New Hat!

I'm a baseball cap type of guy, always have been since i was younger, or well not to young i think i started wearing a baseball cap when i was about 13 i think. The reason behind not wearing one any younger was because i had a really bad thing about my ears, i always thought they were to big and remember referring to them on many occasions as dumbo ears, infact sometimes i still actually do.

But like i said when i was about 13 i think i started to get more into them, it seemed like it was the fashion and everyone was doing it so i jumped on the bandwagon and began to wear one too, and up until now i have never left the house without it. Actually before i moved here and at the start when i was living in Sweden i refused to take it off entirely, i would wear it all day everyday and only took it off to have a shower, bath and go to bed.

Something recently changed though, after watching the first season of New York Ink, the TV show about tattoo artists in the NYC area, i noticed that the lead tattooer and the shop owner who is none other than Mr Ami James was wearing a different type of hat, something i like to refer to as "The Grandad Hat"

Now the reason i always referred to this as "The Grandad Hat" was simply because whenever i seen a old man who was wearing a hat, it was always one of these, hence the name. But after seeing Ami James sport one of these i actually thought to myself how cool it actually looked and immediately turned around and told Marie "That hat is so cool, i so want one of those". 

Now i wouldn't say i was a fashionable type of guy, i'm the type of gent that wears the normal T-Shirt, Jeans & Trainers and that is about as fashionable as i get, although back when i was about 17 i did used to always wear a nice shirt and a pair of jeans with my trainers. Something my mum always thought i looked really smart in when i was out, and seeing as this was my whole outfit on a daily basis it made me feel good inside, but of course that has changed and i have gone back to the old t-shirt and jeans.

So on the weekend we decided that we would take a family trip into town, do a little shopping have a coffee and something to eat at a local café and generally just have a nice day out, but i was on another mission the mission was to find one of these hats and purchase it. Marie had recalled that she had seen them in one of our local clothing stores called H&M and we took a trip into there and found them, i instantly fell in love and found one that would fit and bought it.

My daughter immediately started to laugh when i put it on, thinking that i look absolutely ridiculous with it on, but i don't care i think it looks awsome and i'm going to wear it with pride, however seeing as i now have my stylish cool hat, Marie now reckons that i need to completely change my appearance altogether which means no more jeans & t-shirts but instead i need to now get myself some shirts and go back to my old look. I don't really mind this if i'm honest as i used to feel good when leaving the house in a shirt and jeans, but i hate shopping, and i especially hate cloth shopping. But i guess i'm just going to have to bite the bullet as they say and go and do it.

Damn i look awsome in my new hat!

I would ask that you ignore the stupid look on my face, i was sitting on Skype to my parents at the time when Marie decided it would be a great time to take some pictures of me, and for some stupid reason i think i'll just blame my mum i cannot take good pictures no matter what, my eyes always make me look like i'm drunk and i have no idea what was going on with my lips.

So what do you think? You think i sport this awsome looking hat well?

Until next time, i hope you all have a great day!

The Pizzeria Adventure.

Something we don't normally do as a family in my house is go out for dinner, i know it's quite a big thing in countries like America and such like but over here in Sweden, it's not all that common. I think the Swedish people in general just like to gather at home at the dinner table and eat dinner together there, but on Friday we decided that for a special treat for the kids that we would take a little stroll up to our local pizzeria here in Järpås and treat them to a pizza.

Unfortunately unknown to us until we had got up there, our son Alexander had decided that he would eat not one but SIX pancakes at school for lunch which left himself rather stuffed. We decided however that this was not going to stop our little family evening out and that we would still treat everyone to a nice evening.

Now after being brought up by parents who always said "If you don't finish your dinner, then there will be no treat after it" i have of course taking up this principle myself, this is probably one of the many things myself and Marie disagree on when it comes to parenting, i remember the first time i ever came out of it in front of our teenage daughter (i think she was around 11 at the time) and her response which made me laugh was "There is always room for candy and goodies after dinner". I can still remember to this day my response being "That is the most stupidest thing i have heard in my life, if you are to full to finish eating your dinner, then are you to full to eat crap afterwards".

On the other hand i was willing to make a slight exception for Alexander, bearing in mind that he had been allowed by the school to eat six pancakes for dinner, i was really shocked by this but apparently at school here in Sweden the children go up and pick up their food themselves. Something we never got to do when i was at school many moons ago, but perhaps this has changed? I don't know but it's something that happens over here at least. But although i was ready to make the exception for Alexander, i did not have the same feeling towards the other two.

