Tuesday, 13 November 2012

Wonderbook: Book of spells


The Wonderbook is the Playstation 3's latest peripheral.

In our Wonderbook package was, the game, Wonderbook itself, Playstation eye and move controller .






 This very exciting new concept's first release is the very impressive Book of spells.
Book of spells is by J.K.Rowling and it is brought to you by studio London, the team also responsible for Eyepet.
So you can expect something innovative, and that it certainly is.

There is an easy to follow video when the disc loads to instruct you on how to set up your accessories, and how to get the best picture to make your experience more magical.
You will need, a Playstation eye, a Playstation move controller and the game itself.



When the book of spells loads, you will be asked to position yourself for a photo for your profile.
This itself is a very cool idea as the Playstation eye will take around a 5 second video which then will bring your picture to life just like the moving pictures on the newspapers in Harry Potter.

You will also be asked if you would like to link your new game with an existing Pottermore account.
Pottermore is an online website that delves into the world of Harry Potter and Hogwarts.
It is beautifully designed, very captivating. It seems to be a click and point adventure and full of exciting games and challenges for the most budding wizard.

If you do not have a Pottermore account you can continue into your world of wizardry as normal.

All of the house names are displayed on screen and you get to choose which one you want to be in for your experience.

The voice over provided to help and instruct you throughout the game, has a warming and humorous Scottish accent that captures the feel of the age of mystical fantasy.

Studio London have really used the Playstation eye and move to its full potential for the book of spells, and really makes you feel like you are in and part of the game. The Playstation move becomes your chosen type of wand that is on offer, and with all of the move's sensors give fluid and smooth wand movement. The wand is used to levitate spells out of the book of spells that are featured and used in the Harry Potter series, and then to cast them, open letters and activate challenges. Text and spells taken from the book and levitate and float to the top of the screen. With your wand you can wave through the text and images pushing it in curious directions.

In the first chapter you learn four spells and towards the end of the chapter to get to put all you have learned to the test. Levitating thing's such as frogs, and Cog's to open tall iron gates to allow access to other areas.
You also learn spells that can be used to open locks, light your way and fight off enchanted vines, and maybe most impressively a water spell, which when first casted a horse made of water escapes and you have to use all your skills you have learned to get to and capture.

As you progress throughout the game you are rewarded with Playstation trophies, there is a nice amount of them which will make the game also appealing to trophy enthusiasts.

The Wonderbook itself has pages that when turned come to life on screen and there really are some breath taking moments.
As you start approaching the end of the book you may think you have run out of pages, but fear not. You simply close the book, turn it back over to the front and open the first page to continue.
You are told of the history of the spells you are about to learn, and this is demonstrated beautifully in the form of a pop up book with pop up characters. You also get the characteristic tabs of a pop up book which you get to pull which results in humorous redirection of the story and the way it plans out.

The controls are very well calibrated and with practice it would not take long for anyone to master.

Features that come with this game are, as already mentioned a choice to use an existing pottermore account, and you also get Original content courtesy of J.K.Rowling from the world of Harry Potter.

The whole concept of this game and the wonderbook itself is amazing. Like many families, we find, finding time to sit and read hard, especially with all the new technology coming out, kids are just not interested, with the release of the wonderbook, it will create time to sit together and learn, with many other games planned for release.
Saturday, 10 November 2012

Hope through the horizon

The time is rapidly approaching when i have to see the doctors about my anti-depressants.
I have bean on 75mg for the past 4 months, which is nothing compared to wifey's 150mg's.
I have one more perscription left to order then i will need to discuss further treatment with the doctors.
I have a feeling they may try to slightly reduce them. Am i ready for this? No i dont think i am.
I have started to feel better since having a higher dose, but maybe it has been masking the feelings rather than help deal with them.

On a couple of occasions i have missed a dose. The darkness comes back rapidly. I become vacant, moody (though wifey would just say i'm just moody. But i'd say more noticably so), irritable, fidgety and anxious, and it really surprises me how fast it draws back in. It doesn't even take half a day.

