I have written a brief obituary to the BBC staff newspaper (actually printed on paper for 75 years) Ariel, which will now only appear in a digital format.

Read it here.

http://terminallydisappointed.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/ariel-an-obituary/

I am very pleased with the response from Swizzels Matlow and the way that they dealt with this issue. On the surface you might think that I was simply bribed by an enormous parcel of sweets but this is not the case. Their letter went into great detail to explain what they had done with the hair in question (something to do with science it seems) and what their ongoing quality controls are (something to do with magnets and hair nets). I am confident that while there is a slim possibility that a hair may one day enter a Swizzels Matlow product there is no possibility that anything metallic (magnetic of course) will ever be found therein.

Because I didn’t want to appear greedy or in any way take for granted the generosity of the sweet settlement that was reached between Swizzels Matlow and myself I sent the following message to them to say thank you.

Hello,

I thought I’d drop you a quick line to say thank you for the package of sweets that arrived in the post a week or so ago. More importantly I appreciate your detailed letter regarding the incident with the hair in the Dip Dab. I am confident that this was an isolated incident and certainly won’t let it ruin the relationship between Swizzels Matlow, myself and my dentist.

Once again, thanks for your response.

MISTERSNAPPY vs. SWIZZELS MATLOW

CASE CLOSED.

I have just opened one of your Swizzels-Matlow Double Lollies Dip. I was quite enjoying a bit of retro sweet goodness when I happened upon across a sugar encrusted long brunette hair, not the sort of thing you expect to find in an item of confection.
I am positive that this object was already in the packet before opening for two reasons, firstly I caught it on the lolly after several dips. It was evenly covered in sherbet, not what I would expect if it had just dropped in. Secondly, and more importantly, the last time I had a hair that long to drop in my food was in about 1992, things have been a little thin and cut short up there since then.
Being a man of a certain age blessed with a sweet tooth I am quite a fan of your sweet products but I feel a little disappointed on this occasion to find that the quality doesn’t live up to the qualityI expect from Swizzels-Matlow.
I have place the aforementioned item in a plastic bag and am storing it just incase you require any evidence of my claim. I trust that you will consider my complaint carefully and find a way to restore my faith in the quality of products and cleanliness of your production line that might, say, involve a large box of sweets or a voucher of a reasonable value.
Feel free to contact me at the details listed above if you require any further details of this awful incident.

Yours
Simon (40)

*UPDATE*

‘Lost in the post’ isn’t a phrase that you hear that often but it seems that my delightfully crafted message that was submitted through the Swizzels Matlow website went missing. I subsequently emailed my linguistic gift to them and got the following reply almost immediately.

My beautifully crafted complaint seemed to have been lost on them but I will be sending them the offending item in their SAE for examination. I trust that they will do a full DNA test on the hair but will have to excuse the sticky lolly enclosed.

I will await their results with baited breath, toothpaste and floss.

—–

Dear Simon

Thank you for your e-mail received today.  We are very sorry that you have had cause for complaint about the Double Dip you purchased recently.

Unfortunately we are not in receipt of your original e-mail, however, in order to progress this matter as soon as possible, could you please forward your full mailing address so that we can send you  a Freepost envelope for return of the product for a thorough investigation.

Please be advised that on completion of these investigations we will respond to  you in writing.

We look forward to hearing from you in due course.

Yours sincerely

SWIZZELS MATLOW LIMITED

I’ve had a shower but not completely unpacked or caught up with sleep. Here are the photos from the weekend though…

Launch of STS-1 by mistersnappy

Brian Haw, originally uploaded by mistersnappy.

On the 22nd November 2008 I took a long walk along the Thames armed with my Holga loaded with some black and white film. The Holga is regarded as a toy camera, is notoriously flakey and renowned for it’s double exposures. I took a few snaps along my journey. As the river passes the Houses of Parliament I took a detour to see the peace camp Brian Haw made opposite our seat of government in Parliament Square. I nervously approached him not knowing if he’d be happy to have his photograph taken by another passer by but my request met with silent approval and a feint but gracious smile following my thanks.
Brian was campaigning for the fair treatment of peoples overseas who were victims of unjust regimes and invading forces. I may not have agreed with all of his politics but you can’t help but admire a man willing to sacrifice everything he had and everything he was to fight for what he believed. He remained campaigning from 2001 until recently when ill health forced him to seek treatment in Europe.
Brian Haw died today after a long fight with cancer.

More here.

There’s me, just below the Shuttle on the Wired.co.uk homepage. Read more here www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-05/3/geekdad-discovers-…

So who did I see, apart from NKOTB*… twice…? Well, there was Yes, there was Paul Simon, there was the Pet Shop Boys, Guns and Roses at Wembley Stadium and possibly Whitney Houston before she got cracked out of her head. Best of all, though, was the band of bands, the high priests of rock, yes… AC DC! I couldn’t believe my luck when I bagged that one. My position wasn’t the best, I was right at one of the rear exits, stage right, but that didn’t matter because their sonic boom filled the whole venue and where there wasn’t sound there was ego! The place was heaving like a friday night in an Irish pub, and to quote a familiar lyric, ‘the earth was shaking’ when they took to the stage. I can almost recall every detail of that concert including the rising stage where Angus Young belted out a perfect guitar solo and those canons at the end of ‘For those about to rock (we salute you)’.

