2010: Dating, d*cks, and Meat Loaf

If you rearrange the words in the title, it will make up a sensible title for the post, it’s a little Christmas game, I hope you enjoy it. I actually had a different title, but I’ve been informed it was quite offensive, so I’m playing it safe.

I thought I’d be normal and write a quick year in review, it seems to be the “in thing” right now, must be the time of year or something.

But I’ll make mine a bit different, it will contain minimal marketing stuff, mainly because I’ve not done any! I will however include some D9 Hosting stuff in there, so anyone looking for anything semi-serious to read wont be totally disapointed with the content.

**START WARNING**

This blog post contains mild references to genitalia, if you are offended by this, please don’t read any further.

**END WARNING**

The year started with January, but it must have been an uneventful month because I’m having serious trouble remembering it. I should point out at this point that I’m useless with dates (date dates, not date dates, more on that later), so if I say something happened in March, don’t take that as gospel, it probably happened in August.

February and March were the same as January.

This blog post is starting to sound like a bad idea.

Instead of doing things by the month, I’ll just think back to a few memorable things and talk about them, they may or may not be in chronological order.

Online Dating

One of the most amusing things that happened to me in 2010 was a foray into the world of online dating with a couple of friends, it’s led to many amusing stories being shared between us, none of which will ever be discussed on this blog.

To sum it up, I’d say a lot of the stereotypes are correct, there are A LOT of really crazy people on there, but some really nice people as well, a bit like life in general really.

So if you live in a village where the number of girls/boys aged between 18 – 26 (insert your own age range there) is less than 5, or if you just fancy meeting a few new people, I’d recommend giving it a go, if nothing else some of the profiles will make you laugh.

My favourite was the bluntness of this one:

“I’ve joined *name of dating site* because I’ve just found out I’m pregnant”

Meat Loaf & Malfunctioning Penises

This happened in December, I’m 100% sure of this because it was only 3 weeks ago.

As a birthday present for my Dad, I bought 4 tickets to go and see Meat Loaf at the Manchester Evening News arena. My Dad’s a bit of a fan, but so am I, so I killed 2 birds with one stone.

I managed to get good tickets, we were in the tiered seating right next to the stage, and around 7 rows back.

During one of the songs (Paradise by The Dashboard Light), Meat Loaf and his sexy (in an older woman kind of way) female singer stopped half way through, and proceeded to bring out 2 big mechanical penises that fired t-shirts into the crowd. As we were near the front, I thought the chances of us having a t-shirt fired at us were quite high.

After a couple of shirts had been fired, the female singer (Patti Russo) turned around and pointed her penis at us. She pressed the fire button, and the penis malfunctioned, she proceeded to take the shirt out of the penis and threw it to someone in the front row, I was disappointed.

It was a very good gig though, and it contained a few more stories that will never be told on this blog, but if you are into that kind of music and he’s in your area, go see him!

I’ll include a couple of Youtube clips for your viewing pleasure, be warned that they contain a little bit of naughty language, if you want to skip most of it, jump to 1m 60s on the 1st video.

Bobby Farrell & The Thompson Curse

Bobby Farrell was the male singer in the 70’s Disco group Boney M, he sadly passed away yesterday from currently unknown causes.

This on it’s own wasn’t enough to warrant a mention in this blog post, but read on, the plot was like the custard my mum put in this years xmas trifle, it thickens.

Here are a list of gigs that either me, or a member of my family have bought tickets to in the recent past:

  • Meat Loaf, 2008
  • Tina Turner, 2009
  • Elton John, 2009
  • Michael Jackson, 2009
  • Meat Loaf, 2010
  • Boney M, 2011

Out of all the above, the following went as planned:

  • Tina Turner, 2009
  • Meat Loaf, 2010

And the rest:

  • Meat Loaf, 2008 – Cancelled, cyst on vocal cords
  • Elton John, 2009 – Cancelled, bad illness
  • Michael Jackson, 2009 – Cancelled, death
  • Boney M, 2011 – Likely to be Cancelled, death

I also have tickets to see Peter Kay in October 2011, so I’d be very nervous if I were him.

D9 Hosting

Yay, a semi serious story from 2010 that doesn’t relate to music!

D9 Hosting has been going well throughout 2010, it’s gone from being a hobby to a full time job. So much so that we took the decision to get some staff in back in the first half of the new year, which allows us to offer true 24/7 technical support.

The first few weeks were obviously a little difficult whilst we got everyone trained up, but we have a good set of customers who were very understanding, and now that the staff are trained up, I’m sure any customers will agree that any technical issues are dealt with in a timely and efficient manner.

