rich_jacko

2021 managed to clear the very low bar set by 2020 (Hey, the only new scar I have this year is a physical one...). We may not quite be back to normal yet - cancelled parties this week have sadly proven that - but we've collectively come a long way and this was the year life began to resume.

I've enjoyed regular meet-ups with friends again, trips to the seaside, a birthday picnic and meal out, the return of parkrun, two big family events/celebrations, my sister/nieces' visit to Sheffield, a trio of major running events, my first holiday away in two years, and a much freer Christmas than last year.

All the best to you all, however you're seeing in the New Year, and may you have a fantastic 2022!

It's perhaps tempting fate, with a relatively unknown new covid variant now circulating, but I want to record how good it feels, now that social and entertainment events have been starting to get back to normal.

Friday pub socials are now happening two or more times a month, and we're getting a pretty good turnout. It's great to be able to relax and spend time with each other over drinks once again.

Just over a month ago, I went to see Tim Peake talk about his career at City Hall. Much of it was things I already new, but some of it was fresh (I'd never previously thought about the difficulty of getting to sleep in zero-g!), and there's nothing like the personal touch of having Major Tim talk through it all in person. It was basically the best PowerPoint presentation ever!

November saw two big birthday parties on consecutive weekends, for Cis and Liz's 50ths. I only paid a brief visit to Cis's, at Trippets Lounge Bar, but it was great to see so many people there and catch up with faces I'd not seen in a long while. Liz's do, at Walkley Community Centre, naturally featured an enormous buffet, as well as party games and dancing into the night (well, 11pm). I had a wonderful time.


A week later, I went with Gillian down to Telford for Wales Comic Con. I'd never have spotted this was on if Gillian hadn't mentioned it to me, and I'm glad she did. We went to a Q&A talk with Doctors 5 through 8, and racked up a few autographs and photo shoots between us. There were a lot of cosplayers to admire too (We were ticking off Doctors). It was a good day out and fairly, if not entirely, successful - The organisation of the event left a lot to be desired and we had a long delay on the trains back. You can read Gillian's post here.


On Monday this week, I was back at City Hall for another space-themed show, this time Return of the Jedi in Concert - the film, up on a cinema screen, accompanied by a 70-piece live orchestra. It sounded fantastic, though at times I had to remind myself to pay attention to the live music, not just get lost in the film!


This coming weekend will also see my final running event of the year, the Percy Pud 10k. This one is a bit of a Sheffield institution. I've never entered it before. The course is through familiar territory, but it'll be a different experience running it as part of a big event, with celebrations (and Christmas puds!) at the finish.

Looking further ahead, I remain hopeful for a much more fun festive season than last year.

I love my godson's imagination.

He's figured out that telling me stories is an effective way of delaying going to bed. Last night, he was telling me all about Evil Santa.

Unlike Good Santa, who lives at the North Pole and delivers presents to sleeping children, Evil Santa lives at the South Pole, breaks into people's houses when they are asleep, and steals their presents.

Good Santa is clever, and worked out how to fool Evil Santa by hiding presents in stockings. Evil Santa thought they were just socks and didn't steal them. That is why we leave out stockings for Good Santa on Christmas Eve.

This story has a happy ending. Luckily, there were Night Detectives on the lookout for Evil Santa. In 2001 they finally managed to capture him and put him in prison. While he was in prison, Evil Santa thought about the presents he had stolen, and it made him feel sad. So eventually he was let out of prison and now he lives at the North Pole, where he helps Good Santa deliver presents. (Nice to see the rehabilitation system working effectively!)

Since Evil Santa no longer lives at the South Pole, some dinosaurs have moved in and live there now...

[It was at this point I sensed we were going off on a new tangent. I suggested the Bug tell me about the dinosaurs another day, and he should go and clean his teeth.]

Christmas seems to have snuck up suddenly and unexpectedly this year, but I'm now starting to get into the festive spirit.

