I've completely neglected the game of othello lately. I'm playing right now in a tournament on kurnik for the first time in I can't even remember how long. So many memory competitions and media nuisances and jobs and things getting in the way. But I'm not doing all that badly, considering.
I should really write more on the subject, to make this into a proper blog entry and not short-change my readers, but it's late and I'm going to bed as soon as the tournament finishes. So I'll just advise everyone to buy the Sunday Telegraph tomorrow, where somewhere among whatever rubbish the Sunday Telegraph usually contains (I've never read it, but I'm pretty sure it complies to the usual quantity-not-quality rule of Sunday newspapers) there should be a big article about the World Memory Championships.
Saturday, August 04, 2007
Friday, August 03, 2007
Wheeee!
It's the weekend! This is the first full week's work I've done for a while, so it makes a couple of days off feel extra-special. I'm going to hopefully do some hour numbers and hour cards practice, possibly draw some pictures (remember that learning-to-draw intention I had? Still got it, just haven't had the time to doodle), maybe clean up my flat just in case I decide to move out (living in Nottingham would be a heck of a lot more convenient if I'm going to be working there). All in all, just relax. Yay!
Thursday, August 02, 2007
Behind the door of the Big Yellow Teapot, there's a whole world of fun
Having a conversation at work today about children's toys, and the subject of the Big Yellow Teapot came up. I always wanted a Big Yellow Teapot, and I never got one! Admittedly by the time it came out I was a bit too old and a lot too male to be in their main target market, so I never really told anyone I wanted one, but someone should have realised and bought me one anyway. I had a Family Treehouse, also mentioned in the article linked above, but that was comparatively rubbish, and no substitute for a Big Yellow Teapot. It's not fair.
Wednesday, August 01, 2007
The railway and the telegraph
Two inventions of the Victorian age without which the world would be a much better place. Got up earlyish this morning and intended to catch the 7:22 to work, which gets me into the office a bit after eight, which lets me leave in time for the 5:00 train home. However, I missed it by about thirty seconds, and had to get the 8:03 instead. Which was cancelled. And then the 8:22 did turn up, but the electrics failed and it never left the station. So I had to get the 8:39, which was running late as well as being full of three trainloads of passengers, and didn't get to the office till gone half nine.
So I couldn't really justify leaving before five, so I got the 5:34 home, in time for the visit of a writer and photographer from the Sunday Telegraph, who conducted a surprisingly lengthy interview - more than three hours they were here! I taught him a basic card memory technique (which he seemed to pick up quite well), while the large photographer wandered around the room knocking every single one of my posessions over on his way. He also took photos of me in the hat and the Brazilian Mystery Cape, which should look good. Although they probably won't get into the paper - they've got enough writing and pictures there to fill a largish book, and they're only writing a little article for which they're also interviewing Tony tomorrow.
So I'm tired.
So I couldn't really justify leaving before five, so I got the 5:34 home, in time for the visit of a writer and photographer from the Sunday Telegraph, who conducted a surprisingly lengthy interview - more than three hours they were here! I taught him a basic card memory technique (which he seemed to pick up quite well), while the large photographer wandered around the room knocking every single one of my posessions over on his way. He also took photos of me in the hat and the Brazilian Mystery Cape, which should look good. Although they probably won't get into the paper - they've got enough writing and pictures there to fill a largish book, and they're only writing a little article for which they're also interviewing Tony tomorrow.
So I'm tired.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Zoom zoom zoom
Just as I was about to take my saucepan of spaghetti and my other saucepan of bolognese off the hob, my phone rang with one of those talking text message things. I've never had one of those before. It just said "zoom zoom zoom", from a phone number I didn't recognise.
The scary thing is that I have no end of friends who might have decided to send that message, so I have no idea who it could be from. I was going to call back, but I decided to have my tea first before it got cold. I'd just about got it onto the plate when the phone rang again, with another unrelated phone call. And then just after I'd finished, someone else rang up to talk to me. And bear in mind that I can go weeks on end without ever using the phone sometimes. So I forgot about the text message until right now, and now it'd just be silly to ring up. It made me giggle, and I imagine that was the only reason for the message. And I dare say whoever sent it will own up, right?
The scary thing is that I have no end of friends who might have decided to send that message, so I have no idea who it could be from. I was going to call back, but I decided to have my tea first before it got cold. I'd just about got it onto the plate when the phone rang again, with another unrelated phone call. And then just after I'd finished, someone else rang up to talk to me. And bear in mind that I can go weeks on end without ever using the phone sometimes. So I forgot about the text message until right now, and now it'd just be silly to ring up. It made me giggle, and I imagine that was the only reason for the message. And I dare say whoever sent it will own up, right?
Monday, July 30, 2007
One last observation
I now hold the world records in all the memory championship disciplines involving cards and binary digits, and none of them in the ones involving decimal numbers. It's because I've got good systems for the cards and binaries, better than anyone else (I think so, anyway), but an unexceptional one for the numbers. I need some ideas for how to improve it, something that doesn't involve switching to a 10,000-image thing, because I just don't think that would work.
Okay, that's it. Memory competitions over for another month, British media blissfully unaware that there even was a competition last weekend, I don't need to talk about memory any more. In fact, I resolve to give the whole talking-about-memory thing a rest for, ooh, at least a fortnight. I think my loyal readers have had more than enough.
What did I talk about before this last month or so, anyway? How about work? I'm not technically really looking for a job, but I did agree that Hays could put my CV forward for three permanent jobs today - they sound a bit upset that I've taken a temp job (albeit a temp-leading-to-permanent-possibly job) with another agency, after telling them I didn't want one. I hate to upset anyone. One of these jobs is in Denby again - maybe I'll cycle if I get an interview.
No, work's too dull a subject. Cartoons! I haven't watched nearly enough cartoons lately. Apart from a couple of episodes of Thundercats. I really must do that proper Thundercats review blog thing I was talking about. I'm sure you'll all love to read it. I just want to get some kind of magic device that lets you put pictures from old videos on the internet. I'm sure such a thing exists, but I'm a bit ignorant when it comes to hardware.
Okay, that's it. Memory competitions over for another month, British media blissfully unaware that there even was a competition last weekend, I don't need to talk about memory any more. In fact, I resolve to give the whole talking-about-memory thing a rest for, ooh, at least a fortnight. I think my loyal readers have had more than enough.
What did I talk about before this last month or so, anyway? How about work? I'm not technically really looking for a job, but I did agree that Hays could put my CV forward for three permanent jobs today - they sound a bit upset that I've taken a temp job (albeit a temp-leading-to-permanent-possibly job) with another agency, after telling them I didn't want one. I hate to upset anyone. One of these jobs is in Denby again - maybe I'll cycle if I get an interview.
