Saturday, January 3

Take the worry out the wedding with a professionally written speech

Have to give a speech? Worried about what to say? Beat the fear of public speaking with a professionally written speech

After years of writing for fun, I've finally decided to set up a business, and am now offering to write wedding speeches for your next big occasion. I  can work with you to prepare your next speech and make it something you'll look forward to delivering.

Using my 5 rules of successful speeches I can create the right speech for you. I'll even show you how to deliver the speech, so you can relax knowing everything will be perfect on the big day.

Be a confident public speaker with a Freelance Speech! 

What speeches am I offering?

Whether you only have 4 hours or 4 months I can help out with your speech. I can also edit your existing speech for you as well. 

See what people are saying about Freelance Speeches

I want to say that Simon is a wonderful speech writer. He helped me from my first, terrible draft to the very end; a complete and beautiful speech. Thanks to his ability I am also confident now to get up and give my speech! Thank you, Simon. - Jimmy D

The story of Freelance Speeches 

I have a nervous stammer and as a child I struggled to talk. Even now, if stressed, I struggle on certain letters. M’s and W’s are my nemeses.

So when I stood up to speak at my grandfather’s funeral I was shaking with fear, certain I was going to stumble over my words. But I didn’t stutter once from the first word to the last.

The reason? I trusted in the words I’d written and because of that it was easier to find the confidence to speak them out loud.

When I sat down again I knew I’d learned something new.  The biggest battle with public speaking is finding the right words to say. Every great speech starts with a great script, and I decided to spend my life helping other people find the right words to say as well.

Sometimes I still stammer when answering the phone, but I love talking to my customers and finding the right words for them. And nothing gives me more pleasure than when they thank me for helping them to stand up and find their voice.


Tuesday, July 27

Simon is blogging again!

Those of you who are still hanging around here, like Tom Cruise hanging on to his last thread of sanity, may be interested to know that I'm blogging again.

You can find my new blog, maybe a bit more grown up than this one, maybe just a little bit more sensible, but probably just as full of rubbish as this one is, at SpiritualAtheist.co.uk.

Come and take a look and let me know if I've matured at all over the years

Thursday, August 28

If you don't like Gay marriage, Don't have one

The Friendly Atheist just wrote a brilliant post on Gay Marriage, Religion and the U.S.A.
Well worth a quick look.

Saturday, August 23

Wisdom from a Lamppost.

It's amazing. It's like the lamppost knows me!

Friday, August 22

Church of Scientology to come to Bristol

According to a report on GWR. Bristol's local radio, this morning, the scientologists are thinking of starting a new Church here in Bristol. Scientology Tent at the Discovery Balloon Fiesta
After handing out leaflets at the Bristol Balloon Fiesta the Church believes that the University town has lots of young fresh minds seeking answers and wants to set up here so they can help guide them.

Lets Review some facts about Scientology.

  • Scientology was invented by the Science-fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard

  • Scientologists believe that mankind is plagued by the spirits of Aliens, Thetans, that were brought to earth and killed by the Evil Galactic Warlord 75 Million years ago.

  • The only yourself of the Thetans, which bring misery and depression, is to work your way up through the Scientology course towards the Bridge of Freedom.

  • These courses are not free. To became a fully fledged Level 7 Scientology, and discover true peace, happiness, and enlightenment, can cost more than $350,000.

  • Scientologists are encouraged to lie to their family about how much they are spending and what they believe

  • Scientology breaks up families by pushing individuals to sever contact from relatives and friends critical of Scientology.

In Short
  • Scientology is a cult, designed to brainwash people, separate them from their loved ones, and take their money.

If they do try to come to Bristol I will be more than happy to lead the Protest.

There's enough lying here as it is.

Wednesday, August 20

The Apartments Strongest Man

As I was walking through the apartment carpark tonight, I was approached by the kind of man one might more often associate with a Harley Davidson.

"Hello there, young man," he said. Well he certainly knew how to get on my good side. "Feeling strong?"
For a second I wondered if he was running a 'test your strength' stall in our carpark, but then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw the Van. He was moving someone in. Bugger.