Last weekend, I went with the Chivers and Anne to Lincoln Christmas markets, which were as vast and impressive as I remember from a previous year. They were a little too busy, which made it difficult to get to some stalls, but well worth the trip and I came away with various goodies. The legend that is Brown's Pie Shop was equally busy. We had to wait half an hour for a table even at 4pm but we already knew that would be worth it. The medieval market in the Bishop's Palace was a little quieter (due to the entry fee) and nicely atmospheric. We briefly went in the cathedral before heading home.


In the last few days I've made significant Christmas-related progress: I've got the bulk of my Christams shopping done, written most of my cards, put up and decorated the tree, and started this year's Lego Christmas build. I've also been to the Sheffield Christmas Blitz at the cathedral (which was very well done, and had the odd juxtaposition of carol singers and an air raid siren), Edy's mince pies evening (where the house was new and the baking was as epic as ever), and watched Gremlins and Muppet Christmas Carol :o)


Next week looks promising, bookended by a team Christmas meal (with colleagues up from London) on Monday and the Sheffield work Christmas do on Friday. In-between, there's a new Star Wars movie!

Well, the table's set at least ;o)


This year's Christmas village display was a big project over several weeks. Fortunately, I had help:

I am actually feeling pretty organised this year. The shopping was all done a week ago, cards all dispatched, and I'm about halfway through the wrapping. Plus I broke up from work on Friday. On the social side, so far this Christmas has involved:

- "Duncan Road Christmas" on 30th November with lunch at the Harlequin and a trip round Kelham Island Christmas market
- last FFS of the year
- Christmas Lard Club at Rowsha
- Decorating Gillian's flat
- Watching Gremlins at the Showroom for Nigel's birthday
- Work Chistmas do at the Milestone (plus Shakespeare's plus the Kelham Island Tavern...) on Friday
- A trip to York Christmas market on Saturday
- Edy's mince pies evening

Some photos from York:

I'm doing presents round the Chivers this evening (Thanks to those of you who contributed towards the Goblin's!), then lunch out on Christmas Eve, and then it's the day itself. That came around quickly!

I had planned one more Doctor Who evening of the year, to watch a few of the Christmas specials, on 14th December. I'm now busy that weekend, and the Saturday after. This coming Saturday doesn't really work either, as it's a match day and at least two of my regular guests for these evenings are away (plus I should probably get on with my Christmas shopping!). I might still try to fit it in on a random day closer to Christmas if folks are interested and available. Any preference for dates? December is busy!

Also, do people want me to carry on with Doctor Who evenings next year? They wouldn't be as frequent as this year (I want to get back to hosting big screen evenings where we watch other things), but there are, after all, 799 episodes of the show and we've only been through (quick count...) 93 of them in the evenings I've hosted this year. If yes, any requests? Or have we had enough of a good thing and should I just go for something completely different?

Yesterday was an epic day for Lego building at the Jackson Towers kids club.

Tim dropped Bryony off around 10:30am. Then Jamie came round an hour later (so Ju and Paul could build a bed) and Evie brought my assistant builders to three an hour after that (so Ed could do car runs).

Our task for the day - building a Lego Christmas market, all 2,878 pieces of it according to the boxes. The kids all played well together. There were enough different things to build that we could all gather round the table and help without getting in one another's way. The one-person-find/one-person-build technique also worked well.


It wasn't all building. Jamie and Evie wanted to play with other things, so the Star Wars and Lord of the Rings Lego and Doctor Who pseudo-Lego also came out to play. This meant the growing marketplace occasionally got invaded by Ringwraiths and Daleks...

We broke for lunch and watched 'The Christmas Invasion' (B's choice). We broke again for an afternoon snack and watched 'The Empire Strikes Out' (B's and J's choice). Yes, in the latter case we took a break from Lego by watching... more Lego. Lego Star Wars cartoons should really carry a health warning though. I think B nearly choked herself to death from laughing.

The kids were collected by their respective dads in the reverse order they arrived in. Evie wasn't pleased about having to go as there was still more stuff to be built. Jamie wanted to stay too when it was his time to go. Liz rang about 5pm to check we were still alive/the phone was working. Yes, but we weren't quite done yet! We finally finished around 6:30pm, and here it is completed (B's layout):


It was a fun day. The kids all enjoyed it a lot, and I did too.

Unfortunately but inevitably, this happened this morning: