So, it is Christmas time then, and the songs have been playing. My iPod's Christmas playlist has been on a little over the last week or so, where I seem to have repeated a few of the songs by accident. I have two versions of Happy Xmas (War Is Over), a few versions of I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus (including pretty much the whole of the A Christmas Gift To You album from Phil Spector), and other tunes.
I'll admit that I haven't really done any work on my own Christmas album since the beginning of January if truth be told. I had another listen to what I recorded in the shape of Winter Sounds and Santa Claus Is On His Way, and was pleased with them, even if they are just basic very rough (and with my obligatory awful sound quality at home).
Artists included on the playlist include obviously John Lennon, Greg Lake, Jona Lewie, Sarah McLachlan, Aimee Mann, Paul McCartney, Bing Crosby (yes I know, but I don't care if you think it's cheesy)), The Pogues, and many more. The list is endless as to who can be on this sort of thing, but there is no Cliff Richard on my playlist!
Already we have watched a few Christmas films at home, with special mention made to Elf and the Disney animated A Christmas Carol with the voices of Jim Carrey (a few characters) and Gary Oldman (a few more characters), which are both seasonal must-watch films with us. We have got the Albert Finney version of A Christmas Carol (actually called Scrooge) out ready, as well as the Patrick Stewart version, and Louise is pushing for National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.
Have you noticed that I don't really know what to talk about and am making this up as I go along again? Thought so.
So, what the hey. Times are tough financially, and I know that is the same for so many of us. However, I am of the mind of trying to enjoy what I can of Christmas. I've been around and visited people, delivered presents (less than I would normally, again due to financial constraints), and given out the cards. People have said how they wish I had been sooner so that they could have had their cards with them to pass on to me, but in truth I give out cards not to get them back, but just because I am letting them know how important they are. There are some who I haven't got around to visiting, and to those I apologise once more. Security work doesn't give you much time (or fuel money for that matter) to be able to get around everyone.
I got myself a copy of the bumper Xmas edition of The Big Issue while I was in Mansfield on Wednesday (I miss the place I'll admit). I'm looking forward to reading it, especially the piece on The Gruffalo where they are suggesting that it could become a "Christmas Icon". That would be nice. I've read the book and The Gruffalo's Child, and loved them both. I also enjoyed the BBC's animated cartoon of the former, and am looking forward with joy to seeing The Gruffalo's Child as an animated piece by the BBC this year. I'm also looking forward to seeing the BBC's new version of Great Expectations as well, if the bloody recorder works and records it all for me. I love Charles Dickens stories. There is something about them that is just brilliant and, strangely enough, timeless in a way. They are stories that never seem to tire like some do. There are reinterpretations of them, and there are straight copies, and there are also stories based on his writings. His influence is wide-ranging, and I love how he brings a ray of light and hope into the darkness of those times during which he was writing.
That is really what I see as this Christmas in a way. We are living through dark times now, but for just this short period that some call Christmas (and some call other different things such as the Jewish ritual of Hanukkah) it would be nice if we could forget the troubles that we are all in and just have fun.
Happy holidays everybody. I will most likely be blogging during Christmas night, since I am at work. That and possibly watching a few Bond movies if I bring my Bond box set with me.
Take care of yourselves. I look forward to more ramblings to come. Thank you for reading.
23 December 2011 (41 years, and 28 days old)
PS - Before I forget, I would like to suggest that people check out the great compilation album It's Not Like Christmas (available on iTunes as well) by various independent artists (including my personal friends SWIMMING and Amusement Parks On Fire). All proceeds go to the charity SHELTER, and I love it. Out of interest, I would actually love to join APoF on stage for The Day It Snowed if ever I caught them during Christmas gigging.
Thursday, 22 December 2011
Thursday, 15 December 2011
A quick thought
"Life is like a box of chocolates..."
I suppose that if you study that single section of a longer sentence from the film Forrest Gump, then it can be very enlightening.
"...you never know what you're gonna get."
And so to the rest of that line. A good pay off considering the character that Tom Hanks is portraying. I am certain that the writer must have thought that there was more to the line though, and when they came up with it, it must have been a eureka moment.
Basically, when you open a box of chocolates there are many different types of chocolate sweets in there, and they can be sweet or bitter, or anywhere in between.
