My Navel

Tonight Matthew, I am staying in the Thistle City Barbican hotel; and my, what a shite hotel it is.

I went for the Thistle City Barbican because I have learned my lessons about shite hotels. I have stayed in a couple of dives in my time; there was this one hotel I stayed in near Victoria Station in London - it was only £40 a night and I truly feared for my life during my stay. Still, the room was spacious even if I did think I was going to end up being murdered in the night. Learning this lesson I vowed never to stay anywhere as cheap and nasty again.

Next up, I stayed in the Tavistock Hotel which was pretty horrendous, but at least I didn’t fear for my life. Again, my standards were raised a notch.

Many pleasant stays further down the line and I haven’t ever regretted my decision to stay a bit more up-market in my hotel choice. Tonight, I pushed the boat out a little further and stayed in the Thistle City Barbican, paying just over £200 for the privilege. With high hopes, I sauntered in to reception and checked in - all good so far - the place looked rather spiffing. However, the journey to my room revealed a rather shabby interior in great need of renovation. My room was worse.

Problems with my room at the Thistle City Barbican…

• No aircon (@ £200 a night I fucking expect aircon!)
• No iron or ironing board (despite being listed as in the room in the literature).
• Barely enough space for the bed.
• Dirty walls.
• Wall corners so damaged that the brickwork is visible under the crumbling plaster.
• Crappy office suspended ceilings (I didn’t check if you could see into the next room by lifting the tiles).
• Awful furniture that was coming apart at the Formica seams.
• The toilet flush barely functioned.

This is a Thistle Hotel - I thought these were supposed to be good!?

- note: I would use an interrobang at the end of that last sentence if I were using Unicode fonts.

Then I went for dinner.

On the surface of things, the restaurant was okay. Shiny decor, mostly clean, seemingly attentive staff. I ordered quickly, my wine arrived promptly; it was a breath of fresh air.

Then my main-course arrived before my starter. The main course was wrong and was whisked away while my starter was prepared. The starter came and was consumed and the main-course followed swiftly. It was quite clear that it had been kept warm; the plate was red-hot and the side salad (on the hot plate) was wilted to mulch. My second glass of wine sat on the bar for ten minutes before I left the table and retrieved it myself. My burger, which was supposed to be 100% British beef was dry as a nun’s mimsy and tasted like it had heralded from Iceland.

After I finished and my plates were cleared away, I sat for ten minutes awaiting my bill. I left before it arrived; hell, they had my name a room number.

All-in-all, my stay at the Thistle City Barbican was unpleasant and I would recommend it to no one. It is over-priced and tatty.

Just in case anyone is under any illusions about which hotel I am talking about here, it is…

Thistle City Barbican
Central Street
Clerkenwell
London EC1V 8DS

…and it is shite.

I recently decided that it would be good to have a lower dependence on mains electricity and all the benefits it brings. We suffer quite frequent power cuts in the rural area we live in, and it is only a matter of time before we run out of camping gas during one of these outages.

So, taking my destiny into my own hands, I bought a fire-steel on Wednesday, and ever since I have been itching to burn stuff; the office isn’t a great venue for this, but the weekend slowly came around and I set out to make fire.

I am lucky enough to live on the border of a forest, so after putting my son to bed on Friday, I trekked off into the woods looking for fallen silver birch. I have read the silver birch bark makes for good tinder and it wasn’t long before I found some. In between flailing wildly at horse flies, I selected my fallen branch and set off home with it.

On my outing I found some intact clay pigeons. These, I thought, would make good fire-starting vessels (and candle holders) being shallow dishes. I later discovered that they were made of some sort of brittle plastic rather than clay, which was slightly embarrassing.

I spent most of Saturday sawing my log into chunks and peeling off the bark. My son’s bedtime came and went and it soon came time to prove to the world that I could make fire. Like Prometheus, I gathered my fire steel and tinder with the sole objective of making things burn.

