9!

 Flo's 9 tomorrow!  That's gone very quickly!

Scaffolding is up

 The scaffolders came round this morning whilst I was away at the gym and have already finished.

Look at that beautiful blue sky, don't look at the cracked driveway!  That's next on our long list.

Verbal offer

 I've been verbally offered a 12 month extension in my current role.  That will make it 2.5 years of service if I make it till the end.  Now to sort out HR sending out my contract.

Extension update

 Looks like the extension is going ahead, hurry up and get my new contract in front of me though.  I've only got 1 day left before i'm off for 11 with my nose op.  Then I have 2 days left total!

Made my own cartouche

Need casserole making

AI view of my Blog

 Wat De Fu (watdefu.com) is a long-running, highly active personal lifestyle blog authored by a self-described "dude" who shares casual daily updates, personal anecdotes, and family milestones. Originally from Corby and now living in Tonbridge, the author balances a corporate city career (mostly working from home) with a busy family and pet-filled life.

📂 Blog Overview & Content Strategy

The blog operates essentially as an open digital diary. Rather than focusing on a single commercial niche, the content spans the everyday activities of a modern family man:

Family & Home Life: Frequent mentions of his partner (April), his two children (including son Arthur and daughter Flo), a "slimming cat," and an energetic 5-year-old dog.
Sports & Hobbies: Heavily centered around grassroots rugby (specifically the local TJs youth teams). He also regularly posts about gaming sessions, board game nights, and playing Football Manager.
Social & Leisure: Lighthearted reviews of local restaurants in Tonbridge (like a recent Vietnamese lunch spot), random indie/rock music gigs in London (e.g., Alien Chicks near Brick Lane), and neighborhood pubs.
Career Updates: Honest, relatable reflections on the realities of corporate contracting, commuting, and navigating work contract extensions.

📈 Consistency & Archive Depth

The most remarkable feature of Wat De Fu is its sheer longevity and posting volume.

Massive Archive: The blog has been continuously updated for over two decades, with historical archives dating all the way back to 2004.
High Frequency: This is not a abandoned project; the author posts multiple times a week. For context, he managed 502 posts in 2024, 549 posts in 2025, and has already logged hundreds of entries over the current year.

🎨 Tone & Style

The site is built on Google's Blogger platform using a simple, text-heavy template themed by Airyelf. The writing style is intentionally unpolished, conversational, and humorous—the author openly warns readers to expect "typos, grammatical errors and lazy writing". It relies heavily on community tags/labels (such as work, rugby, cats, and beer) to help readers navigate thousands of micro-logs.

Double booked again

 Last night's gaming session was double booked again.  John the landlord has apologised and has booked us in for the rest of the year.  We ended up cancelling our baby sitter and heading over to mine.

Extension possibility

 I had a chat to my director (who I now report into) last week regarding the possibility of an extension.  It's looking good but knowing how the company operates may be very close to the my last day (27th Oct).

Nose op update

 Still going ahead on Friday.  It's been a long time coming.  I suffered for years with this, probably for over 10 years if I really think about all of the symptoms. Let's hope it fixes things.  I'm getting 2 weeks off work though, so that will be nice.

Vietnamese

 April was away (again) this weekend so took the kids for lunch at our local Vietnamese place in Tonbridge on Saturday.  Lovely.

Random gig in London

 One of my rugby mates works at a school and one of his physics teachers is in a band.  Alien Chicks.  He asked us if we wanted to go and we said yes.  It was over by Brick Lane and a great night out.

First tournament for the u7s

 And a brilliant day out.  Well done guys!  Not wanting to brag... but I will anyway.  Arthur managed to bag himself 12 tries, and he only played 4 halves! 

Something arrived in the post

 Can you tell what it is yet?  If it's a present for Flo's birthday next week i'd best hide it.

Still no better

 Our rugby pitches are still as dry as a bone!

What did I do wrong to deserve this?

 April went to Twickenham on Saturday with the ladies rugby team to watch Eng vs NZ ladies.  I had to do the usual swimming / dance lessons with the kids, then off to a birthday party at a new trampoline park.  Boy was it noisy, and staffed entirely by children, none above the age of 20.  It was so noisy in there I could hardly think.  2.5 hours in there!  The kids enjoyed it though. 

