It’s a Blog ! Not a Log !

Those of you who read my blog will no doubt have come across posts about our Cane Corso (Italian Mastiff) Blue, well I’m sad to say Blue’s been a little bit under the weather these past few weeks due to damage to her cruciate ligament in one of her hind legs.

She developed some lameness in her leg in May which was prescribed anti-inflammatories for and this seemed to do the trick, however at the end of June, beginning of July her symptoms came back, so after 2 visits to the vets and a set of x-rays we were told that she’d most likely torn her cruciate ligament and were referred to a Consultant Vet at North West Surgeons nr Frodsham.

So along came the appointed consultation where we were told that from what could be seen from the x-rays it appears that Blues ligament has indeed been torn, this was apparently obvious from the x-rays (not a vet myself, so have had to take his word for it), the next step we’ve been told is surgery and at present Blue is booked in to have the operation on the 13th August 2010.

We’ve been told the operation has a 96% success rate, but this all depends on how her recovery is managed, so for the first 6 weeks, Blue will be crated confined and only allowed out for her constitutionals and that’s it, then after the 6 weeks its a case of very slow, gentle exercise, which will gradually build up to a manageable 20 minute walk, and then over time hopefully build up to longer walks and fingers crossed semi-normality.

I can honestly say I am very nervous about Blue going under anethisia, as thats probably the most dangerous part of the whole operation, don’t know what we’d do if anything every happened to Blue, so fingers crossed, wood touched everything will go smoothly.

Will endeavour to keep you all updated on how our little Princess is getting on

you discover one of you ancestors was a former Ukrainian Vodka Distillary owner….

Well if your Dan Edelstyn, you get the next flight to the Ukraine to learn more about how his great-grandfather’s vodka distillery seized during the  Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, you hunt down the village that is home to this long lost distillery and along the way film the adventure.

But suppose that’s not enough, suppose you find that the distillery is still there but on the verge of closing, thus rendering a large chunk of the villages populace out of work, most people might just get on the next flight home with there curiosity about their family history satisfied, but then again those people aren’t Dan, who decides that maybe just maybe he can turn around the fortune of the village and the family’s former distillery, so how does he do this, he decides to start producing Vodka again, a vodka that resonates with  history Zorokovich 1917 Vodka . . . and so the adventure begins . .

First Dan has to find companies that are willing to believe like he does that there is a market out there for a new vodka, one of the earliest to take an interest is Babelgumwhich has helped finance the film he’s making about the distillery and is hosting it on there website, he also meets with one of the biggest Ad Agency’s Saatchi and Saatchi to discuss ways to market this new Vodka . .

Dan’s also set up a Vodka club, whereby members invest £50, which helps pay towards the filming costs, this little donation also gets you a credit on the eventual theatrical release of the film he’s making of his adventures, but not only that you also get  a pair of tickets to one of the premiers, and an actual bottle of  vodka from the distillery. . .  might have to see about investing myself come payday

But instead of me telling you how he’s progressing in his adventure why not follow him yourself on Babelgum, to start you off I’ve posted the first part of his adventure

If you enjoyed this episode of his adventure more can be found here http://www.babelgum.com/vodkaempire , a new one is posted every couple of day’s so keep checking back to see how Dan and his Vodka’s getting one, eventually the whole series of episode will be combined as a documentary that will be appearing on More4 later this year, so this is a chance to see the whole thing as its being made.

You can also follow Dan’s adventures via his blog My Vodka Empire & also his Twitter account danedelstyn.

I’ve managed to acquire some of the early samples of this family vodka and I can say its not a bad little number, though I’d recommend chilling it first as this seems to enhance the overall feeling you get from drinking it, which is a smooth sweet taste with a slight burn to the back of the throat, which you’d expect from a vodka, all in all its a very smooth drink and I’ll be watching out for it when it hits the shelves.

P1060571, originally uploaded by BagRat.

Well were now into the 4th day of our holiday and we’ve managed to cram in visits to :

Whitby Abbey, which was a pleasant couple of hours spent walking round the remains of what at one time must have been a very imposing structure (still is I suppose) for such a small coastal town of the times, the views from the hill its built on give you some very good panoramic views over Whitby and the surrounding area.

Filey which once you’ve seen it you’ve seen it

Goathland, again a pleasant little village which seems to be making a living off the back of Heartbeat, just about every shop there is a gift shop, which is a shame, as I’m sure it would be nicer/quainter if it actually had some proper shops.

Becks Hole, home of what must be Britains smallest Pub, The Birch Hall Inn, nice place to stop off in for a beer and one of their hearty sandwichs and home made Pork Pies, dogs are welcome as well.

Grosmont, the place where the steam engine line starts and home of the steam engine workshops, you can go for a ride on one of the locally restored Steam Engines and experience a time gone by, theres also a nice little pub there just by the railway crossings that serves a very nice Beer battered Cod and Chips.

Pickering, which is a quaint little Market Town and also the end of the line for Grosmonts Steam Railway, theres a rather nice little bakery there that does lots of home made sweet and savoury pies.
The day we went there was a flea market on which had quite a few nice antique stalls for those who like that sort of thing, you’ve also got the remains of Pickering Castle, which sadly we did’nt get to explore as it not open on a Monday or Tuesday.

Probably going to have a drive to Scarborough today as it looks like its gonna be a sunny day indeed . .

kennys party 071, originally uploaded by BagRat.