I was seeing a thearpist and some of what i have leanrt has helped. It has certainly made me feel i can follow some steps.
I feel i have become happier, more helpful, more on the ball, more energetic.
I also feel that i'm acheiving more, which feels good.
It also feels great to be able to have more energy to spend and play with the girls.
I'm having trouble controlling some habbits like having my phone in my hand most of the time, and i need to try to organise myself better. At the same time taking controll of some habbits like hording. I am getting to grips with decluttering.

I'm starting to notice thing's more now to, like when wifey is showing signs of an attack so we can get help quicker.
I'm still having slight difficulty with memory but wifey would say that is down to too much ps3.
But it's one of my fondest habbits, hobbies.

So for now things seem to be looking up. wifey needs steriods asap and then a start date for new medication, but hopefully it will all happy.

Thanks for reading folks

Tattooing so far

I have done about 7 tattoo's now. The most recent and most proud of is one i have done on my leg. It's just the outline so far.
I had advice from my mentor and i am very happy with.
I now really think i may become really good at this.
Looking forward to the future

Wednesday, 26 September 2012

Apprentice tattooist

For a long time i have dreamt about being a tattoo artist. Never actually expected it to happen.
I have always loved body art and piercing and found it very fascinating.

I was fortunate enough to purchase a beginners tattoo kit recently. Well i say fortunate but not to sure the kit is really of much quality. See i have been watching the kits on ebay. Yes mainly the ones you import from China. And while some may say, serves you right for buying one of those kits. I really did spend long time looking at different kits.

I found a certain kit which was on a great deal. It had been reduced to £55. What a great price for a complete kit. Worth a lot more than what it is on offer for.

I started practising on grapefruit and oranges. So far so good. Just need to practise, practise. It wasn't long before wifey started asking me to start inking her. I refused and told her i do not want to give her a bad tattoo. However she kept asking until i gave in.
So this is where i started to get teething problems.

I am not a scratcher as i will not be tattooing from home. But since wifey offered to be a guinea pig and claims she does not care how the tattoos look as she will not see them often on her thigh. I thought ok.

I started

Saturday, 14 July 2012

A pain in the Ar-se


I am going to be really honest. Recently when I have been going to the toilet to pass solids. In this house.....we pass solids! I have occasionally seen blood in the bowl. I’m sorry if this seems graphic, but people sometimes describe it as little coffee beans, which hasn't put me off my coffee at all, but I found it does look like that. Little bloody coffee beans that are sticky and I guess squishy. Hope you haven't been sick. not nice! This has only been happening recently, like over the past 4 months. It keeps coming and going, so just when I think I should get this checked out I wont have it again for about a month. Each time I get it I say to myself 'should go to the doctors really!' Well yes I bloody well should have!!! And you guessed it I still haven't, only due to not being able to see my G.P as he is always fully booked and I keep missing the deadline to phone for an appointment in the morning. But I am still to do so, and do intend to do so.
Obviously when it first happens to you, you think ERM.... that's not right! I'll give it a few weeks and see if it clears up. So it does, then it comes back and it is quite a strange sharp feeling when your going. And back to this circle. Now you do panic you think Shit! No pun intended... what the hell have I got bowl cancer? You start to panic you start to google it I LOVE google by the way. You start looking at forums with people saying it could be this, it could be that. Very helpful forums though. You read on.... panic more.... and then you read about what it could be and I think I have...... piles, 'grapes' pets in your bum haemorrhoids whatever you call them. So I still need to make a doctor's appointment but I just want to reflect on something.