No, work's too dull a subject. Cartoons! I haven't watched nearly enough cartoons lately. Apart from a couple of episodes of Thundercats. I really must do that proper Thundercats review blog thing I was talking about. I'm sure you'll all love to read it. I just want to get some kind of magic device that lets you put pictures from old videos on the internet. I'm sure such a thing exists, but I'm a bit ignorant when it comes to hardware.
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Other things I should mention
Tuttlingen is noted for producing surgical implements - the top winners all got a special souvenir case of scalpels and things. Which is very nice, but I only had hand luggage, so I couldn't possibly take them home with me! I gave my set to Boris. I did manage to fit the trophy in my rucksack, although I can't think how since it was stuffed full to bursting on the way out too, and I didn't leave anything behind. Commendably, this year's best-foreigner trophy was only half the size of the one I got in 2005.
On the train on the way to Zurich this morning, the passport inspectors inspected my passport to a quite scary extent, examining it through a magnifying glass, shining lights through the pages, practically taking it to pieces to examine the component molecules. I have no idea what they were looking for, but since I didn't get arrested, they presumably didn't find it.
There were no trains running from Birmingam airport train station today, as usual. I might have mentioned before that it's the only train station in the country that seems to be permanently served by nothing but rail replacement buses. A man at the station with such a strong Birmingham accent that I think he must have been faking it to sound cool said the current lot of maintenance work is going on until September the nointh, although that probably won't concern me, since I'm flying to Bahrain from London, and tragically I don't think I'm going to get the chance of any more foreign trips in the next couple of months. It's really not fair.
On the train on the way to Zurich this morning, the passport inspectors inspected my passport to a quite scary extent, examining it through a magnifying glass, shining lights through the pages, practically taking it to pieces to examine the component molecules. I have no idea what they were looking for, but since I didn't get arrested, they presumably didn't find it.
There were no trains running from Birmingam airport train station today, as usual. I might have mentioned before that it's the only train station in the country that seems to be permanently served by nothing but rail replacement buses. A man at the station with such a strong Birmingham accent that I think he must have been faking it to sound cool said the current lot of maintenance work is going on until September the nointh, although that probably won't concern me, since I'm flying to Bahrain from London, and tragically I don't think I'm going to get the chance of any more foreign trips in the next couple of months. It's really not fair.
The brain's fine, the fingers need some help
First of all, it turned out not to be possible to find a big black hat for sale anywhere in Stuttgart. I'm horrified. But I suppose if they were easy to come by, everyone would wear them and they wouldn't look so cool any more. So I bought a straw hat instead, which looks quite cool and works as something to prop my stopwatch up on.
Anyway, the competition was great, the venue was excellent, lots of fuss being made over the whole thing by everyone at the Aesculap Akademie. All the competitors got an Aesculap Memo Masters '07 T-shirt, which everyone except Andi dutifully wore. Who needs a team uniform when the venue dress us? Sixteen competitors in the adult championship - twelve regulars and four eighteen-year-olds from the local grammar school who'd never heard of memory a couple of weeks ago and were having a competition among themselves to see who'd do best. Sabine Michelfelder won, for the record, just in case she goes on to be world champion in a few years' time.
Meanwhile, Gunther was on cracking form all weekend. Even better, so was I! After the first two events I mentioned yesterday, I ended up with 3915 in the binary digits, another world record, and 3000 points from the first three disciplines. Which is very cool. Cornelia was third-best in binary, like in the cards, Simon was fourth in all three events on the first day, and Boris, Johannes and Alisa were the chasing pack. Seriously tough competition.
For the second day, I did much better than I expected in the events where the German language got in the way a bit - an entirely respectable 62 in historic dates (Hannes got 79, and he's aiming to beat my record some time soon), 90 in spoken numbers, 81 in names (all German names, half of which I'd never heard of before), and 109 in words, which I'm extremely pleased with - attempting 110, so just one spelling mistake, and about 25% of the words were ones I didn't recognise. Boris set a new world record 227 in words, and Gunther beat his own world record in abstract images with 244.
In speed numbers, I did 360 in the second attempt (having made a bit of a mess of the first one), which would have been a new world record too if Andi, who skipped the morning's events, hadn't done 396 in the first go. So that's his revenge for me taking his speed cards record in Highley. I'll get it back in Bahrain.
At this point, I noticed that Gunther's consistently great scores in everything were not only giving him a safe lead over me (which didn't worry me, because what with the language barrier I didn't go there aiming to win), but also giving him a high enough score that a half-decent score in the final discipline, speed cards, would put him on top of the world ranking list, dislodging me! Unless I could do a very good time in the cards and beat him after all.
But I did a safe 55 seconds first time round, because this was practice for the world championship and I never practice slow-and-steady speed cards. Gunther did a safe time of one minute or so. Second time round, I did 27.44 seconds, but as I put the cards down, they slipped out of my hand and spread all over the table. I carefully put the pack back together, but there was one sticking out that I wasn't sure was the bottom one or another that had come out. And without looking at the face and thus invalidating my time, I couldn't be sure. So I tucked it into the bottom of the pack and hoped for the best. I got the recall right, but it turned out that the last two cards had got switched, so the time didn't count. Which is extremely annoying, but never mind.
Gunther did 47 seconds, and I've been trying to work out in my head whether my time on the second pack, if I'd got it right, would have put me narrowly ahead of him in the final table, or narrowly behind. Perhaps someone with the spreadsheet could save me the effort and work it out properly? Not that it matters - for one thing, I have the moral victory of knowing that but for that mishap I would have had a personal-best total score, despite the four disciplines in German; for another, honour was the only thing at stake anyway - only Germans can win the German championship, foreigners compete alongside them but fight for a different set of trophies. So Gunther was always going to win the big cup, the smaller cup he gets to keep and not return for the next champion and the complete ten-bulky-volumes encyclopaedia (of which he already has more than enough - that's always the prize at the German championships, and this was his eighth win), and I was always going to win the smaller best-foreigner trophy.
But that does put Gunther in the number one spot on the ranking list, that has been my personal property since August 2004! I always figured it'd be Clemens who knocked me off, but it just goes to show how Gunther's still improving steadily after all these years. He definitely deserves to finally be number one, and I'll just have to do something special in Bahrain to get it back.
Cornelia is also still improving at a rate of knots - she finished a bit behind me in the total rankings, to get the second place German trophy. She's now up to 5th in the world ranking, and Simon, who was third, moves up to number 8. It's quite staggering how the standard keeps rising at these things, and the scores get higher by so much every time.