This is so true in life as well, where we never have everything nice and twee. Sometimes there are hard metaphorical hard centres, there are occasional sour centres, sickly sweet, fruity centres, and all sorts of others. We all go through these different things.
In a box of chocolates we know which flavour is our favourite though, and that determination has been made because we have tried the others. So in life, if our lives were made up of only good things where nothing ever happened, then we would take them for granted, and probably not even know how good those times are. As is it though, we all have good and bad times, and we appreciate those good more because of this.
I might add though that it doesn't stop us from being irritated by everything that happens to cause the bad times though, but I try not to take advantage of what is good in life because of it - my family, my love (Louise), my friends, and all else that happens that is good.
Thank you for reading, please take care.
I suppose that if you study that single section of a longer sentence from the film Forrest Gump, then it can be very enlightening.
"...you never know what you're gonna get."
And so to the rest of that line. A good pay off considering the character that Tom Hanks is portraying. I am certain that the writer must have thought that there was more to the line though, and when they came up with it, it must have been a eureka moment.
Basically, when you open a box of chocolates there are many different types of chocolate sweets in there, and they can be sweet or bitter, or anywhere in between.
This is so true in life as well, where we never have everything nice and twee. Sometimes there are hard metaphorical hard centres, there are occasional sour centres, sickly sweet, fruity centres, and all sorts of others. We all go through these different things.
In a box of chocolates we know which flavour is our favourite though, and that determination has been made because we have tried the others. So in life, if our lives were made up of only good things where nothing ever happened, then we would take them for granted, and probably not even know how good those times are. As is it though, we all have good and bad times, and we appreciate those good more because of this.
I might add though that it doesn't stop us from being irritated by everything that happens to cause the bad times though, but I try not to take advantage of what is good in life because of it - my family, my love (Louise), my friends, and all else that happens that is good.
Thank you for reading, please take care.
Sunday, 27 November 2011
41 years and 2 days old
Here we are then, another Monday morning and I am looking forward to finishing this shift at 9 o'clock, when I will have to drive through busy traffic to get to that bed as soon as bloody possible!
During the night I have been carrying on a little project that I am undertaking, which is to somehow copy everything over to external hard drives in readiness for completely gutting this here laptop, to replace the Windows Vista with Windows 7, which I have sort of wanted for a long while now, but always been scared of having to fork out to pay for all of the software I got off the internet again. Now I am biting the bullet because I am bloody sick of the slow OS, and the fact that there is so much more that I can do with Windows 7 that Vista won't let me do - hopefully including better recordings!
I also had the chance to watch the film X-Men First Class, which I got as a freebie from Blockbuster, whilst getting Louise a film with Keanu Reeves in called Harry or something, I can't remember now what it is called, but I am sure that we will probably be watching it together on Tuesday before it has to go back. It's about someone that gets pulled into a robbery without meaning
I eventually got to watch the film The Searchers as well over the last week, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought it was one of those times where John Wayne really gave it his all, which I don't think he does all of the time. That's just my opinion, so don't go off on one oh devout Wayne-ites.
I still haven't got around to doing anything for that last song on Paul McCartney's first album, which I know I have to do. I don't know what it is, but I just can't seem to be bothered lately, and I can't understand why.
Over the last week there are a few dates of interest. The 22nd of November 1997 was the day that Michael Hutchence from INXS died. The 24th of November 1991 was when Freddie Mercury died, and that really surprised me because I didn't know that it had been that long. The 27th of November 1970 was when George Harrison released the astounding solo album All Things Must Pass, which was exactly a day after I was born, which coincidentally is the day that John Lennon & Yoko Ono left the UK for New York, with John never stepping foot in the UK ever again. I don't think my being born had anything to do with that. Well, I hope not anyway.
Louise made me a lovely Coffee and Walnut Cake for my birthday, and it is already finished, I am sorry to say. Hopefully she will make more cake soon, because it was bloody gorgeous I'll tell you.
I have been looking at Christmas coming up, and surprisingly for me I am absolutely all over the place present wise. I am usually much more organised, and in fact usually finished by now to be honest. I can't believe how not sorted out everything is. I will be very soon though, mark my words! I will be giving Louise the Christmas Card list later because she has asked if I want her to write them out... Daft question really, because I am likely to say yes to that offer.