Once there we made our order, myself and Marie got our normal dish, which is the kebab plate, which consists of chips, salad and alot of kebab meat and the twins got a small children's pizza which was split in half for them to share, leaving them with about 6 slices each, Mikaela our oldest opted for some Kebab wrap with alot of salad and stuff in it. The minute the food i arrived and i seen Mikaela's choice i knew for a fact that she would not finish it i mean the thing was gigantic, i don't know anyone in the world that would be able to finish that dish so in the back of my head i was thinking well aslong as she finishes half of it i will make the exception for her.

In the end Alexander managed to eat 4 out of the 6 slices and Maximus 5 out of the 6 so they ate pretty well. Mikaela managed to eat about half but had left quite a bit on her plate, so i had said that we should not give them anything good after it as they hadn't eaten as much as i would have liked, plus every child had turned around and said the magic words "I'm to full to finish this"
Now at the pizzeria the guys their normally give the children a lollypop after the meal and the boys of course knew this, so straight after saying that they were full they were asking about their lollypop's, myself of course being the Hitler/enforcer of the family turned to them and said that there would be nothing because they had not finished what they had chosen for dinner.

But just as we were leaving the man behind the counter like always handed the boys their lollypops, i could not believe the look on Max's face, it was the look of "Ha, i got something anyways. You don't decide anything here!". Normally i would let this type of thing go, but Max is in a phase right now where his attitude and cheek towards the family is at a all time high and i decided that i would like to bring him down a peg or two. Perhaps this was childish of me? i have no idea really, but i think as a parent it is my duty to instil certain things into my children so with the look of "Oh really" i turned quickly around and said "You may have the lollypop Maximus, but you are not allowed to open it or eat it". Lets just say the minute those words left my mouth the smirk left his face very quickly.

In the end and after about 3 hours after we had eaten i eventually did give in and allow them to eat their lollypops, i thought it was only fair as although they didn't actually finish the plate they both did really well, especially Alexander after eating all those pancakes at school and still managed to eat 4 out of the 6 slices of pizza he was given, do i feel bad for given in eventually? well yes i do, as i said before i think it is our duty as parents to teach our children good traits so i really shouldn't have but i did, and at least i waited a good few hours after the fact before i decided to give in and allow them to eat there lollypops.

Do you think i did wrong? do you think i was immature in the way i handled how Max was smirking and the look of you don't decide anything?
I would really appreciate some feedback on this, so feel free to drop me a message, or perhaps share a story about something similar.

But for now i think i shall bid you all farewell.

Whatever

There is few words in the English language that annoy my fiancée Marie who is Swedish if you didn't already gather since i'm now living over here. There is a few but they mainly annoy her for the simple fact that she finds them hard to pronounce and in all honesty most of these words even i have trouble with.
However if there was one word that i think she could choose that she absolutely hates, loathes and despises it would have to be the word "WHATEVER".

I should perhaps invest in one of these for Marie?

Why you may ask? well it's one of the words that i use very frequently, i always believed that women as a whole enjoyed having control, me? i'm the laid back guy who doesn't really care all that much about things like décor, dinner and things like that and as i said i always thought women loved being able to choose stuff like that themselves. But Marie? she hates it worse than anything in the world.

So the other day when we were discussing what we should have for dinner and our son Max decided to hop on my bandwagon of i don't know, so just whatever you find is fine set her off the edge i think.

The whole situation started off last Wednesday, Marie had been at work all day and returned but hadn't bought anything for dinner, yes we are one of those family's that normally buy dinner on a daily basis, i know it's a little bit stupid but sometimes that's just how things pan out, but after speaking to me and me giving the normal response of, i have no clue what to have for dinner just pick up whatever she decided that perhaps the twins might be able to help with our little dilemma.

Upon asking Alexander what he would like for dinner seeing as it was just myself, Marie and the twins home that day (Mikaela, our oldest daughter was staying in town with her gran because she had majorettes practice) he decided he wanted pizza from the pizzeria, this was a no go of course because myself and Marie had already planned to do this on Friday as a little treat and something for us to do as a family. But Alex being his normal self stuck to his guns and refused to budge from Pizza.

Seeing as we had no luck with him Marie then proceeded to ask Maximus: 

Marie: "So Max, seeing as nobody else in the house has any idea's for food what would you like for dinner tonight?"
Max: "I don't know"
Marie: "So you have no idea at all what you would like?"
Max: "Whatever...."


I could see the little glint of red in Marie's eyes as the words left his lips, i honestly thought she was going to have a nervous breakdown, but instead decided to inform me that he was indeed my child, maybe not by blood but 100% by personality. I couldn't do anything but laugh my ass off, i know it probably didn't help the situation but i just couldn't help myself, safe to say Marie was not amused and just left the house leaving myself and the boys laughing about it while she once more had to venture up to the local shop here and find something.