There was a barbecue after the championship, and then the lavish prize-presentation ceremony, which goes on for hours but is always very entertaining - everyone gets medals, trophies, certificates and so on, there's a big screen display with the statistics, lots of applause and local dignitaries handing out the prizes, I love it. The world championships prizegiving ceremonies are always rather subdued in comparison to the German spectacle.
So, all in all, I'm delighted with the way I performed. I was good in EVERYTHING, no weak events, and that's exactly what I've been aiming for over the last year of practice. Bahrain's going to be fun - Gunther kindly, and inaccurately, said he wouldn't have a chance of beating me, but it's going to be a real challenge. As for who's going, that's the problem - Gunther will be there, the rest of the Germans aren't so sure - Cornelia and Hannes definitely can't, which is a real loss (we'll also be missing Joachim, who's currently in Costa Rica on his gap year and can't make it), Boris and Simon are thinking about it. Clemens, no idea, but I really hope he'll be there.
Boris explained to Tony Buzan that as a student, he might not be able to make the trip to Bahrain. Tony, who never really understands the concept of not having enough money for something, helpfully replied "You must!", but he did say that they'll be announcing the prize fund within the next week. In WMSC language, that generally means in the next two or three months, so we'll have to see, but if they did offer big prize money, and split it between, say, the top three in each discipline rather than giving it all to the overall winner, they would get more competitors.
Even so, I'm looking forward to it. If I can do this well there too, I'll win. Need to practice the hour numbers and cards over the next month, but otherwise just keep on form. I want it to be tomorrow, to be honest. I hate waiting for in a competition when I'm in the mood, and I've seldom been quite so in the mood as I am right now.
Anyway, the competition was great, the venue was excellent, lots of fuss being made over the whole thing by everyone at the Aesculap Akademie. All the competitors got an Aesculap Memo Masters '07 T-shirt, which everyone except Andi dutifully wore. Who needs a team uniform when the venue dress us? Sixteen competitors in the adult championship - twelve regulars and four eighteen-year-olds from the local grammar school who'd never heard of memory a couple of weeks ago and were having a competition among themselves to see who'd do best. Sabine Michelfelder won, for the record, just in case she goes on to be world champion in a few years' time.
Meanwhile, Gunther was on cracking form all weekend. Even better, so was I! After the first two events I mentioned yesterday, I ended up with 3915 in the binary digits, another world record, and 3000 points from the first three disciplines. Which is very cool. Cornelia was third-best in binary, like in the cards, Simon was fourth in all three events on the first day, and Boris, Johannes and Alisa were the chasing pack. Seriously tough competition.
For the second day, I did much better than I expected in the events where the German language got in the way a bit - an entirely respectable 62 in historic dates (Hannes got 79, and he's aiming to beat my record some time soon), 90 in spoken numbers, 81 in names (all German names, half of which I'd never heard of before), and 109 in words, which I'm extremely pleased with - attempting 110, so just one spelling mistake, and about 25% of the words were ones I didn't recognise. Boris set a new world record 227 in words, and Gunther beat his own world record in abstract images with 244.
In speed numbers, I did 360 in the second attempt (having made a bit of a mess of the first one), which would have been a new world record too if Andi, who skipped the morning's events, hadn't done 396 in the first go. So that's his revenge for me taking his speed cards record in Highley. I'll get it back in Bahrain.
At this point, I noticed that Gunther's consistently great scores in everything were not only giving him a safe lead over me (which didn't worry me, because what with the language barrier I didn't go there aiming to win), but also giving him a high enough score that a half-decent score in the final discipline, speed cards, would put him on top of the world ranking list, dislodging me! Unless I could do a very good time in the cards and beat him after all.
But I did a safe 55 seconds first time round, because this was practice for the world championship and I never practice slow-and-steady speed cards. Gunther did a safe time of one minute or so. Second time round, I did 27.44 seconds, but as I put the cards down, they slipped out of my hand and spread all over the table. I carefully put the pack back together, but there was one sticking out that I wasn't sure was the bottom one or another that had come out. And without looking at the face and thus invalidating my time, I couldn't be sure. So I tucked it into the bottom of the pack and hoped for the best. I got the recall right, but it turned out that the last two cards had got switched, so the time didn't count. Which is extremely annoying, but never mind.
Gunther did 47 seconds, and I've been trying to work out in my head whether my time on the second pack, if I'd got it right, would have put me narrowly ahead of him in the final table, or narrowly behind. Perhaps someone with the spreadsheet could save me the effort and work it out properly? Not that it matters - for one thing, I have the moral victory of knowing that but for that mishap I would have had a personal-best total score, despite the four disciplines in German; for another, honour was the only thing at stake anyway - only Germans can win the German championship, foreigners compete alongside them but fight for a different set of trophies. So Gunther was always going to win the big cup, the smaller cup he gets to keep and not return for the next champion and the complete ten-bulky-volumes encyclopaedia (of which he already has more than enough - that's always the prize at the German championships, and this was his eighth win), and I was always going to win the smaller best-foreigner trophy.
But that does put Gunther in the number one spot on the ranking list, that has been my personal property since August 2004! I always figured it'd be Clemens who knocked me off, but it just goes to show how Gunther's still improving steadily after all these years. He definitely deserves to finally be number one, and I'll just have to do something special in Bahrain to get it back.
Cornelia is also still improving at a rate of knots - she finished a bit behind me in the total rankings, to get the second place German trophy. She's now up to 5th in the world ranking, and Simon, who was third, moves up to number 8. It's quite staggering how the standard keeps rising at these things, and the scores get higher by so much every time.
There was a barbecue after the championship, and then the lavish prize-presentation ceremony, which goes on for hours but is always very entertaining - everyone gets medals, trophies, certificates and so on, there's a big screen display with the statistics, lots of applause and local dignitaries handing out the prizes, I love it. The world championships prizegiving ceremonies are always rather subdued in comparison to the German spectacle.
So, all in all, I'm delighted with the way I performed. I was good in EVERYTHING, no weak events, and that's exactly what I've been aiming for over the last year of practice. Bahrain's going to be fun - Gunther kindly, and inaccurately, said he wouldn't have a chance of beating me, but it's going to be a real challenge. As for who's going, that's the problem - Gunther will be there, the rest of the Germans aren't so sure - Cornelia and Hannes definitely can't, which is a real loss (we'll also be missing Joachim, who's currently in Costa Rica on his gap year and can't make it), Boris and Simon are thinking about it. Clemens, no idea, but I really hope he'll be there.