Oddly there is one other thing that sticks in my head. It seemed quite innocuous a the time but over the years it has come to signify something, it just not until last week that I realised what it was. So I’m back at the rear exit of Wembley Arena and AC DC have just started their set. The whole place is going utterly mental and there was the expected crowd of people in their black AC DC t-shirts starting to get sweaty. I’d closed the doors and was diligently keeping an eye out for crafty smokers and aisle hoggers when a face appeared at the small window in the swing doors. Ah yes… a late comer. There is always one (more likely more). Now unlike in the posh realms of theatre, later comers used to be welcome. It’s not like you’re going to disturb the main act, even if you slam the door really hard, so like a polite steward in my hi-vis vest, I let him in.

Mr late arrival looked liked he’d just got off the last train from the city. He was dressed in a smartish suit, rain mac, neat hair and  carrying a briefcase. He was a little narked that he was late but I reassured him that he’d only missed a song and a half and he happily went to his seat. It’s what happened next that amused me. As soon as he’d found his place he dropped his suitcase and began his Superman like transformation into sweaty rock fiend! Off came the jacket, then the tie, quickly followed by the shirt to reveal his AC DC t-shirt. He’d obviously been wearing it all day beneath his work gear in anticipation for the evenings entertainment. He couldn’t have been happier and completed his transition into total rock sweat-monster within minutes!

Another thing that always amused me in my late teens, the days when my metabolism still functioned, was seeing the tubby chap on a bicycle every day while waiting for the bus to college, and not being able to understand why, if he was doing all that exercise, he was still carrying around a spare tyre that was obviously not fit for his bike! In my naivety I never asked myself how far he’d gone or where he was going. Whether he was stopping of at McDonalds for breakfast on his way out and dinner on his way back? But he was just the tubby chap on the bike, which brings me to the point of this post.

Last week I joined the promotional bandwagon for the release of the Foo Fighters latest long player, Wasting Light. They had a ‘one night only’ showing of their rockumentary ‘Back and Forth‘ at a cinema near work and I was determined to attend. I’m not always the smartest bloke in the office but I know how to scrub up when we’ve got a client in, and typically on that day we had one of our biggest clients visiting the office for an all day meeting. So I’ve got my smart jacket and trousers on for work but I’ve got a medium grade rock fest to attend in the evening. What to do? I remembered Mr Late Arrival and his sneaky tee and searched the wardrobe for my Foo Fighers t-shirt to slip on under my shirt and jacket but due to the redness of the t-shirt this wasn’t going to work. By the time I got to the cinema I couldn’t bear the shackles of my smart work atire anymore so rushed to purchase a nice bright t-shirt to wear instead of my smart work wear. The transformation was complete. I had become that guy!

The next day, with the music still ringing in my ears, I cycled from the station to the office realising that not only had I become the smart chap at the rock gig but also the chubby bloke on the bicycle.

My life is complete, but you can rest assured that I will not be dressing smart for Glastonbury!

*You may not have liked the names on my list of free gigs I’ve attended at steward but looking back on them they were nearly all both class acts and legendary (perhaps not Whitney!), but there is an excuse for the New Kids on the Block gig…twice.

I will admit to being a Spurs supporter. In 1991, when the year ended in 1, Spurs played Nottingham Forrest in the Cup Final at Wembley Stadium, in the shadow of the famous twin towers. I was desperate to steward at the match but our bosses made it clear that you didn’t get to pick and chose which gig you worked. You were there to steward and steward you did. Well little old me broke the golden rule and put a request in for the big match only to be met with ‘the deal’.

Most of the afternoon slots at the football were taken and strangely a lot of my fellow stewards weren’t able to work the evening gigs at the Arena, so here was ‘the deal’. You can do the Cup Final, but you have to also do NKOTB… both evenings! I thought about this briefly and immediately agreed! The game was fantastic and we won 2-1. I stood at an entrance and was consumed by the atmosphere, a brilliant day brought to an abrupt halt when I remembered that I had to return to the Arena for New Kids. And two nights I did, both of which I was right at the front, collecting cards and gifts from hysterical girls who had possibly pissed themselves during the concert.

All I can say is if Spurs had lost I would have hated every moment of those two evenings but I think the pay off of seeing your team win a Cup Final at Wembley and being paid for the privilege was worth it, don’t you?

Floating Promo, originally uploaded by mistersnappy.

I saw this amazing video a while ago on the Berg London website and wondered how long it would be before Future Magic became Present Magic.

Well that day was today. The original demo for Future Magic was on iPad but now you can create your own words and shapes in space using your humble iPhone running Penki and any camera that can make a long exposure.

These initial attempts were made on my point and shoot Canon A470 at 200 ISO with a 15 second exposure. The app explains everything you need to know and all you need to do is find a good word and a dark-ish room.

Get this song to number one!!