Rich has just uploaded a selection of new photos to the web - an album entitled ‘Spring half-term 2009 – Brit Awards and, um, Bruce Grobbelaar'.

If you're reading this note on Rich's website, www.softbulletin.co.uk, then simply go to the photo section of the site to view these snaps. If, on the other hand, you're reading this note on Facebook - well, simply click here to be redirected...

A blog entry by Rich Fisher

The other day in my blog, I wrote a few words about what it was like to have a student from Spain come and spend a month living at my house.

One thing I didn’t mention though was a very amusing website that my visitor, Miguel, introduced me to.

Now most of you will almost certainly be familiar already with the online Encyclopaedia otherwise known as Wikipedia – which can be found at www.wikipedia.org

What I HADN’T been aware of though is that some mischievous tinkers have taken it upon themselves to create a spoof Wikipedia site called Uncyclopedia – which is packed to the gills with savagely funny entries for just about anything you can think of.

For instance, my beloved home town of Nottingham has it’s own page – with just one of the sections reading thus...

“Nestled languidly in a former colliery, this charming high-class resort plays host to some of the most dramatic scenery to be found anywhere. Recent changes in local Government policy have had a dramatic effect on the city's population. Generations of deprivation, poor educational achievement, low expectations, poor healthcare, gun crime, poverty, injustice, decades of underfunding, urban decay, social eugenics, bad planning and sheer bloody stupidity within the City's council of Warlocks have all been righted throughout Nottinghamshite, with the introduction of PR men to ensure any bad publicity is removed or challenged post haste. Costing almost half a million pounds PA, these public propaganda machines are still cheaper than actually fixing the problems faced by Europe's biggest Utopia, and a pittance when compared to the 'costs' of certain local councillors.”

You can view ‘Uncyclopedia’ by clicking here. Be warned though, if you do visit the site it’ll be a bit like the first time you discovered YouTube – you’ll end up on there for a good couple of hours..!

A blog entry by Rich Fisher

A few days ago, when I last wrote on my blog, I referred to some photos that I uploaded to the interweb*, showing what I’ve been up to during the first few weeks of 2009.

As I said, it’s been quite an eventful few weeks – not least because, for a four-week period from mid-January to mid-February, I was duty-bound to play the role of ‘host with the most’.

Many of you will know exactly what I am referring to here.

But for those of you who don’t – well, the school where I work recently had a couple of Spanish students spend a month with us as part of their teacher training. And I actually had one of them staying at my house for the entire duration of his stay in Nottingham!

The chap in question was a gentleman called Miguel, from Madrid – who can be seen in some of the aforementioned photos.

Now I’d like to say that I agreed to let Miguel stay at my house purely because I’m a nice person who will offer sanctuary to any waifs and strays.

As it happens though, my prime motivation was actually money!

Yes, funding from the students’ university in Spain meant that a tax-free lump sum of £400 was up for grabs for any staff members at my school who were prepared to offer one of the students food and shelter.

And on this basis, I was very quick to volunteer. After all, I’ve been so bloody skint in recent months that there are few things that I WOULDN’T do for several hundred pounds!

That said, as well as providing a welcome injection of cash, I also thought that having someone from another country come to stay for a while would prove to be an interesting and enlightening experience.

And so it proved.

One thing that was particularly interesting about being a host was something that happened before Miguel even arrived – namely, the reaction from certain colleagues at work when it was revealed that I would be hosting one of the Spanish students.

I’ve always found it interesting what perceptions people have of you – and I couldn’t help but detect a bit of incredulity from certain quarters about whether I had what it would take be a host. There seemed to be a certain degree of “Rich being host? How on earth is someone as haphazard as him going to manage to provide food and shelter for anyone?”

Contrary though to what people might expect, I am actually pretty domesticated on the sly.

And during Miguel’s stay, I quite enjoyed having an opportunity show off this side of who I am - and maybe surprise a few people in the process.

Indeed, the most enjoyable thing for me about having Miguel staying was the fact that it saw me embrace my love of cooking.

Yes, I do love cooking.