Kenny reached the grand old age of 50 last week along with Andy reaching the 40 mark, so they had a joint party to celebrate and used the oppurtunity to get everyone back togeather again.

It was good to see all the faces from the partys togeather again having a laugh and just generally getting on, party kicked off at of all places Stretford Cricket Club, then moved onto Lisa’s flat, where drinks flowed and people talked bollox (mainly due to what they’d had).

We left fairly early on in the morning 5:00am so maybe not so early, but the party carried on after we left, ending only when John, Ben and a few others decided to place most of Lisa food stuffs in the freezer . . . oh and after Ben had emptied a full bag of flour over the sleeping Lisa’s head (not nice Ben).

Gotta say Kenny was looking good for an old man and no doubt has many years left in him, all the best Kenny and Andy

Chris the guy who punched me in the back of the head has kindly posted a reply to my post about him punching me, I’ve posted his comment below, as its only fair he give his side of the story, so here it is in all its entirety,

# chchrison 06 Sep 2009 at 12:22 am

“hahaha u dick im a scally, hahaa u were begging me 2 stop battering you haha depression haha u wud get raped in jail u dik hed, it will b a laff wen i c u in chorlton agen hahahaha safe dik head btw you did slap my arse in the toilets so dont chat shit on ur blog yh”

Thanks for leaving the comment Chris

Went out for the night in Chorlton with John, Myles and Sarah, was a good night until some scally mate who I’d spent the previous 30 mintues having a chat to and had a laugh with, he seemed ok,  got on fine with him and his mate, left them to go have ciggy out front of the bar, came in for a piss walked passed them both and gave them a tap on the back to acknowledge them and say what a good night we’d had and hoped they were having a good night, next thing I’m having a piss when suddenly i get a fist in the back of the head and turn round and its this scally punching me, because i’d apparently touched his arse, being the big man he bitch slapped me from behind, was’nt really hurt, just more in shock then anything

His mate was sound though just dragged him out of the bar, though next time I hope he has the decency to hit me face on rather then sucker punch me from behind

Picture 095, originally uploaded by BagRat.

Did’nt really post to much over the weekend as I spent quite alot of it in bed, due to being called out to an alarm call at my workplace, was there from midnight Friday till 5:30am Saturday morning, so spent quite a while in bed recovering.

So seeing as most of Saturday was spent in bed thought we#d better do something on Sunday, was’nt sure what to do or where to go, but in the end we decided on Chelford Car boot.

Got there for about 12:30 and spent a good hour or so just wondering round looking for bargain’s but think we missed most of them, so just ended up buying lots of quaility cheeses instead, more about those in another post.

After leaving we thought we’d best take Blue for a walk and on the way back we chanced upon Styal Estate a rather good dog walking place, we’d heard about it before but never actually bothered to go look for it, really wish we had cause its definatly a dog friendly walk, lost of paths and fields for Blue to galavant in, I’ll stick some photo & videos up this weekend so you can see for yourselfs.

Anyway its close to 8:00am and I’d better start making my way to work, cyas laters
.

Well got another email from some of my friends in Nigeria letting me know once again that I could be in for a nice windfall of money, this time however no-ones died and left it to me, something I’m quite happy about as it’s not nice toreceive money because someones died.

So if no-ones died where’s the money come from, well it appears that some   was destined to be paid to me as part of a contract award was in a bank for a long time and it acquired a hefty amount of interest while it was in there and the nice Bank Manager thinks that I should get it as he thought it unfair that Ididn’t get the contract, so he’s decided to give it to me, isn’t that sweet.

Anyway heres his nice letter in its entirity, notice the excellent grammer and construction of the letter, its hard to believe that English is his first language . .

International Remittance Dept
HSBC Bank plc
8 Canada Square
London E14 5HQ

Mr Parry Jones
Int’l Remittance Director
Hsbc Bank London
Tel: +447024076241

Oh how these Nigerians make me laugh with there promises of money, why should I a rich westerner need such money when the street over here are paved with

Picture 187, originally uploaded by BagRat.

So we’re back from the soul night at Orlando’s which was a very enjoyable evening indeed, big up to Tony the DJ and his delectable co-hort Katie, but a bigger up to Rupert for a superb evening indeed

We had the meeting yesterday afternoon with our Line Manager to discuss the circumstances/events that led up to the verbal assault we both endured from our MD, our Manager listened to what we had to say and agreed that what happened should’nt have, however as the only person she can raise a complaint with is the Chairman, who also happens to be the MD’s father, she does’nt think anything will happen, something we both agree with her on (though it should matter and something should be said).

Anyway she’s asked us what we’d like to happen, we suggested an apology, though we all know he won’t apologise, so the most we can ask is that she goes in and informs him that she’s had a complaint from both of us about the incident and is herself not happy with the situation i.e. We should be treated with the same respect in the work place as he expects from us to him and the same respect that he treats other Dept’s.

He’s now away for about a week on holiday and as yet she’s not spoken to him, so hopefully she’ll speak to him next week when he gets back, but some how I don’t think she will, though I will be asking her in a week or 2 how it went, even if she does actually say anything to him, again I dont think it’ll make any difference, all it will probably do is just lodge in the back of his mind that his workers have complained about him and come the time when we get pay rise’s it’ll be reflected in what we get or don’t as the case may be.

If she has’nt said anything to him in 2 weeks time I will again raise an issue with her and then get in contact with ACAS for some advice.