day 84... week of revolution/ day 3/developing my revolutionary brand

day 84...revolution week/ day 3.. developing my revolutionary brand.

Every political clan or popoular revolution has a distinct brand, a way in which it is absoloutley recognisable and seperateable from its competitors, you know the kind of thing i mean. Think about the revolution in cuba, its definately all about wild facial hair, unwaranted military dress and fat cigars.

All movements have one.. the nazis favoured the swastika, the side parting and an unnecesary over use of eagles on uniforms.. but they are visable distinguishers, i could absoloutley have a spoken or written revolutionary brand... the soviets for example liked to adress everyone as comrade! it sounds cool  im not sure it works in teesside accent tho.

So i think ive just about decided on a look for me and my troops, i shall model it below for you viewing pleasure.

As you can see ive rocked with a military theme.. i feel it gives a degree of authenticity, and lends an air of authority... the hat.. is not for decoration, if we need to take the fight to scotland we will need hats people, warm thick ones, its flippin cold out there.

And heres how it looks in full... with weaponary!!

See there it is, the epitomy of style within conflict, you cant fail to be taken seriously looking that dope.

So .. i believe my mission has been accomplished. The points of my revolt are there for all to see, i have a styleised logo.. see above, that should reflect the theme of mighty struggle against adversity, and now i have the look that is the distinguisher betwixed me, my troops and the enemy.

mission accomplished

day 83... revolution week/ day 2/ formenting unrest!

day 83...So after thinking up and printing my samizdat yesterday... today my task is to forment unrest among those around  me, this is to be achieved by word of mouth and also of course by getting unsuspecting friends and strangers to read, and be outraged by the points outlined in my shocking pamphlet.

Here is said pamphlet  front and back!

want a close up of the opener? (front of pamphlet) here it is! this is meant to grab the interest, is your interest grabbed? it should be.

Heres my father reading my war cry against the enemy, as you can see he was so shaken by my message that he had to sit down.. stiring stuff.

So... today i went off to spread my message, first of all i thought why not hit up those closest to home with these revelations? so i provided the folks with the neccesary reading, then i took the message to my friends... they too felt shell shocked, how could our government sell us down the river in such a manner? Oh yeah again because those in charge are the enemy (scotish).

serious expresions  for serious matters!

i can almost feel an uprising!

After hitting the friends up with the call to arms (not literally) i decide the general public needed to be aware of what i had uncovered, i mean they cant have known allready..  they would be furious if they knew.... right?

After that i realised the best way to cause unrest away rom home wasnt passing paper hand to hand, but  to inform people online, show them what id discovered, get them behind the cause. So that i did...So now i have people with me, behind the cause...but we need more soldiers.... plege your support people on fb  or here. i have tasks for everyone, We NEED  your help!

day 82... revolution week day 1/ printing my samizdat!!

When starting any revolt/ demo the key thing is to gain public support for your cause, the traditional way to do this is to print a pamphlet, and preferably for that pamphlet to strike such a chord with the public  that said work is passed around person to person, and house to house gathering support for the cause, and bolstering your ranks.

Unsure what samizdat is? may i suggest youcheck this link.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samizdat

The book sugested i follow the traditional style of  samizdat pamphlet.. Focus entirely on message, no excesive use of colour, as little paper wasteage as possible etc..

As you are aware, Scotland won the poll i put out there for possible things to revolt/ demonstrate against, Now although it was in the mix, poll wise as a light hearted option, There are several things about scotland politically at present that bother me deeply.

I shall highlight a few here.

Despite Scotland demanding and recieveing an  independent parliament in which ministers north of the border and only them  vote on all matters scotish,
the same ministers still get a vote on westminster issues that effect England and wales. Imagine that somewhere else in the world, american ministers getting a vote in canadian parliament, but canadians  having no say on u.s issues.

Despite years of moaning for independence which they now have, a massive amount of english tax money still goes north of the border, what kind of independence is this? Can you imagine quiting your place of employment and them continuing to pay you?.

The finances for both countries health and education systems come in essense from the same pot,however  north of the border, tuition fees for universities do not exist, though students a mile south of the border will be paying £3000 a year, and patients in scotland do not pay for prescriptions, while ill people in work, south of the border can end up paying a fortune for long term treatment.

So really they wanted and claimed independence of government, yet we still largely fund scotland, and all of its departments. Tax money is divided both sides of the border in such an unfair way that scotland can afford to make the above concesions for its people, while england can not.

And heres the final sting... our prime minister, secretary of state, chancelor and about 5 other senior cabinet ministers are all Scottish, and so all decisions relating to england  and its people are all made by Scots, who have their own parliament.

