Happy Birthday!

Was Jesus a Welsh Boy?



Watching the weather forecast today I noticed on the map of Wales that there is a place called Bethlehem! Could it be that our saviour is actually Welsh?! Some would argue that of all the places appropriate for the saviour of the world to be born, the land of our fathers is clearly in the lead – but for years we had all bought into the ‘palestinian’ story. click here

Congestion charge revolution

Yesterday I went to Bristol with Chris – it was part of my birthday present from him. On the way over we got chatting about politics and somehow ended up discussing the idea of real high congestion charges in big cities (e.g. £80 to enter within a 10 mile radius with a car). To compliment this there would be a bike usage campaign.

Of course, those with disabilities would have a disabled sticker for their car which would allow the congestion charge to be waivered.

Anyhow, to cut a long story short – we decided that it would cause some kind of revolutionary backlash in the west. Over here we’re so engrossed in individualist consumerism and ‘rights culture’ that to infringe on someone’s ‘right’ to drive everywhere would create more disgust than the idea that innocent people are dying for no good reason in the third world.

Somewhat ironic?

“Why did Christ come into the world? To liberate people from sickness, troubles, from death. In its essence, Christmas is a holiday of hope.”

- Vladimir Putin (found via jesus-institute.org)

My Surprise Party

Instead of taking me for Japanese food we ended up at Jon and Cathy’s place, where all my friends were waiting to surprise me with a party. It was a real good surprise – one I hadn’t anticipated.

When I walked in it took me a few minutes to link the concept of a surprise party with the fact that everyone was saying “surprise” – so I kind of glanced around puzzled: “what’s this?” I thought…

Anyhow we had food and laughed a lot, played “a new tradition at our birthday parties” (ala Jon Matthias) – Pass the Parcel. It was the first time I had played PTP in years! At last I knew why no one had replied to my emails.

Thank you everyone – it was awesome! Click here for more photos.