There are two tins:

1. Small change
2. Proper money

Small change is anything that is not really worth carrying around. This means 1p, 2p, 5p, and yes, 10p pieces.

Proper money is anything larger than that. So 20p, 50p, £1 and £2. Sometimes a 10p will make it in, depending upon my mood. If it is a note I just carry it anyway. Proper money is called upon when I need to park in Basildon, cross the Dartford bridge or buy a 99p coffee in Pret.

It could be that there are more advanced ways to organise one’s money, I don’t know. I will perhaps ask Margaret, my accountant, whether I am in tune with current best practice.

Questions for study groups
How do you organise your money?

Posted by Dave at 9:57 pm on May 7, 2012 and filed under In-depth analysis, Photographs.

11 Comments

On Saturday we went to the Olympic park to see the water polo test event. Here are some photographs. The full sized versions can be seen by clicking on each one twice, or in this Flickr set (slideshow version).

Above: this is water polo (this one benefits from being seen at a larger size). In summary: you try to throw the ball into the opponents’ net whilst team mates hold the members of the other back, push them under the water, etc. Those may or may not be the rules, I’m not sure.

Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by Dave at 7:26 pm on May 7, 2012 and filed under Photographs.

2 Comments

Limited self-understanding or ability to communicate about Christianity. Borderline when it comes to doctrine or being a youth worker. Rubbish at the second part of the Old Testament. Hermeneutical genius.

[Day spent sorting paperwork. Attempting to make space in home office for the contents of CartoonChurch HQ.]

Posted by Dave at 8:31 pm on July 10, 2011 and filed under Photographs.

8 Comments

Part two of my detailed and in-depth travel diary. Today I saw some slippers with built in LED lights for night time walking.

These, as I see it, are the future of the slipper. The promotional material says that they are ‘ideal for those late night bathroom visits’, but I’d say the possibilities are endless. Undertaking nocturnal obstacle courses, reading a book by slipperlight, apprehending any night time criminals making their approach crawling along on the carpet, the list goes on.

Please use the comment section below to put forth your opinion as to the merits of slippers with headlights. Please respect those with opposing views as I can see this being a contentious topic.

Posted by Dave at 6:57 pm on February 20, 2011 and filed under Photographs, Utter nonsense.

19 Comments

I was pleased to hear that Bishop Michael Jackson was announced as the new Archbishop Of Dublin And Glendalough today. I don’t, as a rule, comment here on church news any more, but I wanted to post this picture.

This is Bishop Michael Jackson (as he was then) and I sorting the press badges for the 2008 Lambeth Conference into alphabetical order. I can’t remember exactly how we came to be doing this, but I think it was a day or two before the conference and some help was required in the nerve centre of the operation and we both happened to be there with some time to spare. I am known, as you are no doubt aware, for my administrative skills, so I was, no doubt, an obvious choice.

I do remember clearly that he was a very friendly bishop and he was most interested in my cartooning activities. I wish him well in his new job.

Posted by Dave at 10:15 pm on February 2, 2011 and filed under Anglican goings-on, Lambeth 08, Lambeth Conference, Photographs.

2 Comments

1) Mowing. It all costs money.
2) Safety, especially in heavily grassed neighbourhoods.
3) Watering concerns. Screen-wash can’t be good for it. And who will water it when we’re away?
4) Animals and the things they do on lawns.
5) Keeping the edges trimmed. I’ve never been good with those lawn-edge-trimming shears. Over-zealous use means lawn gets smaller and smaller until there’s nothing left.
6) Dealing appropriately with requests for sporting fixtures.
7) Mockery.

[Picture from the Essex Country Show, where rural crafts and pursuits like this are showcased.]

#iknow #thisisrubbish #buttheJudgesmightlikeit

Posted by Dave at 8:23 am on September 20, 2010 and filed under Photographs, Utter nonsense.

3 Comments

We have a new tent.

It is to replace the campervan which was retired from active service a year ago.

In order to prove to ourselves that we can put up the new tent we went on a highly unadventurous camping trip to a camp site approximately 3 miles from home at Barleylands, a ‘farm park’ that people around here visit in order to make themselves feel as if they have been to the countryside. This small escapade proved that our pitching is yet to be perfected. We did get there eventually though (picture above) and retired to a local pub to recover.

