Geofftech - 50 pence - Contributors 426 to 450

Tuesday 18th May, and I saw a woman on the train this morning with an iPod mini! Where did she get if from? Well.. obviously either off of eBay, or she'd been to or had it brought back for her from the US recently... but it was so cute! And silver!

I wanted to talk to her and ask her about it, but she has her white ear buds in all the time, and I didn't want to interrupt what sounded suspiciously like Suedes Greatest Hits playing. And I'm not very good at taking subtle photos either, and my camera was buried deep down in my bag, etc .. etc .. otherwise ...

It's Wednesday, the 19th May and I'm vaguely excited (?!) because I'm making my first proper effort tonight to visit someone, somewhere that I wouldn't have normally gone to, just to go and get 50p. I'll be going to the Oakdale Arms pub, in Harringay, London N4 this evening to go and a chap that works there who promises me 50p if I go and collect it in person.

So if you fancy popping along too for a chat about 50p's and/or all things iPod, then I'll be there at about 7pm I guess. If you want to know where it is, then it's here.

In the meantime, I finally get round to nabbing one of the senior guys at work, who I've been waiting to catch him off guard when he's having a smoke outside. So here's Adam Bartram (426), a cigarette, and my hand full of his kind contribution outside our building this morning.

Adam (as I suspected), used to be a long-haired rocker in his more youthful days and picks Motorhead's "Motorhead" from the album "No sleep 'til Hammersmith". It must be this version Adam insists, as "It's got lots of loud explosions in it", except that "You can't hear the explosions because the music so loud it's drowning it out".

Adam got slightly teary eyes as he recalled the halcyon days of being at this gig and how his head "Rattled with noise" for about two days afterwards. And this is the sort of person that they now entrust to look after Googlebytes of data on BBC servers.

The sort of person who'll be looking after the BBC system of the future though are like my next young contributor. Step forward Jack Bartram (427) which the observant amongst you will notice has exactly the same surname as of Adam (#426) above.

This is no coincidence, for Jack is spending a couple of weeks here at the Beeb on work experience from his school to learn all about .. about .. well what he mainly learnt from spending some time with me this afternoon is how to send spoof emails using false names, which I think is a very underrated skill, and yet very important for all future spammers-to-be in this day and age. Wouldn't you agree? And his song choice is the excellent Strokes "Last Nite". Thanks Jack!

You know, contributor Chris (#4) commented to me earlier how "Things appeared to be slowing down", and maybe that was putting him off reading my webpages on a daily basis.

Well, I think that contributor Robin (#28) must have overheard this and was perhaps looking for 'wacky' ideas to mention and help me fill some space here as this afternoon he got very excited (And I do mean very excited) about the fact that we have a new coffee variety in our vending machine here in our office... yes - it's new 'Dark Roast' flavour Kenco coffee! Robin thinks that "If I find this exciting then I'm sure other people must do", and that "It's a guaranteed crowd puller" to my site. Umm... ok... thanks! (I think).

But putting all that excitement aside for a second, I've got to go and dash off up to the Oakdale Arms pub in Harringay to collect another 50p, so more later!

Ok, so for this first time since this all started (if you exclude Amersham the other week when I was going there anyway), I made a specific journey today to go and meet someone in person to collect 50p off of them.

It all started a couple of weeks back, when a nice man called Stephen Early emailed me saying that if I went to the pub where he lives - The Oakdale Arms in Harringay, north London, then he'd give me 50p, and he might be able to convince some of the other regulars to do the same to. He also mentioned that he saw himself as "An ex-geek" (he no longer has a computer job), but he had installed a wireless access point into the pub!

So armed with my digital camera in one hand, and a laptop with wireless card in the other I took a deep breath and ventured into Arsenal territory yesterday evening, and got there at exactly 7pm.

"Is Stephen Early around" I asked the barman as he poured me what would prove to be a very tasty pint of Pegasus bitter.

He wasn't said the barman, but he'd call him where he was.

"Tell him it's Geoff the iPod man" I said, which drew a puzzled expression, but he must of duly passed on the message as ten minutes later as I'm half-way through by pint, a cheerful Steve turns up in the pub!