However, the twin factors of living on my own and having an incredibly busy life means that I don’t tend to flex my culinary muscles all that often.

More often than not, dinner round mine will be involve chucking a frozen pizza in the oven. Or cheese on toast. Or a trip to the chippy.

Being obligated in my role as host however to provide Miguel with an evening meal every day, I suddenly found myself forced to up my game considerably.

And yes, there were odd nights were it felt like a real drag.

Sometimes after all, when you come home feeling absolutely knackered after a tough day at work, the last thing you want to do is cook.

Generally though, it was great having an excuse to cook up a storm most evenings – and I like to think that I definitely broadened Miguel’s culinary horizons during his stay, by introducing him to all sorts of delights ranging from curry to the traditional English Sunday roast.

And I even entered new territory by having a bash at making some home-made desserts – including avocado and jalapeno-flavoured ice-cream!

Meanwhile, Miguel also introduced me to some Spanish fare. His first night after his arrival saw him knock together a mean Spanish omelette, while he also introduced me to the Spanish custom of drinking red wine mixed with Coke - which actually proved to be a surprisingly agreeable combination!

Sadly, Miguel never got round to making a paella during his stay. Mind you, the fact that I don’t eat meat meant that that was always going to be a bit of a challenge for him.

But anyway, enough talk of food – how did my guest and I get on?

Obviously, this factor was probably the biggest risk in my having agreed to be a host. After all, it was quite possible that I could’ve ended up with someone living in my house who I simply didn’t get on with – something which, obviously, would’ve been incredibly awkward…

Happily, this proved not to be the case.

Okay, so I don’t think Miguel and I are destined to be best mates for life. However, I’d say we got on pretty well – something that was probably helped by a shared love of football!

That said, the standard of football Miguel is accustomed to is worlds apart from that that I tend to watch of a weekend.

Yes, being from Madrid, Miguel unsurprisingly supports Real Madrid – one of the best teams in Europe. Naturally then, I think he was quite bemused by what he saw when I dragged him along on a freezing cold night to go and watch my team, Nottingham Forest, play a match against Sheffield Wednesday.

All in all, thiswas probably a bit like grabbing someone who’s done their food shopping in M&S all their life and taking them to Netto instead to get their groceries!

Still, I did take him for a pre-match pint and then post-match fish and chips from the chippy – and so if nothing else, he can at least claim to having partaken in all the important rituals of the British matchday experience!

Miguel’s stay also happened to coincide with our respective countries playing an international friendly match against each other – with the England team taking on Spain in Seville.

Miguel and I sat and watched the match together on telly – and with Spain the most in-form best football team in the world at the moment, it was no real surprise when they ended up comfortable 2-0 winners.

To his credit, Miguel was gracious in victory – though to be fair, with it only being a friendly match, I wasn’t particularly arsed really about whether England won, drew or lost!

Despite his love of football though, Miguel’s stay did actually disrupt my viewing of Forest!

Yes, with primary schools being incredibly busy places, I’d decided it’d be nice to provide Miguel with an opportunity to spend some time with the staff from my school in a more relaxed, informal setting. And so a few days after his arrival from Spain, I invited all my colleagues over to my house for an evening of food, drink and idle chit-chat.

Now I picked the date for this shindig a few weeks in advance. However, no sooner than had I told everyone, it was announced that, the very same night, Forest would be playing an absolutely massive game - an FA Cup tie against Derby, their closest rivals!

Naturally, this presented me with a bit of a dilemma.

The match was actually being televised live, so I could’ve just had it on on the telly while I had people round. However, with my colleagues being 95% female, I’m not entirely sure most of them would’ve really appreciated being made to sit through an entire match!

In the end, I decided on a suitable compromise. Yes, I would set my SkyPlus box to record the match, avoid all contact with the score… and then watch it ‘as live’ when everyone had gone home!

As it was, I was actually so pissed by the time my last visitor left that I ended up falling to bed, still not knowing the score!

I did however watch the match ‘as live’ when I got up the next morning. Had I known what a turgid 90 minutes it would turn out to be, I probably wouldn’t have bothered. But hey, such is the lot of the die-hard football fan..!