Me at my StrongestHeavy lifting is not, in fact, my strong point. I understand that when you look at my photographs you may think, 'now there's a hunky, husky man!' but the fact is I just know how to dress well. In truth a resemble a Snowman that has been giving 2 pipe-cleaners for arms.

But of course, when someone comes up to you and says, "feeling strong?" there's any one answer you can give...
"I reckon so. You want some help?" Who says 'Christian Charity' is dead, huh! No really. Who? I'd quite like to meet him.
"Well, I've got a big old TV I need to carry up the stairs." A TV for Ganesh's sake!! How hard could it be.
"Sure, why not." And I walked to the back of the Van to see what I'd just agreed too.

It was like a palette of Breeze blocks in TV form; 32 inches of pure lead. For someone who struggles to lift 25kg at the gym it felt like I felt like I completed my entire workout with every single step. We only had to climb one flight of stairs, but by the time we got the top, some several hours later, I was sweating like a Eskimo in Disneyworld.

Finally, I reached the room, put the TV down and shook the bikers hands. Or at least I tried to, but suddenly realised my arms didn't work anymore. I wished his step-daughter luck in her new flat and half walked, half fell back down the stairs to my flat, where I've spent most of the night collapsed on the couch trying to recover.

Christian Charity indeed. I knew there was a reason I'm an atheist.

Entering the Forbidden Room

I emailed the landlord on Sunday night about the teenager’s abuse.

On Dan's suggestion, I also mentioned that our door was starting to lean off its hinges. It was a small meaningless issue and I hadn't even thought of raising it until Dan pointed it out. I'd screwed the hinges back on myself and, although the door was still slightly awkward to close, it was so minor an issue as to not even be worth mentioning. There were many other, much more important, issues I could have mentioned, like the intercom entry system to the apartment not working or the smell of Weed that hovers in our hallway, but I figured she know about these things already. And besides I’ve never met my landlady, having found the apartment through a letting agency, and have no particular desire to meet her now. For one thing I’d have to tidy up.

Imagine my annoyance then when, yesterday morning, I got a text message from her. "Hey Simon. Would it be alright if I come round about seven tonight to look at the door?"
Bugger. I forwarded the text to Dan, appending a footnote: "so we're tidying tonight then?"

Now, fortunately, Dan’s mum had been down the week before so the house was already reasonably tidy. All we had to do was Hoover, hide any stray underpants, and tackle the forbidden room.

The forbidden room lies behind a thick wooden door in our bedroom. There was a time, before the door was sealed and barred, when it was an ensuite bathroom, clean, pristine and with a beautiful power shower. Then one day the shower stopped working so well. And we started to notice that the walls had gotten damp. I bugged Dan to tell the landlord about it, that being his job in those days but he never seemed to get around to it and eventually, to save ourselves from having to think about it we shut the door and locked the damp away.

So with the imminent visit of the Landlady we faced a problem. What if the landlord decided to do a tour of the property when she came too look at our virtually undamaged door? What would she say when she opened the door to our ensuite and saw a new species of six foot fungus growing there. I can’t be sure, but I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to paste it here.
Drastic action was needed.

And so we rushed home, getting in about six, prised open the door and got immediately to work.The dirtiest sepia tone bathroom you ever did see
The next hour was a mass of arguments, dust, cobwebs and semi-nude cleaning. Walls were scrubbed, tiles wiped, mirrors polished and toilets flushed.

At five to seven, we found our clothes again, and sat down in front room, trying to look as if we had been idly waiting for her the whole time. The bathroom was as clean as it had ever been. The damp was still there, we couldn’t hide that, but that was hardly our fault. The important thing was that the room looked loved. We just might get away with it.

By 8.30 there was still no sign of the Landlady. We had Dinner, watched the Olympics, and then sat there to stare at the clock for a while. Finally at 8:50 my phone rang.

“Hi, Simon?” It was my Landlady.
“Hey ya. You ok? What happened?”
“Yes well, I turned up at seven to see you.”
“You did?”
“Yes," she said, "But I couldn’t get in. Your intercom system doesn’t appear to be working!”

And so ends our foray into the forbidden room. But join us again next time wont you, when the landlord comes to call...

