Holy Bullshit Batman So I'm doing my usual late-night channel surfing, trying to find something decent to watch. And I stumble across the funniest thing I've ever seen. Now this wasn't one of my usual shows that I tend to watch (Big Bang, How I met, 30 Rock)' in fact, this was no where near that type of show. This was a US evangelist giving it his all!! How does this crap get it's own channel? I know that there is a large population of the world that follows religion (some a lot more than others) but evangelists are the epitome of bad taste! Now I don't mean to offend, if you're mentally unhinged enough to place your faith in an imaginary person in the clouds, then all the best to you. Religion seems to be a funny thing, the evangelist will lie through his teeth that he is exorcising a demon from a person, just by placing his hand on a that person's head and speaking like James Brown (that demon being anything from a gamy ankle to full-blown homosexuality). You also have the standard religious person that does whatever they want, as long as they go to church on a Sunday. But then you have the radicals tipping the scales into the bat-crap crazy side of things. Why can't people just get along? As an atheist I have no interest in religion... Now don't get me wrong, the bible is a good read, with some very good books on moral grounding. But I do not feel the need to talk to an imaginary friend every time I want to get my way? A US evangelist spewing his verbal-diarreah on my TV isn't that bad from my perspective... But If my atheist views were televised in the US, they'd be burning effigies of me in the street

Well that escalated quickly? Work has been ridiculously busy the past 4 weeks. My last Opuss post was when I was at LHR Airport. And this one finds itself being typed out whilst I am in a hotel in a foreign country! Now that seems like a standard process right? Airport - foreign country... Wrong. Nothing in my #life is ever standard it seems. At the end of last month I was excited that I was about to get on a plane for the first time. The destination for which... Shanghai!!! Not bad for my first time out of the UK. But the foreign country I am in now, is not China... I'm now in Turkey! I started the beginning of Feb in one country, and will be ending it in another. And neither of those countries are my own! Now that's not bad going considering I purchased my first ever passport 3 months ago!!

Boarding Pass So today I find myself sat in the executive lounge of an international airport. Doesn't seem like a big deal to most... But to me it's a pivotal moment in my #life. I'm to be 33 this year (just have to live past Easter to beat Jesus at living!!) and this is my first trip overseas. The range of emotion I have felt (and still feeling, here in the lounge), has been right across the spectrum. Nerves, panic, excitement and general awe. People take things like this for granted... I don't think I ever could.

2 paths followed, same destination reached. I left school quite young, without finishing. Outrageous you may think? Meh... I hold a managerial role in IT support within a company in the top 20 of the FTSE 100. I applied myself 5x as hard since leaving school and my job is earned. If I had applied myself in school I would probably be in a different profession. Architect, Pilot or maybe even Doctor... I jest, nobody from my school went on to be any of those things. Although one of the guys from my form is known as a chemist?? I was told at the age of 15 by my dead-beat uncle, "You need to go to school every day, you don't want to turn out like me!!" But back then, I kind of did... I mean, who in their right mind wants to work 40 hours a week? He was unemployed, living off the state, and drunk every waking hour. At 15 that seemed awesome!! So I didn't listen, and continued to bunk off. Now thankfully I'm one of the rare cases in #life where #life just falls into place. I now have a pain in the neck wife, and 3, 4 and 14. A decent job with prospects and I only have to survive #life until Easter next year for me to beat Jesus at living!!! All in all a sweet #life... Only there's this overwhelming hypocritical tirade that flows from me on a regular basis. I constantly tell my kids that school is important, that with hindsight I wish I attended more. Wished I'd learned some proper subjects. Who'd of thought, after all these years of sorting myself out, and being an outstanding member of the community, a family man... I am dishing out the same advise as a dead-beat drunk?