Anyway, I can't really think of what else to write and, in all truth, I am sick of my accidentally hitting something near to the keyboard on this laptop which keeps moving the blooming cursor away from where I want to be typing, and occasionally deleting text. This has taken far longer than I would have hoped.
Anyway, thank you to everyone on the social networking sites who wished me a happy birthday. It was a nice day. I may have been at work for some of it, but that didn't stop it from being nice. I also worked at the Cancer Research shop on Sunday because of the rather boring Christmas Lights switch on at Newark, followed by this shift right now.
Thank you for reading, and I hope that you all take care.
28 November 2011 (41 years and 2 days old).
During the night I have been carrying on a little project that I am undertaking, which is to somehow copy everything over to external hard drives in readiness for completely gutting this here laptop, to replace the Windows Vista with Windows 7, which I have sort of wanted for a long while now, but always been scared of having to fork out to pay for all of the software I got off the internet again. Now I am biting the bullet because I am bloody sick of the slow OS, and the fact that there is so much more that I can do with Windows 7 that Vista won't let me do - hopefully including better recordings!
I also had the chance to watch the film X-Men First Class, which I got as a freebie from Blockbuster, whilst getting Louise a film with Keanu Reeves in called Harry or something, I can't remember now what it is called, but I am sure that we will probably be watching it together on Tuesday before it has to go back. It's about someone that gets pulled into a robbery without meaning
I eventually got to watch the film The Searchers as well over the last week, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I thought it was one of those times where John Wayne really gave it his all, which I don't think he does all of the time. That's just my opinion, so don't go off on one oh devout Wayne-ites.
I still haven't got around to doing anything for that last song on Paul McCartney's first album, which I know I have to do. I don't know what it is, but I just can't seem to be bothered lately, and I can't understand why.
Over the last week there are a few dates of interest. The 22nd of November 1997 was the day that Michael Hutchence from INXS died. The 24th of November 1991 was when Freddie Mercury died, and that really surprised me because I didn't know that it had been that long. The 27th of November 1970 was when George Harrison released the astounding solo album All Things Must Pass, which was exactly a day after I was born, which coincidentally is the day that John Lennon & Yoko Ono left the UK for New York, with John never stepping foot in the UK ever again. I don't think my being born had anything to do with that. Well, I hope not anyway.
Louise made me a lovely Coffee and Walnut Cake for my birthday, and it is already finished, I am sorry to say. Hopefully she will make more cake soon, because it was bloody gorgeous I'll tell you.
I have been looking at Christmas coming up, and surprisingly for me I am absolutely all over the place present wise. I am usually much more organised, and in fact usually finished by now to be honest. I can't believe how not sorted out everything is. I will be very soon though, mark my words! I will be giving Louise the Christmas Card list later because she has asked if I want her to write them out... Daft question really, because I am likely to say yes to that offer.
Anyway, I can't really think of what else to write and, in all truth, I am sick of my accidentally hitting something near to the keyboard on this laptop which keeps moving the blooming cursor away from where I want to be typing, and occasionally deleting text. This has taken far longer than I would have hoped.
Anyway, thank you to everyone on the social networking sites who wished me a happy birthday. It was a nice day. I may have been at work for some of it, but that didn't stop it from being nice. I also worked at the Cancer Research shop on Sunday because of the rather boring Christmas Lights switch on at Newark, followed by this shift right now.
Thank you for reading, and I hope that you all take care.
28 November 2011 (41 years and 2 days old).
Monday, 21 November 2011
Music, Dreams, Films & Means
You know sometimes you just seem to get into gear with things. I have just one more song to do for my other blog, to record a cover version of it and write about it. That would be the end of that first album that I am looking at, bar a little dissection I was thinking of doing where I discuss that album in general.
I think it is probably just the fact of how the song is to be honest. It's an experimental piece which, although I actually like it and can't fully explain why at the moment, I just can't seem to get motivated. Perhaps I should have stuck to just learning and recording some songs and not everything? That's rhetorical really though because the whole pushing myself could be a valuable exercise for me. I already feel like it's making me better musically, as well as with my own composing. I find myself thinking more about that side, rather than just picking up a guitar and strumming or riffing something that I hope I'll find the find the words for and then make up a melody, or slam it together with any set of lyrics that I already have.