When I was young maybe 10, 11 or I could have been 12, 13 or 14 come to think of it, cant really remember but, I had a water infection. It was PAINFUL! An awful feeling, I was suffering for about a week before my mother made me go to hospital. I was in a few hours having samples, checks etc. then I waited, a doctor came and asked me to face the wall and lift my knees into my chest. Now what I didn't know at the time was what to expect. He stuck his dam finger in my arse and twisted it, in my mind, I nearly jumped so high I may have hit the ceiling. I lay there for about 20 minutes after shivering. I felt violated, like my arse virginity which I was never going to loose had been stolen from me. I felt sodomised and angry that I had no idea that was going to happen.

A good friend of mine had the same intrusion happen to him over a different medical reason. There was a family guy episode where it happens to peter griffin and he sues his doctor hilarious, and I guess many men have been through the same before the dreaded check for prostate cancer in later life.

Now that horrific time stayed with me for years... and years. Until I got over it. How did I manage to? Well while my wife was pregnant, and when she was giving birth, she had to endure all sorts of intrusive procedures in her lower regions. Student doctor's staring at her and I’m thinking HEY! There's no baby yet perverts. So I decided... after woman have to go through, all those checks, procedures and intrusions, they don't complain about it. I felt like I have been a whining 4 year old for all those years because I had an unexpected poke in the bum which when I think about it now always reminds me of Tom Green's character in Freddie got fingered, great film! if your sick and have a warped sense of humour too as well I guess. But I thought I have no right to complain, and I should just get over it. A friend of wifey's told me that I may have to have some horrible checks like having a camera up there, and be flushed out by a tube... but ill have to live with it.

So really the point I’m making is Gents, we may have had a horrible intrusive experience by a doctor, but compared to what our significant others have to go through is nothing. So get through it. Check your balls when your waist deep in the bath or having some me time. Get your back passage checked for prostate or bowl cancer. Talk to your friends about it and have a laugh about it.

Just do it!



I do not own the rights to these pictures.
Friday, 13 July 2012

How many faces?

I decided i would try and do something a bit fun
 and see how many faces i could pull
 before they started to look similar.

                              

                                  Caution! Potential ugliness







Wednesday, 4 July 2012

my family story

I have been with my wife for 4 years.
 We met at the same work place which I had just started at and I was new to the town, and one of the first people to smile at me was her. Of course, I smiled back.
They say the first impression lasts, and I could not get that smile out of my head.
Later during that day I had a colleague come over to me and asked me if I was single and what is my phone number. This colleague was a 45 year old man and admittedly it was rather strange.
He soon saw the worried look on my face, and said nervously, laughing it wasn't for him. It was for a young lady on another department.
He took me over to meet her and I already had an idea who it was.
When we got the department I suddenly saw her. She saw me and threw herself to the floor. I chuckled and said OK and walked away. Within three minutes I had a text saying 'hey!'
I replied and we got talking. Within ten minutes she ask if i would like to go for a meal on the same evening. At some point we bumped into each other in a staff corridor and we arranged it. I think she had finished for the day and was going home. She looked very alternative like myself so I was quite excited. I counted down the minutes and went home and tried to look my best.
I then walked about a mile to the restaurant, it was an Indian restaurant and I was not keen on the idea.
 She got dropped off by her brother in law and we went to get seated. She took off her coat and sat down. She looked FANTASTIC! My heart was pounding and I was rather dizzy.
We ordered our food and got chatting, I kept telling myself to keep chatting and not let the conversation stop, no matter what rubbish I was saying. I really enjoyed my meal and enjoyed her company, I felt myself falling for her there and then. I then found out she was 19 and I was 24 so I kept thinking would this work? I stopped thinking about it and thought let's see how thing's go. We wrapped up the meal and she offered to pay, I said that wasn't necessary and I offered to pay. She went to pay and her card was declined, I found it rather amusing and went and paid. We then went our seperate ways for now. I couldn't stop thinking about her already. I hadn't got very far and she phoned me, as she was learning to drive her brother in law suggested she dropped me home. She drove me home and was listening to pop music I thought for a second oh dear. But it didn't really matter we both had different tastes in music and she had great humour and personality.
At some point my phone battery went and I couldn't find a charger. Once I found one I sent a really long text explaining my battery had gone etc.
We got chatting and was sending each other over a hundred texts a day. We were pretty much always together. At one point it started to get a bit rocky but we pulled through it and decided we wanted to be together.
We had been together for four months and I knew she was the one. We spoke about a family and decided we wanted one. We never looked back, no regrets to this day. None.
 Wifey had started to have really bad morning sickness which we recently found out she suffers from hyperamisis. The pregnancy was difficult for us both. The hormones created mood swings and that sometimes made me short fused. It wasn't easy living out of a box room in a single bed with no room. How we managed for so long is crazy.
We eventually moved to wifey's parents who had plenty of space and room.