Boris explained to Tony Buzan that as a student, he might not be able to make the trip to Bahrain. Tony, who never really understands the concept of not having enough money for something, helpfully replied "You must!", but he did say that they'll be announcing the prize fund within the next week. In WMSC language, that generally means in the next two or three months, so we'll have to see, but if they did offer big prize money, and split it between, say, the top three in each discipline rather than giving it all to the overall winner, they would get more competitors.
Even so, I'm looking forward to it. If I can do this well there too, I'll win. Need to practice the hour numbers and cards over the next month, but otherwise just keep on form. I want it to be tomorrow, to be honest. I hate waiting for in a competition when I'm in the mood, and I've seldom been quite so in the mood as I am right now.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Scores on the videoprinter
Very quick post tonight, because I really should get some sleep (not to mention finish reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows), and we start tomorrow morning at 8:30am (we finished today at around 8:30pm).
Clemens isn't there - he showed up briefly just to say he wasn't taking part, I don't know what the story is there - but we've got the full complement of the rest of the world's best Germans (unless Steffen Bütow or Jan Formann are still active enough and German enough to fall into that category). Andi is also half there, in his usual way - he doesn't want to get up early tomorrow, so he's going to skip half the disciplines. He says he's definitely not going to the world championships, but I'll believe that when I see it.
30-minute numbers didn't go quite as well as I'd hoped, but I ended up with a respectable 1000 exactly - Gunther got a new world record 1160, Cornelia 1016, Simon 985, Johannes 890, Andi 740, someone whose name I've written down on my piece of paper as "AK" got 700 (Alisa Kellner, of course - I knew it would come back to me eventually), and Boris 660. Going to be a tough competition, obviously.
But I did seriously well in 30-minute cards, with 16 packs - Gunther got 11 and an extra few cards, Cornelia nine and a half and Simon nine. Scores on the doors after two disciplines:
Me 2064.1
Gunther 1820.2
Cornelia 1570.0
Simon 1513.1
Andi 1078.2
Boris 1013.0
Johannes 1010.9
Binary went well too - with a bit of luck I've beaten my record there. Gunther no doubt did well too, so I should still be narrowly in the lead after day one. Tomorrow, of course, we have the untranslated German-language events, so expect me to drop down the rankings. I'd write more, but it's bedtime and Harry's in a tight spot.
Clemens isn't there - he showed up briefly just to say he wasn't taking part, I don't know what the story is there - but we've got the full complement of the rest of the world's best Germans (unless Steffen Bütow or Jan Formann are still active enough and German enough to fall into that category). Andi is also half there, in his usual way - he doesn't want to get up early tomorrow, so he's going to skip half the disciplines. He says he's definitely not going to the world championships, but I'll believe that when I see it.
30-minute numbers didn't go quite as well as I'd hoped, but I ended up with a respectable 1000 exactly - Gunther got a new world record 1160, Cornelia 1016, Simon 985, Johannes 890, Andi 740, someone whose name I've written down on my piece of paper as "AK" got 700 (Alisa Kellner, of course - I knew it would come back to me eventually), and Boris 660. Going to be a tough competition, obviously.
But I did seriously well in 30-minute cards, with 16 packs - Gunther got 11 and an extra few cards, Cornelia nine and a half and Simon nine. Scores on the doors after two disciplines:
Me 2064.1
Gunther 1820.2
Cornelia 1570.0
Simon 1513.1
Andi 1078.2
Boris 1013.0
Johannes 1010.9
Binary went well too - with a bit of luck I've beaten my record there. Gunther no doubt did well too, so I should still be narrowly in the lead after day one. Tomorrow, of course, we have the untranslated German-language events, so expect me to drop down the rankings. I'd write more, but it's bedtime and Harry's in a tight spot.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
And now for today's post
Hi! I'm in Stuttgart! No time to write anything else, but I thought you might like to know.
Blogging in an unusual location
I couldn't get on to Blogger last night, so I posted this on the LJ account I never use:
Having found an internet cafe in Tuttlingen, I'm darned if I'm going to let the fact that Blogger isn't working stop me from blogging. I'll do one here instead, and copy it over later. It'll be a short one, because German keyboards have the Y and Z in the wrong places and I can't type very quickly. But I had to record the fact that I left my hat on a train, again, on the way here from Zurich airport. It's getting a bit silly now.
I wouldn't have done it if I'd been travelling on my own, but I had the TV people with me, distracting me. It's quite definitely their fault, rather than mine. But never mind, I'll see if I can get a new hat when I go to Stuttgart tomorrow - I've got the whole day to myself for once, and plenty of time to get properly outfitted for the competition on Friday. Well, almost the whole day, they want to film me again tomorrow night - I might ditch them, depending on the mood I'm in, because I feel like I've hardly had a second to myself for the last couple of weeks.
The woman at the hotel complimented me on my German! She might have been jumping to conclusions a bit, because all I'd done at that point was nod while she rattled off explanations of where breakfast and the lift were. Although I did understand the breakfast thing, and it's in another building down the road, so I'm quite proud of myself there. Tuttlingen is a really nice town, by the way, a lot bigger than I'd expected. The venue for the championship looks nice too, from the outside. Looking forward to it!
Having found an internet cafe in Tuttlingen, I'm darned if I'm going to let the fact that Blogger isn't working stop me from blogging. I'll do one here instead, and copy it over later. It'll be a short one, because German keyboards have the Y and Z in the wrong places and I can't type very quickly. But I had to record the fact that I left my hat on a train, again, on the way here from Zurich airport. It's getting a bit silly now.
I wouldn't have done it if I'd been travelling on my own, but I had the TV people with me, distracting me. It's quite definitely their fault, rather than mine. But never mind, I'll see if I can get a new hat when I go to Stuttgart tomorrow - I've got the whole day to myself for once, and plenty of time to get properly outfitted for the competition on Friday. Well, almost the whole day, they want to film me again tomorrow night - I might ditch them, depending on the mood I'm in, because I feel like I've hardly had a second to myself for the last couple of weeks.
The woman at the hotel complimented me on my German! She might have been jumping to conclusions a bit, because all I'd done at that point was nod while she rattled off explanations of where breakfast and the lift were. Although I did understand the breakfast thing, and it's in another building down the road, so I'm quite proud of myself there. Tuttlingen is a really nice town, by the way, a lot bigger than I'd expected. The venue for the championship looks nice too, from the outside. Looking forward to it!
Tuesday, July 24, 2007
Look North
"Look North" was the local counterpart of East Midlands Today that I got when I was living in Boston. I never really understood why it was called Look North. It covered Yorkshire and Lincolnshire, which is kind of up in the north, so why would the people watching it want to look north? The only thing up there is Newcastle and Scotland and the Arctic. There's more things to see if you look south, or east, or west.