I'm just basically saying that sometimes we lack the motivation to do the things that we need to do. Perhaps I should just do something else, and maybe the motivation will come.
Another irritation is the quality of my recordings, which is basically using the built-in laptop microphone. It's bloody noisy to say the least, and noise removal is horrendous, which is why I've not used it! I'll be honest, the first thing I'd do with a big lottery win is buy a place and set up a home studio with ProTools or something. That would be so sweet. It would probably mean that I'd be in there spending time away from Louise rather than the same time spent at work presently. For a man who can't get to a studio much (finances), I love recording in one - it's magical. Especially when all you go in with is the basic song or even a little inkling or something, and see it grow into a produced piece. There is absolutely nothing else like that.
Anyway, here I am gabbing on as per usual. For a round-up of what's been going on since last time, let me tell you that it is basically the same old story. Work for the most part as always. Went visiting on the Wednesday of last week, basically because I needed to drop a car off that someone loaned me while mine was in the garage getting it's brakes repaired. More bloody money! Then there was the inevitable lift back home.
On Sunday we went to Louise's parents for a lovely dinner, which for me included some really gorgeous chicken. It's nice to get some meat sometimes, although that may offend those who are vegetarian, so I'm sorry if I have.
I was absolutely shattered come the Monday morning drive home from work, mainly because Saturday's shift finished at midnight, and then when we were trying to get some sleep, the neighbours were making a racket until about half past five in the morning. We had obviously arranged to go out for Sunday dinner, so Louise got up about 9 and I got up at 10 I think, which meant both of us got very little sleep. We spent a good while at Louise's parent's house, and came back in the thick fog, whereupon arrival home meant readying my things for work that night, with that shift finishing at 9 in the morning. It's a frightening thing to say, but I am surprised I made it home alive because I really thought my eyes were close to going at times on the way back. I'm sorry to say this but my old trick of stopping off on the way home from a tiring shift wasn't utilised because quite frankly I didn't know where I would have stopped or what I would have done if I had stopped.
When I used to do that, it was when I was working at Chesterfield, and I used to stop at a roadside cafe on the way there that was on the road from Mansfield to Newark, where I would have a small cup of tea. Where I am working now, I don't actually use any roads that have a roadside cafe, and a flask of tea in the car would have gone cold by the time my shift had finished.
I don't remember if I did anything musically inclined over the last week or so, but I do know that last night and the night before I watched a couple of films for the first time. The night before this I watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I liked the film, but did think that it could have been better. The bit towards the end with Professor Xavier was really weird because it looked like there was something seriously wrong the face and that. There were other things that I thought were strange as well, such as the bullet in the head at the end and everything, if it was that easy why didn't they just do that sooner? Enjoyable movie if you don't think too much.
This last night though I watched a film that people are shocked I have never seen before - The Searchers starring John Wayne and Jeffrey Hunter (famous to me as Captain Pike in the Star Trek pilot episode known as The Cage, which I really like). It also featured a very young Natalie Wood, which is quite topical considering the thing with her death being reopened, but I won't go there.
I really did like the film very much, although I still sense something weird about John Wayne's acting, but I don't know what it is. The locations were absolutely gorgeous, with the mountains and everything. The opening shot of the film where someone walks out and you see the mountains and the range around the house the people live in is just incredible. John Ford really knew how to shoot a film. I'm beginning to think that I should give some more John Wayne films that I haven't seen a good chance. I have seen Rio Bravo before with him, Dean Martin & Ricky Nelson (yes, the singer), and I really liked that. I also liked The Cowboys and The Shootist. My favourite westerns are still Clint Eastwood though, with my mind stuck between High Plains Drifter and Pale Rider.
Saying that though, I have never considered myself a fan of the genre. Everyone knows that I am a Science Fiction nerd. That's why after reading a review from Moo-V, that I know I have to check out The Green Hornet, because they gave it a favourable review. Me and Louise are both hoping to see Hugo and the new Sherlock Holmes film, money permitting, especially considering that Christmas is coming up and presents must be bought. I could be like someone I work with who doesn't buy a present for anyone and doesn't even celebrate it, but that just wouldn't be me.