I will bosh a photo of said pamphlet up tommorow when i hand them out!

Thats right people, its revolution week, I ran a poll on the blog site , asking what you would most like to see me revolt/ campaign against. The options were our socialist government, climate change bores OR Scotland.

To my absoloute delight the latter was victorious, and so for the next week, hold tight as i go on full attack, full revolt against Scotland.

day 81... travel plans

day 81... travel plans. Today my task was to get a map of the world... view, and consider. Then divide the map up into 4 colours each colour to represent  one of the following categories:-

*places you have been

                    *places you intend  to go this year

                                   *places you would like to go at some point

                                *places you never intend to set foot upon

The colours and their asociated meanings are listed below on this tastefull and informative  (trivial pursuit) pie chart.

AAAnd below you will find  the map itself decided then divided, feast your eyes my friends...

So as you can see i basically want to visit most o the world... i felt ashamed while gazing across the map  and seeing how much of the world was coloured green considering my love of travelio.

You be astonished  upon seing n.z and aus red, however this is merely due to the 24 hour flight required to get there from the u.k.. and for me day long flight sound similar to "chop your fingers off then scran them you proper doil".

The axis of evil is defo worth a visit i reckon, sun, sand ,burkha's, islamic extremists.. road side bombs. They cant guarentee a 5 star hotel but they certainly could promise an eventfull holiday.. high octane. Ideal destination for adrenalin junkies maybe.. i should be its marketing man.

map divided- colour coded- decisions made- dadeesh

day 80... primal scream!!!!!! day.

day 80... and today is  "primal scream day"

screamadelica.. a classic album by primal scream

Just some doil screaming!!

Allow me to point out at this stage tha i in no way buy into alternative therapy's be it yoga, reiki, pilates crystals or any other "therapy" given the thumbs up by middle class stay at home mothers with too much time and money on their hands.

Similarly primal scream therapy is not something i would like to align myself with (unless it involves listening to the compete works of primal scream, in which case i would happily participate) However the book insisted that that was todays task.

I was provided with a choice of 4 screams...below you can view my menu of screams.

1. YEEEAAARRGGHH!!!!!
2. RAAAAHHHHRGH!!!!!!!
3. WHOOOOOOARRR!!!!!!
4. EEEEEEEEEEEEKK!!!!! (women only at the books insistance)

So i took my choice, and considering myself a bit of a beast, naturally i chose option number 2. I pictured my scream before i exuded it... what i saw was a bellow of superhuman proportions, knocking fragile ornaments from the shelves of neighbours homes. smashing windows, causing water to spill from aquariums,the streets  satelite dishes being slightly moved and picking up obscure foreign speaking channels.

All that actaully happened when i let the primal scream rip was my cat sprinted from the room fast as a cheetah, and my next door neighbout banged on the wall in a manner that sugested i should cease my venting immidiately.

So i gave it a blast.. literally, did it work for me? No... you can give me screamadelica over just plain old screaming anyday.
primal scream - screamed
all stress relieved - defo not

day 79... day 79... today return to childhood

day 79... my task was "today return to childhood" The book wasnt overly specific on what i was required to do, however a few sugestions were made, i took them on board and jumped headlong into a day of childlike behaviour ( some might say this isnt dis-simlilar to a usual day for me).

As highlighted in previous tasks i got into the odd bit of mischief as a child , despite as far as i remember being a fairly pleasent and easy going.
 However  luckily no scandalous behaviour involving the general public  was required of me today, it was more to do with those day to day things younger children love doing.

Heres what i did:-

I stomped about the house making as much noise as was humanly possible.

I acted as any normal child would and kicked off about the lack of ice cream in the freezer as if it was a war crime.

I tied my shoes incorrectly (i do this every day)

Like all children, i despised having my hair washed today, i huffed and puffed like an angry bull ...as the shampoo streemed into my eyes causing bearable yet vexing stingage.

I played with my food , which was spaghetti bolognese... it got messy.

I considered peing myself, but i couldnt be bothered to get changed or jump back in the shower so gave it a miss.

I drew with the lack of perspective, accuracy and colour recognition that only children and world famous artists can muster.

So i acted like a child all day.... and it was fun.

day 78... superhero day

day 78... and today is "become a superhero day", the task was simply to create a whole new superhero, become said superhero and take on his special abilities.

After a little think i struck gold, i was to become rolled up news paper man.. why? you may be asking. Simple, every super hero needs a super vilain to fight with and it seemed only right that spiderman have a nemesis who more exactly personifies his greatest fear, and to be honest i had no idea how to become small amount of water around the  plughole man or mouth of a sleeping human.. man. 