Unfortunately we ended up with sausage and chips for dinner, which well wasn't exactly the best in the world, kinda boring if i have to be honest, but i guess that is what happens when you don't tell someone what you want for dinner.

Is there something out there that you absolutely hate hearing that is similar to this story, i would love to hear it so drop me a comment and let's all share that word that really irritates us to the bone.

But for now i shall bid you all a good day, take care everyone.

I Got Featured.

I can't believe it, i opened my e-mail account the other day to be spammed like crazy from the website Bloggers.com. It is one of those websites that you can place your blog on so that more people can see you and perhaps come and visit and maybe drop you a comment or two, and apparently every week the people that run the website picks a few websites to be featured on their main page.

I was absolutely shocked to have been picked for this week's featured blogs but also honoured, it's really nice to be recognized and don't know anyone in the world that doesn't feel the same.

Unfortunately i changed my twitter account name recently from @ben_moffat to @TheAngryScot and for some reason i am unable to login to their website anymore using my twitter account, this has become a bit annoying since after being a featured blog i have become quite popular on their website and have had alot of friends requests, comments left and private messages but am unable to respond to any of it. So i have contacted bloggers.com and am hoping that they will get back to me with a resolution very soon.

But i thought i would just share my news with everyone because i am absolutely delighted right now, i started out blogging only a few months ago because my fiancée thought i would be pretty good at it, and that it would save me spamming my Facebook & Twitter with my random thoughts and comments, but i didn't think that i would have so many people interested. Now im thirsty for more, of course i blog because i enjoy writing and i find it fun but getting recognition from other bloggers just drives you to want to do more, get featured more and do other fun things.

I have also recently been invited to another website called Triberr.com which has turned out to be another great experience and helped me get my blog out their so i would like to thank @Bobbutterbottom for recommending me, and of course to @Erinwallace  who is the tribe leader. Really happy that i joined the tribe and met so many lovely people.

But for now i will bid everyone farewell, and hope you all have a great day! Mines just got alot better!

Screenshot From My Computer

First School Pictures.

It finally came around, on Tuesday the boys had there very first school picture taken. Marie had picked out some some very nice clothes for them to put on which included a nice shirt and a pair of jeans.

I have to admit i was pretty excited about this event, i mean it's there very first one what parent wouldn't be! Although it always brought back memories of when i was a kid and how much i hated photo day, the thought of standing in a line with all your class mates and then having to sit in a seat in front of everyone and do that fake smile just made me really feel stupid.

But school photo's are a great thing, it not only brings you joy to look at them and gives you a nice photo journal of how they grow up year after year, but it can also be used later in their lives as ammunition when they bring their first ever girlfriend/boyfriend home, I think it's every parents right to do this. I personally had no choice in the matter when i was growing up as my mum and dad insisted that our school pictures were framed and put up on the wall of the staircase leading up the bedrooms and the most recent ones placed on the wall in the livingroom. I mean talk about embarrassing!
At least now i get to have my own revenge, taking these embarrassing things out on my children, i mean us parents deserve a little bit of fun don't we?

Unfortunately i did what every dad in the world shouldn't i combed there hair made it all nice and looking respectable and then proceeded to give them their baseball caps to put on, oops i guess you could say. I neglected to think that placing their baseball caps on their heads would cause their hair to become once more a mess, so the preview of the photo's got sent to us and of course i did a stupid thing according to Marie, she hasn't said anything but i know she's thinking it.
Safe to say i have learned a valuable lesson today, but i thought i would take the previews of the pictures and stick them up here so that everyone could see them, i'll apologise to everyone i guess for their hair hehe.

   (Alexander "Left" & Maximus "Right")

Apart from the hair, and the fact it seems that Alexander decided to take one of his buttons out the photo's are brilliant and look forward to getting them home soon, so that we can buy some frames and put them on the wall for everyone that ever enters our house to see.

But until next time, i bid everyone a great day.

He Just Refuses.

Well the day finally came and we could say goodbye to Alexander's cast, i got to say and maybe it's wrong of me being a parent and all, but i was so happy when Monday came around and we could cut the damn thing off. Not that it was much of a problem to deal with him, but having to push the wheelchair up that staircase on a daily basis for 3½ weeks just killed me.
Perhaps that actually says more about me, and the fact i need to get back into shape, or at least get to a shape that doesn't consist of weighing 93kg (205lbs).

Marie had told me that on the way back from school on Monday, he was telling Max our other son how he was going to run and run so fast that Max wouldn't be able to catch him and continued to tell him all the other fun stuff he was going to do now that it was time for his cast to be removed.

