in a very short stretch of the Tyne but the most impressive of the lost has to be the Gateshead Millennium Bridge which looks stunning at night. The Tyne bridge was also impressive looking like the Sydney Harbour Bridge but what I really liked was how the buildings seemed to be squeezed into the surrounding space – it really reminded me of the descriptions in Iain Banks ‘The Bridge’.

A bonny time was had by all as you will see from the pictures below:

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Went to Olympia today to the Dr Who Experience and despite being delayed 45 minutes while they coaxed the Tardis to work it was pretty good. See some pictures below, a number of which were taken with my Olloclip wide-angle and fish-eye lenses for the iPhone.

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I have sat here for a while wondering whether I should press Publish on this post given the sensitivity of the content. But social media in the 21st century seems to allow things to be aired that previously wouldn’t have been acceptable – like my testicles for example. Those of a sensitive disposition look away now.

Men of a certain age are told to regularly check their testicles. This has always seemed like pretty redundant advice to me since that’s what most men have been doing since birth anyway. It was during one of these regular root arounds that I discovered a lump. One’s mind immediately fears the worst and conjures up words beginning with C. A visit to the doctor resulted in some diagrams of my internal workings that I haven’t seen since junior school and the assurance that it was probably nothing to worry about but it would be worth getting it properly checked out. So a date with the local NHS hospital was booked.

At the allotted hour I turn up at the hospitals x-ray department and am ushered to a waiting room full of people of all ages, many of whom were clearly not here to have their balls scanned. Over the next 30 minutes or so the waiting room empties and fills again as people get served.

I had by this point already worked out who would be the nurse scanning my boys. He was a young chap who would regularly come out and call someone’s name and then when they stepped forward cheerfully say “Hi! I’m Matt” thrusting his hand out to greet them. Therefore, when my name was eventually called, it was a great surprise to find that it was being called by the young, attractive, brunette. Taking this in my stride I decided that this would be no problem as the NHS has rules about this sort of thing doesn’t it? There would be a male nurse also present to make sure that she didn’t jump me while I was in the room with the crown jewels out.

The nurse’s opening gambit was to tell me to drop my trousers and pants and to “grab hold of my penis, pulling it upwards towards my belly button and hold it tightly there”. So just the two of us then? Yep. I did as requested and lay on the bed. At this point there was lubrication involved but I think that’s a topic for only a man and his nurse.

I have to commend her in that at no point during the examination did she ever sneak a peak at my tackle, her gaze was firmly fixed on the screen in front of her. The downside of this inattentiveness was that her eyes were not on the job in hand, so to speak, and therefore there was a certain lack of delicacy of touch. Her decision to concentrate ahead also meant that she missed the contortions of my face as she tried to push my balls through my body and out my anus.

Given that this was an ultrasound scan there was a great temptation to say something like “is it a boy or a girl?” or “can I get a picture to show the girls at work?” but I decided that these were probably a bit clichéd and so I went with “so did you volunteer for this job or did you just get lucky?” This was met with a polite smile and a revelation that this was one of the easier parts to scan – the mind boggles.

And then the diagnosis. It was a C but in this case a cyst and as the doctor said, nothing to be concerned about. I was able to leave the hospital happy that I was all in working order but slightly stickier around the edges and with walking like John Wayne.

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Dodgy have reformed and that is good enough for me to venture out on a Wednesday night in January to see them play live in, of all places, the Arlington Arts Centre, just outside of Newbury. This seemed like an odd venue given that it is the arts block of the Mary Hare school for profoundly deaf children.

For a band that were at their height quite a few years ago now the gig last night must have felt like starting out all over again. There were probably under 250 people there in what the Dodgy website will no doubt describe as “intimate”!

There were a couple of issues with last night’s gig. The first was that the new “album” isn’t released until February and so the first half of the set, which was all new music, was enjoyable but hard going as I like to practice at home before hearing music live. I thought that the new world order dictated that bands now release music to promote a tour as that is where the money is rather than tour to promote the music but clearly not in Dodgy’s case!

The other issue was not mine but Dodgy’s. To be fair it was actually only leadman Nigel Clarke’s issue in that he likes playing the new music but is now bored of the hits that everyone had actually come along to hear. I can really sympathise with that but while the new music showed a real return to form for the band actually we all love to hear the hits too. So the second half of the set was almost entirely the sing-along tunes you love Dodgy for, including my all time favourite, Cold Tea. But you cannot please everyone it seems as the friend I went with was disappointed as they didn’t play Good Enough. However, given that they went off without playing an encore I strongly suspect that this had been intended but the clock ticked past 11pm and the curfew hour for the venue.

Anyway, it was an enjoyable night in an “intimate” venue and the very welcome return of Dodgy – welcome back guys!

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It’s around this time of the year that, for the last couple of years at least, that I have written a very short summary of my year. This year I am not going to and this is why.

I was introduced to my first computer when I was 11 – it looked very much like the one on the left and I was hooked. (Before any pedants point it out I know that this isn’t actually a computer but a teletype connected to one, at the Rutherford Appleton Labs in my case.) Anyway in the intervening time I have seen many changes including the explosion in social networking tools such as blogs, Facebook, Google+, Twitter et al. This has led to much more personal information being available as individual’s share their lives with people hoping that others might find it interesting. I very much subscribe to that point of view.

However, it has become increasingly clear that some readers don’t take the information at face value and twist what they see for their own purposes which is not the reason I write at all. So I am left with a few choices namely to stop, carry on regardless or self-moderate.

I have no intention of stopping as I enjoy the my blog even if no-one else does, it also serves as an excellent record of the things that I enjoy in life, my family and the things we do together.

Given the circumstances self-moderation seems like the only option which to an extent I already do but I am slightly miffed that I should have to watch my words  just to ensure that others don’t misinterpret what I might say but then again I am not going to let a small minority stop doing what I enjoy.

So there!

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