I took my newly-harvested birch bark shavings and my fire steel and loaded the clay. With trepidation I positioned the steel and struck, and I stuck, and I struck. I was beginning to lose heart when the damn-stuff caught; Prometheus I wasn’t, but by god, with a little bit of gentle nurturing, I had fire. I took the clay pigeon, complete with burning wood shavings to the chimnea that I bought the wife for her birthday and successfully lit a blazing fire. It was at this point I discovered that the, now slightly wilting, clay pigeon was actually made of plastic. What was the world coming to? Does trade descriptions know about this?

I sat back and enjoyed the blaze, but I couldn’t help wondering if I was missing something. It must have taken thirty strikes of the steel for the tinder to catch and my inner survivalist was feeling somewhat inadequate.

I remembered reading about char cloth and, wondering if this would make fire-lighting any easier, I ventured forth into the kitchen to find biscuit tins. Returning to the fire armed with a tin and a shirt that was now a bit too small (the onset of middle-aged spread taking its toll), I began to take the shirt apart with a sharp knife. I loaded the strips into the tin and punctured the lid before placing it onto the somewhat towering inferno that was building in the chimnea. Within ten seconds, the lid popped off and flames burst from the sides; not wanting my shirt of be reduced to ash, I took a length of birch log and prodded the lid back down. Jets of fire sprang from the puncture holes like some out-of-control Bunsen burner, and every time I withdrew my birch log, the lid popped off and flames erupted from the sides. Resolving myself to holding the lid on with my log, I waited for the volatiles to burn off and the jets of flame to die down. When they were all but a flicker that would be out-done by a candle flame, I wrestled the tin out of the fire and set it aside to cool.

Upon opening the tin, the previously white cotton had been reduced to a lightweight, gauzy, black cloth. You could imagine some goth-chick going wild over it. I took it out gently and marveled over its fragility and elegance nature.

Well, there was no time like the present to find out what this stuff was like for fire-lighting. I cut a two-inch square piece and loaded it into my now slightly misshapen clay pigeon. After putting some of my birch tinder next to it, I struck the steel in its general direction; not only did it start glowing immediately, it held the glow. I piled some tinder onto it and gave it a good blow, and before I knew it, there was fire. One strike of the steel was all it took; how much easier was this than striking into raw tinder? In seconds I had a small conflagration that was causing the clay pigeon even more problems in the shape-retention department.

Over the course of the evening (and one and a half bottles of red wine), I lit two more fires with the char-cloth. Never once did I need more than two strikes of the steel (I think the second strike was superfluous really, it was the wine and enthusiasm kicking in). Char-cloth really is the dogs-bees when it comes to fire-lighting. I was so impressed, that I cut the rest of the shirt up and made another two batches of char-cloth. I probably have enough to start a hundred fires now.

Tomorrow, I am planning to fire up the volcano stove with my son, to make lunch. Watch this space.

I said a long time ago that I would find some content about piercing care, as a fair number of people were landing on this blog looking for this kind of information. I don’t like providing a dead-end user experience. So, I went looking and found an ezine article - a bit of a cop-out, I know, but I doubt I am seen as a big enough authority on the subject to get someone to give me custom-written content.

You took the plunge, bit your lip, and braced your self for the pain. Moments later you had a shiny new piece of jewelry making sparkling from your navel. You’ve pierced your belly button and now you’re ready to get on with your life and show it off at the club or pool side. Unfortunately there is one one problem. It’s red, it hurts, and it’s kind of swollen. It’s not quite ready for it’s debut but don’t worry, it’s only a few days old. In order to make the most of your new piercing, it’s important to take care of it. Just follow these simple steps and you’ll look sexy in no time showing off your new belly bling.