Turns out that he lives at the pub, and is a director of the company which runs it and a couple of other pubs in the area. They also like their beer, and when I saw beer - I mean proper beer, as the Oakdale had a fantastic selection or real ale's on tap, including a couple of milds and cider on as well which is quite a rare thing to see.

And so we did what blokes do in a pub - drink, and talk about anything and everything.

Ok, so we initially started off talking about beer - how northern UK pubs serves their beer differently to those in the south. The difference between a kegs, caskets and barrels, etc.. and how Guinness Extra Cold is the same product just passed around the chilling loop another couple of times, and is really a bit of a marketing scam, and did you know that the colder beer is the less flavour it has anyway?

"Ideal temperature for beer?" I ask Steve "12 to 13 degrees centigrade" he replies.

Then, one of the Oakdale's regulars spotted me with my laptop and wandered over and asked if I could look something for him. "Sure" I said, thinking "Football scores? Train times? The weather tomorrow?". Nope, he wanted to know about the Pitcairn Islands in the Pacific ocean! And so we looked it up, and I discovered another two letter domain extension that I never knew before ".pn" for Pitcairn! Brilliant.

And before I knew it we were chatting to more of the regulars, beer was flowing nicely, and it didn't take much persuades for them to decide that they too would like to contribute 50p. And who was I to say "No?". So I didn't.

So BIG BIG thanks to Colin-the-nerd (428) (That's not his real name by the way), who wanted to remain anonymous and so I promised to give him the classic blacked-out face effect that I've already done on a couple of other people here.

"Why anonymous?" I asked. "Are you on the FBI's top ten most wanted list or something?", and only later realised that he deflected answering my question by going on to tell me the difference between the FBI and CIA, as well as MI5 and M16 here in the UK. (One does domestic intelligence, the other is international - I forget which way round it was!)

He has a sense of humour too as he quickly realised that his nominated song didn't have to be a very good one, as he kindly picked the Timmy Mallett/Bombalurina version of "Itsy bitsy teeny weeny yellow polka dot bikini".

Next was Ian, or just Big Ian (429) as everyone seemed to call him, and who was I to argue? who also realised the potential of choosing a not-entirely-serious tune with The Wurzels "Combine Harvester (Brand new key)", and if you feel like I, or they are making any of these up, then go to www.everyhit.com and search for them where you'll see that I am (unfortunately) not!

Ian also decided that if I could setup a website just to get 50p's for an iPod, then maybe he should setup his own website for something that he really wanted - so we checked online, and unfortunately www.iwantablowjob.com had already been taken, but not to worry Ian, as www.gimmeablowjobplease.com is still up for grabs...

Then there was Mike (430), or Arsene Wenger as he's known (as he does look a bit like the Arsenal Manager) who thinks that "I should write a book about this" (So do I Mike, know any agents or publishers that want to take me on?)

He also chose the excellent "Shoplifters of the world unite" by The Smiths, who was then (eventually) followed by the barman - Tom (431) who they all managed to eventually persuade into contributing (I made it clear to him that he didn't have to if he didn't want to!) but he did. What a nice man. Oh and his song is Belle & Sebastians "The state I am in" from their album Tigermilk.

Then Colin-the-nerd, (still not his real name) disappeared somewhere saying "I'll just go and fetch Rob, so he can join in too", and sure enough a few minutes later Rob Ruein (432) (looking like he'd just woken up!) appeared and became contributor number four-hundred and thirty two! Excellent!

And he chooses Hatebreed's "I will be heard" as his song. Thank you Rob!

And that was it.. oh! Except for the man that had invited me there in the first place!

I'd almost forgotten to grab 50p from the man himself who had invited me up in the first place! And so Steven Early (433) contributed his coin to the pile, and picked an intriguing song - "Fade to black".

Now this is originally a Metallica record, but he picked the version done by a band called Apocalyptica, who take rather heavy metal songs and produce orchestral sounding versions of them (they're a quartet which isn't really a full orchestra is it? but I don't know how else to describe it), and Steve went and stuck one on on the jukebox!

Then I realised it was getting late, I had to trek all the way back across town, my girlfriend rung to check where I was "I'm still in the pub!" I said, "He's in brothel!" shouted Ian helpfully, and thanking everyone for an marvellous evening I dashed up the road to Seven Sisters station to get the tube home.

