i would like to

move to the coast. still work hard. grow vegetables and cycle to work. not live in london. "go back to school"

specifically...

...i would like to have 2 pints in the white hart in aldeburgh, listening to some good blues and slide, having walked around iken. then I would like to go to the lord nelson and have fish and chips, then finish on the beach. not in the office, and not in hackney. still, its got to be done...

the last few weeks

have seen a rat infestation, possible legal action, binning a lot of my stuff, cleaning the rest of my stuff, laundering all my clothes, putting it in storage, taking it out of storage, arranging a van to move, moving, settling in and now this evening amy had a major gas leak outside her house, and her buyer has just pulled out.

a quiet night on the sofa in my new home is a luxury, especially as i'm worried for my young lady.

today

i went to a bookshop in a run down church, bought a first edition of harry potter, saw seagulls being territorial, drank two pints of the best beer in the best pub ever, and lit a fire. all with the best woman in the world. how fortunate I feel.

happy christmas all xx

The most expensive teaspoon in history...

...is an iPhone.

In case anyone wondered, carrying an iPhone on the way to a meeting on the back of a Moleskine notebook, over a cup of hot tea is not a good idea.

The image of my iPhone sinking under the warm, brown depths and seeing the screen flutter is an interesting one.

Fortunately, the little voice in the back of my head told me to purchase the insurance, and a new one is arriving tomorrow.

re-tying the shoelace of friendship

is what i did this weekend. a lovely party with people that've not seen for ages, and people i've seen a lot of but not taken the time to talk with. its a reminder how great the people in my life are, and how much fun can be had with a long length of fabric. i have a good sunday feeling, and apart from no popkin, it'd be a perfect weekend!

small joy

i heart cheap pizza with holes in the base, beer, the italian job, drunken popkin, moving to london, wanting an iphone and my card getting lost in the post.

i heart network rail

email sent to network rail, 11th september:

I have been a commuter for many years, enjoying the excellent service at Liverpool Street.

The upgrade of the station information board will see a landmark and daily icon for many thousands of commuters disappear from daily life, hopefully replaced by a very useful and more modern alternative.

My reason for emailing is to see if it would be possible to acquire part of the information board as a memento, namely one of the small, rotating signs which reads 'Ipswich'. It may seem like a very odd request, but i've spent a large amount of time over the years searching out that sign on a daily basis, and i'd be keen to hang on to it.

Please be assured this is a genuine request, and I am happy to come to Liverpool Street to pick it up, obviously once the original information board has been removed.

email from network rail, 17th october:

Further to your email below requesting a small rotating board from the information board at Liverpool Street.

I can confirm that the existing board has now been removed, and in view of your request, an ‘Ipswich’ panel has been kept, for your collection at Liverpool Street station.

I would be grateful if you could pick this panel up []. Can you please confirm the date you will be arriving and we will arrange for the panel to be left at reception.

Alternatively, can you please contact xxxxxxx who will arrange for the panel to be left at station reception on your stated date.

I hope that this information is of use to you.

i am *so* chuffed. sad, but chuffed.

if i had my way...

i'd be outside all the time digging up the garden, planting plants, chopping down trees and raking up leaves. a day wouldn't be done without dirt under the fingernails, and tired would be tired because of lifting 4 tonnes of earth, not travelling 4 hours.

until then, i'll content myself with alan titchmarsh and my little patch of suffolk soil, but the call of the wild is rumbling!

little cartoons

you know those little cartoons you used to get of the months of the year at school. they used to have a sunny symbol over july and august.

i wonder if that'll have to be changed now?

so it ends and begins.

finally home. finally well, finally better.

i now need, a holiday.

curious

today i mostly watched samba. it reminded me of when i first discovered it, and used to like listening and trying to figure out the rhythms. even though i knew all the rhythms it was wonderful to be able to listen, take some energy (without sounding odd) and perhaps also make some comments and suggestions to the excellent chap who was leading at the time.

i went to rehearsal like i needed a three week holiday, and came back feeling like i only needed two. despite hearing stories of cambridge, latitude and other frivolity that appears to have passed this summer by.

on saturday i will be playing with some extremely good musicians, without having to worry about teaching or looking after everyone else. i can't bloody wait!

wheat free no go.

i tried to make wheat free tortillas this evening. it ended up as a dough of crumbs.

also, its nice that its been grey, raining and had trains-that-broke-down today.

the view from the study, despite the rain, is rather lovely. my apple tree is looking goood!

yum

a bacon and egg sandwich and a cup of tea cures everything.

new steps

its rather exciting at the moment.

new house, new job, amy selling her house, I have a study and a herb garden. its rather like growing up, but scary!

i'm looking forward to starting my new job and changing work. i'm really going to miss all of my co-workers, but not the nonsense that goes with the place.

its rather nice to be able to sit in a quiet study (!) with a lovely person downstairs and a nice pint of adnams contemplating the day.

there are some lovely videos of myself and james playing at the white horse. thanks to the wonderful amy i now have congas, and was able to play them on monday night. it was *superb*

marvellous :)

some tips...