The pregnancy was going by so fast and we were trying to get prepared buying things early etc, it is very expensive and you never finish getting things, but we tried to be prepared.
When it came close to the big day, my father in law took us 30 miles to the districts hospital. We went to the hospital and was waiting for closer contractions. Wifey's waters hadn't broken so she stayed over night. I was not allowed to stay. I couldn't sleep so stayed up quite late playing computer games. When I went to sleep I slept for about two hours then my father in law woke me up telling me wifey had gone into labour. He drove 30 miles in about 20 minutes, when he gets stressed he heaves and had been heaving for months and I kept thinking dont heave know, haha!
He got me there in record time.
 We had a very long wait, wifey had been pushing for hours. From around 2am to 7am. She was exhausted she hadn't slept properly for days and couldn't physically push any more.
It wasn't until a specialist came to check and found out bean was stuck, she had the Williams curse of a large head and it was stuck so she couldn't be delivered. They had to medically intervene and had had a spinal tap. I couldn't be in theatre with her and I was pacing the room for what felt like hours in my scrubs. Wifey had to stay still for her spinal tap as moving with a needle going into her back could potentially paralyse her. Around 09:30 I was called in and wifey had to have a forceps delivery. It was frightening to watch and you felt so helpless. They finally got bean out and wifey had to have stitches I think I was in slight shock it had been a very stressful ordeal for all but bean was calm throughout. When they got her out I noticed she had eyebrows like her mother I splurted out she's got big eyebrows. I didn’t hear crying and started to panic. Wifey had to have stitches and bean was on the heated bed getting cleaned and checked. My heart started pounding I starterd to fear the worse. It felt like an hour and there was still no crying, was world was going dark. It was more like 5 minutes and then you get relieved by a cry, it was the most beautiful sound in the world at the time as you knew baby was fine.
We had a few pictures in our scrubs with bean then she finished looking after wifey.
Bean got dressed by the nurses and then she was handed to me. She looked like the world's most beautiful porcelain doll, she was slightly jaundice so she had a lovely skin tone.
We did nothing but stare at beanie for weeks, we weren’t interested in doing anything else.
It has been very difficult but but being a father is the best job in the world. Bean is now 3 and goes to play school and is very popular, she is smart funny and has the best personality.

Over the months after bean was born wifey's eye sight had been causing her problems. She kept leaving it and ignored it for months and put it down to blood pressure, and other things.
We finally went to the opticians after months of nagging and she had floaters in her eye. She had glasses but rarely wore them.