I know that me and Louise will be soon getting ready to watch Albert Finney's Scrooge film, and she mentioned last night that she wants to watch the Jim Carrey animated version of A Christmas Carol, which is closer in tone and dialogue to the original short story by Charles Dickens. We're also likely to dig out National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Elf, to name just a couple of other films that we have. I am tempted to suggest Oliver! Not sure how she would take that idea though?
Anyway, have I really been going on for this long? Blinking heck! I had best leave it there.
Christmas shopping is late for me. I have just started this past week and was scared to do so. It has meant forgoing a bill or two, but I hope that I can catch that up. As I said I enjoy Christmas and I enjoy giving people presents. A small amount of debt in my opinion is bearable when it comes to seeing people being happy with a small gift from the heart.
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
22 November 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 27 days old).
I think it is probably just the fact of how the song is to be honest. It's an experimental piece which, although I actually like it and can't fully explain why at the moment, I just can't seem to get motivated. Perhaps I should have stuck to just learning and recording some songs and not everything? That's rhetorical really though because the whole pushing myself could be a valuable exercise for me. I already feel like it's making me better musically, as well as with my own composing. I find myself thinking more about that side, rather than just picking up a guitar and strumming or riffing something that I hope I'll find the find the words for and then make up a melody, or slam it together with any set of lyrics that I already have.
I'm just basically saying that sometimes we lack the motivation to do the things that we need to do. Perhaps I should just do something else, and maybe the motivation will come.
Another irritation is the quality of my recordings, which is basically using the built-in laptop microphone. It's bloody noisy to say the least, and noise removal is horrendous, which is why I've not used it! I'll be honest, the first thing I'd do with a big lottery win is buy a place and set up a home studio with ProTools or something. That would be so sweet. It would probably mean that I'd be in there spending time away from Louise rather than the same time spent at work presently. For a man who can't get to a studio much (finances), I love recording in one - it's magical. Especially when all you go in with is the basic song or even a little inkling or something, and see it grow into a produced piece. There is absolutely nothing else like that.
Anyway, here I am gabbing on as per usual. For a round-up of what's been going on since last time, let me tell you that it is basically the same old story. Work for the most part as always. Went visiting on the Wednesday of last week, basically because I needed to drop a car off that someone loaned me while mine was in the garage getting it's brakes repaired. More bloody money! Then there was the inevitable lift back home.
On Sunday we went to Louise's parents for a lovely dinner, which for me included some really gorgeous chicken. It's nice to get some meat sometimes, although that may offend those who are vegetarian, so I'm sorry if I have.
I was absolutely shattered come the Monday morning drive home from work, mainly because Saturday's shift finished at midnight, and then when we were trying to get some sleep, the neighbours were making a racket until about half past five in the morning. We had obviously arranged to go out for Sunday dinner, so Louise got up about 9 and I got up at 10 I think, which meant both of us got very little sleep. We spent a good while at Louise's parent's house, and came back in the thick fog, whereupon arrival home meant readying my things for work that night, with that shift finishing at 9 in the morning. It's a frightening thing to say, but I am surprised I made it home alive because I really thought my eyes were close to going at times on the way back. I'm sorry to say this but my old trick of stopping off on the way home from a tiring shift wasn't utilised because quite frankly I didn't know where I would have stopped or what I would have done if I had stopped.
When I used to do that, it was when I was working at Chesterfield, and I used to stop at a roadside cafe on the way there that was on the road from Mansfield to Newark, where I would have a small cup of tea. Where I am working now, I don't actually use any roads that have a roadside cafe, and a flask of tea in the car would have gone cold by the time my shift had finished.
I don't remember if I did anything musically inclined over the last week or so, but I do know that last night and the night before I watched a couple of films for the first time. The night before this I watched X-Men Origins: Wolverine. I liked the film, but did think that it could have been better. The bit towards the end with Professor Xavier was really weird because it looked like there was something seriously wrong the face and that. There were other things that I thought were strange as well, such as the bullet in the head at the end and everything, if it was that easy why didn't they just do that sooner? Enjoyable movie if you don't think too much.