1) dont' drink 5 pints of adnams on an empty stomach
2) don't nearly fall in the water on the way home
3) eat lots at all times

good questions to know someone...

1) what stations are on your radio pre-dial?
2) do you read a newspaper, if so, how often and which one?
3) what bad things do you try not to do but do sometimes anyway?
4) mac or pc?
5) walk or car?
6) can you cope easily with changes in plans?
7) do you like going away but coming home?
8) can you think of at least 2 opportunities from any situation?
9)

rocky balboa

is an amazing, terrible film.

a fighter always fights.

tiny pad

just been to look at a new place.

it was tiny.

about 1/2 the size of what i've got now for the same price.

thank goodness for good deals!

good book

illusions, the adventures of a reluctant messiah. its all about a bloke who flies around america give airplane rides to people, supposedly then meets the second coming. sounds strange but very good!

off to look at a new gaff

from home

worked from home today and managed to get quite a large amount done which is nice. connectors group is shaping up to be quite interesting.

had a phone call about some of the new waterfront flats being built, as i was interested in buying one. they start at £130k for a studio flat 1/4 the size of my current pad. that's not going to happen then.

also managed to fit a decent session in at the gym, so now have no energy left at all. off to bed to be a snob and listen to radio 4.

small band good sound

after the standard 30 minute delay due to cold water on the line arrived safe for samba. good little band and sounded nice. also had time to sample the joy of adnams' barley wine, which is very nice, dark and thick.

working from home tomorrow which is nice, so should finally be able to get in touch with connectors, invites and hopefully email.

i consider this another attempt to blog regularly. i'm going to try to do it everyday.

past lives

just had an extremely unsettling experience.

when i was 16, i used to run a business called pupiline.

it was all about helping support young people, it was founded after i left my first school because i was bullied. it grew to be a very large concern, lots of people, lots of money, and lots of cameras...

i went to visit my grandparents and they've been putting all the old footage from my (shockingly many) tv appearances on to dvd.

watching them all i forget how much went on.

more to follow, including some clips.

Casualty is shithttp://www2.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif

Home for Christmas, wonderful roast beef.

Helped wait on the olds and did the cleaning.

Whole of the family decided to gather to watch a nice festive programme. Casualty. All about a man who got stabbed in the neck and a woman who wanted to kill her daughter. Lovely.

My friend's daughter can't walk to the shops in SA withouth being mugged. She's 12. And we watch this shit on the TV.

So my dad and I drank 30 year old scotch instead, and polished the Sheffield Steel.

Bombay Bicycle Club are amazing.

Roll on Christmas.

No longer Veggie

I'm currently sat on the sofa watching 'Badly Dubbed Porn'.

The day started with waking up late, which was lovely. I then progressed to the Lord Nelson Pub, which serves possibly the best adnams in suffolk. Its amazing.

Then I went to a restaurant and had some non veggie meat sections. I enjoyed eating some meat, and it was special.

I also watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind yesterday, and it was amazing. Its a wonderful film, and something that I wish was true.

Probably should never post again after drinking all day, be interesting to read this back tomorrow....

ipswich

its been horrible in my lovely home town for the past few weeks.

a real air of unease amongst everyone, police cars on every street corner, and the fog today has made it even stranger. as the news has just broke that they've charged the second man arrested, hopefully there'll be some closure for the families of all 5 girls before christmas. somehow i think that the town will always be different.

in other, more facile news, i've a lovely new laptop. its white and shiny, and to break it in i'm going to watch a dvd.

How to Wow 'Em Like Steve Jobs

A cool article that details Jobs' five keys to a dazzling presentation.



Worth a read!

read more | digg story

Can sites like Digg change the face of journalism?

Since Digg brings new from blogs that no one would see into plain view, and encourages other blogs to link to it will likely change journalism by allowing readers to contribute in ways they haven't before.

Digg is a fantastic website, check it out if you've not already!

read more | digg story

Greenpeace: McDonald's Destroying the Amazon

"Greenpeace on Thursday said McDonald's was fueling Amazon rainforest destruction by using soybeans grown in the region as feed for chickens that end up served in the fast-food chain's European restaurants."

interesting... i'm a vegetarian so have no call for mcdonalds, but i do eat soy and soy products. perhaps i'm doing more harm than good with my crazy vegetarian lifestyle!!

read more|digg story

Sigur Ros!!

Went to see Sigur Ros at Hammersmith Apollo on the 28th March.

Totally amazing gig. Quite possibily, in fact definitely, the best performance i have ever seen.

If you've not seen or heard them before, check them out.

Reviews and other stuff can be found here: and here .

Amazing!

Flickr and Blogger

Pearsonified | Best damn blog on the planet.

Very useful post on how to add Flickr Photos to Blogger...

Chinese Menu

rahoi.com

Very humourous, but they speak better English than my Chinese!

Soldier Emails....

Welcome to MichaelMoore.com!

There's nothing more powerful than the voices of people experiencing something.

