I’ve been doing a lot of driving recently.  This past week I drove from Somerset to Essex for a meeting in Chelmsford, and then back again.  The previous week I did almost the same journey for a meeting in Maldon.  Both times I went up the night before and stayed overnight in Colchester with some friends (thank you again, Phill and Phil, the accommodation and ironing service was much appreciated).  In case you’ve never done that journey before, at best it’s a 4 hour drive in each direction.  If there’s traffic on the M25 or A12 it can be a lot longer.

Now, I see myself as a very level-headed person.  I don’t get stressed, I don’t get angry, I don’t judge people.  Until I get into a car, apparently.  While on the roads recently I’ve noticed just how much I judge the other road users, mentally criticising their driving abilities and in some cases even their choice of car.  It came as a bit of a surprise, actually, that I would so easily fall into this habit of judgement.  So I thought I’d share with you what form this judgement takes.

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This is a song I began to write at Spring Harvest last year.  On Sunday I included it in the worship songs and taught it to the congregation, as it seemed to fit well with the theme, and it seemed to go down well!  It was actually the first time anyone had heard it, my wife included, so it was good to get it out at last and being useful.  I even had a lady ring me up this evening asking for the words, because she’d found it really inspiring!  That’s such a huge encouragement for a songwriter.  Not that I seek attention or praise, but that God is working through my offering and allowing my gift to bear fruit.  Halleluia!

So, here are the words to the song, “Jesus your name is higher”.  I don’t have the music written out yet, but when I do I’ll try and make sure that finds its way onto here too.   (more…)

For those who don’t know, I have a brother.  That’s not entirely accurate, I actually have two brothers, but for the purpose of this paragraph I want to stress one in particular.  And for those who still don’t know, he’ll soon be adding to the Dawkins family tree.  If you’re reading this and you’re confused, allow me to get specific: my brother Christopher is engaged.  Yes, yes, I could have just said that, but then I wouldn’t feel clever.

On Saturday we drove up to Bristol to see lots of people – Christopher’s fiancee’s parents were playing host to my parents for the day, with a view to providing an opportunity for Christopher and Sarah to show their respective parents around the wedding venues.  And it was a good excuse to all meet up and eat food.  There was no particular wedding-related reason for our presence, I think Sarah just wanted to see Samuel.

So, up to Bristol we drove.  And, to add to my excitement, I got to drive underneath the Clifton Suspension Bridge, which I have never had cause to do before (I’ve been over it a few times, but never under).  Little pleasures.  Samuel slept pretty much all the way, as he tends to do whenever we’re travelling at more than 30mph – he seems to be a human speedometer, letting us know quite noisily if we’re not going fast enough.

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At the weekend, which for some reason began on Thursday, we had visitors.  Not just any run-of-the-mill, common or garden, everyday type visitors.  Oh no.  These were special.  Anne-Marie and Sarah are our best friends from Colchester.  I lived with one of them for two years, Ellie lived with the other for two years, and they’re now living together in what used to be my house.  It’s all rather confusion really.  We’ve been through a great deal, the four of us, the good and the bad, the ordinary and the random, the practical and the spontaneous.  So close is our relationship that they no longer fit into the category of ‘friends’ – they have managed to transcend that definition and become more like family.  They are the sisters I never had.  And I love them both very much.

Anyway, enough of this mushy stuff, back to the story.

AM and Sarah came to visit on Thursday, having made the journey in Sarah’s little blue Fiesta all the way from Colchester (a good 4 hour drive, not including loo stops), and arrived on our doorstep laden with hugs and presents for Samuel.  Both their presence and their presents were very much appreciated (see what I did there?).

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Just a quick post to alert my faithful readers of the latest additions to my blog.  In my previous post I mentioned that I had been working on another writing project, and that this blog had been taking a back seat for a while as a result.  Well, I’m tentatively going to reveal what that is, right here on my blog.

I’ve been writing a diary.

Before you say anything, no I don’t mean this blog.  And no, I’ve not been daring enough to actually start scrawling on paper.  When Ellie and I found out that we were expecting a baby, we decided it would be a good idea to keep a pregnancy diary to log the whole experience for future reference.  While Ellie took the traditional route of writing it down in a book, I set up a private WordPress blog and wrote each day as an entry in that.  Well, not every day, but the important ones.  Actually, I rarely got time to write about each day on the day itself, which is why I’m still working on the project – I’m still filling in the gaps I’ve missed!

