New Year new start

Well its not long now till the wedding day and my stag do takes place this weekend! Got to get the rings back and sort out the cake. Not long till I'm a married man, yikes! Seriously I'm really looking forward to it.

Well its been a while since this blog was updated. I'm still on the Squadron although I'm waiting to hear where I'm going on promotion believe it or not. Guess they are scraping the barrel these days eh? Sgt Nureldin? Sounds odd to me.

Choc surprise!

Imagine my glee when my beloved handed me a big tasty looking Thorntons treat. I sank my teeth into it and instantly met some extremely rigid resistance. Obviously not a soft centre I thought to myself as I chomped down again. My teeth were making no impression on the object and I detected a distinctly metallic flavour.

Before my teeth splintered and blood began pouring I removed the object and examined it. Within the outer chocolate shell something glistened and shone. With my little finger I coaxed out what looked like a ring of metal. It was a ring. In fact it was a lovely gift from my sweetheart, intended to be a surprise. A surprise it was, having nearly robbed me of my pearly whites and choked me into the bargain. A good job I didn't swallow the thing whole or I would have been waiting 24 hours or so to find my present!

Bless her heart, she had given me a lovely shiny signet ring inlaid with a diamond. Thanks babe, lovely engagement present. Hopefully any presents I might receive in the future will come more traditionally wrapped. It was lovely surprise though!

Marlowe

I highly recommend that everyone checks out the video for Performance Monkey at the bottom of this Blog. Truly awesome I think you'll agree. Nicely done Simon, Chloe et al. Keep up the good work. Got "Deep Breathe Fake Air" on order to accompany my copy of "Day in July". I'll be listening to the rest of the discography very soon I assure you.

A decent proposal...

It just occurred to me, rather shamefully, that I have not properly announced my engagement to the delightful Sarah. This event took place on bended knee on the 20th December 2007.

As we prepared to go out to a work Christmas party I surprised poor Sarah with an early Christmas pressie. This took the form of a teddy bear in a box. In little Ted's hands was another package, wrapped in festive paper. This package contained the bling bling ring! As Sarah opened this second, hidden package I dropped to one knee and popped the question. Luckily for me the answer was in the affirmative!

The ring is a diamond trilogy design. One stone signifying our past, one our present and the final stone signifying our future. Well Sarah accepted the ring and proposal gracefully and our night was a delightful one. I feel sure our future together will be too.

Yawn... swing shift

Swing shift for the very first time for me. Technically though it is a graveyard shift, occurring as it does from 12 midnight till 7.30 am. It is kind of nice being left to my own devices with just three guys to work for me but it can get awfully dull. Once the jobs are allocated to the troops there is not a great deal to keep the mind active except add to my blog of course!

My lofty aim of adding to my blog daily has fallen by the wayside as you can see. It has been nearly a full month since my last entry. The reason behind this is my little secret at the moment but I will provide info at a later date. Let us just say that I am at last allowing my hitherto hidden creative side to come out.

Wedding plans have been delayed slightly whilst the missus and I sort out some cohabitation. My current housemate has agreed to be bought out by my darling fiancée but in the meantime we need to sell her house. Yours truly has been doing some minor improvements in order to shift the place quickly before the economy comes crashing down around our ears! Anybody looking for a one bedroom house in Lincoln let me know! Right thats enough for now while I go find something productive to do.

Parents! Who'd 'ave 'em?

Weekend over thank God! What promised to be a pleasant experience turned out to be a family nightmare. The old dragon decided to throw a little engagement bash for yours truly and my lovely fiance. However things rapidly got messed up.

The party was a tame one featuring a few family friends but pleasant nonetheless. Fireworks were in store as the dragon gave my fiance a hard time the next day. We ended up travelling home with a bit of nasty taste in our mouths. Still, early days yet. Things can only get better!

Death of Benazir Bhutto

So it seems that Al Qaeda strike again and have robbed Pakistan of a much loved political figure. It can be argued that Musharraf could benefit directly from her death but although he is not a democratically elected leader even he would balk at destabilizing his own country to the extent it is at now. Many islamist groups would be opposed to her purely for her sex or her western influences.

To organisations like the Taliban Bhutto was an anathema. Educated in Britain and America, a working mother with a glamorous image, one can only imagine the level of animosity felt toward her by islamic fundamentalists. For this and other reasons Al Qaeda is prime suspect. Suicide bombing is their favoured modus operandi after all.

Pakistan is in dire straits now. Already unstable, this has thrown a lit match into the tinder box. The perpetrators can stand back and watch the consequences of their actions unfold. Lets hope that the people of Pakistan can withstand the storm that is coming.