All in all then, I’d say that being a host was a rewarding experience – and not just in monetary terms!

Saying that though, my £400 did actually end up being slashed down to £390!

Yes, Miguel arrived at the beginning of his stay, and departed at the end of his stay, by bus. And as part of my duty as host, I was obligated to pick him up and drop him off on each of these occasions.

Having not perhaps read the ‘small print’ as well as I maybe should’ve done though, one thing I didn’t realise until a few days before the end of Miguel’s stay was that I was going to have to get up at 6am on a Sunday morning to drive him down to the designated drop-off point.

Needless to say, this would’ve been bad enough on ANY Sunday morning – however, this particular Sunday morning happened to be the morning after Valentine’s Day as well!

Needless to say, Miguel very quickly found himself being presented with a crisp ten pound note, and a copy of the Yellow Pages open on the page for local taxi companies…

A small price to pay to preserve the sacred ritual that is the Sunday morning lie-in, methinks..!

* If any of you are reading these ramblings on Facebook, you can click here to be redirected to Rich’s blog – where all the photos that he refers to can be seen…

A blog entry by Rich Fisher

Yesterday, I uploaded a load of photos onto my blog* depicting things that I’ve been up to so far in 2009. And though the new year is still young, I think it’s fair to say that it's already been fairly eventful in the World of Rich.

For starters, work has been busy, as I continue my endeavours on the primary education battleground.

But then to be fair, it usually is!

Away from work meanwhile, my house has also been a hive of activity recently, with various visitors having been over to stay… some just for a few days, and one particular person for a bit longer!

I shall write about those things another time though. Because now, I want to say a few words about the one thing that has dominated recent weeks – something that’s now all just about melted.

Yes, the biggest snowfall we’ve had in Nottingham in six years!

Now generally speaking, winter is by far and away my least favourite time of year. However, snow is something I am very fond of for lots of reasons.

One, I find it deeply amusing how just a few millimetres of snow never fails to cause mass panic and bring the UK to a complete standstill.

Two, I love the fact that a sprinkling of snow can make even the most drab landscape look like a picturesque Christmas card.

And three, I love the fact that a bit of snow is a perfect excuse to break out the good ol’ mulled wine!

But more than anything, snow, when you get enough of it, is simply bloody good fun!

I mean, throwing snowballs, building snowmen, going sledging – what’s not to like?

I’m pleased to report that the first two of these three activities were both something that I partook in during the current deluge of snow, though I didn’t actually build a snowman.

Saying that, I didn’t have to – because someone made one for me!

Yes, the early hours of Thursday 6^th February was one of several occasions during the last few weeks when it snowed during the night in Nottingham.

And that morning, when I stuck my head out of the front door first thing in the morning, I discovered that someone had built a snowman in my front garden – complete with a Nottingham Forest scarf round its neck!

Needless to say, this really made me smile!

And that’s saying quite a lot really - because I’d woken up in a particularly foul mood… owing to the fact that, the previous night, I’d sat and watched Forest lose 3-2 in a match against their arch-rivals, Derby County.

Amusingly, I still don’t actually know who it was who crept up to my house early in the morning and made the snowman!

Naturally, there are a number of people who I suspect may have been behind it – but all of them are denying any knowledge!

I am touched though that someone must have known that I’d be fed up because of the footy result, and decided to do something to cheer me up.

If it was you though and you’re reading this - thank you!

As it happened, Thursday 6^th February proceeded to get better and better – because hot on the heels of discovering the mystery snowman, I discovered that my school was having to close for the day due to the snow.

Now don’t get me wrong, I love my job!

However, no matter how much you love your job, everyone loves an unexpected day off!

And there was only one thing for it – yes, sledging!

Now when we’d had the first snowfall a few days earlier, I’d immediately found myself getting a bit of a bee in my bonnet about wanting to go sledging – something I’ve not done for years.

Not because I haven’t wanted to – but simply because we never seem to get enough snow these days in the UK.

And so it was that I set off on a bit of a mission to try and buy a sledge. Alas though, a good hour-and-a-half spent driving around Nottingham as part of this quest proved a fruitless exercise.