Question for tent geeks: The whole of the tent material seems to have ended up pulled right over to one side of the tent on both of the occasions we have pitched it. So on one side you have the merest glimpse of tent pole, but on the other side quite a few inches (or centimetres for you young people) of tent pole visible. This makes it very difficult to put the final pole into place. Such a thing does not happen in the video and there doesn’t really seem to be a way to make adjustments. Also (unlike the video) there are arguments and some mild swearing. Is this normal?

Posted by Dave at 3:03 pm on August 1, 2010 and filed under Essex Life, Photographs.

18 Comments

Come on now, you can’t complain. I haven’t posted any cat photos since 2007 (don’t check).

Evie sits on the pile of paper in my home office. Yes, that is the original artwork for the cover of ‘The Exciting World of Churchgoing‘. She sits on the documents in the hope that a game of ‘cord’ will be forthcoming. ‘Cord’ is a game involving a piece of cord. It is similar to another game called ‘ribbon’, which owing to constraints of time and space I don’t have time to explain.

This is the reason I needed my own office – to stop such diversions using up my precious time. In my job it is important that one is able to stare out of the window at the traffic on the dual carriageway without any distractions.

ENDS
(Do tell me when writing that gets tiresome)

Posted by Dave at 10:04 pm on July 15, 2010 and filed under Mundane, Photographs.

14 Comments

This is my photograph of Bishop Laurie, watching a pilgrimage go by whilst seated at a pub table.

Permission was sought / not sought from the following people for this photograph:
- Bishop Laurie [Not sought]
- Pilgrimage participants [Not sought]
- Pub owners [Not sought]

Posted by Dave at 3:27 pm on July 9, 2010 and filed under Photographs.

5 Comments

I got into a little bit of trouble with yesterday’s photograph – hopefully this one is less offensive. Before you ask – no, I didn’t ask permission, and yes, I was hiding in the car park like the paparazzi.

I shouldn’t really be posting on the blog at past 1am, but I’m not really sleeping well at the moment and yesterday’s one didn’t seem to do me too much harm. I find blogging good for digestive problems and anxiety.

In other news, it is General Synod this weekend. I’ll be posting things about it on the Church Times Blog and/or website. I don’t know which yet. I won’t be hiding in the car park – we have special reporters we send to do that (joke). General Synod is good for sleeplessness, but less good for digestive problems.

ENDS

Posted by Dave at 1:14 am on July 8, 2010 and filed under Photographs.

2 Comments

I now have the keys to the new office and will be moving some things in over the weekend. Here are some pictures of the office in its empty state. Warning: Those who find dull pictures uninteresting should look away now.

Above: Empty office. Note heater and powerpoints. The computing department will be on the left I think, and the drawing department on the right. The location of the filing department is still to be determined. It looks a bit dark – that is because the lights aren’t on, it was cloudy and the windows are tinted a bit.

(Click ‘read the rest of this entry’ for more of this kind of thing.)
Read the rest of this entry »

Posted by Dave at 8:57 am on April 30, 2010 and filed under CartoonChurch progress, Essex Life, Mundane, Photographs, Starting a Business.

12 Comments

Some sad news from Moorlands College, where I was a student from 1995-1997:

Dear Moorlands Graduate,

This email is coming to you because you are on our database as having been a student at the college during the time that Bill Cotton was on the faculty here. We had hoped to send this message before the weekend, but it was unfortunately delayed.

Bill had been suffering from cancer for a few months and died, peacefully and at home, last Wednesday night. The funeral is tomorrow (Tuesday 30th), at 11 a.m., at Bransgore Community Church, Shackleton Square, Bransgore, BH23 8NU. Gladys, Bill’s widow, wanted his former students to know of his death, and to know that any who would like to come to the funeral and thanksgiving service will be very welcome.

Martin Inchley

Bill Cotton was the Old Testament lecturer, Librarian and my tutor at the college. A group of about 10 of us were part of the ‘Cottons’, a group which, led by Bill, met for worship, social events and to go on missions. The photo below shows Bill and the Cottons on mission in Tenerife of all places:

Going clockwise around the table from left foreground: Bill, Andrew, Heidi, Malc, Dave Horton, Marco, Chris, Dave Walker, Phil, Bob, ?

Another picture, this time Bill with members of the tutor group as they graduated in 1998 (I was no longer there by then).

Anyway – very sad news. I hadn’t been in touch with Bill since being at Moorlands, but he was an important part of my time there and will be sadly missed.

Posted by Dave at 1:09 pm on March 29, 2010 and filed under Photographs.

5 Comments