A collection of random thoughts and ideas
Last year I achieved my savings challenge. I saved different amounts each week to pay off from my credit cards. Following this plan I paid off over £750 extra from my cards, without really noticing.
This plan made me feel discplined and I was proud of myself for sticking to it for two years now.
I counted every yellow car that I saw in 2022.
Yes, it’s ridiculous, but I am addicted to counting yellow cars. I count them whenever I see them and add them to my counter which is permanently in my car.
As you can see the average became fairly constant from around June onwards. The average was around 37 yellow cars each week. There are certainly more peaks during the BST months, with most of the below average weeks coming during the beginning and end of the year.
The highest weekly total was 81 which came in a week with a visit to Llandudno and a residential visit to York. It’s no surprise that the highest totals always come during the weeks with long drives, and particularly those into cities.
You can probably spot the weeks that I was off with covid (which I managed to catch twice in 2022).
There have been some cracking songs out in 2022. I have narrowed a list down to my favourite 20. It’s a random selection, so sorry.
20 David Guetta & Bebe Rexa – I’m Good (Blue)
I have always been a fan of Blue – the Ice Pop Instrumental version, specifically. It was great to see the song getting another chance to take on the charts in a new version by David Guetta. I have had to download the clean version so that I can play it in the car with the kids.
19 Tenchi, Shaggy & Embody & Moss Kena – It Wasn’t Me
Such a brilliant fun remix of a silly song that came out 21 years ago! This is fab.
18 Harry Styles – Late Night Talking
A great some from Harry. What a year he has had!
17 Lewis Capaldi – Forget Me
Lewis Capaldi songs are always brilliant. He didn’t fail with this one.
16 Nathan Dawe & Ella Henderson – 21 Reasons
Such a good dance track.
15 Topic, Robin Schulz, Nico Santos & Paul van Dyk – In Your Arms (For An Angel)
For An Angel is one of the most underrated dance songs ever. So it was a delight to get a reworking of a classic.
14 LF System – Afraid To Feel
It has been brilliant to get dance songs back at the top of the charts again. This is an instant classic.
13 Lizzo – 2 Be Loved (Am I Ready)
Much was made of Lizzo’s other tune About Damn Time. That was fab, but I love this one. It’s fun and underrated.
12 Eliza Rose & Interplanetary Criminal – B.O.T.A (Baddest Of Them All)
Another dance chart topper. This one is great. I haven’t been fortunate enough to hear this on a night out, but I bet it goes down a strom!
11 Shouse – Won’t Forget You
Such an earworm. And with loads of remixes it was hard to escape this from my playlist.
10 Sam Smith – Love Me More
A Sam Smith classic. Somehow they release mellow, easy to listen to songs that are brilliant.
9 Sam Ryder – Spaceman
After Sam’s performance on New Year’s Eve, I have to include a couple of songs from him on the best of list. He is awesome.
8 Mimi Webb – House On Fire
I thought it was funny how she was able to sing this outside the Queen’s house in June.
7 Sam Ryder – Somebody
Somehow this was even catchier than Spaceman.
6 Purple Disco Machine & Sophie and the Giants – In The Dark
I love Purple Disco Machine. This is one of his absolute finest.
5 Harry Styles – As It Was
As soon as it was released it was clear that this was going to be a phenomenon. Brilliant!
4 George Ezra – Anyone For You (Tiger Lily)
Oh my word this was a classic. It is up there with George Ezra’s best.
3 Latto & Mariah Carey & DJ Khaled – Big Energy (Remix)
How this was no a bigger hit is beyond me. This is a fricking awesome tune. Although DJ Khaled’s new watch that he mentions at the end annoys me, thankfully it doesn’t detract from the awesomeness that is this song. Amazing!
2 Joel Corry & Tom Grennan – Lionheart (Fearless)
I could have flipped a coin to decide between 1 and 2. Lionheart is just awesome. It wasn’t a smash hit but I think there’s still time for it to experience success. It is one of the best dance tunes of the 2020s so far.
1 George Ezra – Green Green Grass
How could it be anything else. I love this song. It gave us a funny moment at Buckingham Palace and it has had our family singing along every time we’ve heard it. A perfect pop song.
This is a totally hypothetical wishlist. We cannot afford to move house and, even if we could, the places I’ve picked carry an upmarket premium which means a move to these places could never happen. But if I could live anywhere else, these places are on my list of places where I’d love to live.
Tarporley
Tarporley is a weird one to include on my list as it is only up the road. I’m not entirely sure I’d want to live there as it is very snobby, but there is something so appealing about the village and its community feel.