Anyway, East Midlands Today was kind of like a dumbed-down version of the Central Tonight interview - they gave me the whole of the sports news to memorise a pack of cards, and then only had me recite precisely six of them before making impressed noises. Other than that it was just the usual questions, although at least this time the studio was just around the corner from work, rather than in Birmingham.
Speaking of Birmingham, tomorrow I'm flying from there to Zurich, and thence by train to Tuttlingen. Then a day's sightseeing in Stuttgart, assuming I can escape Nick and his camera, then two days of memorising against the world's best. Woohoo! See you (and by that I mean write a blog that you will subsequently read) on Sunday, unless I find a net cafe and the time to blog while I'm there.
Anyway, East Midlands Today was kind of like a dumbed-down version of the Central Tonight interview - they gave me the whole of the sports news to memorise a pack of cards, and then only had me recite precisely six of them before making impressed noises. Other than that it was just the usual questions, although at least this time the studio was just around the corner from work, rather than in Birmingham.
Speaking of Birmingham, tomorrow I'm flying from there to Zurich, and thence by train to Tuttlingen. Then a day's sightseeing in Stuttgart, assuming I can escape Nick and his camera, then two days of memorising against the world's best. Woohoo! See you (and by that I mean write a blog that you will subsequently read) on Sunday, unless I find a net cafe and the time to blog while I'm there.
Monday, July 23, 2007
Dance your cares away (clap-clap)!
Boomerang are showing Fraggle Rock! They started tonight with the first episode, and I found out about it fifteen minutes beforehand, so I was thrilled. I don't think I've ever seen the first one before, or at least it didn't ring any bells in my ever-unreliable memory. Strangely enough, they're showing the US version, even though the British version with Fulton Mackay is available on DVD (I've been sort of meaning to buy it for ages. Maybe I still will).
Oh, and I also started the new job today. It seems okay, although it's one of those companies with a lot of bureaucracy and lots of people to get to know from all the little departments I'll be doing the accounts for. Plus the commute to Nottingham is inconvenient. But it's still preferable, morally speaking, to staying at home doing nothing all day. And I only have one more day till I flounce off on my holidays. Yay!
Oh, and I also started the new job today. It seems okay, although it's one of those companies with a lot of bureaucracy and lots of people to get to know from all the little departments I'll be doing the accounts for. Plus the commute to Nottingham is inconvenient. But it's still preferable, morally speaking, to staying at home doing nothing all day. And I only have one more day till I flounce off on my holidays. Yay!
Sunday, July 22, 2007
Not more memory talk!
Sorry, I know I've been on about nothing else for the last week or so, but that's just because I've been doing nothing but talk memory 24 hours a day. Starting tomorrow, I'll shut up about it for a day or so.
But today I felt that I'd have to do some practice for Germany. All this media attention had completely knocked me out of the memory-competition frame of mind, I hadn't found the time for even a pack of cards except the one I did on the telly, and I'd completely forgotten exactly what I'd planned to do in Tuttlingen. I figured I needed to spend the day doing a lot of work, just to get me back in 'the zone'. I promise never to use that expression again.
Anyway, I did a 30-minute numbers, 30-minute cards and 30-minute binary, and got 1164, 18 packs and 3255 respectively. Which is extremely encouraging - if I could do that in the competition, it'd be two world records and a score that should beat everyone except Gunther in the other. Although doing it in the competition is a different kettle of fish altogether, obviously. And I would expect Clemens and Gunther to be somewhere around 1200 in the numbers too, because that record's ripe for the beating.
18 packs of cards is doubleplusgroovy, though - I attempted 18 and got them all flawlessly correct. And the binary isn't too disappointing, because I'm never going to be on top form after two other half-hour disciplines in a short period of time. So now I'm going to give my brain a rest until Friday (you know, except for the new job, I might use my brain a bit for that), and look forward to Tuttlingen! Historically, I always do terribly at the German championship, and I'd really like to break that pattern this time round.
But today I felt that I'd have to do some practice for Germany. All this media attention had completely knocked me out of the memory-competition frame of mind, I hadn't found the time for even a pack of cards except the one I did on the telly, and I'd completely forgotten exactly what I'd planned to do in Tuttlingen. I figured I needed to spend the day doing a lot of work, just to get me back in 'the zone'. I promise never to use that expression again.
Anyway, I did a 30-minute numbers, 30-minute cards and 30-minute binary, and got 1164, 18 packs and 3255 respectively. Which is extremely encouraging - if I could do that in the competition, it'd be two world records and a score that should beat everyone except Gunther in the other. Although doing it in the competition is a different kettle of fish altogether, obviously. And I would expect Clemens and Gunther to be somewhere around 1200 in the numbers too, because that record's ripe for the beating.
18 packs of cards is doubleplusgroovy, though - I attempted 18 and got them all flawlessly correct. And the binary isn't too disappointing, because I'm never going to be on top form after two other half-hour disciplines in a short period of time. So now I'm going to give my brain a rest until Friday (you know, except for the new job, I might use my brain a bit for that), and look forward to Tuttlingen! Historically, I always do terribly at the German championship, and I'd really like to break that pattern this time round.
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Just another frantic Friday
Sooo, let’s see. I had to get out of bed at seven o’clock in the morning to get showered and dressed before Nick arrived to film my every movement. He got here about ten minutes earlier than promised, at 7:35, while I was still eating my bacon butty, and we discussed the fun-filled day ahead.
Caught the train to Nottingham at 8:39, where Nick got told off for filming on the station and the train without permission, arrived to find that the Bentinck hotel and pub next to the station was all cordoned off by police barrier tape. No time to really gawp at it, because I wanted to find the place I was going for an interview before having to talk about it for the cameras – it turns out that the New College offices are in a great location, right near the city centre and all the good shops. Nick wanted to film the interview, but I refused to let him anywhere within sight of the place, so as not to jeapordise my chances, and packed him off to a coffee shop.
The interview was fun – they had a half-hour written test first, giving me some paperwork and asking me to put together a month’s accounts, like an exam question. I haven’t done an exam for years, but I think I picked up on the bits you were supposed to pick up on, and provided a halfway decent set of answers. More companies should do this kind of thing, I’ve always felt interviews are a pretty rubbish way of picking an accountant. But we did have a conventional kind of interview afterwards, which also went well. I judged that professional-hardworking-type would go over better than eccentric-genius, so I didn’t mention the memory stuff except once in passing, and didn’t tell them I was on the local news that evening.
