Chris Worfolk's Blog

The decade is over and a new one has begun. So once you’re done clearing up from the wreckage of NYE parties and making arbitrary promises about how you are going to change your life, it might be nice to take a quiet moment to reflect on the fun and games we’ve enjoyed during the past year.

As usual the year began with January which was the month I got into Twitter just before it become cool. I also attended York Brights for the first time and launched Leeds Skeptics in the Pub. Meanwhile on the atheist front the bus campaign was in storming through and we officially won the Christmas vote.

The temperature dropped in February but there was plenty of emotional warmth as Perspective launched. We celebrated Darwin’s 200th birthday and Galileo Day with a traditional feast. Meanwhile down in London the AHS held it’s press launch.

It was a quiet month in March though with plenty of drinking of course including a RDF meetup. As part of my AHS work we began planning a society in Huddersfield and saw Durham through their first Reason Week. I also spoke for Humanism at the interfaith panel and launched the Humanist Action Group.

Most of our time in April was taken up by Rationalist Week 2009 whether it be planning, writing talks, gathering equipment or the week itself – and of course, being interviewed by the local press. This was shortly followed by the LAS AGM at which we elected Sophie as president.

Lighter nights resulted in be finally spending some quality time at the park in May as well as having a 4am post-close BBQ. It wasn’t all fun and games though as I set a new personal record with a 44 hour shift.

Summer was finally drawing near by June as Atheist Society celebrated with our End of Year Ball. The AHS held it’s AGM in Warwick and I worked my last day at Open Door Design. Meanwhile in the real world the BNP won two seats in Europe and Michael Jackson died.

Stress levels were running high in July as I battled with letting agents and finally made it in to my new apartment, not to mention swine flu running rampant. I celebrated 5 years of blogging and re-launched this website in preparation for the CWF website integration. Meanwhile Leeds Atheist Society went camping and HAG expanded our activities.

I kicked off the fun in August with a visit down to Swindon to visit Kieran and followed it up with a good warming of my house. We also said goodbye to Michelle and Rich went back in the closet meanwhile I got myself an iPhone and the Chris Worfolk Foundation was incorporated.

The arrivial of September saw the start of a new academic year but also resulted in us having to say goodbye to Felix. Elsewhere Si took another step towards becoming an alcoholic and Derren Brown correctly predicted the lottery numbers.

Change was afoot in the month of October as LAS got into it’s full swing for the 2009/2010 academic year. I celebrated by birthday, myself and Daryl planned the re-launch of Leeds Skeptics in the Pub and the Chris Worfolk Foundation held it’s first official trustee meeting.

Leeds was feeling the aftermath of the EDL protest in November as I filmed a debate for Ummah Channel and in a suprising twist attended a live sporting event in the way of the Four Nations Final. Leeds Skeptics rebooted at it’s new venue while the Chris Worfolk Foundation launched it’s new website, the Perspective leader’s guide and announced humanist communities.

Finally in December we won a huge victory in the form of Killing in the Name beating X-Factor to Christmas number one. I left The D after three years and tried to carry on my life under very testing conditions. Finally the year ended with a good old fashioned Circle party for New Year’s Eve amidst a very drunken weekend for myself and Kieran.

That concludes fun times ’09. Things will be no doubt be just as exciting in 2010 – officially the year of the Chris Worfolk Foundation, which I will be writing about later. And as if that wasn’t enough we even have a new Doctor Who as well! It’s all going on in the next twelve months.

On Thursday I hosted a New Year’s Eve midnight dinner party which seemed to go down a storm. It just goes to show that cooking while intoxicated, even to the level where you can’t string a sentence together, it is safe and successful idea.

On Thursday myself and Kieran braved the bitter cold to go for a wander round Kirkstall Abbey. A lot of it was unfortunately closed off but we got round the main parts and the visitor’s centre which was informative if a little brief.

In the true spirit of the holiday period there has been a fair bit of drinking within the past week.