Previous Posts

Tuesday, August 19

Thank you for your support

A massive thank you to all your support on my last post about the homophobic abuse suffered by my hubby and I, both here and over on my facebook profile! It's awesome to have so many of you agreeing that I did the right thing.

I'm beginning to believe it. So far, the kids are staying away.

Sunday, August 17

Homophobic Abuse In My Own Home

Tonight my partner and I suffered homophobic abuse in our own home. And I handled the whole thing so badly.

We live in an apartment block, renting a ground floor apartment in a block shared with 17 others. Recently the teenagers in our area have decided that hanging round in our carpark isn't cool enough, and through the use of slender wrists through the buildings letterbox manage to break in every evening and hold a gang meeting in our Hallway. They're kids mostly, kid's with nothing better to do than Invade our property to get out of the rain. And as it turns out, nothing better to do than shout abuse at my partner and I whenever we try to enter and exit our home.

It's not even like they're particularly creative. We've been called Batty boys, faggots, and been told that we 'like it up the shitter.' But it's abuse, pure and simple. I try to ignore it, but it annoys me, and it upsets Dan. These kids ve no right to be in my home and no right to make me or my partner afraid to walk out our own front door.

Tonight I exploded at them. I told them to get the fuck out of my house.

"If you're not gone in ten minutes I'll be reporting you for trespassing.
"It's not your house. And my mate lives here, he invited me in."
"Then go to your mates flat!" Dan said, to them. Surprisingly he seemed calmer than me. I was so angry. All I could think of was how much they'd annoyed me.
"Fine," I'm yelling at them now, "then I'll report you for Homophobic Abuse. Take your pick."
"Report us for what?" One of them said. He can't have been more than about 13.
I ignored them and turned to walk back to the flat. The kid started to follow me, panicking.
"What do you mean. What did we say?"
I walked into the flat, held the door open and turned to face them. They knew where I lived now. What the hell had I done? But then, the kid who followed me looked genuinely concerned. Maybe I'd scared them. I'd threatened to report him, he was trying to talk his way out of trouble. For a moment though, I wondered if he truly even understand what him and his friends had done to upset me.
"You were there!" I snap at him, "You know what you said." And I closed the door, fumbling to lock it in case they tried to get in.

10 minutes later I went to look again, and all of them had gone.

But here's the thing. I did it all wrong. They're Kids. Just Kids. Kids with nothing better to do than sit in places they have no right to be and hurl meaningless abuse. They can't possibly understand the hurt and the pain they caused or how much they scared Dan. Why couldn't I have told them that? Why couldn't I have tried to stay calm, reasonable, maybe even educate them a little. Why couldn't I at least have just ignored them, maybe that way they still wouldn't know where I live now...

I got it all wrong. I saw red and just shouted and yelled and gave them a reason to hate me. Now I don't know what I'll do next time I have to walk past them. Because they will be there again, at the very least they'll still be in the carpark next to my house. They're not just going to go away and now I've given them a reason to single me out and make things worse for me and Dan. Especially Dan. I'm so worried I've made things worse for him.

How can I fix this? Any advice would be welcome.

Sunday, June 1

Hag Night

It was my stag night last night, so I'm absolutly nackered, and still full of champagne bubbles.

Photos are on the way. I only hope I'm not doing anything stupid in any of them. Facebook is a very dangerous thing.

Tuesday, May 27

The cost of a wedding

It's all a bit too familiar.

Monday, May 26

The Final Countdown to Love

It's literally the final countdown to the wedding now. I don't want to say this, because it sounds like an old Aunt or Uncle, pinching the cheek of their favourite Nephew and remarking 'My haven't you grown fast?' but it's come around so quickly.

It's been over a year since we got engaged, over a year since we first start looking at venues, and everything seemed like it was a such a long way away, they was so much time.

Now time's pretty much run out. In a few weeks it'll be all over, all the hard work, all the fights, all the months of planning and the continual colour scheme changes, and all the dieting and binge eating, and saving and worries will be over and done with, and we'll be sat in the Jacuzzi comitting it to memory and to a finacial debt that will last until we retire at the age of 90.

Love. Thank God I'll be over and done with it soon.