ROLLED UP NEWS PAPER MAN!!!

R.U.N.M was created the day an open bottle of white lightning (cheap chemical based cider) was spilt onto a  copy of the daily mail. Thus the paper gained super powers, the power of flight (though only over short distances) the power to whack and of course an inflated hatred of the news papers preffered target.. the spider.

Super hero created.
i fear for spiderman if he sghows his face in teesside.

day 77... saving the planet

day 77... And today i was to "save the planet at any cost" The book wanted me to  interfere in peoples lives and with their stuff, in the hope that by the end of the day i would have made just a little difference to planets well being.

Rightly or wrongly i get vexed by the amount of what i reguard as climate change  scare mongering in the media these days, this is a view all around me know i hold, which as you may imagine made it hard to suddenly switch perspective on the issue and start giving people lectures.

However as agreed i went through the day, mind on the plight of our planet, buying into every gloomy prediction on ice caps, species dying out by a certain year  and taking government advice on what i could do to help as my war cry i went about causing people minor inconvenience all day long.

I turned heating down a few notches

I turned off unwatched t.v's
I switched off unused computers

I hung up my mobile during a call, as i was worried what damage the we jointly were causing the earth.

I underlined the benefits to the planet of  using roll on instead of aerosol

I put a sign up in public toilets asking people only to flush when neccesary.

And for the first time as far as i remember .. i recycled.

So i tried my best to save the world all day, id love to say it felt great, that my thoughts on climate change have altered, however what happened today was i felt like what i think of people who bang on about recycling, energy conservation etc.

world saved .. maybe not
done.

hey people... i require your assistance!

Hey... how about doing the pole you should find opposite the post your reading, to aid me in my choice for revolution week!

day 76... jamming the line!

                     the boys at harrison hq would hate my choice of phone!!!

day 76... And today i was to "jam the line" of the headquaters of the Ku Klux Klan in Harrison Arkansas by constantly ringing, and then hanging up... the thinking i guess being that if i was jamming the line people who have regular business with the KKK couldnt get through.... or maybe it was just to be an annoyance.

I did feel a little rude tho, i dont make a habbit of ringing  and hanging up, and i had visions of a lonely, bored man sat in an empty office, looking for things to do... i pictured him making lists of jobs he would like to have, places he would rather be, his favourite asian actors etc...(obviously the latter would have to be disposed of before he leaves the office) The thought of him dashing eagerly to the phone, only to find noone on the line was almost heartbreaking.

I may not support his views, but i dont want to abuse him for them. Anyway i did as was required, i believe their line was suitably jammed for a moment.. so mission complete.

The number should any of you require it is  (001) 870-427-3414. It might be nice to have a chat with the gent running the place, maybe you could even persuade him to take up a different hobby, as he enjoys dressing up, and shouting  why not suggest amateur dramamtics.

line jammed.. mission complete

day... 75 blaging cash from millionaires!

day... 75  And  i am to "ask a billionaire for money today"  Billionaires give cash to all manner of causes, from malaria to aids... and while these undoubtedly are all great and worthy causes it does leave the question why shouldnt i have some?

 So i am to ask a billionaire for 0.01% of his fortune..  its fair to say he wouldnt  notice its absence, and i certainly would notice its arival in my bank account.... and while it's unlikely i will recieve any response as the book says "if you dont ask, you dont get".

So with this in mind i picked my target, and did a little research. He is Ingvar Kamprad, he is the man behind the furniture empire IKEA, he is as you may be aware Sweedish , he is 82 is married and has 4 children.

You can find the letter below:-

.......................................................................................................................................

Hallo Ingvar,

Although i am not Sweedish, I have been visiting your store and devouring its delicious meatballs for as long as my memory stretches, and so i feel some afinity with your people. OOOOh! i love those meatballs, and the sauce ... good heavens Ingvar what fine cuisune!

I love your furniture too, because its stylish and also relatively inexpensive, However unlike yourself (in switzerland) i live in england, where i am very harshly treated with reguards to tax, And so despite my best efforts i am poor.

I wondered if you could hook me up with 0.01% of your fortune, this would make no dent in your accounts, but massively boulster mine  and make me the happiest man in england. I'm possitive it would be tax decuctable as a charitable donation, plus you'll recoup some when i come in for meatballs.

Dont worry about similar letters, i will keep any corespondance to myself.

many thanks,

mike shotton
.....................................................................................................................................