Tuesday was Lil’s birthday and as such we went for our traditional Lil’s birthday celebration steak. She wasn’t there or anything because she was busy having a meal at some other restaurant but it was still excellent steak.

Wednesday afternoon Mike went on some kind of mission to get everyone to the pub for a few pints as it was the final time we would be in before New Year. I still had things to do however so I ended up going out for a drink and then back to work!

Finally Kieran arrived in the evening and we headed out for drinks on Call Lane with Rich and Tim. Fun times.

Last Tuesday was a strange day.

You see, I engaged in exercise. Actually that’s not unheard of but certainly playing competitive football is – I haven’t played competitively for 12 years now and it’s probably been about half that again since I regularly played at all.

But with work now having a team I headed down to Goals on Kirkstall Road on Tuesday for our second match of the “season.” It snowed. And hailed. And rained. But I can see the potential fun in summer 😉 .

Rage Against The Machine’s “Killing in the Name” beats out the X Factor single to be Christmas number one. Win.

The Saturday before last I worked my last McShift.

It’s very depressing because it’s a clear sign I’m getting older. Not that the fact that many of my work colleagues were 6-7 years younger than me wasn’t a constant reminder of my aging but somehow getting up and moving on with my life really drives the message home.

I’ll miss the place, I’ll miss the people. The people really were fun. I like most of my work colleagues but there is something about the fun and the energy of all been stuck in a crap dead on job (not that I was stuck there, essentially working for laughs but anyway) and making the best of it.

Still, onwards and upwards. I have exciting new work commitments now and new challenges ahead with my charity. This chapter may be over but the book has just begun.

Friday night was work’s Christmas party. If nothing else it produced some good photos 😀 .

I don’t know Joe McElderry. I’ve never met him. I don’t know what kind of personality he has, whether he is a enjoyable man to be around, funny, charming and interesting or not.

But if I was to guess I would give him the benefit of the doubt and say that he is probably a nice guy. Honest, genuine, just wants to get up there and sing.

Which makes me wonder how situations like this occur.

Look at yourself. You’re throwing darts at somebody else’s head! What kind of sick weirdo does that?

If I was to take a guess I would say a sweet kid who has a great voice on him but isn’t the smartest kid in the class that has been taken by the music industry and turned into a tool for their own use.

That’s why we’re raging against the machine.

For those of you who read NME you may well have read possibly one of the silliest comments I have read in a long time, and this is from someone who reads the Daily Mail every morning.

Cheryl Cole has launched an attack on Rage Against The Machine for sabotaging the Christmas Number One race. Despite the US band themselves not orchestrating the Facebook campaign to get ‘Killing In The Name’ to the top of the charts ahead of X Factor winner Joe McElderry, Cole said the battle had now reached biblical levels. “It’s David versus Goliath and it’s not fair on Joe. It’s getting out of hand.” She went on to say that the thought of a US band topping the charts at Christmas was just wrong. “If that song, or should I say campaign, by an American group is our Christmas Number One I’ll be gutted for him and our charts” (The Sun).

The obvious first point is that this campaign wasn’t started by Rage, it was started by fans (and someone would phrase that as true music fans for obviously justified reasons). But that isn’t the main point that I want to make.

The reason the comment is so stupid is because the campaign hasn’t sabotaged the race for the Christmas number one, it’s created a race! Until Rage came along there was no race, the only thing this campaign has sabotaged is X Factor’s divine right to have the Christmas number one as it somehow thinks it is entitled to.

And this is what the campaign is about – it shouldn’t just be a fact that X Factor is entitled to take the number one spot every Christmas, we’re tired of it. We want a fair race based on genuine musical talent rather than how much publicity you can spin off the back of an appallingly bad TV show.

As such I cannot imagine what thought process went through her head that concluded “yes, that’s an intelligent thing to say.” Presumably none.

In other news despite the physical single now being out for the past two days it has still failed to catch up with Rage! Saturday will be the real physical sales boost though so Rage needs a big lead and the campaign needs you. You can gift up to two extra purchases to friends and you can also grab some copies for free without a credit card from Nokia Music.