This last night though I watched a film that people are shocked I have never seen before - The Searchers starring John Wayne and Jeffrey Hunter (famous to me as Captain Pike in the Star Trek pilot episode known as The Cage, which I really like). It also featured a very young Natalie Wood, which is quite topical considering the thing with her death being reopened, but I won't go there.
I really did like the film very much, although I still sense something weird about John Wayne's acting, but I don't know what it is. The locations were absolutely gorgeous, with the mountains and everything. The opening shot of the film where someone walks out and you see the mountains and the range around the house the people live in is just incredible. John Ford really knew how to shoot a film. I'm beginning to think that I should give some more John Wayne films that I haven't seen a good chance. I have seen Rio Bravo before with him, Dean Martin & Ricky Nelson (yes, the singer), and I really liked that. I also liked The Cowboys and The Shootist. My favourite westerns are still Clint Eastwood though, with my mind stuck between High Plains Drifter and Pale Rider.
Saying that though, I have never considered myself a fan of the genre. Everyone knows that I am a Science Fiction nerd. That's why after reading a review from Moo-V, that I know I have to check out The Green Hornet, because they gave it a favourable review. Me and Louise are both hoping to see Hugo and the new Sherlock Holmes film, money permitting, especially considering that Christmas is coming up and presents must be bought. I could be like someone I work with who doesn't buy a present for anyone and doesn't even celebrate it, but that just wouldn't be me.
I know that me and Louise will be soon getting ready to watch Albert Finney's Scrooge film, and she mentioned last night that she wants to watch the Jim Carrey animated version of A Christmas Carol, which is closer in tone and dialogue to the original short story by Charles Dickens. We're also likely to dig out National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and Elf, to name just a couple of other films that we have. I am tempted to suggest Oliver! Not sure how she would take that idea though?
Anyway, have I really been going on for this long? Blinking heck! I had best leave it there.
Christmas shopping is late for me. I have just started this past week and was scared to do so. It has meant forgoing a bill or two, but I hope that I can catch that up. As I said I enjoy Christmas and I enjoy giving people presents. A small amount of debt in my opinion is bearable when it comes to seeing people being happy with a small gift from the heart.
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
22 November 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 27 days old).
Monday, 14 November 2011
Memories, like the windmills of your mind
Before I start typing this, I will let you know that I wrote it yesterday, and it ended up going somewhere completely unplanned. I will however leave it as it is rather than mess about with it.
I was actually wondering what this Movember thing was all about recently, but was stupid enough to not find out anything until about the seventh of the month. I wish I had thought about researching it sooner because, to be quite honest, I have sported many different variations of facial growth, so a month with a 'tache wouldn't have been too much of a problem. Even Louise said she would have put up with the discomfort for a good cause (kissing y'see). Next year is set in stone then, but for now you can all go and sponsor my brother Mark and the team he is a part of in this wonderful charitable event that sheds light on something that is incredibly important.
 |
| Granddad, Paul, and me with moustache |
My granddad (on my mum's side) died of prostate cancer and, to be honest, I try to think of him when he was the active and incredibly fit man that I and many of us in the family used to go on walks with when I was younger (and much fitter myself). I remember the man who me and Paul invited to go and record Rock Around The Clock with, where me and Paul played guitar and he played harmonica. He was someone who I absolutely loved and looked up to, and I am sure that everyone who met him felt the same way, even Alex who engineered that recording session at what was Bandwagon Studios.
 |
| Me with beard at Alton Towers |
Sometimes I will think of him as the man I saw in the hospital at the end, and that would make me sad and cry occasionally. That is not a bad thing I think, because it shows how I felt, and still do feel.
When we recorded that session I was sporting a moustache which I still had at the next session some time later, bringing about Alex's comment, "you're take now Freddie!" It's probably just me, but that still makes me smile thinking about it, although I may at the time have preferred he had mentioned someone else such as Burt Reynolds, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, or someone else that was far less camp. Now I just think that it is funny, and maybe even more so.
I remember the walks with granddad vaguely. I remember walking down to Pleasley Vale, back when you could walk everywhere without being stopped by security gates and fencing. I don't think that sort of thing was as in your face back then.