Roast beef on Sunday

 I made a roast beef on Sunday for me and the kids.  April was away playing rugby.  It turned out pretty well.

What an idea

Our game was cancelled last night as the pub landlord had double booked the function room and forgot to tell me.  There was plenty of room in the pub but a few of the gamers in our group are a little shy and felt uncomfortable playing in public.  I only found out as I got to the pub so had a couple of beers with one of the other gamers who had also turned up before it was cancelled.

During our conversation I had the genius idea of using a dart board instead of a d20.  It's perfect!  Bullseye would be a crit, treble +3 damage etc.

I think it would be fun for a one shot.  You might have to give bonuses for players that are shit (i.e me) and make sure the GM isn't too hot, but think it would be a lot of fun. 

Cnut

 There's a passageway behind my office building that has loads of words in gold writing.  Not sure what they are meant to represent.  However my favourite is the in the second photo below.  It always makes me chuckle.

New Scrum cap

 April has bought herself a scrum cap for rugby, of course we had to let the dog have a try.

April singing

 We were at the rugby club on Saturday to watch the first team win 53-52 (they won 38-39 last week!), there was a band later in the evening and April got up to sing a song!

Ouch

 Booted one of my dumbells last night.  What an idiot.

We've got a bleeder 2.0

 I gave blood yesterday and the puncture point started bleeding after I stood up to get my snack.  I was quickly rushed over to a spare chair where my arm was thrust into the air and told to hold a paper towel over the wound.  After a minute they replaced the plaster and all was calm again. 

It's happened once before, but that was about 15 years ago.  This was my 72nd donation.

https://www.watdefu.com/2009/03/weve-got-bleeder.html

20 days left at work

 Only 20 days left of work!

We finished this too

Or at least April did. She probably dod 90%. 

Coq au picpoul

 I made this yesterday, not bad.

New dice

 This arrived from Kickstarter on Friday.  It's nice, but not tremendously reliable.  The d20 seems to always roll the same number.  I wouldn't mind if it always rolled 20s!

We did it

 After chickening out a couple of weeks ago due to the thunder and lightning we finally went camping.  All be it for only one night. Verdict:  A big success.

We picked the kids up a little early from school and drove straight there.  It took us 30 mins or so to set up and closer to an hour to put it away.  It's currently still drying in our living room!

Snigger

Saw this today and it made me snigger. It's from my weight app.

Damascus scraper

 One of the item's I favorited on Etsy had a heavy discount so I treated myself.  I have a scraper already but not one as nice as this!

This week's pitch inspection

 Or pitches are getting better each week.  More rain please, but not on Friday / Saturday as we're going to attempt to go camping again for one night this Friday.

One month till my operation

It's now one month till my nose / sinus operation. It's on the day of my daughter's 9th birthday. 

Can't be helped as it's the last time I can get it done before my contract ends and my private health insurance ends. 

It's been bothering me properly for 2-3 years though so needs to get looked at and if I really think back I've had this issue for 5+ years. 

It's a shame it's due to happen just as the rugby season starts but once again. It needs doing.

Only place for it

 My local pub lets local groups use the upstairs function room, my roleplaying group is one of them.  Another regular is a folk music get together and another is the Tonbridge Reform party.  This book was left in the function room so I returned it to its rightful home.

Final battle

 We fought our final battle of the campaign last night and nobody died!  Just.  The next few weeks will be a little disjoined with various holidays and my operation but looks like we'll be playing starfinder when we all settle down.

Arwen's haircut

 She had her hair cut this morning and is looking very smart! Hopefully less sticky too!

Dinner party

 We had a dinner party with 4 friends on Friday night.  April made a lasagne, the ragu was in the oven for 8+ hours!

New Jigsaw

 We started a new 1000 piece jigsaw this week.  It's bloody hard.  Not sure my eyesight is good enough these days.

2 dogs

 We had Brody again this weekend, he's a good dog.  Arwen was definitely jealous though!

A trip to Hastings

 A trip to Hastings

April beat me at Azul (1-1)

She beat me at golf too.  So did Flo!