That said, I did come agonisingly close when I popped into a branch of Toys R Us, and spotted a couple of plastic sledges sat tantalisingly across the store.

Alas though, I wasn’t quite quick enough – because just as I began making a beeline for them, someone else got in there first and grabbed both of them… none other than Forest striker Nathan Tyson!

And so it was that I went home empty-handed - and ended up making a bit of a gamble. Yes, I resorted to eBay!

Suffice to say, you could buy pretty much anything on eBay – so getting a sledge was never going to be a problem.

BUT… would my purchase arrive before all the snow melted?

Gloriously, the answer proved to be yes! And after recruiting a fellow sledger in my friend Emily from work, the two of us spent a Thursday afternoon when we would ordinarily have been teaching kids hurtling down the slopes at Nottingham’s beautiful Wollaton Park.

And apart from a slight moment of panic when I lost my phone in the snow, it was a right laugh!

Of course though, snow can outstay its welcome – and I think it did reach that point with the recent deluge.

In my job, for instance, it can play real havoc.

For most of the last couple of weeks, the children at my school weren’t allowed to go outside at all during their playtimes, because it wasn’t safe for them to do so. And when they have to be cooped up inside all day, kids tend to go a bit mad – which makes your job as a teacher hard.

And my weekly game of five-a-side footy ended up getting cancelled last week cos of the snow, which was annoying.

That said, I am glad we’ve had a bit of snow.

Having spent seven quid plus postage on it, I just hope I don’t have to wait another six years before I get to use it again..!

* For the benefit of any of you who are reading these ramblings on Facebook, you can redirect yourself to Rich's blog site by clicking here.

A blog entry by Rich Fisher

Today I’ve been thinking a lot about birthdays – as the next couple months sees quite a few coming up among the important people in my life.

First of all there’s Cat, long-suffering ‘other half’ of my brother Al - whose birthday actually falls on February 14th.

Later on in February meanwhile it’s my mum’s birthday on the 22^nd; while Al himself has his on March 16th.

All in all, I think it’s fair to say that the timing of these three birthdays isn’t exactly ideal!

Well, Cat’s being on February 14^th is pretty cool I suppose.

After all, it means there’s always a lady in my life who I can send a card to on Valentine’s Day – even if, very much like 2009, it’s one of those years where my lovelife is proving to be a total car crash!

That aside though, the early part of the year is usually of course a time when we’re all pretty bereft after the excesses of Christmas – both in terms of decent ideas for presents… and also, perhaps more critically, the cash to buy them!

In view of this, I’m pretty pleased to say that today saw me successfully sort out presents for all three of the aforementioned people.

And I’m pretty pleased with what I’ve got for them too!

Needless to say, I’m not going to spill the beans as to what I’ve got for them, in case any of them are reading this!

However, given that I’ve had birthdays on the brain, it seems timely to write a bit about a website that I’ve become acquainted with recently, that’s well worth a visit if any of you find yourself with any imminent need to buy a card – whether it’s for a birthday or otherwise.

And that’s www.moonpig.com...

You may have already heard of Moonpig, as it’s been quite heavily advertised on TV recently.

If not – well, it’s basically a website where you can actually design your own bespoke greetings card, and then have it printed and sent to you… or sent directly to the intended recipient!

How cool is that?

The price of having a card made with Moonpig surprisingly affordable too. There are all sorts of templates that you can use – for instance, there are loads of ones based on popular magazine or newspaper front covers, where you can change the headlines to be about the person that you’re designing the card for.

I went down this route a couple of months ago when one of my work colleagues left to start a new job as a deputy head teacher at another school.

The colleague in question, Lisa, has a massive love of motorbikes. And  so after a bit of a tinker around Moonpig, below is what I came up with…

Who knows, with the rise of Moonpig, maybe the ‘off the shelf’ greetings card will end up becoming extinct eventually?

Though I hope note, as birthdays would never quite be the same without getting at least one of those generic ‘Happy birthday nephew’ cards with a picture on the front of an angler or a formula one car – which are always touching when you’ve never shown any remote interest in fishing or motor racing..!