One more thing to mention then because of someone that I saw on the tube, and I feel like having a bit more fun here.

I took a picture on the tube (hence slightly blurred) of the guy sitting diagonally opposite me who was listening to his iPod and I managed to take this sneaky picture:

And here's the deal: If you are that person, email me! If you know who that person is, tell him to look here and get in touch with me, and I will give them a 50p 'prize' just for the hell of it, and for a little bit more fun here.

So come on ... is that you? You were traveling on a southbound victoria line train at about 10pm last night. If it is, get in touch, meet up with me (to prove that you look like the photo!) and I'll give you 50p!

Thursday 20th May and I have to mention this!

This is the funniest thing I've read on a forum for a while. A guy is complaining that people told him to water-cool his PC, and so he did so by pouring water into his machine! and was surprised when it went "Bang!". Is it real, or a wind-up? Have a read for yourself and decide...

Also, I get a lovely email from someone calling herself "Steph" who commented that she liked my Fairy Liquid line up from the other day, "Very Andy Warhol" she writes, and thus wishes to donates to the cause... You see! So for all those that were thinking it was completely surreal, it just goes to show... And i've given her my address and is therefore another 50p on the way!

Oh, and tonight I'm going down to the West One Four club in Kensington to see the band Small World Incident, so feel free to pop along if you want to give me 50p. I hope to be collecting more some off of unsuspecting punters anyway...

Friday 21st May and today at work, i get six 50p's in a very short space of time! We're moving office in a few weeks time and I bumped into a couple of people who we're moving in with who were down out way for a meeting.

Pete Traill (434) at first wanted to be number 500 (but that's taken), and then jokingly asked if he could be number 501 (but that is already taken as well!) so in the end he just conceded and gave me 50p here and now.

As did his colleague Mark Seabourne (435) who had to go through an almightly rigmarole of taking one his tops of and making sure his pants weren't showing. And by pants - to all those of you stateside - I do of course not mean trousers, but his underwear. Ah, whatever. He chose Rage against the machine "Bullet in the head", whilst Pete opted for Tenacious D's "Tribute". Thanks guys!

Then, I got some in the mail at work which I completely wasn't expecting.

It turned up from contributor Stefano (#327), who - completely out of the blue sent me £2 worth (that's four lots) of 50p's that he collected from ... from ... er, well to be honest I'm having a little bit of trouble reading his handwriting on the note that he put inside (sorry Stefano!), but it does say (I think), Alberto L (436), Patrizia G (437), Silvia D (438), and Semola the dog! (439), a lovely two year old cocker spaniel.

They're all friends of Stefano (especially the dog), and again, if I was handing out awards as part of the this project (i'm not, but maybe I should...) then Stefano would be now be winning the "International award for most arm-twisting to friends and colleagues". But like I said - That doesn't actually exist.

Stefano does email me back later with their tune choices:

"Lili Marlene" Marlene Dietrich, - "Alba chiara" Vasco Rossi (who?!), "The Day Before You Came" Abba, and "A Winter's Tale" by Queen. Great! Thank you all!

Saturday 22nd & Sunday 23rd May - well I took my PC apart to put some new bits into it, so that I can the use those bits to upgrade my mum's PC which is now a really old thing that she's got.

However, nothing in life is simple as you expect it to be, is it? And I really should know by now that when I estimate that "It'll take a couple of hours" to do all this, then really I should, double it, and then double it again, and realise that I'm going to spend all weekend building PC's and re-installing software, and so I did no 50p collecting, and (rather slackly) didn't reply to a single email! So if you've mailed me recently and I haven't replied, oops.. I'll get round to it this week, honest.

Oh and here's what the inside of my PC now looks like, just in case you interested (!?)

I should point out that I did come out of "geek mode", for a few hours on Saturday night and watch the new Brad Pitt movie 'Troy' - which was, well.. it was ok I suppose. Not brilliant, but good.

It did get me wondering about the real story of the Trojan Horse epic, and thus found this website all about it.

Monday 24th May and contributor Marco (#17) who has only just spotted the 'singing' dog on the previous page emailed me this morning saying: "I thought you were trying to encourage people to visit your website and donate 50p. I'm considering asking for mine back." and even suggests that we could have a photo taken of me giving the 50p back to him. Nice idea Marco, amusing..! but no! I need it! I'm having a 'lean' spell at the moment, and I need every 50p I can get!