So.. i wrote Ingvar a begging letter, Hopefully this time next year i will be swimming in couch money, if not.. at least he knows how much i enjoy meatballs.

day 74... living for the moment

together ... a winning team

day 74... And today benrik insisted that i "live for the moment" this sounds quite a vague task im sure you will agree, or at least up until i inform you that the moment i was required to live for was 9:31.22 TO 9:31.23, now the absoloute clarity of the task should be slapping you bluntly in the face .

Thats right, my entire day was to be spent preparing for, and building up to the  afore mentioned second, this i did.

A second really isnt a great deal of time (as you may be aware) and so finding something to fill that moment and not much longer was rather difficult, i had a good think, and eventually arrived at what  may be the absoloute height of pleasure a human being can reach within the bounds of the law, and the moral code i find myself under due to my religion.

 To truly live for the moment one has to be prepared.. and relaxed. And so an hour or so before the crucial moment i took a nice hot shower and tried to unwind. .I got changed and after a sarnie(bacon), as one cant be truly happy on an empty stomach ... i headed for the office and made the neccesary arrangements.

Want to know what i did? well i'll tell you anyway, at the apropriate second i pressed play on the ready queued up computer before me, and saw boro's  final goal against basel...acompanied by ali brownlee  ( the comentator's) exclamation "the greatest comeback since lazarus!!" , while taking the first chug from an ice cold can of coca cola ( other beverages are available)... It may not sound much , but for me this was a truly heavenly moment in the day, 2 of the things i enjoy the most being enjoyed simeltaneously.

So.. i lived for the moment... and i liked it. I encourage you to give it a shot. (coke and boro video optional)

day 73... teenager day!

day 73...  And  my mission was " today act like a teenager" I feel i accomplished this  with great aplomb, and as you might imagine (bearing in mind the task), minimal effort.

Allow me to talk you through the activities i enjoyed revisiting  today:-

Sleeping as if it's an oplympic sport

eating ice cream from the tub

Allowing my rubbish and used clothes to accumulate in the bedroom

mopeing and being lethargic, while trying to keep the correct amounts of over excitement and agresiveness.

showing no consideration for others in my choice of music or indeed the volume at which i play it. I also listened only to music i loved as a teenager, and i must say even then i had impecable taste.

no lights on at all  in my house where possible.

Moaning about everything.. how life is unfair, how much i hate maths. I tried to persuade myself that i wanted a sleepover at a mates house.. but no amount of feigned enthusiasm for staying awake till 7 watching ultra violent films, then crashing out on the  floor could persuade me. I also gave up reading for the day as, as all teenage boys know reading is cack and pointless.

I attempted to shun   my ever growing cynicism and tried my best to regain a degree of unrealistic idealism reguarding the world, granted this was entirely un-authentic as even as a teenager i wanted to smack the kids who went on about green issues as well as marxism and other non workable systems of government .

I even considered foregoing a shower, and attempting to cover up the man musk with lashings and lashings of lynx/axe ( the smell of all adolescent teenage boys)  but full on blokes just cant pull that off.

So i lived as a teenager for the day.. and i made a discovery, being so lazy and obnoxious is actually incredibly tiring, maybe we shouldnt judge them so harshly for their 12 hour sleepathons.

day 72... name fine on street sign?

day 72... And today the book suggested that i may like to "write to your local authority and ask that your street be renamed after you" Sounds a great idea to me, So write a letter i did bearing in mind benriks advice that i should " explain why the current name is no good" and "give details of my achievements" if i desired a succesfull application.

......................................................................................................................................

Michael Shotton
129 Braemar road
Billingham
TS232Aj
Dear sir/ madam

I write to you with reference to the street on which I live, Braemar Road in Billingham. I feel the name of the road is far from appropriate; it has no place in English history, nor has it any significance to the northeast.

Please allow me to suggest as a replacement Shotton Road, the reasons for this are two fold, Firstly, Not only does the name have significance to the north east (Shotton in case you are not aware is a town near Peterlee), this in turn gives it more relevance to the English public, as it relates to our culture and history.

Secondly Shotton is my family name, and I undoubtedly being a famous son of the northeast deserve to have some form of permanent monument unto myself, upon reflection I have decided that the streets name being changed will suffice. As you will no doubt alter the street to the name suggested when I become infamous the world over, you may aswell change it now to save time and blushes.

Incase you are as yet unaware of my many achievements, allow me elude unto a few, I am the discoverer of the now world famous route to rievaulx prehistoric cave paintings, I have kept Teesside's kebab shops afloat over the last decade, I famously and bravely once threatened France.

It is not for me to boast, however now that I have shared with you but a small few of my many achievements, you see the importance of this small but necessary gesture.

I leave the arrangements to you.



Many thanks


Mike shotton
....................................................................................................................................