Interview done, and it took rather longer than planned, we then got the bus out to Chilwell to visit Grandma. She, of course, turned out to be a natural in front of the camera, and we got a heck of a lot of entertaining footage in the can (I think that’s the technical term). We went into Beeston for lunch, and came back to find my Central TV taxi waiting for me already. By this time, the constant filming of everything was starting to get on my wick, and it was pouring with rain again. Nick kept us standing outside while he filmed establishing shots of Grandma’s place, but eventually we got in the taxi and set off for Birmingham.
“It’ll be about 40 minutes,” said the taxi driver, inaccurately as it turned out. “How long do you want me to wait for you there?”
“Wait for us?” I said, surprised. It was about quarter to four, and the show didn’t start till six. The driver wasn’t at all happy to find that he’d been hired to wait around in Birmingham for anything up to three hours. He moaned that he wouldn’t have taken the job if he’d known that, because he had an important birthday party to go to and he’d have to miss it. He phoned his boss and complained to him too. Meanwhile, it was raining very heavily and there were roadworks and traffic jams all over the place. A tree had come down over the main entrance to the Central TV studios, so we had to drive around the back to try to find a way in.
When we arrived, I decided to perform my random act of kindness for the day, and told the driver to go. We were just down the road from the train station, so taking a taxi back to Derby offended my sensibilities on several levels – as a working class hero, I don’t like taxis anyway, and as an accountant I was appalled that Central were paying a taxi to sit outside the studio for hours, whereas as someone who appreciates the importance of this birthday party, I would have hated to be responsible for keeping him sitting around.
So, having saved the big TV company a bit of money and put a dent in the profits of a small taxi firm, possibly getting the driver in trouble for it, we went into the studio, which was a very cool place. Just about as soon as we got inside, someone mentioned in passing that the train station had closed down because of the weather, but I decided to cross that bridge when we came to it.
Probably worth mentioning at this point that it was in fact Central Tonight yesterday, and East Midlands Today on Tuesday. I had got them mixed up and told everyone it was the other way around, so I do apologise to anyone who wanted to watch it and missed it. If you did, you can see my performance here, if you select Central East, and evening bulletins, and Friday July 20th. My bit starts around the 22nd minute, if you don’t really want to watch the rest of the latest news in the east midlands.
It’s a lot of fun to see what goes into the making of a live local news show. The studio set is a lot smaller than you’d think, and it’s weird to see it all brightly lit, with cameras and autocues lurking in the darkness around it. And my bit went very smoothly – they gave me a pack of cards and thirty seconds or so to memorise it during a montage of people on the streets of Nottingham trying to remember cards too, then I recalled it afterwards. I knew we wouldn’t have the time to recite the whole pack, so I just concentrated on getting the first few flawless – I would probably have struggled if we’d got past halfway through the deck. Still, it looked great on the telly.
And I got to see all the behind-the-scenes stuff, like the story they had to drop when a breaking-news thing came up (it was just about the fact that it had been raining rather a lot, so not really news as such), and the story behind the Bentinck Hotel (someone threw a firebomb into it, apparently).
Then it was just a case of getting home, which promised to be an adventure. Strangely enough, though, I was feeling extremely cheerful by that point, after having been in an irritable kind of mood most of the afternoon, what with the constant filming and being rushed from place to place. I was quite looking forward to a lengthy rail-replacement bus ride in the still pouring rain. But it turned out that half the trains were still running from New Street station, which will teach me to believe any gossip I hear in a newsroom.
There was a lot of confusion at the station, of course, with half the trains being cancelled, and we eventually got on one that we were assured went to Derby, even though the electronic displays all said Weston-super-Mare. Fortunately enough, it did go to Derby, and we got away without buying tickets too.
So today I was planning to spend the whole day in bed, apart from Nick coming round for yet more filming for a couple of hours. But I also found that I’d got the job – starting Monday, for three months with the possibility of applying for the permanent job there afterwards, assuming I like it. I think I probably will, although I’m a bit concerned by the fact that they apparently requested that I should wear a more boring tie to the office than my playing-cards one…
As for tomorrow, a bit of final practice for Germany! I need to keep reminding myself that it’s Sunday tomorrow, because I was thinking all day yesterday that it was Saturday.
Caught the train to Nottingham at 8:39, where Nick got told off for filming on the station and the train without permission, arrived to find that the Bentinck hotel and pub next to the station was all cordoned off by police barrier tape. No time to really gawp at it, because I wanted to find the place I was going for an interview before having to talk about it for the cameras – it turns out that the New College offices are in a great location, right near the city centre and all the good shops. Nick wanted to film the interview, but I refused to let him anywhere within sight of the place, so as not to jeapordise my chances, and packed him off to a coffee shop.
The interview was fun – they had a half-hour written test first, giving me some paperwork and asking me to put together a month’s accounts, like an exam question. I haven’t done an exam for years, but I think I picked up on the bits you were supposed to pick up on, and provided a halfway decent set of answers. More companies should do this kind of thing, I’ve always felt interviews are a pretty rubbish way of picking an accountant. But we did have a conventional kind of interview afterwards, which also went well. I judged that professional-hardworking-type would go over better than eccentric-genius, so I didn’t mention the memory stuff except once in passing, and didn’t tell them I was on the local news that evening.
Interview done, and it took rather longer than planned, we then got the bus out to Chilwell to visit Grandma. She, of course, turned out to be a natural in front of the camera, and we got a heck of a lot of entertaining footage in the can (I think that’s the technical term). We went into Beeston for lunch, and came back to find my Central TV taxi waiting for me already. By this time, the constant filming of everything was starting to get on my wick, and it was pouring with rain again. Nick kept us standing outside while he filmed establishing shots of Grandma’s place, but eventually we got in the taxi and set off for Birmingham.
“It’ll be about 40 minutes,” said the taxi driver, inaccurately as it turned out. “How long do you want me to wait for you there?”
“Wait for us?” I said, surprised. It was about quarter to four, and the show didn’t start till six. The driver wasn’t at all happy to find that he’d been hired to wait around in Birmingham for anything up to three hours. He moaned that he wouldn’t have taken the job if he’d known that, because he had an important birthday party to go to and he’d have to miss it. He phoned his boss and complained to him too. Meanwhile, it was raining very heavily and there were roadworks and traffic jams all over the place. A tree had come down over the main entrance to the Central TV studios, so we had to drive around the back to try to find a way in.
When we arrived, I decided to perform my random act of kindness for the day, and told the driver to go. We were just down the road from the train station, so taking a taxi back to Derby offended my sensibilities on several levels – as a working class hero, I don’t like taxis anyway, and as an accountant I was appalled that Central were paying a taxi to sit outside the studio for hours, whereas as someone who appreciates the importance of this birthday party, I would have hated to be responsible for keeping him sitting around.
