November 20th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Articles, Just For Fun
I’ve just got home from town and written a blog post (which will appear next thursday for reasons which will be revealed next thursday!) however so not to keep you waiting for a new post here are some thoughts on town…
Firstly town is insanely busy and there seems to be a bizarre mix of Christmas and normality going on…back on the 7th November Queensgate (the shopping centre) launched their decorations and Santa’s Grotto (I can’t help but feel he should still be sleeping until December!) yet with all these decorations there’s no Christmas music playing so although town looks Christmassy it doesn’t feel christmassy (not that I want it to in November I’d just rather it was one way or the other!)…secondly because of all the Christmas stock finding anything in a shop seems to be an impossible task! In the three bigger shops I went into I had to ask where things were which in theory is easy however tracking down a shop assistant requires a lot of energy and wandering!
I think all this is a sign of getting older…there doesn’t seem to be any excitement in shopping in such a incredibly busy place…however I have a solution!
Wander into down during the daytime (before 4!) on a weekday and it’s quite empty, there’s space to breath…you can walk around the shop without tripping over 20 toddlers, 5 walking sticks and being rundown by an old (or just very fat) person in a mobility buggy thing and because there’s not a million people blocking your view you can actually find what you want!
I think I’m going to do all my Christmas shopping on a weekday…or online which of course is even more relaxed and has no risk of being tripped up or run over!
November 18th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
Blogging is a strange lifestyle…I say lifestyles because that’s what it is…clicking ‘publish’ after writing a few words isn’t where the blogging line is drawn…a week may pass when nothing appears on a blog yet the blogger’s mind is still at work pondering the next post.
So in the last week I haven’t been silent, I have in fact been pondering my next post. I’ve been thinking about a few things this week which will make their way into blog posts soon but for now the thought of blogging seems to be in my mind.
A blog is a strange thing really…I suppose it’s almost an online diary although often less personal but at the same time can be personal thoughts structured in a form ready to enter the blogosphere and find out what the world feels about them…blogging isn’t about complete thoughts…quantity or even quality it’s just about thoughts…well I think so anyway!
So with that thought I leave you…soon to return for more thoughts!
November 13th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Church, Just For Fun
We have an electronic drum kit at church…everytime I play it a little part of the drummer inside me dies…
November 11th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Current Affairs, Just For Fun
Taken from www.buynothingday.co.uk - link
Saturday November 29h 2008 is Buy Nothing Day, It’s a day where you challenge yourself to switch off from shopping and tune into life.
The rules are simple, for 24 hours you will detox from consumerism and live without shopping. Anyone can take part provided they spend a day without spending!
Buy Nothing Day is the biggest 24-hour moratorium against consumerism. People around the world will make a pact to take a break from shopping as a personal experiment or public statement and the best thing is - IT’S FREE!!!
November 10th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
November 7th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
I haven’t had a busy week just haven’t thought of anything to blog…it’s nice to so Obama won the elections for president…it’s also been nice to have some time to attempt to study for uni this week…it’s also been nice to pick up Pete Greig’s ‘God On Mute’ in the last couple of days for prep for mondays doodles with the same title.
Tonight was a fireworks/camp fire night…one of my favourite evenings on the youth group calendar…lots of fireworks and no causulties and apparantly young people don’t like soup…
I have a busy day tomorrow, I shall leave the house at 7:30 travel to derby for a day’s Child Protection/Advocate training then return and go straight to ‘The Point’, if I’m lucky I shall get home at 11pm!
I’m also speaking sunday evening at the Yaxley Youth Service which I’m looking forward to…it’s always nice to be asked to be a guest speaker…so it’s a busy weekend
You never know I might think of something interesting to blog!
In other news myself and Joel did some track mixing yesterday so there’s now a properly mixed version of ‘Escape This Town’ on my myspace page!
I know I never even said I was going but it’s been such a busy 8 days…last thursday I went to Sheffield to see Jo for the weekend, I returned home at 11:30 on Monday and left for Letton Hall at 12:30 on monday!
So the last few days I’ve been a leader on The CROPS Trust’s Letton Hall houseparty with around 70 young people and it’s been a brilliant funny and challenging few days.
I had the opportunity to lead worship on the first night which I really enjoyed, it’s great to lead in different settings and it was nice to have a bit more freedom on songs, styles and repeats!
I was also asked to lead a seminar on ‘How to read, understand and apply the bible’ and in planning that I found myself challenged and hopefully the seminar provided some useful stuff for young people…at some point I shall try and post all my notes online!
One of my favourite bits of Letton was the ‘Half Hour Hold’…a half hour slot each day of silence…It was great having a chance just to listen to nothing, to be able to read the bible a bit more and just ponder various thought…I highly recommend silence!
Anyway usual blogging should resume from now on!
October 12th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun, Youth Work
Last night at church was ‘The Point’ (the usual monthly Youth Service I’m involved in organised by The CROPS Trust. The difference was that for the first time we used the upstairs (church bit) of Park Road…it’s amazing what CROPS managed to do with what is usually a dullish building…moving the chairs out the way, adding some coloured lights and some backdrops made it look brilliant…and the smoke machine addition was just a bit of fun!
It was a great evening and was really nice to hear a real drum kit in Park Road again!
October 6th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
A commonly seen practice among many slugs is apophallation. The penis of these species is curled like a cork-screw and often becomes entangled in their mate’s genitalia in the process of exchanging sperm. When all else fails, apophallation allows the slugs to separate themselves by one or both of the slugs chewing off the other’s penis. Once its penis has been removed, a slug is still able to mate subsequently, but using only the female parts of its reproductive system.