Little Fluffy Clowns - Balloon Modelling Down Under

More Fluffy Clowns.
These guys are taking part in the RedBull Flugtag, raising money for Mcmillion. But inbetween they still have time to be educational.
And nude...

Sunday, May 25

Confessions Of A Balloon Modeller

I had no idea the squeak of rubber could be so dangerous

I skip a heartbeat

This post is brought to you by InsideCardiacArrest.com

Heaven knows I worry enough about death. In fact, I'm kind of fascinated by it. There's something about the total finality of it that both interests me and scares me half to death. So if I keep thinking about it too much I might find out about it much earlier than I'd like too.

It's so easy to go as well. 325,000 people die from Sudden Cardiac Arrest, such as congestive heart failure, every year. Thankfully, sites like InsideCardiacArrest.com exist to fill me and others in on how to spot the signs.

So that's one less thing for me to worry about.

Oh No Vision

Any time I mention that I watch EuroVision people look at me funny, as if I must be mentally retarded and should probably be put down.

I used to think they were the crazy ones but this year I'm not so sure. No matter what the UK does, we always end up right at the bottom of the list. And you'd think that as the UK pays for the majority of the event we could rig the voting a little...

There were however some highlights. Terry Wogan getting more and more bitter as the votes were counted, the terrible jokes by the Eurovision hosts, and of course this wonderful entry by Bosnia.

Wednesday, April 9

Lost at Sea

I'll keep this short because there's nothing more tedious than reading about someone elses dreams.
Last night however I dreamt I was on a boat where you had to jump over a railing and onto a saftey net to get to the bottom decks. This was just fine until the entire boat seemed to turn into a circus, and I not only had to jump once but had to jump onto swinging tire, onto a trapeze, into the arms of another trapezeist and then drop comfortably onto the saftey net below. Everyone seemed to think that this should be really easy and kept telling me to hurry up and jump.

"Well you hurry up and jump damn it," I shouted in my poshest dream voice.

And then I woke up.

As odd as it might be a circus ship doesn't sound like to bad an idea. I might go talk to my bankmanager tommorow to see if he can give a loan

Monday, April 7

There are times when I hate myself.

Like the times when I realise that in my own efforts to make my own dreams come true, in my own futile attempts to make something of my life, that I've let the biggest thing in my life suffer. It's scary how easy it easy to overlook my boyfriend. He is just there, he's always been there, and I feel fairly confident that he always will be. And so I get on with my life, doing the things I want to do with my time, happily beliving that he will be ticking along just fine.

And then there are times when the whole thing collapses. Times when I just want to go up to him and hold him, and say 'sorry' a million times until the pain goes away. Times when he needs me and I'm too busy caught up in my own little world to notice.

I hate myself for not being everything to him that he needs me to be. Hate myself for not being the man he sees when he looks at me. But mostly I hate myself for being so selfish that I can take him for granted. Because, tommorrow, if he wasn't there, my world would cease to exist. He is the my morning, my lunch-time entertainment and my night. He takes my moaning, my complaining, my cynical bitterness and he welcomes it, loving it. He takes me as myself. So many times I forget what an amazing thing that is to ask of somebody.

This is all very dramatic of course and the cynic in me is screaming at my lack of style. Right now I feel worried for him, and sorry for myself, and sorry for him and worried for me. Even when I'm upset for him my emotions are selfish.

I want to know how to give him more of me. I want to know how to find the relationship we had.
I don't think we've lost it, we've just had to ration it out to last a lifetime. But right now, I'd take a firework over a fire anyday...

Wednesday, March 26

The Freelance GuruUPDATE: Due to a technical error at The Freelance Guru the blog URL is now http://freelanceguru.co.uk.
http://www.freelanceguru.co.uk is currently not working due to Bloggers inability to handle double domains.
Please update your links

Over 9,000 hits later the Freelance Cynic has been re-incarnated.
The 'Freelance' saga continues over at The Freelance Guru

RECENT POSTS ON THE FREELANCE GURU!

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Sunday, March 16

Moved to the Freelance Guru

Over 9,000 hits later the Freelance Cynic has been re-incarnated.
The 'Freelance' saga continues over at The Freelance Guru

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