Lymm
Such a picturesque village with lots of quirks and interesting history. I would love to live in the village!
Whitby
Whitby is one of my favourite places in the world! It really is beautiful. As a tourist I love it, but I get the impression that it is a really lovely place to live.
Scarborough
After our holiday where we stayed there in 2021, I would happily live in Scarborough. I love Peasholm Park, the beaches and the atmosphere. It is nothing fancy, but I am sure it would be a nice place to live.
Conwy
Conwy is such a lovely place to visit and I there is something about the town that feels so homely. It is definitely somewhere I’d live, although the roads in the area would annoy me.
Saundersfoot
Such a lovely village – I’d opt for Saundersfoot rather than its more famous neighbour Tenby. Saundersfoot seems, at least to me, more of a home than a place to visit.
Wells-next-the-Sea
I fell in love with Wells on our recent holiday. It is definitely somewhere that felt like it had a community feel. There seems enough for people to enjoy as holidaymakers as well as residents. Fabulous place!
St. Alban’s
We stayed in St. Alban’s recently and loved it. A small but beautiful city. Verulanium Park would be worth living there for alone (the park is shown in the picture for this article.)
The lost classic, The Ultimate High, was first released in 1993. It has stood the test of time.
The Ultimate High is a song by The Time Frequency, a Scottish group. A couple of minor hits in 1992 set the group up for bigger success with The Power Zone EP which included a couple of other songs that I am not very aware of, and, most importantly, The Ultimate High. The EP peaked at Number 17 in the charts.
I don’t know exactly when I first heard TUH but it must have made an impression on me. I remember hearing it played by Stu Allan on the radio. It was in 1997 when I went to a student night at Valentino’s in Stoke-on-Trent that I properly began to love the song. I remember the moment it was played and everyone singing and dancing to such a euphoric song.
Unfortunately, that was the one and only time I ever heard the song out in a club. In truth, it was probably the last time I ever heard the song played by anyone but me.
Checking WhoSampled, I can see that the song was sampled on a few hardcore dance hits. But for some reason, this absolute classic tune has never taken off.
The Time Frequency had a few other hits and I really liked much of their music, but nothing ever beat The Ultimate High.
One of my favourite dance tunes is N-Trance’s Set You Free!
Set You Free was originally released in 1994, peaking at Number 39. Back then I would pride myself on finding little known dance tracks in Sphere, the local music shop. But I’ll be honest, I don’t think I had found Set You Free until it was re-released in 1995.
It feels like such a strange concept in 2022 – re-releasing songs. Songs don’t get re-released any more, they just get released and at some point hopefully they get discovered. But back in 1995, Set You Free kind of actually followed this sort of pattern, taking three years to make it big.
Set You Free was recorded in 1992 with vocals from the amazing Kelly Llorena. According to Wikipedia, she and the members of N-Trance drove all around the country performing the song. Clearly there was an appetitite for it as it was released in 1994. Popularity seemed to grow and the record label re-issued it again in 1995 just after Christmas.
It entered the chart at Number Six and then seemed to hover round the charts for months. That moment when the Rain and Thunder sounds at the start of the song is so instantly recognisable. Kelly belts the vocals out like this is her one chance to sing on a hit record (to be fair, this was her biggest chance, but not her only one!)
The remixes were strong and I particularly loved the TTF Edit (The Time Frequency, a Scottish group who produced one of the most underrated songs ever, The Ultimate High).
A remember discussing with friends about there existing a rap version of the song. Every so often it was on the radio. On the CD this is known as the Pop Edit and the rap is performed by Ricardo Da Force. I always wondered how N-Trance went from this to Stayin’ Alive, but actually the Pop Edit bridges that gap. Da Force is brilliant on both records – I’m serious as cancer.
Set You Free was remixed in 2001 by Rob Searle, peaking at Number Four. It was a delight to see the song back in the charts. This version was great but not quite as strong as the original version.
Set You Free was recently covered by Sam Ryder and his version is brilliant. I can’t believe that no one has tried to blend this into a dance version.
Set You Free is the song that convinced me of my love for dance music. Released at the start of 1995, the truth is that my love of the genre began that year and Set You Free was the first huge dance hit of a vintage year of dance songs. It is one of my favourite songs ever and is rightly thought of as a classic.
As Robbie Williams releases his XXV album, full of orchestral versions of his greatest hits, I thought I’d share my favourite Robbie songs.
I have also read this with a list of Take That and Robbie Williams songs, which seems not quite right to me. So I’ve included Take That songs where Robbie takes the lead.
