40 by Forty

So, we're still doing this shtick, huh? Damn straight. It's the 22nd of December and I'm officially on leave from work. Most challenges are officially suspended for the duration of the holidays.  Which is just as well, to be honest, given just how many snacks I ate yesterday! Well, ok, given I'm a third-hand-idea for a faux-conversational blog post, I suppose I have to go along with it. What are we doing today? Brewing beer.  Or more accurately, tasting beer! Oooh, is there any for me? No. Oh... I don't think it would be good for your USB ports. Fine. It's not like I wanted any anyway... Sorry. Thanks... So, how was it? Any thoughts on the challenge, now it's done? I still remain of the opinion that there's a lot of faffing about in brewing beer and the end result was not earth shattering enough to make that worthwhile. I guess going down the kit route always risked that, but it's surprising how little difference adding the va

But, this isn't how these blogs are normally laid out! What's going on?  I'm scared! Firstly, calm down.  Secondly, we're coming up to Christmas and I'm at 25 out of 30 of my one-off challenges. I've got time specific plans for three of the remaining ones and thus only a couple of others to tick off over the next three months. To keep the blog turning over, I'll be re-visiting a few challenges that need updates, with a view to dropping a short "what happened next" on most of my long-term challenges. This week, pull ups! So, what did happen with them? Err... I lifted myself up and down needlessly for three months, until I was able to do it an arbitrary number of times based on our ten fingered hands. So, challenge complete! Any thoughts on the challenge, now it's done? I really dislike exercise. Are you going to keep doing it? Despite my dislike of exercise, yes. (Probably.) Maybe not quite as regularly, but the extra strength is actu

This challenge is courtesy of… Magnus "The Viking" Lyon. The challenge Go axe throwing. A bit like my sword fighting challenge , axe throwing is the sort of thing that I do in my head all the time. (You may very well think that I sometime imagine doing it to troublesome colleagues, I couldn't possibly comment.) As a result, this challenge was a great excuse to go do something silly, frivolous and fun that I wouldn't normally give myself permission to waste money on. Conveniently, Magnus happens to be friends with a man who runs an axe throwing business called Sean.  (The man, that is, not the business. Sean would be a weird name for a business. The business is actually called CPS Activities .) After a couple of false starts, we managed to gather a group of six of us to go and throw pointy things at other things. We got off to a fine start, somehow managing to co-ordinate six adults to all make it to Beecraigs Country Park on time. (This was something o

This challenge is courtesy of… Jackie Burrel, who the entire 40 by Forty thing is courtesy of. The challenge Try fire spinning.    Fire spinning, for those not in the know, is not just spinning flaming things around your head.  Oh no.  It's much more complex than that.  It's... err.. hang on, I had something for this...   Ahh yes! It's spinning flaming stuff around your head without setting fire to yourself!   I'm sure nothing could possibly go wrong with this challenge, right?   Because I didn't feel like an impromptu trip to the hospital, I teamed up with Jackie and the flaming hippies from the Monday Meadows Fire Club. This had the twin advantages of letting me borrow equipment and also providing some tuition/supervision/someone to laugh at me when I set myself on fire.  The Monday Meadows Fire Club meets at 9pm on Mondays (not a great surprise).  I got there at 8:55pm, because I'm a civil servant.  The flaming hippies shambled in bet