New Navel Piercing Care:

• Keep it clean: It’s important to keep any piercings clean and there no exception when it comes to belly buttons. Your belly button, though often covered by clothing, can still collect bacteria. Clean your belly button piercing twice daily to keep it bacteria free. Be sure to use an antibacterial soap to rid the area of any harmful germs that can cause infection. While cleaning twice daily is a good rule of thumb, you may find that your life style requires a little more cleaning. If you take part in any of the following activities or activities similar to, be sure to clean your piercing when you are finished:
  • Spending time in a hot tub or pool
  • Working Out
  • Participating in sexual activities
  • Participating in labor intensive activities. Handsome
  • Working in a Kitchen
• Use a Sea Salt Soak:The healing process for a belly button ring can be extremely long (6 to 12 months), but you can help speed up the healing process by soaking the area in a mixture of sea salts and distilled water. You can buy the pre-made soaks that are offered at many piercing shops or you can make your own in a pinch using sea salt and distilled water. Use this soak 3 to 4 times daily for about 5 to 10 minutes. Keep this up until the piercing is healed.(Note: Professional piercers suggest using a mixture of sea salt and water that is close to that of your body’s. Get a gallon jug of water and add sea salt until you are able to taste it. Add little by little until the taste of salt is apparent. Remember to keep track of how much salt you are adding so you can prepare the mix again if needed.)
• Try Not to Touch: It’s new and exciting and there is something inside you that draws you to touch your new navel piercing. Unfortunately, this is one urge that should go unsatisfied. The more you touch your piercing the more you will irritate it and the more likely you are to transfer harmful bacteria from your hands to your sensitive navel. If you do have to touch it, be sure to wash your hands thoroughly with an antibacterial soap.
• Ask an Expert:A little pain, discomfort, blood, and discharge is common with new piercings; however, if you’re experiencing any or all of those things in excess don’t hesitate to call or visit your piercer immediately. If you feel that something is not right it’s better to be safe than sorry.

4 Things to Avoid

Never Use Rubbing Alcohol or Hydrogen Peroxide: When you look down and see a red or irritated piercing you may be tempted to run to the medicine cabinet for a solution. While rubbing alcohol and hydrogen peroxide may work in other situations, when used on new piercing they can actually cause more harm than good. Both substances are harsh and can severely dry out your skin, prolong the healing time, or increase your risk of scaring.

Never Use Medicinal Ointments to Speed Healing: A ointment like Neosporin is terrific for a cut or scrape, but when it comes to piercings it can be counterproductive. Your piercing needs oxygen to heal and these ointments create a protective barrier between your skin and the air. Without oxygen your healing will be slowed. Additionally, overtime, the petroleum based gel can prevent the sea salt soak from reaching your skin.

Avoid Tight Clothing Around New Piercing: A new piercing is sensitive and a new belly button piercing is in a happens to be in a very bad spot when it comes to healing. Even though you love your tight fitting jeans and skirts, try to give your belly button room to breath. Clothes that are tight will cause friction. To much friction can cause a world of problems the least being increased healing time and the worst being infection and/or rejection of the piercing.

Never Ignore a Problem: If you think there is a problem, address it immediately. Waiting will only have negative consequences including, full blown infection, scarring, and rejection or removal of the piercing.

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Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jennifer_Wasilewski

Please don’t take this as medical advice, because it isn’t. If in doubt, talk to your GP.

I have been so incredibly busy (and a little lazy).

Fear not, I am still collecting my belly button fluff (although summer production is very low), but I have little or no time to update the blog. I can only apologise.

I have tried a couple of times to get this back on track but the 2800 bits of comment spam have deterred me. I am sorry if anyone has actually posted good comments, but I was not going to read all 2800 comments to see if there was one or two real ones. If your comments never appeared, then please don’t take it personally - you were the victim of an impersonal mass-cull.

I have added an anti-spam captcha thingy (aka: Math Comment Spam Protection Plugin) which should help. For the love of god, please don’t left them do math!

More to come hopefully.

My web-log analytics are a constant source of joy and amusement to me. People search for the strangest things, and a not insignificant number of them end up pondering my navel.