There's a story on the BBC news website today - Rivals Challenge iPods dominance as a PC Pro magazine senior writer recommends other portable music players apart from the iPod saying that they are better value for money, have more features, and a better battery life! Have a read and decide for yourself.

Contributor Jack (#427) who is still in the office this week on work experience sends me a picture, which shows that he's obviously learning a lot, as he's had time to make this fantastic er... collection of office implements, including two staplers, a roll of tape, plastic cup and a pair of scissors. Umm.. thanks Jack!

And I promised that I'd put it here on the website for him, so here it is. It'll probably win next years Turner Prize.

I do get a 50p today though - except it's not a straight 50p, it's from one of the new guys here at work Dylan Norman (440) who's from East London in South African and therefore gives me a 5 Rand coin that he had lying about at home instead.

Now this is in fact just a little shy of 50 pence, but I'm happy to cash it in for him, which I'm able to do as my girlfriend is South African and she bought it off of me for 50p! Nice one, oh and he chooses "Iron, Lion, Zion" by Bob Marley as his tune - thanks! And that's a terrible picture of me as well I've decided!

One last thing to talk about today must be that of someone that has been most adamant that he will not contribute.

Introducing... my colleague Stewart Jump, whom I've been asking more or less on a weekly basis (i.e. everytime I see him) from pretty much day one of this, so since November of last year and he keeps saying "No!".

In fact, it's sort of almost become a bit of a comedy routine as I say "Will you.." , he says "No...", and then we carry on as if it'd never been mentioned.

So today I thought I'd grab Stewart and get a photo of him being an official non-contributor. Umm, cheers Stew.

Suggestion as to what he's pointing up to at the ceiling on an email to me please.

Tuesday 25th May and getting out of the tube at Oxford Circus this morning, I'm treated to the site of the '118 188' mystery runners, with full wigs & moustaches on, except that instead of their normal running attire, they're dressed up in yellow jump suits with an ironing board behind them!

Why? Well, because they were giving out 'iron on' transfers to any passers by, and they got very excited when I took their picture! (And proceeded to give me a handful of transfers).

At least I had my camera on me at the time - yesterday I was really annoyed when wandering about at lunchtime I saw a guy with a brilliant sandwich/advertising board. On the front it said "The end of the word is so like, nigh", and on the back it had "Black Friday - The final episode of Friends, followed by new evil Big Brother 5".

Yes, just in case you've had your head buried in the sand the last ever ever episode of Friends is being broadcast in the UK this Friday on TV - interesting because normally they'd show it on cable a day earlier on Thursday, but this week they're not doing it, because they want people to watch the launch of Big Brother which follows right after it. Sneaky marketing plot ou-quoi?

Anyway - to work, where I get a 50p in the post from Stephanie Horner (441) which I've been expecting, and she chooses Franz Ferdinand "Take me out" as her tune. Thanks Steph! She also later mails me beck to tell me she's an iPod owner, and it seems live I haven't used that icon for ages! So it's nice to see it again.

And look at that.. that's 441, plus the 9 'reserved' people, which means that I'm technically at 450 people. 450!

That's the 90% mark - just 50 to go! I just need 50 people to give me 50p and the whole thing will finally be finished...

Friday 28th May and you've probably been thinking "Ooh - he hasn't updated his website since Tuesday". Yeah, well now I have, and get what - i've been been sick again. I had a sore throat on Monday evening, on Tuesday it got worse despite taking many (legal) drugs, but to no avail - and Wednesday I awoke to a raging headache, runny nose and an even worse sore throat.

By Thursday it had developed into double sneezing - literally - I would sneeze once and almost instantly sneeze again! Most odd. And I rang up work this morning and my dear colleague John told me not to come in and infect everyone when he heard my chesty cough down the phone. Anyway, that's how ill I've been - I've not even had the inclination to update my website, well until now of course.

A few facts on sickdays though - in the UK there were 176 million days taken off by people last year, which is on average 7.35 days per year. And that's up 0.9% on last year.

Employees though suspect that almost a fifth of those are faked 'sickies', and apparantly there's a rumour going round in my company at work that if you have more than 10 sick days in a year, then they treat that as a little suspicious and start keeping tabs on you!