2010 was really a year of stabilization for us, we wanted to build solid foundations from which we could move the business forward in the coming years, and I think we’ve gone a long way to achieving that. There are still a few little things that could do with some tweaking, but all in all it’s been a very good year.

With a bit of luck we’ll be ready to go on a full on marketing spree in 2011 and take the number of sites we host past 20,000.

Other “D9 Stuff” to happen in 2010 included the launch of our official Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/D9-Hosting/20700629688

We should probably launch our own Twitter account as well, but….I have an intense dislike of Twitter :-0

I Went to Leicester

In November I drove down to a service station in Leicester to pick up a new car, can you tell I’m running out of things to write about?

I Tore my Groin

As you may (or may not) know, I’m a keen football player.

Back on August 15th I tore my groin. It’s now December 31st and I’ve only managed to play 2 games since, I think my football career may be coming to a cross roads.

Christmas

We had a Christmas in 2010, it was around 1 week ago.

Unfortunately my 88 year old Nan got rushed into hospital the day before Christmas eve, we were all prepared for the worst but thankfully after 5 days in Hospital she’s back home and back to her normal talkative whiskey drinking self. But I did spend most of Christmas going to and from the hospital.

That’s a pic of me and her from this past year:

I'm the one on the left

And I know what you are thinking, why on earth is Dan wearing a suit? Well I had to, it was a wedding.

But whilst we were at the hospital, it dawned on me where I get my warped sense of humor from – it’s from my Nan! A couple of quotes from the hospital include:

“You know we were going to have a big party for my 90th birthday, I think we should probably bring it forward a year just to be on the safe side”

“I’m like the Angel of Death, that old dear (looking at the person in the next bed) was fine when they brought her in 2 hours ago, and now her feet are blue and she’s unresponsive”

New Year

Who knows what the new year will bring, I suppose we’ll find out in 12 hours and 5 minutes time.

So a very, very belated Merry Christmas and a very, very Happy New Year to you and your family. I’ll be back in 2011, with (maybe) a more serious and relevant blog post.

Toodle,
Dan




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Comments

28 Responses to “2010: Dating, d*cks, and Meat Loaf”
  1. Thanks for an alternative review of 2010, the long stream of conventional end of year reviews hitting my inbox were starting to seem like turkey left overs – never ending and very boring!

    I hope your gran makes a full recovery.

    All the best to you, Dan for 2011!

    Stuart

    • Dan says:

      Thanks Stuart,
      It’s the same every year, there’s the odd good one but a lot are the same old stuff – you read one and you’ve read them all, I like to be different 😀

      Happy New Year!!

  2. Paul Hanna says:

    Hi Dan

    Thanks for another great post, I love reading them, we share the same sense of humour.

    Glad to here your Nan is ok and good luck for 2011.

    Happy New Year Dan from a cloudy Birmingham.

    Paul.

  3. SImon says:

    Hi Dan

    I have to agree with Stuart about the year end reviews and what a nice change your slight irrelavent one was.

    Have a great 2011

    and best wished for your Nan’s full recovery. here is quote from when I had to visit my dad in hospital,a nurse talking abouty the man in the next bed said “I thought he was dead he was breathing funny”

    Cheers

    Simon

    • Dan says:

      haha, good quote, we should introduce your Dad to my Nan, they’d get on like a house on fire….never understood that phrase.

      Happy New Year!!

  4. John says:

    Cheers Dan,

    Good luck and best wishes to you, your family and your business colleagues for 2011 and beyond.

    Good health to your Gran too. My Dad was 90 a few weeks ago, so quite a milestone.

    Must be a Yorkshire thing this Hugh More. Keep it up.

    Happy New Year and of course to Paula too,

    John

    • Dan says:

      Thanks John,
      Can’t beat a bit of Yorkshire Hugh More – What do you call a small tree that plays the guitar? Spruce Springsteen!

      That one makes me chuckle every time 🙂

      Happy New Year!!

  5. Hi Dan,

    You’re not supposed to start drinking til later tonight!!!!

    Other than that… Interesting post!… unless you happen to be Peter kay! – please don’t kill him , I’d like to go see him one day too!

    As for dating… why would a young handsome and nearly rich guy needto do on a dating site…hehe
    You should just get yourself to some IM seminars with Paula 😉
    She’d fix you up in record time 😉

    On a serious note – hope you’re Gran continues to recover and keep going to force you into spending some of your cash for her birthday 🙂

    Catch you in the new year mate….
    And do keep up the great service with D9 🙂

    Randy
    http://www.RandolfSmith.com

    • Dan (el_passo) says:

      You need to stop writing like a spam bot, your comment got spammed again!!

