My deepest apologies. Yes it’s been a while since my last post and that’s simply down to the fact that I’ve been extraordinarily busy. Not just all the swing dance that’s been going on, but also juggling work, play, and a budding relationship too (no, I won’t go into that!).

But in an effort to get this blog moving again, I’ll post up an addition to The Odd Spot, which showcases a few odd things I’ve seen around.

This entry features Andy Saunders, a mechanic from Poole in Dorset, UK, who has converted a Suzuki Wagon into a "mini-Hummer".

It’s supposed to look like a miniature version of the giant American gs guzzler. But I can’t help but notice, It doesn’t really, does it?

(Photo courtesy Ananova)

In any case, Mr Saunders is quoted as saying that he’d like to get £15,000 for it at auction. If you’re thinking of buying it, all I can say is, it’s still a Suzuki Wagon underneath!

Full details from Ananova and BBC News.

I’m trying my best not to be completely obsessed with dancing. (Which is, admittedly, one of the reasons for not having posted on this website for at least a month!) But I have to admit that it is an addictive activity and I am starting to get a little envious of my brother who dances professionally. And it’s difficult not to dance once you’ve started.

Last weekend I organised Bomb The Bank on behalf of the Swing Dancers of London. A wet and soggy affair, at least 30 dancers came down to the South Bank to dance. I admired their dedication as I sat underneath an umbrella for much of the afternoon, playing the tunes off my laptop and watching my own feet get soaked. It was tremendous fun, and to prove it, look at these guys dancing!

Anyway, I’m looking forward to the next one at the end of this month. All I can say is that I hope it doesn’t snow like today!

But it doesn’t stop there. This past week alone was a chance for me to learn a couple of new dances. At work, there is a weekly class for salsa, one of the more popular dances at the moment in London. So I joined in with the class which started with a Merengue, followed by a Salsa. I impressed with myself: I’m not completely sure that I ‘get’ the music, but I was surprised at how easily I picked up the steps. But I know that it does have something to do with the fact that after nearly two and a half years dancing Lindy hop and jazz steps, new dance steps are coming ever easier to me.

And on Friday, I also joined a tango class at Dragon Hall in Holborn. This dance and music I do ‘get’ more and I love it as it is such an expressive dance. Ever since seeing Al Pacino dance in Scent Of A Woman, and dare I say it, Arnold Schwartzenegger and Jamie Lee Curtis in True Lies, I’ve always wanted to learn to dance tango. And in this one lesson, I did manage to get the ‘basic’ pretty easily. And there I surprised myself again - dancing can be easier than you think. Okay, so I’m still a long way to being any good, but I’m on my way!

Ultimately, I’m looking still to dance socially, but from the two extra classes I did this week, I’m loving the idea that I might some day be able to mix different styles of dancing and improve my ‘vocabulary’. But I’ll still try not be completely obsessed with it all. Dancing for fun is a great feeling in itself and having done aikido competitions as a kid, I doubt that I’d ever want to do much more than dance socially. In spite of this though, I know one thing: it’s going to hard to stop my feet from moving.

And they’ll keep on moving, particularly as I’m off for three days of dancing at the London Lindy Exchange this coming weekend!

So for our intranet at work, I was asked to do a one-minute interview. I thought I’d reproduce it here for fun, so hope you enjoy it. It was actually written a month ago, so some of the entries are slightly out of date, but hey, does it really matter?

One minute interview - Lester Mak

Where did you spend your last holiday and what was great/bad about it?
I’ve just come back from skiing in Bardonecchia in Italy (about 60 miles from Turin in the Alps). Having never skied before, I impressed myself over the course of the week by being able to ski comfortably at the end down the whole mountain without falling over, hitting a tree or taking out a bunch of five year olds in those trains of moving chicanes on the slopes. But it was slightly depressing when you see them skipping around off-piste on the snow and you feel like a heavy klutz.

What’s your favourite meal?
My father is a chef, so as a kid I was taught to appreciate good food - which also means being spoilt by having lots of it as well, of course! But, ironically, my favourite meal is a good simple fry up for brunch on a weekend morning. I’ll never miss that!

What was the last book you read?  Struggle or pleasure?
After Dark by Haruki Murakami. Murakami is such a fantastic author and he has a brilliant imagination, albeit somewhat very twisted for some!