Bean was 10 months old and wifey and I got married. We didn't want a big fuss we just had a lovely wedding and a lovely day. The wedding is a story for another day.
 Wifey had decided she wanted the same surname as me and bean, which I could understand. We had a bit of trouble registering to get married as we lived on the border of two towns, address of one town council tax paid to the other I don’t know why. So this caused a lot of stress.
We finally cracked it and the closest date at the time was December the 1st 09. We set it and was married in four months.
As it was December it was our first Christmas with bean and it was magical. Wifey's parents do a great Christmas. Before I met wifey and her family I hated Christmas but they soon changed that.
 I became a Christmas freak like them I never had a Christmas like it.
As the months went by wifey's eyesight kept getting worse, I always told her it was because she doesn't wear her glasses. I went on and on about her going to the opticians. She kept putting it off.
 A year passed and wifey still kept putting off the opticians. We had decided to have another baby, and the pregnancy had made her sight seem worse. We eventually got around to the opticians and wifey was referred to the ophthalmologist. Wifey had her eyes checked and we found out her nerves at the back of her eyes were white and not red. We were told it could be a few different thing's, scary thing's, like multiple sclerosis or rarer body degenerative diseases.
She was referred to a neurologist and was sent for an mri scan. Wifey told me it was the most horrific experience she had to face, imagine a higher pitched commodore 64 tape loading deck. She showed me a youtube clip of a scan and it was horrific.
Wifey had to endure other test like a lumber puncture, an VEP and lots of blood tests, she is squeamish but coped very well. It has been a very trying time and a lot of pain and upset. Wifey was also still pregnant with Boo at the time and Boo had been through it all with her.
We both have a form of depression and none of it helped our moods.
 We were told the most likely diagnoses is M.S. So further tests and hospital visits happened regularly, we should have shares in doctors and hospitals by now.
 It was getting close to Christmas 2011 and wifey was not really in the mood for it, it is her favourite time of year and she couldn’t enjoy it. We had a lovely day though. On the 27 of December wifey was diagnosed with M.S. She was loosing her vision in her left eye and was told she would have to have a course of steroids to try to speed up the recovery process.

A couple of months passed and after seeing lots of specialists wifey would have to be induced. her dream of a home birth after the 52 hour first birth she went through had to be forgotten, a home birth was something she was really looking forward to.
On 20th of February 2012 we had an early induction at the hospital to start the induction,
Wifey had a pessary put in and was told this will work quick or wont work. After 20 minutes wifey's contractions started to get stronger, we couldn't believe it was happening so we called the midwife to get her checked over. Wifey had started labour she was given a tens machine and had to go for a bath. Contractions got stronger and midwife’s did not believe wifey at first, Boo was on her way! We stayed in the delivery room and wifey kept yelling to rub her back about a thousand times. Wifey started to struggle with the pain, she was exhausted her M.S was affecting her body. She had an epidural which took a while for the nurses to put in. After a while wifey couldn't feel a thing. She was 2 cms and was left for a while. Soon after midwifes came to check and she was 10 cms, we couldn't believe it was happening so fast.
Wifey pushed Boo out in 15 minutes. She had to have stitches again but Boo was crying straight away. Tears were streaming down my face and I was handed Boo, I couldn't believe we had another perfect baby, we didn't have the stress of the first time around.
We had two beautiful girls and due to wifey's condition we had been given a 3 bedroomed adapted property, everything finally seemed to be picking up. We even went to get a dog from the dogs trust as with my career I sometimes have to work 24 hour shifts, she we decided a dog would be good company and protection. The dog's trust do an incredible job.
The dog is perfect she was like a missing link and although we would like more children, it probably wont happen, we have to much to deal with right now so a dog seemed perfect. But that isn't to say in the future we wouldn't adopt, if we did I would like a boy as we have to wonderful girls.
Wifey had to have her course of steroids and we had to travel to the hospital for three days. It wasn't easy seeing her attached to an I.V drip and I have trouble telling her how I feel anyway.
She wasn't very well and I had to have time off work to look after the kids. Wifey had to stop breast feeding because of the treatment she felt awful about it. After a few days wifey was on top of the world, for a few weeks too. Then came the lows and trips and falls again her legs will sometimes just go because of the M.S Wifeys eye sight has been getting worse again and she has recently had another course of steroids because she is starting to loose the eye sight in her right eye so once again they had to medically intervene. It is once again a scary time and she has also been to she may have lupus which I don't really know what it is yet, she told me not to look it up as it will scare me.

So there is more to fear and who knows what is round the corner.
All I know right now is that wifey is very brave and I am so proud of her but I am also very worried about the future


thanks for reading folk's






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