October 5th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Joanna, Just For Fun
My sexy Apple Mac has a build in webcam and also a rather cool programme called Photobooth, it basically applies weird effects to your photos and lets you preview them before taking…here’s some of the best of the weird photos Jo and me came up with when playing this afternoon!
October 2nd, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
This afternoon I thought I’d wash my bedding amongst other things so I stripped the bed, grab clothes from the basked, fed the washing machine and sat back at my computer to plan sunday school.
I went back to the machine just now and inside the machine happened to be my apple remote (see picture) which I use to control my Macbook for watching DVD’s in bed, listening to music and for presentations.
To my amazement it appears to have survived the wash and still works perfectly…and it’s cleaner!
and now for my musing…
whilst putting underwear out to dry I was thinking that unless you had a day of going commando it’s impossible for a human being to have all their underwear clean at the same time, you will always have at least one pair dirty (or worn for those people who describe dirty underwear as underwear which one has soiled oneself in)
October 1st, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Current Affairs, Just For Fun
I’ve had a pretty busy first few weeks back in Peterborough what with residentials and uni and the like so keep finding that although I have things to blog I tend to never get around to physically blogging them.
So here’s my life in brief…
London - I’ve been heading down to London on tuesdays for lectures…it’s nice only have one day of them a week however tuesday evenings seem to have become full of meetings so last night I got home, had 10 minutes to eat then left the house again!
Letton Hall - I’m quite excited about getting to go to Letton Hall with The CROPS Trust as a leader in half term, I last went to a CROPS letton about 2 years ago. This time I’ve been asked to lead a set of worship which I’m really excited about and I’ve also been asked to lead a seminar on reading the bible.
Youth Services - I’ve been provisionally asked to speak at a youth service in Yaxley (Peterborough) early November which is exciting too as it’s not often I get invited to speak at youthy events! I also met with an anglican minister of a city centre church a few weeks back with the view of trying to organise some joint ‘City Centre Churches’ youth work in Peterborough and we set a date to do a joint youth service on the 23rd November which’ll take organising but be great!
Other New Events - We’re almost at the stage of launching a new lunchtime event for young people from the local secondary school who tend to wander into town at lunchtime. The event going by the name ‘Park up’ will see us open our doors on a monday lunchtime offering a ‘drop in’ style youth club. Also in the pipeline is some kind of more in depth, monthly get together for the older young people which should be fun too!
IPOD - Having now been in the world of ipod owners for over a month now I thought I’d reflect on the difference it has made to my life, there’s been two main aspects I’ve noticed a change…firstly when driving I now just plug my ipod into the car which means I get a nice range of music and I don’t spend time changing CD’s whilst driving which I guess makes driving safer! Secondly I’ve been listening to the ‘Holy Trinity Brompton’ church sermons (from their podcast) weekly on my train journey home from London and it’s really nice to feel ‘fed’. The variety of dynamic, interesting and challenging speakers means I actually get to hear a sermon each week at the moment rather than always being busy with youth work!
Anyway I think that’s all for now…in any spare moments I have I’m still trying to mix all the tracks I recorded during the summer…alongside finding I’m writing more songs I want to add!
September 22nd, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun
I cut the end of my nose!
September 18th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Cartoons, Just For Fun
During last nights church meeting (during which a massive 2 decissions were made) I did some doodling on my angenda for the meeting. We have been discussing Cafe Church for months and it was mentioned last night that the first event for Cafe Church could be ‘Carols at Costa’ so here’s my thought on the matter….
September 12th, 2008 by Mark Tiddy Posted in Just For Fun, Music, Worship Leading
Recently I’ve been leading more worship at church and also I’ve been listening to a lot more Five Iron Frenzy and it strikes me that worship songs tend to be very similar, all full of the same kind of language and all making very similar (yet worthy) points about God, however very rarely do you find a worship song with anything profound….I should add that by worship song I’m thinking of people like Matt Redman, Tim Hughes, Stuart Townsend, Ben Cantelon etc.
Although musically Tim Hughes and Matt Redman’s current albums are brilliant and will set a new goal for quality in Christian worship music the lyrics lack anything new.
This is where Five Iron Frenzy come in….I’ve been listening to a lot of their ‘Electric Boogaloo’ album which I believe is one of their best and the lyrics of the song ‘Far, Far Away’ have really struck me, they’re not overly profound but they seem to take a very different angle than the lyrics our average church songs take…so here they are:
Staring at the shoreline
wishing for some hope
the weight of empty fishing nets
is more than twisted rope
And underneath stern faces
they wait with baited breath
with broken hearts from hoping
while casting out their nets
See the figure on the shore
He speaks His words like plain men sing
His hands they still have holes in them
glory to the King
[Chorus:]
Can you hear the bells are ringing
far, far, away?
Can you hear the voices singing
far, far, away?
I know that one day soon a song shall rise
you’ll hear it with the sleep still in your eyes
And Peter was a liar
a traitor just like me
and Judas was a hypocrite
and Paul a Pharisee
When truth can be so distant
and hope evades our reach
Peter swam across the water
and found it on the beach
I hear they’ll hang you upside down
stretched across two boards
for hearing distant voices
and crossing to the Lord
The thing with this song is that theologically it’s brilliant, at the same time I think it puts things in a very different way….I hope you like the lyrics as much as I do.
I wonder if there’s a place for songs like that in church worship?