So, having saved the big TV company a bit of money and put a dent in the profits of a small taxi firm, possibly getting the driver in trouble for it, we went into the studio, which was a very cool place. Just about as soon as we got inside, someone mentioned in passing that the train station had closed down because of the weather, but I decided to cross that bridge when we came to it.
Probably worth mentioning at this point that it was in fact Central Tonight yesterday, and East Midlands Today on Tuesday. I had got them mixed up and told everyone it was the other way around, so I do apologise to anyone who wanted to watch it and missed it. If you did, you can see my performance here, if you select Central East, and evening bulletins, and Friday July 20th. My bit starts around the 22nd minute, if you don’t really want to watch the rest of the latest news in the east midlands.
It’s a lot of fun to see what goes into the making of a live local news show. The studio set is a lot smaller than you’d think, and it’s weird to see it all brightly lit, with cameras and autocues lurking in the darkness around it. And my bit went very smoothly – they gave me a pack of cards and thirty seconds or so to memorise it during a montage of people on the streets of Nottingham trying to remember cards too, then I recalled it afterwards. I knew we wouldn’t have the time to recite the whole pack, so I just concentrated on getting the first few flawless – I would probably have struggled if we’d got past halfway through the deck. Still, it looked great on the telly.
And I got to see all the behind-the-scenes stuff, like the story they had to drop when a breaking-news thing came up (it was just about the fact that it had been raining rather a lot, so not really news as such), and the story behind the Bentinck Hotel (someone threw a firebomb into it, apparently).
Then it was just a case of getting home, which promised to be an adventure. Strangely enough, though, I was feeling extremely cheerful by that point, after having been in an irritable kind of mood most of the afternoon, what with the constant filming and being rushed from place to place. I was quite looking forward to a lengthy rail-replacement bus ride in the still pouring rain. But it turned out that half the trains were still running from New Street station, which will teach me to believe any gossip I hear in a newsroom.
There was a lot of confusion at the station, of course, with half the trains being cancelled, and we eventually got on one that we were assured went to Derby, even though the electronic displays all said Weston-super-Mare. Fortunately enough, it did go to Derby, and we got away without buying tickets too.
So today I was planning to spend the whole day in bed, apart from Nick coming round for yet more filming for a couple of hours. But I also found that I’d got the job – starting Monday, for three months with the possibility of applying for the permanent job there afterwards, assuming I like it. I think I probably will, although I’m a bit concerned by the fact that they apparently requested that I should wear a more boring tie to the office than my playing-cards one…
As for tomorrow, a bit of final practice for Germany! I need to keep reminding myself that it’s Sunday tomorrow, because I was thinking all day yesterday that it was Saturday.
Friday, July 20, 2007
Hoo-boy!
I'm not even going to TRY to write about everything that I've been doing today. I've been on the go for the past fourteen hours and I need to sleep. Tomorrow I'll do some kind of epic-length blog and chronicle everything.
Thursday, July 19, 2007
B-b-b-but I'm weary...
I think that's a Porky Pig quote from "The Ducksters", where he's a contestant on a radio quiz show hosted by Daffy Duck. But I have a nagging feeling that it's actually from a different cartoon, and therefore not at all relevant to what I'm about to write, even to the small minority of people who might be expected to recognise the quote in the first place.
Anyway, I had an interview today on the breakfast show for Radio Derby. My alarm went off at seven o'clock, and I thought "Hmm" and went back to sleep. Woke up a bit later, thinking "Wait, did my alarm go off back then? What time is it?" 7:50. Need to get to the radio station on the other side of the city centre for eight o'clock.
Skipping such unnecessaries as breakfast and showers and tooth-brushing, I made it in time for the 8:20 interview, where I talked nonsense about memorising and totally failed to memorise a pack of cards for them (I don't have a great track record for memory skills when I've just got out of bed, as anyone who was in Malaysia in 2003 will tell you). But the interview seems to have been popular - as soon as I got home the phone was ringing, with the Derbyshire Evening Telegraph and the two local TV stations demanding to talk to me.
The upshot of it is that I'm on East Midlands Today tomorrow, and Central News on Tues. Possibly the other way round, but whoever it is tomorrow is sending a car for me, so I don't need to worry. I also have a pre-arranged trip to see Grandma and a new job interview in Nottingham for the morning (temp job, acceptable pay, leading to possibility of permanent job, doesn't sound great but I'll probably end up taking it anyway), all of which Nick the Channel 5 director wants to film.
I refused to let him film the interview, but otherwise he'll be following me around all day, whoopee. Seriously, the phone's been ringing non-stop this week with one thing or another, it's tiresome and I want to become a hermit. Or better yet, an accountant. The kind who goes to the office and comes home at night and doesn't have to describe to anyone the process of memorising a pack of cards.
Anyway, I had an interview today on the breakfast show for Radio Derby. My alarm went off at seven o'clock, and I thought "Hmm" and went back to sleep. Woke up a bit later, thinking "Wait, did my alarm go off back then? What time is it?" 7:50. Need to get to the radio station on the other side of the city centre for eight o'clock.
Skipping such unnecessaries as breakfast and showers and tooth-brushing, I made it in time for the 8:20 interview, where I talked nonsense about memorising and totally failed to memorise a pack of cards for them (I don't have a great track record for memory skills when I've just got out of bed, as anyone who was in Malaysia in 2003 will tell you). But the interview seems to have been popular - as soon as I got home the phone was ringing, with the Derbyshire Evening Telegraph and the two local TV stations demanding to talk to me.
The upshot of it is that I'm on East Midlands Today tomorrow, and Central News on Tues. Possibly the other way round, but whoever it is tomorrow is sending a car for me, so I don't need to worry. I also have a pre-arranged trip to see Grandma and a new job interview in Nottingham for the morning (temp job, acceptable pay, leading to possibility of permanent job, doesn't sound great but I'll probably end up taking it anyway), all of which Nick the Channel 5 director wants to film.
I refused to let him film the interview, but otherwise he'll be following me around all day, whoopee. Seriously, the phone's been ringing non-stop this week with one thing or another, it's tiresome and I want to become a hermit. Or better yet, an accountant. The kind who goes to the office and comes home at night and doesn't have to describe to anyone the process of memorising a pack of cards.
Wednesday, July 18, 2007
I think I'm safe
The publicity is dying down to acceptable levels now. My favourite request came from the "World Records Academy" who thought I might want to buy an 'official' certificate for $95 ("It's a great marketing tool!") documenting my world record. I decided to pass on that one.
