A singer in my bloodstream......

.....stayed mainline all my life.

One of the many things people have commented about me is my somewhat colourful imagination. As a teenager I would often while away the hours in between thinking about girls and football writing short stories. They were mainly awful of course, but the ideas were there. It's something I've never properly followed up, as the mundane realities of life followed, and I, in turn, followed them.

But now the creative juices are stirring again. Having recently been made redundant, I'm at a crossroads. The notion of spending the rest of my working days tied to both a desk and a 9-5 schedule is something which fills me with as much terror as the prospect of one day in the company of Kerry Katona watching endless reruns of Big Brother. With this in mind, I sent off for a prospectus for an official writing course from the Writer's Bureau which arrived today. I've always had the ideas, I just need something to hone these ideas and bring them to life, and this could be the very thing. The course isn't cheap, and in the present climate of unemployment and parenthood, is a risk. Yet, the alternative of a life working for the man is just so unappealing. The next few weeks could certainly be life changing in the professional world of Planet Mac.

My daughter is a huge inspiration in this. I look at her with a mixture of pride, love and awe in equal measures. It truly is the greatest feeling in the world being a father, as clichéd as it sounds, and I want to be someone for her. I want her to grow up and tell her friends that the person's name on the cover of the novel in the bookstore is that of her father.

So, will I take the plunge and get professional help to further these ambitions? To be honest, it's been many years since I've had any real ambitions. Years of mindlessly toeing the line, heading towards retirement in that socially pre-determined path. There's a stirring in the air. Is it time to embrace it or let it go.....

How can't you see....

...the wilderness growing free?

The world is a fascinating place. I'd love to have seen more of it over the years, but many factors have combined to keep me pretty shackled to this wee island. I'm not the kind of person who'd enjoy being camped out in the middle of nowhere, nor resting among hundreds of grotty students in hostels. For me when I travel, it has to be nice hotels, or bijou bed & breakfasts. Add this to a distinct lack of cash over the years, and you can see they aren't healthy bedfellows. Now that I have a young family, thoughts of travel slip further into the backburner. Therefore my current thirst for exploring new places rests on the shoulders of the excellent 'Google Maps' service, and in particular, the all new and improved 'Streetview' feature. Well, I say 'all new', this feature has actually been in existence for some time, but has been limited to the USA, Australia, Japan, and bizarrely the route of the Tour De France bike race. Now however, it has been expanded to cover the UK, and various major European cities.

My initial excitement at discovering the UK was now covered was blighted somewhat when I realised Stirling wasn't to be included. It's funny, isn't it? I have access to virtual tours of many major cities around the world, and the first thing I wanted to do was wander down my own street to see if I was in. Not to be deterred, I had a wander down many of the streets in Glasgow and Auld Reekie, retracing my steps from many a drunken night out. Great fun. In fact, whilst snooping through the streets of Glasgow, I decided to have a virtual Subcrawl , only without the drink and the long walks. It was particularly insightful on the latter sections of the journey, as my memory during the actual event is somewhat hazy. I always wondered why I could never remember the Kelvinhall stop, and it transpires that I've been getting the Partick stop mixed up with it!

The Laurieston in Glasgow, one of the early Subcrawl stops

It was nice to see both Amsterdam and Florence included in the update, two great cities I've visited over the last few years. I managed to locate both hotels I stayed in, and 'walked' through many of the same thoroughfares as I did when there for real, even if this did bring back painful memories of walking to the top of the Campanile in Florence in searing May heat! Walking around American cities is always fun. You can investigate many of the seedier areas of Baltimore for example, and it feels like your very own episode of 'The Wire', or you can wander along the Miami boardwalks where I swear you can actually feel the sun. Talking of Florida, one of Stirling's twin cities is a town called Dunedin, and having a donner about there has fuelled my ambition to visit the place one day. I have this undoubtedly misguided perception that the locals would treat me like a king, as I reckon the Americans are more into sister towns than the folks here. I can just imagine the reception a Dunedin resident would get in the Anchor in St Ninians, for example.

Anyway, that's all for now, stay tuned for more nonsense tomorrow.

The roll of the wind....

..as we sail across the water.

Andy Murray's continuing quest for world tennis domination continues over the next few days as the surly Scot heads across to Miami for the Ericsson Masters, one of the nine 'Masters' series events, rebranded for 2009 as a '1000' event on account of the number of ranking points the winner receives. Murray is currently ranked number 4 in the world, and victory in Miami could see him leapfrog his nearest challenger, Novak Djokovic into 3rd spot. Both players lost in the 2nd round at this tournament last year, so won't have many ranking points to defend. Of course, the main obstacles in Murray's way will be world number 1, Rafael Nadal, a player who looks unbeatable right now, and Murray himself. Like compatriot golfer Colin Montgomerie, sometimes his biggest enemy is himself. With the right attitude, he should go a long way.

Talking of Monty, it was nice to see the big chap rewarded for reaching the impressive milestone of 500 European Tour events this weekend. He's been much criticized over the years for never winning one of the elusive 'Major' titles, and also because of his less than ebullient demeanour on the golf course. However, any player who wins the European Order of Merit eight times has to be respected. As I write this, the big chap has made a solid start to the current tour event, The Andalucian Masters in Seville.

In the world of gaming, this week I have been exploring the latest addition to the FIFA 09 game for the X-Box 360 - Ultimate Team. EA's attempt to mirror PES's Master League feature sees you attempting to build a team of the world's best players through a series of trading cards, and playing (offline or online) against other sides with your chosen players. Given it's merely an add-on to an existing game, it's pretty indepth stuff, and at the moment, I now have the likes of Vieira and Cambiasso playing for my Stirling Albion side. Realistic? I should say so. I'm still utterly hopeless at playing the game, however, so my online experiences have been pretty grim, as everyone else seems to be an expert.

And finally, to complete the day's sporting theme, Stirling Albion (the real one this time) face playoff rivals East Fife tomorrow afternoon at Forthbank in a must-win game for both sides. The two teams have been pretty disappointing in what has been a poor league this season, and from our point of view anything less than three points, and we can look forward to another season in this division.

Toodle pip for now.

Through the eyes of a child....

...the wonder of it all.

My first child is now just over seven weeks old, and today I found out they don't know their hands are attached to themselves, and won't do until they are around eighteen months old. I got to thinking how useful a defence this could be in later life. So many awkward situations could have been avoided by the use of a good 'I swear I didn't know these were my hands' line over the years.


Hi, and welcome to my first ever blog. I've shyed away from these kind of things in the past, through a mixture of uncertainty how it all works, and well, sheer laziness I guess. The internet has been a marvellous invention, arguably the greatest since the invention of the telephone itself, but there's an increasing number of people who use this tool to have their entire life story open for the world to see. I've often wondered whether I've wanted to be a part of that or not. Recently I joined a social networking site, and through this, I've conversed with many old friends and workmates, but I can't help feeling there's an air of desperation attached to it all. There's people on my 'friends' list whose every waking minute seems to be documented. Is this a cry to be noticed by people socially deficient in other areas, or just a bit of harmless fun to while away the minutes until the next episode of Dancing on Ice comes on?

Anyway, here I am, and after just two paragraphs, I don't know what else to write. This perhaps isn't the best sign for someone who used to write loads of short stories as a youngster, and still believes he has a novel in them, but there you are. And besides, my seven week old child has started doing what seven week old children do best. Cry.

Well, at least they think their hands won't be to blame.....