JR Hartley has a lot to answer to

I've not been much of a fisherman in my lifetime, so I was a bit concerned when I learnt the latest stag do involved fly fishing. It's a bit of a change from the debauchery of recent celebrations and it gave me a change to swing my arm, erect my rod, put me wellies on and catch an old trout. Actually that really does sound like one of those stag do's after all.

With the more senior members, we went along to Brampton Trout Farm and were met by the loud enthusiastic owner. He informed us he'd put a lot more trout in the water and if we caught the tagged huge one, we win a prize in the kitty for £200. A little lesson in the technique and away I went. I could see the trout swimming, right next to my fly which was in the water. But guess what, not one single bite....for 4 hours. We did have one successful catch and it caught a lot of people's attention. We all gathered round the stag as we were informed it was a large trout on the end of his rod. No it wasn't. It was a large branch.

Thank god we later got to celebrate the branch catch in the pub. An interesting and very enjoyable day. Perhaps I'm at that age now...

How can you get there if parts of Rhodes are invisible?

It's been a while since visiting the Greek island of Rhodes, so with a week to go we booked it, packed it.....off. We headed to the town of Afantou which apparently means invisible, however it was clearly there, on the map AND in real life. The view from our balcony over the sea, it's long pebbled beaches and the winding mountains proved it all existed.

We did a good job of ignoring the bingo night, useless reps and desperate couples who've got no conversation themselves and look for you to hook up with. Instead, we went into the small town to seek out real Greek food. We found it in every restaurant we visited too. We also discovered a gem which was half-Greek-half-English (a bit like Prince Philip), called Sergios. They specialise in home-made pasta and pizza though, not traditional Greek but they did a very good job of putting a smile on our faces as we stuffed it with dough balls, pizza, pasta and Greek wine.

So after a great relaxing holiday, the going home saga began. At 2:30AM, we were picked up by the bus, taken to the airport and told "as you know there is a 7 hour delay". We didn't know, but we knew now. Thanks Thomas Cook, you are very informative. It ended up being a much longer delay in the airport with a 12 euro voucher to buy an old looking sandwich from the war. We were eventually flown home on an antique rented french plane where the only way on and off was from stairs at the back of the plane (recently featured on Channel 4's Plane Crash). The arm rests were stuck on with gaffer tape, not sure what the wings were stuck on with.

Punishment 4u

There's been some sort of strange theme in the last few family weddings. A gypsy theme. Don't get me wrong, we are not part of the 'travelling community' and don't allow krumping, fights and grabbing as you may expect at a Gypsy wedding. It's more to do with co-incidental venues and transport. Our latest wedding (my cousin Karen, marrying Paul) was at the Wood Green Animal Sanctuary in Cambridgeshire where a famous gypsy wedding took place and was on TV. The stag 'do' for the other family wedding involved the same limo used in another televised Gypsy wedding (that's another story). I'm hoping this is co-incidence and that the family are not trying to tell us something. I know I've always said that caravans are a thing for when you are in your 40's but I'm just not ready for it yet.

The signs of marriage are always there; gentle reminders; friends getting married; family members getting married...The best reminder was in the hotel we stayed in during the celebrations. The listed building was on the grounds of an old prison. Our room was called Punishment. What else can I say?

The day was blessed with hot sunshine and drinks on the lawns were made more entertaining by the sight of a horse showing off it's manhood and some ferrets looking bored in cages. The entertainment continued after discussing how many people we could get into a school bus ride and how many sambuca's myself and my cousins could get through. This is the result of male conversation fuelled by Pimms and beers.



All in all, it was a great day and not a gypsy in sight. This was wedding number 3 of 5 this year so the suit needs another dry clean; the girlfriend needs another new dress; the bank account needs another few pounds and the belly needs another owner 

A comic in the Live Theatre not in a tin

We've never been to the Fringe in Edinburgh and keep meaning to go along. The closest we have got is to see some comedians as they perfect their acts for the show. The NewcastleGateshead Comedy Festival allows them do do this and at the Live Theatre we laughed quite a lot seeing Jo Caulfield and Anvil Springsteen.