Still at least that's not as bad as the supermarket Tesco's here, who recently introduced a company policy where workers will now not be paid for first three of any sick days that they have. They seem to have brought this in just in time for the football tournament Euro 2004, which starts in just a couple of weeks time. Funny that.

50p wise though I have a source which collected my mail from my work address (where I get people to post their 50p's to) so I've got a couple there, plus also one via PayPal.

So hello and thanks to Jack du Rose (442) who's the MD of duRose Jewellery and his initial email subject line amused me as it read - "Oh you'd like fifty of my shiny english pennies wouldn't you?" (yes, I would actually!), and he went on to ponder about perhaps setting up a fund of his own - to help towards getting him an Aston Martin car!

As for his song, well Jack gets into the humour of it all by not asking for "One of those upstarts" just as Franz Ferdinand or the Darkness, but chooses a "Proper musician" in the form of Chesney Hawkes, and his one-hit-wonder from 1991 of "I am the one and only". Gee.. thanks Jack, you're too kind. He even goes on to point out that I can download it for free from www.chesneyhawkes.co.uk/music.html

And to think I was about to give you a pound for your Aston Martin fund...

Ok, so now I've downloaded dear old Chesney and am now playing it, and I find that George (#172) has emailed me. with news of a rumour that Steve Jobs at Apple will be announcing the opening of the iTunes Music Store on June 18th, with prices of €1. 29 / 89p per track! But it's just a rumour ... !

On the 50p front, Jenny Delaney (443) is next as she sends me an actual 50 pence piece in the mail. She originally emailed me a few days ago asking "are you actually for real?" Hang on Jenny, i'll just prod myself .. Ow! Yes, it would appear that I am real flesh and blood.

Anyway, she writes me a lovely note saying "Thanks for the entertainment provided by your website - it's well worth 50p", and picks the 80's classic song "Heaven is a place on earth" by Belinda Carlisle.

Bloody hell - that's from 1987 Jenny, who must have only been just born back then - and you know what? I think I have a copy of it on 7" vinyl (Shock! Before the days of CD's and MP3's). Hang on, because I think it's in a box of records under my bed, so I'm just gonna go and dig it out and take a photo of it.

Right, here ya go!

And all my old 7" singles were indeed in four separate boxes under my bed, and which box do you think little ol' Belinda was in?

That's right! The fourth and last one that I looked in. Typical.

Anyway, dear old Chesney has now been stopped, and I've just plugged in my record player and am now pumping out "Heaven..." it's a classic! So thank you Jenny!

Finally, a plug for today/tonight for the fact that Channel4 are touting today as 'Black Friday' as it's the last ever episode of Friends tonight on TV, followed by all new "Evil" Big Brother.

Yeah right. We'll see.

Oh, and 50p says that Ross & Rachel get together at the end.

Saturday 29th May. Well what do you know - Ross & Rachel got together at the end. Excellent. Sorry if you haven't watched it yet and that spoilt it for you.

And oh look - a 50p! Nicola Tanner (444) is a first year law Student at Cardiff University, and I don't think she's that keen on revising too much at the moment because she spent most of her time last week emailing me, reading my website and finding 50p-related cocktails on the 'net! (See below).

She sends me this excellent photo of herself and a Tyrannosaurus Rex (Nicola is the one on the right), and she even admits herself that it's Quite a disturbing picture" and chooses "Dragula" from the Matrix soundtrack by Rob Zombie as her tune.

What else? Oh, she also found (told you she wasn't that keen on revising) a Cocktail that is called '50p' on the drinkalizer.com website. Have a look at it! It's excellent, and I am now officially declaring it the official 'iN Da Pod' beverage! I bet the ingredients to make it though cost more than 50p.

And when her 50p turned up in the post, it officially came from from the 'Fifty Pence Co. Cardiff' with it's genuine stamp of authenticity:

Here is another prime 1997 specimen, perfectly sound, only several 1000's of owners. Good runner, will bring you years of happy listening pleasure if you spend it on an iPod".

Of course I'm going to spend it on an iPod!