So letter  ready to send, will it be succesfull? well after those groundshaking achievements i cant see why not. I look forward to walking down Shotton road sometime very soon.

Application made.

day 71... praising unsung achievement!

something to lay praise upon!!

and then lay uponyour toast!!

day 71... Today i was bade to " praise an unsung achievement"

So i kept my eyes peeled ( i hate that term, it doesnt create a pleasent image in my head) for small, maybe overlooked achievements. I looked on the streets as i walked, maybe someone had put real effort into their garden and had heard not a word of encouragement.

 I stayed alert while reading the newspapers maybe something praiseworthy would catch my eye, i listened out as  my friends talked in the pub, when i went to get a coke from the bar i was sure to pay attention to the bar made.. her general manner, her service, the way she poured my coke, the consistency thereof, im afraid she did nothing to inspire praise... nothing noteworthy even on a small  level , however if next time she serves me the ring  in her lip is gone she will certainly recieve praise for that.

Later in the day at home i found it, something definately worthy of quiet accalades in my humble opinion, wnat to know what it was? say YES out loud or you wont understand the next paragraph!!.

O.K... i was relaxing in the living room late in the day  watching nothing imparticular on t.v, and feeling slightly peckish i headed for the kitchen toast i thought.. marmite on toast, now i have always been a big fan of the equally loved and maligned yeast based spread.

 I however has always had a defect, when you reach the bottom of the tub it becomes inreadibly hard to get out of there. When i reached into the cupboard i was greeted by marmite.. but it had evolved.. it was a plastic upside down standing squeezy marmite. Words can not express my delight at how easy it was to use... this i thought is note worthy!!

And so i fashioned a brief note to the makers thereof... it follows:-

...................................................................................................................................

Dear marmite team,

May i congratulate you wholeheartedly  on the creation of your new squeazable marmite, I have always been a lover of the black stuff, but often found myself frustrated by the difficulty experienced removing the last of the marmite from the old style tub.

Your new tub is a stroke of genius, for which you deserve comendation, well done fine sirs,  the contents are as good as ever ,  and the packaging that encases the heavenly goo has made the matter of removal from jar a pleasurable experience.

You have made this marmite user exceedingly happy.

many thanks
mike
xx

.................................................................................................................................


unsung achievement praised!!

day 70 boycott day

not today my friends

take it whichever way your want

well its true

fact

day 70 boycott day so today benrik asked me to boycott something thats never been botcotted before after a long think i decided that today rather than failing to spell check and using punctuation incorrectly i would boycott punctuation all together it took me a while to reach this decision i considered what to boycott long and hard i started with a massive group of possible things to shun for the day this list included  gravity shadows  monsters and of course punctuation while the others  as theories tickled me a great deal i realised there was a definate flaw to them the flaws being that monsters dont exist and so the  boycott  was largely down to them and would in reality be their boycott of real life now the other 2  id love to imagine  control over that by pure force of will i could cause shadows to cease but im not convinced my refusal to entertain them for the day would result in their abolition and gravity in reality has hold of me right now even if i was in space where there is zero gravity the laws  are still what would  dictate my floatyness and so punctuation it is today i didnt read  for an hour as i usually would as i didnt want the plague of  punctuation to infiltrate my ban the mere sight of a comma or a full stop would be enough to send me into an anarchic rage today id be incandesant i tell you so after not reading i had to choose carefully my viewing i rented 5 films yesterday on that wonderfull 5 films for 5 quid deal blockbuster are cracking off i was really looking forward to watching one in particular today i realised in the nick of time that the subtitles that were bound to be on the foreign film would undermine my valiant attempt at temporary non conformity with punctuation i watched a british film instead i thought as is natural when actively boycotting something some sort of demonstration might be in order so this i did granted it took place in my house as i couldnt risk an attack of semi colons from an unsuspected source but a demonstration it was none the less you should see a photo or photos above refusing to see speak or use punctuation for a day is a lot harder than it sounds i couldnt risk finding out the proper doseage of medecine and so a gulp with gestimate had to surfice i boycotted my chosen nemesis all day today finishing up with this blog you wouldnt believe how hard it is not to punctuate at some stages of a written piece i encourage you to give it a try being a little ocd  and terrible with punctuation anyway i started to worry while typing this blog as to whether the spaces between these words are in fact punctuation and also if the radio ive had on as a safe option all day has in fact been comprimising my stand against punctuation sneakily all day with pauses and changes of tone i decided id let myself off and stop thinking about it this my other worry is that this is only marinally worse than my usual punctuation well done to anyone who makes it all the way through this please let me know via comment if you do puntuation boycotted