On the whole, the stranger search phrases people are using when they stumble into my belly button fall into the following categories…

Piercing

Now this isn’t altogether odd; I did write about Jessica Collins and her horrendous belly button piercing accident. The traffic is dying-off now, but for a while I was getting people searching on all sorts of belly button jewellery and piercing related phrases. The best ones are in the form of questions…

“How long will it take for belly piercing to close up after taken out?”

“Can I do cheer after getting my belly button pierced?”

Well, I am not really equipped to answer this sort of thing, but maybe I will seek out some advice on the subject for the odd wayward web-searcher the drifts by this way.

Lumps & Smells

A lot of people seem concerned about the physical well-being of their belly buttons. I get a lot of visitors searching for things like…

“lump in my belly button”

“belly button smell”

“bits in my belly button”

“red lump in belly button”

“my belly button is red”

These people will be having less luck than the people searching for information about piercing. I am no doctor and shouldn’t even try to give medical advice, but I do have this to say:

If you are at all worried about a medical problem, see a doctor, don’t use the internet. The internet is a great place to develop hypochondria and is full of people with opinions but no medical background. Go and see your GP or at least phone NHS Direct.

Odd Questions & Statements

Who goes to Google and searches for “pictures of my wife’s navel?”, or “what does belly button look like?” (might this actually be aliens planning their invasion of Earth on Google)? The slightly random questions are one thing, but the statements are better; here are some of the more interesting ones…

“My son loves my belly button”

“I love my enormous pregnant belly”

“My wife has an outie belly button”

“I have a belly button t-shirt”

That’s nice for you all. What do you actually want? I can actually see some of the troubles search engines have in returning relevant results to some people.

Last, and by no means least, is this fascinating little gem…

“he always compares my navel”

This is so tantalising; what does he compare it to? Come back, tell us, we need to know!

Tickling

This is my favourite. It isn’t weird, it isn’t gross, it isn’t puzzling, it is just a little bit of harmlessness. People seem fascinated by navel tickling, and who can blame them? Here are a few of the great searches people have been landing here from…

“belly button tickling”

“navel tickling”

“belly button tickling stories”

“bellybutton tickling pictures”

“exposed belly button tickle”

“he tickles my navel”

The last one almost made it into the Odd Questions & Statements section above, and I do wonder if it is the same person that has a man that compares their belly button. You have to love the ticklers.

I know, I know, where is the latest fluff report? I have a not insubstantial pile of belly button fluff from the last few months and you want details. I have yet to decide how to process it; do I photograph it en-masse or do I go all the way and photograph each piece? I am thinking en-masse (maybe a selection of the more interesting pieces of lint on their own as well). Also, I am not near a camera today, so have a little patience.

Over three months of not posting! Whatever next?

Don’t worry eager readers (not that I actually have any), I have been diligently collecting my belly button fluff all this time; more on that later though, I want to explain my absence and also today’s events.

Firstly: Where have I been?

Well, as mentioned in the last entry, I was coughing a lot and had a friend dying in hospital. The cough turned into a six-week chest infection and my friend is dead. The cough was mostly clearing up by the time he died, but it was still vicious enough to preclude me from being one of his pall-bearers; the last thing I wanted was to have a coughing fit and drop him on his final journey.

So, Ian Slade is dead. I won’t tell you how great he was or what he did or liked; for those that didn’t know him, it would be meaningless, and those that did know him will not need telling. Needless to say, he will be missed and his death caused me great sadness and distraction.

At around the time all this was happening, my company was bought out by a large London digital agency. I have gone from a large cog in a small machine, to a small cog in a large mechanical lanscape-dominating edifice. This has taken a lot of getting used to and the integration has been challenging at times. On top of this, business is booming and I have more work than ever.

Recently my wife has developed all the classic symptoms of meningitis. The doctors were of the opinion that the symptoms were coming on too slowly for meningitis and sent her home. She didn’t die, which was a massive relief, but I did spend a lot of time worrying.

So that is my life in a nut-shell for the last three months; all except for today that is.

