More

Eh, yeah, scrap that. Yesterday I had a highest score of 258. Today, I don't. I have a highest score of 269. At bowling. On the X-box. Surely there must be some mistake, Miss Moneypenny. I can't explain it either. I don' think I will even try to explain it. It just happened. I nailed it every time. The 'perfect' line and length. Never to be repeated. Ever.

Anyway, today saw us go up to a place called Satwa. Up in Satwa they have the very best chicken kebabs. Cheap and absolutely brilliant. Love them. But that wasn't the real reason for going up. Instead, the missus was interested in getting a dress made. They have a whole street of fabric shops and tailors who can make anything. We were in one shop that had a lot of fabrics that were almost exactly what she was looking for. She was trying to get a copy of a Ted Baker dress made. It is a beautiful dress, no doubt about it. The tailor said he could do it, but it was going to be expensive.

Whilst she was doing all that, I had a look at getting a suit made. I've always bought suits of the shelf so to speak. One in my life it would be great to actually have a tailored suit. So long as I didn't put on weight. They could make a suit for approximately £120 which is as much as you would pay for an O.K suit in the likes of Next or Marks and Spencers. In fact, it was on a par with the last suit I bought in Zara. They had some very nice fabrics as well. I was tempted. And I might actually investigate further. I'd need to pick a cut that would suit me. That's the hard part. In saying that, I'm going to the home of the 'shiny' suit - Hong Kong - in a month, so it might be worth investigating getting one there.

The irony is, I don't really wear suits that much at all. In a formal setting, yes, but I've now got a kilt and the full ensemble which I'd wear rather than a suit. I guess though you get to a certain age and it's important to have a couple of nice suits, just in case.

Oh and the chicken kebabs on the way home were ace!

Tri-

We got a lend of EA Sports for the X-box the other day. I've never really been one for video games, particularly the likes of football based games. The playability has generally been terrible and I would lose interest quickly. I guess I could apply that across the board actually - lose interest. But, I had a sly shot of 10 pin bowling before the missus got back from work. The cheek of me!

Now, actual 10 pin bowling, I don't mind. We used to go on a Saturday night sometimes back in the long distant days. One of the perks of friends having their first car - a drive to the Megabowl. I did bowl in Korea which was often pretty good. I've bowled once or twice in Dubai, so definitely not a lot.

Bowling on the X-box is a different kettle of fish. I might say its easier. It must be. How else can you explain a highest score of 258. I'll write that again just to show that it was no typing error. 258. Eight strikes in total. I've never ever scored that much in my entire life. I doubt that will ever be repeated. I'll never come close to it again.

I'm not sure what happened. It's always the case with bowling, sometimes you just nail it. Each and every time you bowl, it's on line. Other times, you could hit a barn door and no amount of adjusting your stance can correct it. I was just on line all the time. Yes, people can say 'well, it was only on the X-box'. True. But give me my moment of glory. For one day only!

Strips

I got to the office today to hear that Emirates are going to be flying to Glasgow twice a day. I know that doesn't mean much to a lot of people, but I must say, about bloomin' time!

Currently there is only a single flight per day which is O.K. Pretty much every time I fly that route, it's at least 3/4 full. Good for the business but on a personal note, it's always really hard to get discounted tickets because 'regular' customers come first. The upshot is that I would fly to Newcastle which is less busy but further away from home.

So to hear that an extra flight has been added is a bonus and offers more flexibility. Seemingly the 2nd flight will leave Dubai at 3pm and get into Glasgow at 8pm. The return arriving in Dubai at 8am. If that's confirmed, then I could in theory work most of my normal day on a Thursday for example, leave the office at 1pm and fly out at 3pm. That is in contrast to now in which I'd work as normal on a Thursday but not fly out until 8am on the Friday morning. I'd essentially be getting an extra day at home!

Ideally, it would fly to Edinburgh but you can't have everything.

Vaccine

I have been on a 2 day course called 'Personal Effectiveness'. I quite like attending these courses. The first reason for me liking them is that its actually easier for me to get to the course than it is to get to the office - I can have a longer lie!

Not only that but it gives you a chance to meet people of a similiar grade from different parts of the organisation. This time, we have people from Group Medical, Travel Services, Transport and finally Cargo. A good mix actually.

The course looked at how we can become more effective. The hint was in the name!

Over the past couple of days, we looked at time management, communication styles, assertiveness, and being proactive. It was interesting. Some of it, I had heard of before particularly the time management matrix. What really caught my attention was the on the first day, we had a list of values like honesty, family, ethics, health. We were asked to select the 10 that were most important to us. That in itself was really hard. Once we had selected our 10, we then had to compared one with the other and ask ourselves which of the 2 we placed as more important.