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Yesterday afternoon it started snowing.  Not your piddly little microscopic snowflakes, oh no, these were gargantuan, monolithic, ping-pong ball sized snowflakes.  In little more than thirty minutes the ground, nay everything, was covered in a light carpet of snow.  And then it stopped.  Predictable, I suppose.  Still, with the temperatures hovering at the zero mark the snow hung around, and was still there when I went to bed.  And the BBC informed me that more snow was due overnight – “up to 15cm”.  I’d believe that when I saw it.

When I awoke in the early hours of the morning (not deliberately, mind you, this was Samuel’s fault) I had a quick peek through the curtains to see the outside world, and was sleepily excited to discover that the BBC was right – it had snowed.  Lots.  Nowhere near the 15cm they had predicted, more like 3-4cm, but it was still plenty enough to cover everything in a blanket of white, albeit drenched in darkness at the time.

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(Written 15th January 2010, post-dated 27th December 2009)

Our family is not like other families.  Most children abhor the idea of spending time with their parents, let alone uncles and aunties they hardly ever see, and anything family-related at Christmas time is definitely out.  Not in our family.  Every year (if we can) we all meet up shortly after Christmas for “Draisey Day”.  We usually descent on my uncle and auntie’s house in Woking, spending the whole day eating, playing silly games, playing music, and generally catching up on the past year or so.  And it’s one of the highlights of my year.

This year was no exception, not least because we brought with us a portable people-magnet – a little baby boy.  More than that, Samuel is the first of the new generation, which makes him even more significant.  I’m pleased to report that he lived up to the hype, and thrilled everyone the whole time we were there.  He was passed from person to person, he fed when he had the opportunity, he slept very little, and he kept everyone amused without doing a single thing.  What a gift it is to be a baby.  Shame he’s too young to realise it.

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(Written 15th Jan 2010, post-dated to 13th December 2009)

The big day has finally come!  My wife and I are now proud owners of a little baby boy, whom we have called Samuel Joseph Dawkins.  He was born just before 8am, weighing in at 8lb 7oz (and no, don’t even think of asking for that in so-called “real money”).

It all started at 11:15pm last night (well, technically it *all* started 40 weeks ago, but that’s another story…) when Ellie’s waters broke.  She wasn’t getting any contractions at that point, so we phoned the maternity ward at Paulton (which is our nearest delivery centre) for some advice on what to do next.  They said to come in for a quick check-up, to make absolutely sure that it was the waters that had broken and not something else; it was fully expected that we would come home afterwards though, as labour usually lasts many hours, especially for the first child.  Nonetheless, we packed the car with everything we would need for every situation, following our carefully crafted lists to the letter, before setting off for Paulton, which is a good 30 minute drive.

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Here’s a confession – I’ve not been blogging as much recently as I should have been.  The reason?  Twitter.

I use my blog to tell people what I’ve been doing recently.  My readers are usually friends and family, unless a passer-by happens to stumble across something via Google that interests them.  My posts are generally about things I’m interested in, things I’ve done, things I meant to do but didn’t, or things that I want to rant about.

But now I’ve fallen in love with Twitter, my Twhirl client always running on my desktop, ready to accept my latest status update as and when I feel led to bend the world’s ear with my 140 characters of insight.  No logging in, no pressure to write unnecessary paragraphs of fluff, just a short blast of information.  No time like the present.  The result is that I feel like I’ve told the world what’s going on, despite the noticeable absence on my blog.  So I apologise that I’ve not posted more here in recent weeks.  Blame Twitter for being so darn addictive.

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About a month ago I bought a brand new Samsung Tocco Lite, otherwise known as the S5230.  I’m ashamed to admit that it was bought from Phones4u, against my better judgement, but I guess we all make mistakes every now and then.  I had actually only gone into the shop to have a look, and hopefully try it out for real rather than just watching YouTube videos and reading the specs, honest.

Phones4u aside, the phone is mostly fantastic.  Jumping on the touchscreen bandwagon, the Tocco Lite is an iPhone for plebs like me who can’t afford the real thing.  My previous phone, just for reference, was a Motorola L6, which was gorgeous, but was beginning to show its age a little (not in performance, just in a few cosmetic scratches to the case, which turns out to be more plastic than metal, despite appearances).  The Tocco Lite has a comparatively enormous screen, is more or less the same size, and is actually fractionally lighter.  That’s good, because it means it’ll sit in my pocket nicely.

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