Sunday 30th & Monday 31st May is a Bank Holiday weekend here in the UK, meaning that we all get the Monday off as a days holiday, and people go away for mini-breaks and hope that the weather is good (which it often isn't).

I ended up having a bit of a 'bike' weekend myself and rode around various places, including getting stuck 5 miles from where I wanted to be with a puncture and I'd forgotten to take my mobile to call anyone for help - but that's another story.

What I did learn though was (after I'd popped down to Halfords and bought a puncture repair kit), is that just because you've repaired the hole in the tube in your tyre doesn't mean that what caused it has gone.

i.e. I repaired it, put everything back, pumped the tyre up and it went back down again. So I took it apart again, found another puncture (you can see what's coming, can't you?), put it back on the wheel, pumped it up and .. shortly after it went down again.

It was only as I'm reparing it for a third time that my girlfriend helpfully points out that perhaps I should check in the tyre itself to see if whatever caused the puncture in the first place is still there. So I look, and - oh arse. The thorn which had caused the first puncture (and subsequent ones) was still lodged in the tyre.

So each time I was fixing it, the tube was then being re-punctured. Lesson learnt on that one I then think.

Today though I dropped by to some friends of mine Roxane & Dan Butterworth who's daughter was celebrating her first birthday (Happy Birthday Daisy!), and we all sat in the garden, drank tea, ate cake and soaked up the sun, and it was lovely.

And what do you know... contributors Adrian & Sarah (76 & 77) were there and Sarah passed me on two 50p's that she'd collected on my behalf - one from her work colleague Sarah White (445) and one from her husband Stuart White (446) - who are yet to choose their nominated tunes.

Then on the way out (hence pictured in the doorframe) Roxane (447) whom I suspect had been struggling with her conscience about contributing finally concedes and hands over 50p.

There are lot better causes in the world" she says, and I couldn't agree more, which is why I'll reiterate here again that if you think I'm a stupid tosser for doing this, then send me an email that says "You stupid tosser" and send off 50p - or perhaps more - to a charity that you think deserves your money instead, and I haven't got a problem with that.

Roxanne was also worried that I might put a sign that says "Mug" over her head. I suggested it would be funnier using Photoshop to paste in a picture of an actual mug over her head, but I can't find a suitable picture, so we'll just stick with her original idea instead:

Roxane is also an ardent Mac fan/user who's a dab hand at Photoshop herself as well, so putting in a sign like this is easier than a picture of mug, where the lighting & shading would be all wrong and she'd be able to pick holes in my artwork.

So there you have it. Three more, and I'm rambling, so i'll shut it for today. Oh - she choose Dee Lite's "Groove is in the heart" as well though. Thanks Roxane!

Tuesday 1st June. A while back, I seemed to recall predicting having this finished by the end of May! But it would seem not. I'm not getting enough fifty pences per day (my FPPD has fallen right down) for me to make that target!

In fact, if you look at the graph, you'll see that I'm now having my weakest point since the beginning of the year! So if you were holding out, or perhaps thinking I'll wait until he has a bit of a lean spell", well that time is NOW!

I also think a lot of people might be thinking Ooh - he's almost there" and are resting up expecting the end to happen just by itself. But the end will not happen until I get a few more people chipping in!

So c'mon - why not ring up your mum, or pop round and see your neighbour and ask if they'd like to contribute...

Wednesday 2nd June. I've had a few emails from people who are 'going to send' me 50p, and have asked for my address.. so there's about four that I'm currently expecting, but I can't add them up here until I actually get the 50p's!

In the meantime, something vaguely exciting to report is the prospect of a possible place to buy the iPod from. Remember how John Lewis turned me down? And I never heard back at all from the Apple UK store? I wrote to these two places because they were the two big stores in London who I knew sold iPods.

But if you were to come up to me today and say to me I'm after some excellent valued Hi-Fi equipment Geoff with a really friendly service, where would you recommend?", then my answer would always be "Richer Sounds". No question.

But I'd never considered buying an iPod from them because they didn't do them - They sell things like amplifiers, surround-sound systems, minidiscs, etc.. e.g. Hi-Fi seperates.

Until now that is! As I spotted in the newspaper over the weekend an advert for the fact that they're selling 20Gb iPod's for the amazing price of ... £249!