When was the last time you went to the cinema and what did you see?
I went to see Lust, Caution by Ang Lee a couple of weeks ago. I’m an Asian film fanatic in general and love watching films from the region. Tony Leung Chiu-Wai who plays the male lead is one of the best actors in the world in my opinion and Tang Wei made one of the best debut performances I’ve ever seen as the female lead. And of course, Ang Lee is simply a directorial master.

If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you be?

Anywhere I can take a good landscape photo: the mountains, the desert, the sea, cityscapes. Which pretty much means anywhere.

What do you consider to be your greatest achievement?
Not necessarily an "achievement" as such but certainly a claim to fame. I appeared on Countdown in February 1999 and won one of the first Countdown teapots. But in the process, I set a new record by winning a letters round with a three letter word (‘RUN’). The record still stands today as far as I know.

What was your first job?
My first job was Director of a Summer Camp in Shenzhen, China, which was set up to teach schoolchildren English over the course of six weeks. It was tremendous fun with the kids, although it was also one of the hardest jobs I’ve done as I had to deal with very difficult people within the school administration. Yes, harder to deal with than some of Ofcom’s stakeholders!

What was the last music album you bought?
I bought a few swing jazz albums. I’m into swing dance and moonlight as an organiser of free swing dance events in London in my spare time so I need to build up a collection of music. I’m currently involved in planning a number of outdoor events on the South Bank over the summer.

Cats or dogs?
Well, Garfield is my favourite cartoon character. But I don’t have pets at home.

What is your favourite word?
Jazz and zyzygy, mainly because they have strange letters. But they are of absolutely no use for Countdown or Scrabble.

Who is your hero and why?
I don’t like to name drop, so I won’t mention his name, but you probably could guess who he is. A family friend, I remember once sitting in his tiny workshop as a small kid and being impressed with what he did and what were then his relatively small achievements. Starting from a very humble background, over the course of a couple of decades, he’s become one of the world’s most famous shoe designers, and yet he is still the same humble "uncle" I knew as a kid. He is still a big inspiration to me.

What is your pet hate?
People who drive Porsches, particularly those who drive them on a dual carriageway more slowly than caravans…

Tell us a joke
I’m not good at my own jokes, so I’ll borrow one from Colin Mochrie of Whose Line Is It Anyway? fame. This was one of his headlines in a game called "Weird Newscasters":

"Today, legendary human cannonball, the great Zambonee, who was famous for bringing his pet donkey to each of his performances, escaped tragedy today when, just as he was about to be launched, his pet donkey walked in front of the cannon. It took paramedics three hours to remove Zambonee’s head from his ass. Both are resting comfortably."

They say Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.

No, I’m not going mad about buffalos (although their steaks are nice, and Buffalo wings - which are made out of chickens, not buffalo, and are a specialty of Buffalo, NY - are also very nice).

In fact, "Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo" is actually a grammatically correct sentence, an interesting fact that I stumbled upon on Wikipedia.

Stemming from three definitions of "buffalo" - one being an animal, one meaning to bully, and the third being the place - what it stands for is "[Those] buffalo(es) from Buffalo [that are intimidated by] buffalo(es) from Buffalo intimidate buffalo(es) from Buffalo."

So it all makes sense then? Good. I’m off to buffalo some Buffalo buffaloes (although they don’t actually exist).

For more details of this monotonic phrase, see here.

Ok, it’s just over a month away, and I can’t now resist promoting it!

London has been quite springlike for a while now, and with March just round the corner, a few of us though about doing some outdoor dancing. Well, I for one have missed it since my Lindy in the Park experience in San Francisco last November.

So on Saturday 29 March, come join a whole bunch of us Swing Dancers of London down on the South Bank near Gabriel’s Wharf for some al fresco swing dancing!

Bomb the Bank!
Lindy bombing the South Bank!

Saturday, March 29, 2008 • 2:00pm - 6:00pm
@ Gabriel’s Wharf (or in the skater area by National Theatre/QE Hall if it’s raining)

Already feeling springlike? Well, it’s back. We’ll be Lindy bombing the South Bank again right by Gabriel’s Wharf near the Oxo Tower.

4 hours of al fresco dancing, free to everyone. Nominate a tune to play or bring your own, it should be a fun afternoon.

If you can’t make this one, we’ll be aiming to do many more over the summer, so watch out on the SDL page!

Song Requests:
If you have a particular song you want to hear on the day, post it on our discussion page and we’ll try to play it on the day!


Weather Forecast:
We’ll provide updates on the weather on our Facebook event page closer to the date, but we want it to be sunny!
 

So there we go. Why not come along?! 

Links:
Swing Dancers of London