Rev. Tony

BBC NEWS | Politics | PM attacked on Iraq 'God' remarks

This was an excellent interview if anyone saw it. I thought his honestly was refreshing. Even if i don't agree with seom of his policies and and actions, i do agree and support someone who makes decisions.

Amazing Lego Creations!

The title says it all, this list has some really strange Lego creations. Very cool indeed!!

read more | digg story

Durham here i come...

So i've been accepted to study for an MBA at Durham University. PRetty unusual considering i have no first degree and am about 10 years under their average age; but obviously i've impressed someone.

the only slight snag is the cost of it all. the total course costs around £10k, which is not a sum of money I have readily available!! I did apply for a scholarship, but wasn't successful, so i'm going to have to pony up the cash. most career development loans (which is what i'd have to get to fund it) only go up to £8k, so there's a fairly substansial money gap which i've no idea how to fill. its important i do the course, so i've got to find it somewhere!

answers on a postcard...

Public Transport?!?

Having left home at well before 7, i arrived in work just before 9am. Two hours to travel less than 20 miles. Marvellous!

Nobel...

i have been fortunate for the past 2 years to be able to attend the public services summit at nobel week hosted by cisco systems.

the event is nothing short of amazing. it is a fantastic, nay unique, opportunity to meet some amazingly intelligent, senior and powerful people; even more so considering i am a young whippersnapper.

this year i had two major invites, one to take part in a major piece of work by a major corporation in a very interesting field, the other an invitation to speak to a group of senior consultants in washington dc. all very exciting.

my two years at nobel have led me to notice a few things:

merit is very important
a lot of the people that were there over the past few years were there because they had a right to be. their position within their work afforded them enough seniority that they should have been there. i was there because i fitted into the group. if i had clashed with the group or not behaved in a similar way then i would not have been invited again, or would not have integrated as tightly as i felt i did.

people are good
the people that I met over the two years that I was there were, and still are amazing. in spite of the levels which they work at, which are almost universally amazing, they are down to earth, keen and passionate people.

trust is key
it takes a lot of time to build trust and relationships with people. no matter what anyone else may allude to, trust is key to building a productive relationship with people, whether in a business or personal context.

Bag of techmology

on the way back from nobel i saw an interesting sight.

i got onto the bus at oslo to go to torp airport. the bus was almost empty at the bus station, but as we did pick ups along the way out of oslo it got very busy. we had to stop for about 20 minutes to wait for another bus to pick up the passengers we couldn't take on our coach. a fantastic example of the customer service we don't have in this country. if that had been london, the driver would have just driven on. our norwegian driver stopped, ensured the passengers were ok, sold them tickets in advance of the second bus arriving so they could get straight on, and made sure that everyone knew what was going on.

while this was going on, a very young girl, no older than 10 had sat next to me. i was listening to my battered old ipod and watching hte goings on, when i noticed her pull out an old ipod mini from her bag. she turned it on, and began using it no problems at all, she started playing the brick game on it, and i looked away smiling thinking how nice it must be to be 10 years old and using an ipod.

i then noticed her pull out a mobile phone, and begin texting. it was an almost brand new nokia camera phone, so just an old knock off. once the bus pulled away she put down the phone and pulled out a brand new game boy advance from her bag and started playing with that.

this whole sequence struck me. not in a 'back in my day we didn't have those kind of things' way, but it seemed to be an interesting snapshot into the paradigm of our times. this young lady had access to a very wide range of technology, which if it could be harnessed in her educational life, her equivalant of the modern adult working life, then it would be immensely powerful. sadly, that is not the case, and we are stuck using textbooks and chalk. maybe in another 100 years!

Who Am I?

So, some information on me

I am 21 years old, have been running businesses of various different types and kinds for the past year. the first was a social enterprise involving young people which created masses and masses of free to air content, written by young people. Added to this was a load of educational material that we sold, alongside HarperCollins and Microsoft. Sadly it didn't work out, but it had a high profile - check these out: pupiline, oli watts.

Then i moved on to run a consultancy business, which worked with the DfES and the working group on 14-19 reform to produce a load of materials on their work. coupled with work with a load of national charities, schools and other things its been pretty successful.

To come right up to date, i'm now working at the. RBDO of the University of Essex as a Business Development Manager - my job is to scout for new opportunities for work for the University, which is pretty exciting and rather demanding.

Also I run the musical side of the Suffolk school of samba - which is a massive group of drummers and dancers (more here) we play all over the county and did nearly 40 gigs this season. very much fun indeed!!

Tell me about you.

So the job with the new company started on Monday. Having never worked for a big business before, and having never worked at such a junior level, it was a very interesting week.

The training provided is really very good, but it progresses very slowly indeed. I'm going to enjoy the actually working work, so can't wait to get qualified.

Flat acquisition is coming along nicely, and if all goes to plan December will be the big date!

DSC00317,

originally uploaded by oli.watts.

Multimedia message,


originally uploaded by oli.watts.

Multimedia message,


originally uploaded by oli.watts.

Multimedia message,


originally uploaded by oli.watts.