"Tattoo" I'm a big stand-up fan, and a couple of my favourite stand-up comedians have written funny material about tattoos [Dave Gorman's Googlewhack adventure and Rhod Gilbert: The man with the flaming battenberg tattoo]. Both of their stories hit quite close to me and my tattoo. You see just like them, I am not a fan of tattoos. I find them completely pointless... Yet I have one!! The origins of my tattoo stems from a large amount of Guinness combined with a petty need to always be right! Just after my first Son (14) was born, me and my friends went out to wet the baby's head. This involved sinking pints of the black stuff, in an Irish bar, underneath a tattoo parlour. Sounds like a normal ritual. I would normally agree with you on this, but not on this occasion. You see, the friends I was out with, were of the "heavy metal-loving" variety. They loved their hard music, random piercings and tattoos. Now after 4/5 pints they all decide to get some form of mutilation. Whether this be some shard of shrapnel stuck through them, or scarred for #life by a pointless tattoo. I didn't really pay much attention to the decision process... Right up until they all look at me, to see what I was going to have done!!!! Now, the rest of this story will be patched together from random bits of information supplied by the other attendees of this emotionally blocked traumatic part of my #life. It seems it took a couple of extra pints to get me to fold, but they persuade me to have a tattoo. Only I'm adamant, that my tattoo will be completely unique... something no-one else would ever have (a year or two down the line, this failure upsets me to no end)!!!! They get me into the parlour, and in front of "Dai" the mutilator. I "apparently" spew out a an idea, a tattoo concept so benign, that as the words leave my lips I believe it to be the most original idea known to man... There is only one problem. Dai the mutilator is unable to do this image unprompted... he needs a copy of the image to work from! Now thankfully, I'm drunk enough to supply such an image... you see, the image I have chosen can be found in any local supermarket. And right across the road from us is just such an establishment!!! Oh Joy!!! My "friends" manage to make it sound like my idea, and I run across the road to purchase the required image. On my return, the mutilator traces said image, transfers it to my arm and proceeds to carve into me with his tattoo needles!!! The whole Idea of my tattoo was that it was unique, that no-one would EVER have such a thing permanently branded to them. And my choice fitted just that. An image that was so pointless, so benign, no-one would ever have the same thing!!! I left that tattoo parlour, slightly pale from all the alcohol, and lack of blood. But oddly glowing from a sense of right, a smug "I Win!!" look to me. (Waking up with a Guinness hangover is nothing to be laughed at... it is one of the most horrific things to befall a man... But waking up with a Guinness hangover in your arm is a totally new experience!!!) The next day I looked down in horror, as this appalling blood-soaked image stared back at me. And in a few minutes the shocking realisation kicked in. Followed by the beer soaked flashbacks of the night before!! What had I done... This image would be with me for #life! It couldn't be shared, it was too embarrassing... It wasn't of some flaming tribal image... or some patriotic symbol of a Dragon or celtic sign that I could show off!!! It was far worse... in all my drunken wisdom... drowning in the need for a unique pointless image... I got tattooed with... The fairy washing up liquid baby!!! So not only did my "friends" persuade me to get a tattoo... they also managed to persuade me to run to a supermarket, buy a bottle of the stuff... get Dai to trace it and have it permanently inked on me!! Now in fairness, that image sounds pretty unique... who in their right mind would have such a thing??? Jump a couple of years into the future... I now live 170 miles away from where this happened, and I now work in a bingo hall (God's waiting room). I walk past a group of old dears, having a chin-wag.. and one of them has the same tattoo, on her shoulder!!! I now couldn't even claim that it was an original image.. some 60+ year old lady also had the same tattoo!!! to say I was upset, does not even come close!!!. I still live 170 miles away from home, and from the evil mates who did this to me... And I tell the story now and again, to colleagues and new friends. A few months back(13 years after getting it done!!), I'm telling this story to friends.., Explaining in detail how it came about. And I'm met with faces of disbelief. "So that is the exact fairy washing up liquid baby from the bottle??" they said. I explain that as it is traced, it has to be the exact copy from the bottle?? Up one of them jumps, kitchen-bound! He returns with a bottle of fairy washing up liquid! now after 13 years, the bottles have obviously changed design, the baby itself has changed... But it had also changed back! they held up the bottle to my arm to measure. and the room turns silent... Because at this point, my jaw has dropped. Anger spreads through me like a cancer and people can see i'm about to blow!!! This is the first time I have had the bottle next my arm in 13+ years! And after looking at these things side to side, i notice something fundamentally wrong. Something i should of noticed when getting the damned tattoo (and would of, if sober!!). You see, the image was traced off the bottle... then transferred to my arm... therefore, the tattoo I have is not the exact image off the bottle... IT'S THE MIRROR IMAGE!!! the baby was facing the wrong way! over a decade of telling this story, and this was the first time I'd noticed. Every time I'd seen the tattoo it was in the mirror... So always looked the same as it did on the bottle!!! You can imagine how the room reacted once they realised why I was upset... They still take the piss!!! Oddly, I now work for a company that makes the rival product to Fairy (Finish). And the Tattoo is the butt of jokes there too!!