As a bit of an aside, I just pressed shuffle on my iPod. The first five songs are -
Hey You - Pink Floyd
All Around The World - The Jam
Connected - Stereo MC's
Battleship - Red Hot Chili Peppers
Cold Weather - Lee "Scratch" Perry
I don't know why I mentioned that, but I just thought that I would. I find it interesting when I shuffle the songs, because I could never ever guess what song would be coming up next.
The next song after Lee "Scratch" Perry is So Long Frank Lloyd Wright by Simon & Garfunkel by the way. There is just something about vocal styling in the sixties that has never been bettered since in my opinion. Just look at these, The Mamas & Papas, The Beach Boys, the Motown artists (of which the next song 'Heaven Help' by Lenny Kravitz I think is reminiscent in a passing way with it's close harmonised backing vocals).
While we're on the memory thing, I think my first memory of Top Of The Pops is Adam & The Ants performing, and I remember Blondie playing on the stereo at the Marina Fish Bar at Pleasley, when they had a back room where you could sit and chill with your mates. I'm not sure if all of my memories are one hundred percent right.
Anyway, my granddad was a musician. He played the harmonica and had a little keyboard. He loved all types of music, and his harmonica playing including The Fool On The Hill by The Beatles, Stranger On The Shore by Acker Bilk, obviously Rock Around The Clock by Bill Haley, and a lot more tunes. I have an incredibly wide and open minded view to music, which I believe is where I was influenced by him.
We'll finish this right there I think, but needless to say that this Movember thing isn't stupid or petty, but of importance to every man. It is a visual representation of something that is man's. It is there to raise funds for different things that affect men, such as prostate cancer. The money raised will be used to hopefully come up with more cures for these things which will hopefully be stopping people from having to put up with memories such as those that I have when I think of my granddad in hospital, rather than the music, the walks, the stories, the laughs, and everything else that was him.
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
November 15 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 20 days old)
Hey You - Pink Floyd
All Around The World - The Jam
Connected - Stereo MC's
Battleship - Red Hot Chili Peppers
Cold Weather - Lee "Scratch" Perry
I don't know why I mentioned that, but I just thought that I would. I find it interesting when I shuffle the songs, because I could never ever guess what song would be coming up next.
The next song after Lee "Scratch" Perry is So Long Frank Lloyd Wright by Simon & Garfunkel by the way. There is just something about vocal styling in the sixties that has never been bettered since in my opinion. Just look at these, The Mamas & Papas, The Beach Boys, the Motown artists (of which the next song 'Heaven Help' by Lenny Kravitz I think is reminiscent in a passing way with it's close harmonised backing vocals).
While we're on the memory thing, I think my first memory of Top Of The Pops is Adam & The Ants performing, and I remember Blondie playing on the stereo at the Marina Fish Bar at Pleasley, when they had a back room where you could sit and chill with your mates. I'm not sure if all of my memories are one hundred percent right.
Anyway, my granddad was a musician. He played the harmonica and had a little keyboard. He loved all types of music, and his harmonica playing including The Fool On The Hill by The Beatles, Stranger On The Shore by Acker Bilk, obviously Rock Around The Clock by Bill Haley, and a lot more tunes. I have an incredibly wide and open minded view to music, which I believe is where I was influenced by him.We'll finish this right there I think, but needless to say that this Movember thing isn't stupid or petty, but of importance to every man. It is a visual representation of something that is man's. It is there to raise funds for different things that affect men, such as prostate cancer. The money raised will be used to hopefully come up with more cures for these things which will hopefully be stopping people from having to put up with memories such as those that I have when I think of my granddad in hospital, rather than the music, the walks, the stories, the laughs, and everything else that was him.
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
November 15 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 20 days old)
Thursday, 10 November 2011
Let's remember those...
The whole Remembrance Day tradition and the significance of the poppy is based on those who fought and died in World War I. During that very bloody war, battles were waged at Flanders, a land known for it's poppy fields. As that comes to mind I imagine people fighting each other, shooting from one trench towards another, and some "going over the top" to fight the opponent, blood and guts pouring out everywhere, and poppy petals flying in the air, and landing on those bodies now no longer able to go home to those who are left at home as widows, as children without fathers, and those parents who lost their children.
Recently I have heard of the FA banning any team from displaying poppies on their kits. I for one think that that shows the FA to be people who have no feelings for those who are fighting, or for those children who are losing parents right now, and those who are still now losing children in these wars across the globe.