Some interesting results where thrown up. In 1st position, but only just, was knowledge. I then had a spread of 4 at the same level i.e. in the '2nd' position. I can't exactly remember what they were but honesty, relationships, and family were there. Slightly lower was health which is a cause for concern!

Knowledge being 1st was kind of a surprise, but by considering it in more depth, it probably is true. That's what I want. I want to know about things. Everything! I suppose that without knowledge, you don't really have anything. How can you understand things that happen or experiences you have without a knowledge of how to get yourself through them? Knowledge is Power, is the sentence that springs to mind. I'm not the cleverest and I'm never going to be able to scale the heights achieved by the great thinkers or theorists. I won't be able to formulate answers to the big questions like 'why are we here?' 'What's the point of life?' et al but so long as I can satisfy my quest for some kind of 'answer' then all well and good.

And on that note, I'll shut up.

Honk

Back to work yesterday. How depressing. The festive feeling well and truly over. That said, there were still quite of a lot of people still off on leave, including my boss. In many ways it was a gentle side back into it.

Yesterday was also the day my car registration expired. Here in Dubai, you have to register your car each year. It costs something like 400 dirhams. In order to register your car, you need to get your car insured and what we would call an MOT to ensure that your car is safe. This year, is my final exception of performing an MOT as the car is only 3 years old. I don't need to fart about with all that. My insurance has come down slightly as well to 1050 dirhams. I was 1300 dirhams last year. Not really a big saving - £50 or so. Fully comp so I can't complain too much.

I have everything in place now so come the weekend, I'll get that sorted out. It really is a pain in the ass though. When you get to the office, you have to go to this counter, then the next counter blah blah blah. It does my head in. Thankfully, it's only once a year.

Didn't go and do my 30 minutes exercise. Damn it.

Differential

What's new this year?

A hard one.

I've tried to come up with things that are quantifiable. Something that came be measured. That in itself is hard. I am conscious of my health. I can definitely say that I have not been as active as I have been. I don't like that at all actually. To counter that, I want to keep it simple and use the gym upstairs. I'm not setting an unrealistic goals in terms of being able to lift this or that, instead I want to do 30 minutes of either cycling, rowing or running 3 times a week. That would be 3 times more than I'm doing currently. If anything else occurs like sit ups and the like then so be it but this '3 times a week' is my baseline. Distance and time to be recorded. I don't particularly eat loads and loads but I suspect that I could be eating more fruit and veg.

I had said that I wanted to become more familiar with Garage Band on my laptop. I like music. I like listening to it. That does not necessarily mean that I can string 2 notes together but I would like to try. It'll be purely for my own benefit and enjoyment.

There is also the small matter of saving money. I have a figure in my head to put aside per month. Generally, I do that anyway though I have never really formalised it. I know what I want to set aside. If I can achieve that, then brilliant. The reason for this is essentially to buy a house. I don't think we'd buy here in Dubai. In Scotland perhaps but the other option would be in France, specifically the south of France. You are more likely to get more for your money there. It's something to aim for.

Other things that I would like to build upon, but are not especially 'measurable' as such would include being more proactive, particularly at work. Being helpful, courteous and more tolerant of others. I might even write here more often.

Two in 2 days isn't a bad start.

Pass

Let's get this show on the road...

Out with the old and in with the new. Eh, well, not really the new as such as this site remains the same but the year is new. And that's about it so far.

Last night the missus and I went out to a place called Warehouse. It offered unlimited food and drink from 9 to 1am. Not a bad option, all things considered. It wasn't nearly as busy as I thought it would be. It wasn't dead, that's for sure but I there seemed to be a lot of 'walk-in' customers. Mostly blokes. The food was good. I tended towards sushi and what you could call finger food. I had to taste all the ice cream on offer. It was a bit embarrassing actually. They had 5 flavours and I said I would like a scoop of each. Clearly something was lost in translation and I ended up with 5 different plates. The coffee one was awful. The others were lovely. The beer though kept flowing and why not, it was hogmanay.

Midnight came and went. The countdown was shown on the big screens. No Old Auld Lang Syne sadly. You can't have everything. It wasn't an especially late night. The reason for this was only to reveal itself in the little small hours. The missus spent more time in the bathroom than anything. Food poisoning. Nasty. The previous night we order sushi which, in hindsight, wasn't a good choice. It came back to bite her. Badly. It's not what you want to see, ever. At 8am I was at the chemist getting stuff. That wasn't how New Years Day was meant to start.

Needless to say, today was not a day for anything other than resting up and watching TV. Dirty Dancing was the afternoon film. I've never actually seen it before - well, in its entirely that is. Not particularly my cup of tea but it has its moments. I didn't release that it had quite an 'adult' context.

I've not heard any reports of the celebrations here in Dubai. No doubt there will be photos of the Burj Khalifa floating about in the news later.

2012. Bloody hell.