However the reality was alot more different, instead of running around and jumping up and down and doing everything he said he was going to do, he has instead decided that he can't walk still or at least not properly, so instead of walking normally he places the foot that was broken onto it's toes and then hops on it until his other foot lands. Basically limping along, we have tried everything to explain to him that nothing will happen if he tries to walk normally, but instead of trying he just stands there and comes out with things like "I don't want to".
Trying to show him that he is already putting all his weight on that foot anyway just doesn't seem to sink in to him, i'm just not to sure what to do next but leave him to it and hope that in the next coming days that he just decides to try.

Even when Marie spoke to the after-school personal yesterday when collecting him how he had been, since it was his first full day without his crutches and wheelchair, they said that he had not attempted once to walk on it normally and was just limping around, and if he was going to go from one room to another instead of even walking he would crawl instead.

I have to admit that i do feel sorry for him still, i think it's a shame he is obviously still a bit scared that if he tries to walk normally that his foot might break again, but at the same time and i guess this is where the bad parent comes out of me, i think he is just being silly, and needs to just do it.

I have tried all forms of motivation and so has Marie but nothing seems to work, and if i am honest i got a bit annoyed with him yesterday while walking up to the school, since what is normally a healthy 10/15 minute walk turned into nearly a 20/25 minute walk.
Granted there is no rush to get up there, but i just couldn't stop myself being aggravated at him for not trying. I realise that this is the wrong thing to do, but i think it's just my nature and one of my many flaws as a person/parent.

Anyone had any experience with this before? and if so how did you deal with it and handle it. This is the first time any of my children have broken anything, and i have absolutely no idea about how to deal with things after the fact, we have been assured from the doctor at Marie's work that his foot has healed now and he should have no problems walking on it but still he refuses.
So if anyone has any tips or tricks to help us out, please feel free to drop me a comment below.

But until next time, take care everyone!

The Meeting.

Today i had my first ever meeting with my new appointed job coach from the company TechROi that are based in a town quite close to where i live called Trollhättan.

If i had to be honest with myself i was pretty damn nervous this morning about the whole thing, i think it was probably fear of the unknown. I think Franklin D. Roosevelt said it the best with his statement "The Only Thing To Fear Is Fear Itself". Although i don't think i had anything to be nervous about but it still didn't stop the whole feeling i had inside.

Basically the whole point of the job coach is to help me get a job, they can't obviously physically get me a job themselves but they will help with things such as making my C.V. better and making it more aimed towards the company that i am applying to, it is something i need alot of help with since my current C.V. is pretty awful to say the least, so i think some pointers in that direction would be pretty handy. She has also said that she has a boss at her company that deals with I.T. positions so once we have revamped my C.V. slightly and got it looking a little better that she will take it to him for his point of view as to how we can improve it further which seems very positive.

Another thing we will go over is interview techniques, this is something i am in desperate need off, the main reason is that i have not been in a interview for a job in i can't count how many years now and even when i was doing them i always left them feeling a bit awkward, you know at the end of the whole interview the interviewee comes out with those dreaded words, "Is there anything you would like to ask?" i have never ever been able to work out what the hell you are meant to say, obvious things come to mind like pay, holidays etc but i think going into a interview and asking those types of questions make you seem like you are only interested in one thing and that is money. So in the past i have normally ended up just saying "No, i think everything has been covered and i am happy with everything" which again is probably not the best way to end a interview.

On top of all that we will be going over what to wear, i know that might seem a little bit strange to some people, but here in Sweden things are done very differently to other places around the world, i think the word that springs to mind when i think of people in the work place in Sweden is "Casual" the first time i ever entered the job centre here, i was greeted by a gentleman in shorts and a t-shirt, i honestly couldn't take my eyes off him and remember thinking to myself, what the hell is he doing? If i cast my mind back to Scotland and the way the people dress there it is alot more formal, Shirts, Ties and Suits. Unless your a delivery driver or something like that but even they wear a company uniform of some kind, pair of trousers and a company t-shirt or something, so i think some pointers in how to dress for certain types of interviews is indeed required.

But overall i came out of my first meeting with Kicki (Yes that is her name, very strange i know) feeling very positive, i was told before from friends around Sweden that there is many job coaches in Sweden who don't really care and don't want to do the job they have been set to do, but it was certainly not the impression i received from mines, i was given a pen drive from her so that i am able to place my C.V. on so that we are able to work on it and other items that we shall no doubt do in our 3 months that we have together, and a very informative binder with lots of information about C.V's and other aspects of the job coach experience. So i am currently home with alot of information to digest, and alot of things to get done before she rings me to confirm our next meeting. But i have a really great feeling about how the whole process went and i am looking forward to our next meeting.
If it continues to go as well as this one did, i'm sure that i shall be in some sort of employment in no time.

But for now i think i shall bid everyone farewell and go and have some dinner as i am absolutely starving, so until next time, take care.