21. Everything Changes
Robbie’s best song as lead vocal for Take That.
20. My Culture (1 Giant Leap featuring Maxi Jazz and Robbie Williams
This is such a great song. Robbie repurposes his poem, Hello Sir, from Life Thru A Lens to create a verse in My Culture. It’s such a great song. Hello Sir is such a great poem – it is one of the most impactful messages in my teaching career – recognising how destroying the negative effect a teacher could have on a person. In My Culture it is repurposed and uses ‘Dad’ instead of ‘Sir’ which is a bit strange. I’m reading too much into this. My Culture is just a great song!
19. Heaven From Here
Such a beautiful song. It never fails to make me think.
18. Karma Killer
Such energy. Absolutely brilliant!
17. Rock DJ
Just edging past Karma Killer, Rock DJ was such a massive song when it came out. It was everywhere and became such an earworm as a result. It’s a song that everyone knows.
16. Advertising Space
An anthemic effort from Robbie. His vocals are so powerful here. 2005 wasn’t a vintage year for music, so this stands out.
15. Better Man
I always got the sense that Robbie wrote songs whilst wearing his heart on his sleeve. I felt that he was genuinely wanting to become a better man. A great song.
14. Eight Letters
Originally released by Take That on their Progress album, Robbie recorded his own version of Eight Letters a couple of years later for his Take The Crown album. It’s hard to comprehend that this wasn’t a hit because it is a brilliant song and should have been a hit for one of them. (I think Robbie’s version is the best.)
13. You Know Me
Robbie can quickly go from loud rocky bangers to softer ballads. You Know Me falls somewhere in between. What a great song!
12. Something Beautiful
Another classic Robbie song. When that chorus kicks in: ‘Something beautiful will come your way’, you cannot help but sing along
11. Old Before I Die
I loved this when it was first released. I don’t think that it’s probably passed the test of time, and is not considered a classic. But at the time, it was such a statement from Robbie: I am no longer in Take That. It was so different to what we were used to. I remember when he performed it on TFI Friday, he changed one of the lyrics to say, ‘I hope I live to receive Channel 5,’ which is a reminder that 1997 was the year the channel that eventually cancelled Neighbours was launched.
10. Hey Tiger!
A throwaway song for the soundtrack of The Tiger Came To Tea, Hey Tiger! became so popular in our house, it is one of my most played Robbie tracks. It is fun and happy and I love it!
9. Millennium
Those strings from James Bond are so striking. Millennium was an instant classic on release. Brilliant.
8. Bodies
Bodies is probably not considered a classic Robbie song, but it is catchy and great to sing along to. I love it!
7. No Regrets
A Robbie classic. For me, No Regrets has improved with age.
6. Let Me Entertain You
At the time, LMEY was so different. It was another bold statement from Robbie and it is his signature track.
5. Angels
Quite possibly Robbie’s most famous song, Angels was the song that sent his career stratospheric. I remember it being sung by choirs, being used as the last song in nightclubs, soundtracking sad moments on TV and being sang really badly on karaoke – it was everywhere. Angels is a gorgeous song and the world is a better place because of it.
4. Candy
Robbie’s last ever Number 1 in 2012, Candy was famously ignored by Radio One because he was too old. Because of this, stubbornly, I listened to it more. It gradually became stuck in my head. It is catchy and fun and a great, great song.
3. Hot Fudge
Another album track, Hot Fudge is the hit song that never was. I don’t know why it was never released as a single. If you haven’t heard it before then you are missing out.
2. Strong
One of my favourite Robbie lyrics is ‘Is this real, ‘cos I feel fake, Oprah Winfrey, Ricky Lake… teach me things I don’t need to know.’ It always made me laugh. A an upbeat song about Robbie’s miserableness. It is brilliant!
I actually found it really hard to limit myself to 20 songs (that’s why I had to go up to 21!). So, for reference, here are the songs that didn’t quite make the list:
Supreme. Lovelight, Won’t Do That, Do You Mind, Morning Sun, South Of The Border, Ego A Go Go, Sin Sin Sin, Me and My Monkey, She’s The One, Win Some, Lose Some, Come Undone, Sexed Up, Kids, Life Thru A Lens, I Found Heaven, The Flood, Freedom, Could It Be Magic and Beyond The Sea.
Lego recently released their Muppets collectible minifigure series. After finally adding my final figure and completing my collection, I thought I share my list of favourites.
12 Janice
Nothing against Janice, I just don’t have any real memory of her from The Muppets or Muppet Babies. She is familiar and a brilliant figure, just not a favourite.