Jo has been on Mock The Week and other comedy panel shows. I was surprised how good she was, picking up on men's daft habits and inability to work out what is wrong with their other half. This will always remain a mystery to men, so best just leave us to watch the TV with no other thoughts going on in our minds.

Anvil was a lot more different, he threw his prep notes away at the beginning and just got on with the job. His dark humour was often very funny but was sometimes skirting around for laughs but got them. His opinions on young people were spot on and he targeted an 18 year old in the audience to confirm if those 'uncontrolled urges' still go on. They do by the way and surely it's not just when you are younger. What got a lot of laughter involved the sister-in-law as we were there in a group. Anvil was reminiscing and asked if we could all remember Marvel in a tin. He then asked the sis-in-law if she could remember and replied "You mean comics used to be in a tin?". Now that was funny, but the innocence of it all made it funnier again. We chatted to Anvil Springsteen later in the bar, he lives in Newcastle, but is a scouser, so he wasn't 'Born in the USA'. I didn't do that joke but felt like he wanted me to.

All in all, I was pretty well entertained with minimal effort, a bit like watching TV when the Mrs isn't there (see above). We got lush food at The Broad Chare and drink from a few other bars, so let it all happen again soon and we will be content.

It's a Park, in the centre of things

I've never been bothered about a trip to Centre Parcs. It's got an expensive label, but when we were offered the chance to go on a family break there we said yes and went along to see if it is actually a park (with a c of course) in the centre. I can confirm that there is a park and it's more or less in the centre of Whinfelll Forest.


Once you have navigated through the complex road system and you haven't managed to end up lost, facing backwards inside your own car or on top of a cyclist you can be pleasantly surprised by the plush log cabins and the beauty of the forest.


In the place you will find a plethora of activities. The big ones like Go Ape, obstacle courses, scary rope things, zip wire craziness you need to book at least 25 years in advance. However the indoor and outdoor sports arena has all sorts of sporty things to get into such as badminton, tennis, table tennis, footy, golf, water sports and everything else you can think of. Great for kids. Great for fat families too, as they convince themselves they are on a healthy holiday.


The resident animals there must have a great time. There was a duck in the human swimming pool; clearly they're not arsed about their own lake, but who could blame them when there's such a great water slide. The red squirrels also show their little cute faces from time to time, I snapped this one going up a tree. Now when I say snapped. please don't be phoning the RSPCA, I didn't actually snap its neck or anything, I just took an innocent photo and it went on its way to crack some nuts or whatever they do. It got me thinking about those films made some time ago where the squirrels complete obstacle courses to get their nuts. Now I can't get the Mission Impossible music out my head...

Local stars of Tynemouth

I'm not a fan of famous people and would rather ridicule them unless they are fairly normal. Our young culture is now about looking and acting like a celebrity which doesn't put us in a good position for the future. I've posted about local famous people before and at least it's interesting to see who has 'made it' from around your streets. Some you might want to keep quiet about, like 'H' from Steps, or Jimmy Carr's accountant for instance. Imagine my surprise while sitting having a beer in our local village seeing these celebrities pottering around:-

Phil Mitchell returns to chef duties
 at The Vic

Chris Evans arrives in the village
 hoping to find another Virgin

Prince Philip asks what is wrong with
 lap dancing, then blames The Poles

This beautiful girl does a Predator
impression very well.
Predator then beats up wife.

Amstell was a beer when I was a lad

I've seen a lot of live comedians and a lot of them often do their act around the single life, how lonely it is and the things they get up to as a singleton. Sarah Millican, John Richardson and now Simon Amstell (best known for presenting Buzzcocks and making Preston walk out) . The difference is that Simon is gay so the stories of relationships were slightly different and a bit more cringe worthy. His performance was sometimes more clever than funny (we think we are all like that, but even that's funny in itself). On TV he comes across as cheeky but there was little of that although he still managed to get the laughs in.


He looks a bit like a school kid I reckon. He has one of those faces that will probably never look old. I was going to say a bit like Cliff Richard but would rather refrain from giving the old pop-star a compliment. There is still a comparison as they both have faces we'd secretly like to punch. Add a comment to this post if it's true...