A Letter to Paul

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I recently discovered a very entertaining blog called The Captain’s Speech. If you don’t already follow it, please check it out, it’s brilliant!

The author, Paul, recently undertook a mammoth task of writing letters to people who requested it of him. Given he has well over a thousand followers, I will for once be grateful that I only have 40 or so followers and would find this much easier!

(yay, I have less followers… wait, what?)

Since Paul took the time to write a letter to me, it feels only right that I reply!

Dear Paul,

Your letter arrived, as is appropriate to any letter received by any person in Essex, in a fake-tan envelope carried by Joey Essex himself (yes, he’s real. Yes, he did once ask if the Moon was electric). The Queen was unavailable, having taken a break after all the intense games of Twister we’d been playing earlier.

I can honestly say I’d never made the weight connection before with the tea and abductions. I’ll make a point of avoiding the tea (I think I missed out on some really interesting procedures because of it) in future.

Paddington is one of the sweetest, gentlest bears you could ever hope to meet. He does however, have a tendency to get lost and hang around train stations. Also, if the marmalade starts to melt, he gets sticky, so be careful when you hug him.

Mr Bean is certainly iconic, but he has nothing on Blackadder. Oddly enough, they look very similar.

As far as food goes, crumpets are not taken with tea as often as they should. Then again, Essex is more about bling and fake-tan, rather than food. ‘Pip pip cheerio’ has become ‘cya mate’ in these parts. Boring I know.

I was relieved to see at the end of your letter that the moose had escaped. Did one of those kind mounties help find it?

Right, Nintendo. What can I say? It was… 1989 I believe, at Christmas, when my parents unveiled the Nintendo Entertainment System to my brother and I. It was unlike anything we’d ever seen before, and we loved it. As time went by it would be me who became the bigger Nintendo fan, sometimes loyal to a fault. The original Super Mario Bros and its sequels became a staple of my gaming world, but it was the SNES where my love of Nintendo truly blossomed. Super Mario World, Super Mario Kart, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past and Starfox were just some of the games that for me defined an era, along with Street Fighter 2, Yoshi’s Island and so many more. Whilst I’ve come to appreciate PC gaming, and I’ve played on X Boxes and PlayStations, Nintendo is what I go back to. I really really want a Nintendo NX, and I want Breath of the Wild for it. We’ll have to see what pans out there.

My love of Formula 1 began around the same sort of time. My earliest memories of watching it also come from 1989, watching Nigel Mansell in his Ferrari trying to battle with the superior McLarens of Alain Prost and Ayrton Senna. I have a romanticised view of F1 from that era – Mansell was my boyhood hero.

Have I been to a race? Once, Silverstone in 2013. Vettel retired right across the track from where we were sitting. The noise was staggering. I’d love to go again.

I didn’t appreciate Michael Schumacher when he was racing. Maybe it was that move on Damon Hill in Australia in 1994, or his repeat move on Villenueve in 1997? I just couldn’t warm to him – though any discussion on who is the greatest ever has to include him – 7 time champion and 91 wins – he’s earned his place in the pantheon.

Fun fact – I actually hail from the same town as Lewis Hamilton – Stevenage. His experiences of the place were a little different to mine!

I hope the moose stays safe, and you never know, perhaps it will be you who abducts me?