Radio Derby tomorrow, Central News possibly next week. You can get tired of answering the same questions over and over again. Hopefully the German championship won't be covered by Tony's PR company, so I'll be back to my usual blissful state of the rest of the world being ignorant of what I've memorised or whether that's a good thing. And then maybe, if you're lucky, I'll be able to go back to writing about other stuff in this blog.
Radio Derby tomorrow, Central News possibly next week. You can get tired of answering the same questions over and over again. Hopefully the German championship won't be covered by Tony's PR company, so I'll be back to my usual blissful state of the rest of the world being ignorant of what I've memorised or whether that's a good thing. And then maybe, if you're lucky, I'll be able to go back to writing about other stuff in this blog.
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
If you like pina coladas
My internet connection stopped working yesterday, and when I phoned them up they arranged for an engineer to come round this morning. Then a few hours later it started working again, and I told them about it, but nobody specifically said they'd cancelled the engineer, so I realised this morning there was a chance he'd still be coming round at some time between eight and twelve. So I had to get up early. Then I remembered that as well as the probability of the engineer, there was the certainty of the landlord coming round today to do the annual gas safety check. And the likelihood of people phoning me about the press release that went out yesterday describing the speed cards record. And the sporting chance of calls from three different accountancy recruitment agencies about job prospects. And the woman from Radio 4 who hasn't yet managed to talk to me despite our best efforts to arrange a mutually convenient time. And the TV documentary people who are determined to chronicle every slighest movement I make. All in all, it looked like being the kind of day when I'd constantly have people at the door, on the phone or emailing, and wouldn't be able to get anything done.
I'm not sure exactly what I was planning on 'getting done' today. But I would have been annoyed about not being able to do it, I'll assure you. So I decided to take the mature route to happiness, and run away. I went to Nottingham for the morning, and Peterborough for the afternoon, just to see if they'd changed since I last saw them. They hadn't, but I still had lots of fun browsing the shops and enjoying the feeling that people might be trying to contact me and wouldn't be able to find me. I bought a collection of James Kochalka's sketchbook diaries and two of his CDs, and admired his lifestyle, not for the first time - I'm only a memory champion because I can't draw, write children's books and cartoons and record songs with my band, you know.
Of course, when I got home, everyone was lying in wait for me. The engineer had indeed not been cancelled and had left a card, the landlord had let himself in and presumably found the flat not filled with carbon monoxide, I had oodles of emails to read through and the phone was ringing constantly - two job prospects, one of them sounding good and the other not, an interview on Radio Derby for Thursday morning (did I mention I did Radio Shropshire yesterday? I don't remember) and even a call from Tony Buzan to say congratulations.
The TV people want to film me at a job interview. This doesn't seem like a very good way to go about getting a job - if I was the financial controller of a company and wanted a new accountant, I'd go for one who didn't bring his own film crew to the interview. It kind of gives the impression that I care more about being on TV than I do about being an accountant (which, scarily, I really don't) and would be constantly dashing off to give interviews and autographs instead of preparing the monthly balance sheet reconciliations.
On the other hand, they also want to film me going to see Grandma on Friday, which might be fun. Hopefully they won't cancel it, because she's promised to beat me to death with her stick if it turns out that I'm just winding her up about the film crew. I think she's looking forward to being a TV star. She'd make a great one - there's nobody in the world who's a more natural talker, and she's got a heck of a lot of interesting stories to tell.
All in all, I find myself quite liking the idea of escaping from all the people who want to talk to me right now. Maybe I'll go into hiding somewhere until all the excitement has blown over.
I'm not sure exactly what I was planning on 'getting done' today. But I would have been annoyed about not being able to do it, I'll assure you. So I decided to take the mature route to happiness, and run away. I went to Nottingham for the morning, and Peterborough for the afternoon, just to see if they'd changed since I last saw them. They hadn't, but I still had lots of fun browsing the shops and enjoying the feeling that people might be trying to contact me and wouldn't be able to find me. I bought a collection of James Kochalka's sketchbook diaries and two of his CDs, and admired his lifestyle, not for the first time - I'm only a memory champion because I can't draw, write children's books and cartoons and record songs with my band, you know.
Of course, when I got home, everyone was lying in wait for me. The engineer had indeed not been cancelled and had left a card, the landlord had let himself in and presumably found the flat not filled with carbon monoxide, I had oodles of emails to read through and the phone was ringing constantly - two job prospects, one of them sounding good and the other not, an interview on Radio Derby for Thursday morning (did I mention I did Radio Shropshire yesterday? I don't remember) and even a call from Tony Buzan to say congratulations.
The TV people want to film me at a job interview. This doesn't seem like a very good way to go about getting a job - if I was the financial controller of a company and wanted a new accountant, I'd go for one who didn't bring his own film crew to the interview. It kind of gives the impression that I care more about being on TV than I do about being an accountant (which, scarily, I really don't) and would be constantly dashing off to give interviews and autographs instead of preparing the monthly balance sheet reconciliations.
On the other hand, they also want to film me going to see Grandma on Friday, which might be fun. Hopefully they won't cancel it, because she's promised to beat me to death with her stick if it turns out that I'm just winding her up about the film crew. I think she's looking forward to being a TV star. She'd make a great one - there's nobody in the world who's a more natural talker, and she's got a heck of a lot of interesting stories to tell.
All in all, I find myself quite liking the idea of escaping from all the people who want to talk to me right now. Maybe I'll go into hiding somewhere until all the excitement has blown over.
Monday, July 16, 2007
Other things I forgot about Saturday
It was a lovely day! Boris commented "I thought this was England - where's the rain?". It had been pouring down constantly for the couple of months before the competition, and it started again on Sunday, but on Saturday we had baking hot summer sunshine. It was great! There was also sponsorship coming out of the wazoo - I won flights to and accommodation in Bahrain for the world championship, plus a bottle of champagne and a very nice trophy - a glass thing with blue coloured stuff inside, like a giant paperweight. Much better than a fake-metal trophy!
I also did an interview with Radio Shropshire today, and there's been a press release sent out by Tony Buzan's PR people urging all newshounds to call me. Maybe someone will, you never know. But I should probably get back to finding a job. I don't want to be sitting unemployed for too long. Well, maybe for the next two weeks so I don't have to use up holidays straight away to go to Tuttlingen.
I also did an interview with Radio Shropshire today, and there's been a press release sent out by Tony Buzan's PR people urging all newshounds to call me. Maybe someone will, you never know. But I should probably get back to finding a job. I don't want to be sitting unemployed for too long. Well, maybe for the next two weeks so I don't have to use up holidays straight away to go to Tuttlingen.
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