Secondly: Today I watched a man drown.

Some work colleagues and I went to the pub for lunch down on the quay in Exeter; this turned out to be an experience (I would say “mistake” but that would trivialize the lessons learned and their cost). We arrived to find a man having a bit of an argument with the publican; it wasn’t overly heated as such, but there were threats of beatings being casually tossed around by both parties and the man was rather drunk. We sat outside and observed for a while and the publican obviously called the police, as they turned up after a while. They spoke to the man for a while and I went to order food. When I came out of the pub, the man (I wish I could give him a name) was in the river and swimming. Now, before anyone calls police brutality, he dived in of his own accord apparently.

This is where is got ugly. The man stopped swimming fairly quickly and then stopped raising his head for air. People started wondering if he was drowning (he was rather drunk after all) but I think most thought he was faking it to get the coppers to jump in after him (myself included). Then he sank.

People were starting to realise that something was wrong at this point and a few people started to react (myself not included), including one of my work colleagues. There were four members of the public in the water looking for him before one of the watching police officers joined the rescue effort. Unfortunately the water was five yards deep (according to the police divers that turned up later) and visibility was around two-feet in the murky depths of the Exe.

After ten or fifteen minutes, people started to give up; there were professional rescue divers arriving on scene and he was most-likely dead by then anyway.

Then our lunch arrived.

I have spent most of the afternoon dwelling on this: I sat and watched a man drown today.

At first I was paralysed by indecision (is he faking it or is he really in trouble?), then my mind started making excuses: he really is faking and he will come up for air at any moment; the police will rescue him; being fat and unfit makes me a poorer choice for this by far than most other people here; there are already people helping, they will drag him to the surface any moment now; it is too late now, surely?

However, the more time went by, the more I regretted not being the one that said “fuck it” and just jumped in. All afternoon I have been asking myself: would he be alive now if I had acted, if I had not dithered? Those that tried, while they failed to rescue him, can at least say they tried.

For a while I was angry; angry at the drunken fool for going for a swim, angry at myself for not doing anything, angry at the police for just watching. The anger that endures though is the anger at those people that were busy lamenting the fact that no-one was helping him while doing nothing themselves.

I have learned some valuable lessons today. Unfortunately it took a man’s life to teach them.

Update: The BBC have covered the story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/devon/7399083.stm

I have a week’s backlog of belly button fluff and little time to photograph it, so I cheated…

Wednesday’s fluff was a nice shade of red as I was wearing a terracotta t-shirt.

Friday’s belly button was bereft of fluff.

I have been doing this for a month now, so what does a month’s accumulation of belly button fluff look like? Well, something like this…

Please note that Saturday’s and Sunday’s belly button fluff are not included in this image as these were not harvested in the first month.

I do apologise for not coming up with an individual, detailed image of each day’s lint, but I have been rather ill (coughing and snotting mostly) and my dying friend is occupying my mind a lot.

I think it is time to stop beating around the bush; I have been dancing around the whole online anonymity thing but what is the point? His name is Ian and he is dying of an inoperable brain tumor. There, that doesn’t really narrow it down but at least I can use his name.

He has been moved to a hospice to die and seems to be doing so rather quickly. Over the last week his speech and motor-skills have deteriorated rapidly. I don’t think he is much longer for this world.

Woops, I forgot to post this the other day. Here is Belly button of the week (week five).

This picture was taken by kellyandapril on Flickr.

Pregnant bellies are great and well worth cuddling.

I am a little behind on the photographs at the moment. Take comfort in the fact that all lint deposits are being catalogued and kept separated for image capture.

Just to get the formalities out of the way, I had no belly button fluff yesterday. I was wearing a lose top that was not tucked in. I also got up late and slobbed around in my dressing gown until I bathed - I didn’t even get dressed until about 4pm. My poor belly button had a lot less time to gather lint and the conditions were not optimal; there is definitely an advantage to having your top tucked in. I am guessing that it is something to do with the fabric rubbing against the skin and belly hair that makes from clothing fibres come away from the bulk of the fabric.