11 Statler
The minifigure itself is excellent, but Statler is let down by the accessories. I don’t remember him having a laptop!
10 Waldorf
Another great minifigure with better accessories.
9 Gonzo
I love the Gonzo headpiece and his Camilla accessory. But I am not as keen on the suit Gonzo wears for some reason.
8 Miss Piggy
A perfect figure.
7 Bunsen
I always loved Bunsen and Beaker in Muppet Babies! This is an excellent character, but he is slightly edged out by…
6 Beaker
I just adore Beaker’s expression. Lego have captured him brilliantly!
5 Kermit
Perfect!
4 Rowlf
A perfect likeness and great accessories too!
3 Swedish Chef
Such an awesome figure, but I am disappointed that there is no chicken and no basket!
2 Fozzie Bear
A fantastic minifigure with a wocka wocka microphone and a banana! Fabulous!
1 Animal
My favourite minifigure in the whole set is Animal. His figure is perfect in every way, but it’s the drumkit that takes it to a whole other level.
The truth is that it is incredibly hard to fault this set. There are no weak figures and every single character is sublime. They look great on display together! I didn’t think that the Looney Tunes series could be topped, but maybe the Muppets series comes close.
Alan Partridge has just released Series Two of his Audible podcast, From the Oasthouse.
It had felt like so long after the first series that I thought a second series of From The Oasthouse would never happen. However, I am delighted that, after two years, the podcast is back and it’s as good as ever!
I have really grown to love Partridge through the audio medium. I listen to I, Partridge and Nomad at least twice a year, and have done since Nomad was released in 2016. When From The Oasthouse Series One was released in 2020 it added a third Partridge regular listen to my list. I loved Series One. It was true Partridge – he rambled (not wittered, which is a slightly different thing) through eighteen episodes, showed vulnerability and overconfidence at the same time and was absolutely hilarious throughout. It was an instant classic for me.
I wondered what direction Series Two would go in. Would it involve more of his nervous breakdown caused by High Noon? In fact, in Series Two High Noon isn’t even mentioned, but Partridge is still going through some sort of a breakdown after losing his job on TV (oh no! No more This Time?!) and also the sad death of his dog, Seldom. He is desperately trying find something to fill his timem whether that is potholing or trying to get a job back at North Norfold Digital. It is great that the relationship with his grandchildren, which began in Series One, has continued. Somehow, you end up feeling sorry for Alan at the same time as finding him hilarious.
Series Two is shorter and he hints at a Series Three (or Series Two Second Tranche) and this is, of course, the best news I’ve heard since the announcement of Series Two!
During a horrible, tough time for the country, Alan Partidge arrives with hilarity and it is, as always, great to have him back!
We had a brilliant week away in North Norfolk.
The journey from Cheshire to Wells-next-the-Sea is a long one. It took around six hours, including stops. We had a quick lunch stop in Peterborough on the way – that seems like a city worth visiting at some point in the future. After settling into our cottage for the week in Wells, we had a quiet night with fish and chips.
The following day we tried to go to Wells beach but the car park was full by 10am. So we set off to find a different beach. We eventually stumbled upon Brancaster beach. What a beach! One of the best beaches we’ve ever visiting. The sea was so shallow we walked for miles and miles in the water. There is a brilliant little shack selling food and drinks. In the evening we went out for a few drinks. We managed to make it to maybe three pubs before they all started to close (weird).
The next day was a Sunday and the heatwave was in full flow. We set off earlier for Wells beach and managed it! We had a really lovely time on the beach. The huts are just beautiful! In the late afternoon we went for a wander round the shops and for a drink.
On the Monday we set off on a long drive to Lowestoft to visit Africa Alive. We had fond memories of a couple of previous visits and always thought it was the best zoo we had ever visited. On this occasion we felt like it had become a little neglected and didn’t enjoy it quite the same.
On the Tuesday we went to King’s Lynn. What a gorgeous town! We really enjoyed looking around.
On Wednesday the weather wasn’t the best. We drove to Swaffham. I am not sure what we expected but we found it a little underwhelming. Nice, but just nothing spectacular.
On our last day we went to Cromer and had an absolutely brilliant day. Cromer was really nice and we enjoyed the shops, the pier, a steel drum band, getting spashed by the waves, the ice cream, the arcades and the golf. It was a fantastic day out! We called at Sheringham on the way back and loved it. We were a bit disappointed in ourselves that we hadn’t visited there before.
We set off home on the Friday after a breakfast in Fakenham before spending hours on the road. The traffic around Nottingham was horrendous.
We had a brilliant holiday!