That's right, not the 15Gb model, the 20Gb model - usual price £299/£300 - but Richer are selling them for £250 - my target amount!

Then, you need to consider that the the whole Richer policy is one which is fitting to this project.

They take a light hearted look/approach to customer service. They go out of their way not to intimidate people, and do things like give you a free umbrella if you make a purchase when it's raining, and give you free mugs and lollipops in-store, and if it's your first time Hi-Fi purchase with them, they'll give you a big glowing sticker that says "I'm a Richer Sounds Virgin" Excellent!

So I've written to them, telling them about this, and asking if I can be filmed buying my iPod at one of their stores. If they say "No", I'll be amazingly pissed off, but I have this feeling that if they do check the site, they'll like the stupidity of it all and get on board with the scheme.... so I await to hear!

Thursday 3rd June, and I get an eMail from the Apple press office! Look:

Dear Geoff,

We've been alerted to your 50p quest by several sources worldwide over the last 6 months and have been monitoring your progress - as you're nearing completion of your task, we felt it timely to offer both our congratulations and assistance. You've become quite a cult figure among many of our staff here at Apple US and are a regular feature on our internal message boards - indeed there's an entire section called, 'what geoff did today', which receives the majority of hits/comments.

We were most disappointed that you'd been refused permission by a London Department Store to film your purchase and pay with 50 pences, so we've arranged with our Apple UK Store to make your purchase there.

We'd also like to invite you and eight friends to a champagne reception on the date of your choice. All we ask is to be able to take a few publicity shots for our staff magazine. Please contact me at janice.peabody@apple.com to arrange a suitable time.

ours
Janice Peabody
Public Relations Executive

And yes, of course it's spoof!

I just though I'd see if you got vaguely excited (like I did), for a second ... It came courtesy of contributor Janet (#63), who'd forgotten that she'd used that false name "Janice Peabody" before, so I knew straight away it was from her! Nice try though....

Late on in the afternoon, I get a couple of 50p's in the post - Hurrah! The first one is from Martin Cowie (448) who got in touch with me after seeing some of my spoof tube maps (such as the upside-down one here) which are elsewhere on my website.

Turns out that he's getting married later this year, and wants to do the seating plan for his wedding in the style of a tube map, and wanted to know where I got the correct 'tube' font from.

I was more than happy to help him out.. in exchange for 50p of course which he duly posted, and it turned up today. Thanks Martin! And I've asked him if he'll send me a copy of his map/seating plan once he's done it, so that I can publish it here.

Then I got one that I'd also been expecting from Thom Hoffman (449) who's a psychology student at Southampton University. Turns out that he used to work in a pub next to Amersham station, where I was just the other week doing the tube thing. "If I still worked there, and it was open, you could have had a free pint!" he says.

I asked for a photo if he was going to contribute, and so got this one of him (as he puts it) "Liberating a piece of road awareness kit" - excellent!

Anyway, we get chatting and he did indeed send me 50p (turned up taped down to a bit of Lemsip packaging due to me being ill again recently!) and wants me to plug 'That Thom and Chris show' that he does on a summer radio station in Wycombe - called Blink FM. No problem .. duly done, and thank you Thom!

And that's Thursday ... takes me to 449, plus those 9 reserved/future contributors means I'm at 458!

I just need 42 more people...

Friday 4th June - Well now, here's a funny thing. I'd got an email last night from contributor Chris (#300) saying "Have you got a PayPal donation from my friend Linda?", to which I'd replied back "No...!". And I've got up this morning to find an email from him saying "I've checked with her and she definitely send it to you!", but I've had no email about it.

So I actually login to my PayPal account, and he's right ... it's there! Along with another one.

And suddenly - the penny drops. Or should that be about fifty pennies dropped - as I realised what I've done!

When I rebuilt my PC last weekend (you remember the pic of the PC open, yes?) I did a complete reinstall of Windows, everything... and when I've put my email client back on my machine, I've added the 'geoff@geofftech...' account, but completely forgot to add back in the '50pence@geofftech...' account.

One enormous Homer-sized DOH!

So I add it in, I press F5 to send/receive. and.. what do you know! 67 news email all dating back from last week flood in, 61 of which are Spam! But the rest? Some contributions! Fantastic!

And to celebrate and tell you all about it, I think we'll start a new page...