We took our son to Pizza Hut tonight. I know this isn’t a sign of great parenting, but the little blighter is often somewhat pooped after being picked up from nursery and tends to fall apart when we drive him home and then cook something; he needs feeding there and then really. So, once a week we take him out to dinner.

Anyway, justifications of parenting decisions aside, our Pizza turned up one slick short and the waitress admitted that someone had dropped a slice on the floor. She did say though that there was another on the way and to tuck into this one while we waited; so we did.

Then the replacement turned up; it was the same size as the other and both were left on our table. To be honest we were expecting a tiny pizza to replace the one lost slice, not a full medium pizza. We essentially got two for the price of one - needless to say we couldn’t eat all this pizza so I have lunch for tomorrow.

It seems I didn’t manage to post Belly Button of the Week last week, so to make up for this I will post two this week. Without further ado, here is Belly Button of the Week 4…

This is a creative common image from Flickr, as taken by elastic.

It has been a long week.First there was my birthday. I mostly spent this day paying flying visits to friends and wandering around the campus of Exeter University taking long exposure pictures of moving water. In the evening I just went for a quiet drink with my wife; this was really nice. I did make the mistake of drinking beer in the pub and red wine when we got home though - which made me woozy very quickly indeed. All in all, it was a very quiet but very nice day.

Then I got ill. I don’t know what it is but there is nasty cough associated with it as well a flu-like symptoms. So this is why I haven’t been very active this week.

Anyway you don’t want to know about me and my life, you want to know about my belly button fluff.

I have discovered that tucking one’s t-shirt in definitely has a good impact on navel lint production. On Monday I produced this…

This is a not insubstantial lump of belly button fluff. Blue t-shirt, blue lint, no surprises.

On Tuesday I produced this…

A monster bit of belly button fluff. Brown t-shirt, brown lint, huge fluff, Measuring in at a tremendous 13mm I am very proud of Tuesday’s navel lint.

On Wednesday I produced this…

Not huge, but measuring in at a respectable 10mm.  The t-shirt I wore on Thursday was a kind of khaki colour - a bit brown, a bit grey and a bit green. This picture doesn’t really get the colour across well, but rest assured the colour does match the t-shirt to some extent. This one had a surprising amount of belly hair threaded through it - I usually get one noticeable hair a day, this one was riddled with the stuff.

On Friday I produced this…

Grey t-shirt, grey fluff again - I am not really subscribing to this “all fluff is blue-grey” theory that abounds on the web. Friday’s specimen of belly button fluff measures in at a monstrous 14mm. Wow!

On Saturday my belly button produced this…

Another khaki t-shirt, more khaki fluff. Not enormous and quite hairy again. This little lump of belly button fluff was nearly lost to the dust and fluff of the floor. I had a few quick peeks at my navel during the day to see if the accumulations were proceeding as planned, and it was. Then, near bed-time I went to remove and photograph the day’s lint accretion only to find it was not there. Gasp! I cast around in a mild state of panic and found it on my belt - it had obviously only fallen out fairly recently but this is the proof I needed to say with confidence that sometimes “lint is lost”. I need to be more vigilant about protecting my belly button fluff.

Today (Sunday) I didn’t tuck my t-shirt in and the accretion is tiny to say the least. If there is anything worth showing, I will share the photo tomorrow.

On a slightly different note, I visited my dying friend in hospital again today. He had a seizure earlier that day and was almost incapable of speech. He is usually very tired after one of these so I didn’t stay long but we did spend a little while holding hands. It isn’t really a very British thing to do, or very manly either, but it was one of those moments where a certain understanding passed between us. It was the first time my strong facade broke in front of him and my eyes welled up as we held eye contact. Some people have questioned whether he understands that he is dying, I think he knows all too well - I could see it in his eyes.

No sleep for me tonight.