      I don’t moderate comments, so if you post one and it doesn’t show up right away, let me know as it’ll have been automatically sent to the spam queue.

      Paula has to vet anyone I meet on the dating sites before I’m allowed to communicate with them, and if they stand me up, she gets their details and gives them a good talking too :-d

      Happy New Year!!

      • Paula Brett says:

        On the contrary, you’re too bloody picky, Mister!!! Your list of must haves and must have nots is endless, lol! But yes, if they give you the runaround they get treated to one of my long stares!

  6. Dave says:

    Nice one Dan….The highlight of my November was probably nipping over the shop for a pack of sausages so your trip to Leicester was riveting in comparison….I read it six times.

    Cheers and Have a good 2011

    Dave

  7. Hi Dan,

    Hope your Nan recovers, nice quotes, and I guess you scrub up ok. Good post mate. One thing I like about your hosting is the support. It’s 100% excellent. You, Paula and your team are like a postage stamp, FIRST CLASS.

    Have a prosperous 2011 and I’ll “see” you in Support.lol.

    Am off to join your Facebook.

    Take Care

    Donald

    • Dan says:

      Thanks Donald,
      Lets hope we don’t follow the Royal Mails lead and increase the price of our 1st Class 😀

      Happy New year to you and your clan!!

  8. Gaz says:

    Hi Dan, still as bonkers as ever & we wouldnt want it any other way lol, meatloaf was a hero of mine when i was a young rocker in the 70s, God i feel old now.
    Anyway all the best & happy new year to you & all your family,
    Gaz

    • Dan says:

      You being a rocker in the 70’s makes me feel really young, I was only born in 85, haha!

      I love the old music though, can’t beat a bit of Meat Loaf, Springsteen and Fleetwood Mac.

      And on a slightly related note, and this is 100% true, on New years eve, the DJ lost track of time and at midnight there was no old langs eyne, just Paradise By The Dashboard Light, and I didn’t even request it!! Must be some sort of sign, but of what I have no idea.

      Happy New Year!!

  9. Hi Dan

    Hope you had a great new year and that…

    really want to go and see Lee Evens, Peter Kay is awesome to

    “The Advert he made should have won advert of the year”

    Go read Dan

    Danny

    • Dan says:

      Hi Danny,
      Happy new year!

      I think I’m the only person in the country that doesn’t like Lee Evens (or Evans?). I got his DVD as a Christmas present last year and it’s still sat here in the wrapper.

      Maybe I should run a competition and give it away…..

      • Dan says:

        …Or I could find a girlfriend who likes Lee Evans and give it to her as a gift, she’d be happy because she got a gift, and I’d be happy because it cost me nothing!

  10. Hi Dan,

    Great entertaining post as per, just wondering what new car you got if you don’t mind me asking. (bit of a hobby of mine) 🙂

    P.S Happy new year and Good Luck for 2011

    Alex

    • Dan says:

      Hi Alex,
      It was a 2006 BMW 320 D, it had only done 40,000 miles! It also has an AUX adapter so you can play your iPhone through the car speakers, and that’s all I know about it, I know nothing about cars!

      I tell a lie, I also know that it’s Silver, so if you can remember how dirty my black car looked last time you saw it, you can imagine what a Silver one will look like :-0

      Happy New Year!

  11. John McNally says:

    Dan, I saw Meatloaf at the NEC(Birmingham) and he put on a fantastic show, I’m disappointed he didn’t have the giant penises with him though. 😆

    I can recommend Internet Dating. I was married for 24 years, then divorced. I didn’t want to be the oldest swinger in town, so I joined match.com

    I’ve met a really lovely women, who I’ve been with for two years now. There’s no way I would have met her without the Internet. She lived 10 miles away for a start,(she doesn’t now). 8)

    John
    Leamington Spa, England

  12. Hi Dan,

    This was a very entertaining story! I enjoyed it. I hope your Gran is doing well now. I lost mine on last July (she raised me).

    I took the time to read your Bio, and I have to say that it is very inspiring! It served me as a motivational source. I look forward to your next posts.

    Greetings from Florida (USA),

    Ricky

  13. Dee says:

    Hi Dan
    I loved this post! I am a Lancashire lass and have a wicked sense of humour. My other half is a Yorkshire man and we have been together for over 30 years. We have had so much fun it is unbelievable. My Nan had a wicked sense of humour too. Wouldn’t buy green bananas after she turned 80.
    Regards
    Dee