If I may be so bold, I believe that Remembrance Day could now keep the symbolisation, but it would not be difficult to make it a global tradition. If we all joined together to remember those who have fought in wars, then perhaps that could show, even in a small way, that peace is attainable, even in those two minutes when all would be together as one. We all know people who are fighting somewhere in this world. We may not necessarily agree with war, but it is something that is happening right now. Who are we to be so selfish as to think that they are not worth our thoughts, even for two minutes?
Thank you for reading.
November 11 2011 (with this post, my age is insignificant, those I spoke of are)
Thoughts on television programming
You know how I call this series of blogs Ramblings? Well by that I mean that it goes all over the place and doesn't really have a specific subject. I just ramble on about whatever comes to mind, which means to waffle.
Today I am thinking of television shows that I have watched over the years, and that I watch now. For those of you who aren't so interested then I apologise, but I just thought that I would go on about something that is important to me.
I am a very big fan of Star Trek in it's various incarnations, even most of the Enterprise episodes I have seen. I haven't seen all of them, which is a rarity for Star Trek, because I have seen every episode of all the other versions of Trek. The original series of Star Trek is, in my opinion, a case where the television series was wasted. If the studio behind that original series hadn't have tried to change things but had left it to the people who were making the programme, then perhaps the series would have lasted much longer and been better, especially if they hadn't have kept on lowering the budget every year.
At present I am watching the last few episodes of a series called Dollhouse, which was created by Joss Whedon (the man behind Buffy The Vampire Slayer). I heard that changes were made before the first episode was even aired on American television, and that the whole idea of it was altered so much by those changes. Perhaps if the studio had left the creative team to do what they wanted, then the programme may have been better and not had so much inconsistency, and perhaps it would have lasted longer than it was allowed to.
Another Joss Whedon show that was cancelled early on was a series called Firefly, which was a space based series. This was a case of it being cancelled before suddenly becoming an incredibly popular programme. Unfortunately the studio behind it had already made their minds up. Because of that, the team behind that series made a cinematic film which has since gone on to become a very popular and much spoken about science fiction film.
Star Trek itself is another one of those television series that has proved it was finished early, because it became so popular after cancellation that it spawned a series of films based on the original series' characters, and various different spin-off's (The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Enterprise, the recent incredible film from JJ Abrams' fantastic team, oh and the Animated Series).
There are other programmes that I have seen over the years that I wonder about. Heroes is a series that I wonder if the studio had tried to change too much, and if that is why it went down the pan? The first season of that programme is genre television gold in my opinion, but then it strayed a little bit each year. I think it has potential for revival if someone has the balls to try it, but I doubt that someone would. I also think that it could make a good film if someone took the time, but again I doubt someone would even think of that.
I watched Lost from beginning to end but, if I am being honest, I felt let down by the ending. I thought that I had wasted all of that time watching that series, especially when the studios let them have their own way with the series.
I am watching a television series that is from the same people who were behind Lost, and that is Fringe. Similar to The X-Files, but also different enough as to not be a carbon copy. What can I say, I am the sort of person who absolutely loves Sci-Fi and genre based television. I am looking forward to hopefully watching another series that the people behind Fringe and Lost have developed, which is called Alcatraz. That is different where I think they are looking at things that happened while the prison was up and running, where prisoners suddenly show up decades later in San Francisco, and a team have to catch them all over again.
Another programme I have started watching is Alphas, which is similar to Heroes in the way that it is about people who powers, but this time there a group of good people with these powers trying to capture those others who are using their powers for bad basically. Slightly different, but like I said similar at the same time.
I suppose where I am going with all of this meandering chatter is the fact that I don't like it when programmes get cancelled, especially US programmes because, in all truth, if we watch the programmes or not in the UK or anywhere other than the US it doesn't really matter, because they could still can the series in the states. It is irritating to me that it is like this. I wish it wasn't, but there we have it.
And so ends a meandering ramble that sort of says something. There are other programmes that people watch which aren't genre programmes but still get cancelled. I am sure that a lot of them get just as pissed off as I do about these things.
Do you know what? I'm just three minutes away from the very end of Dollhouse's last episode now. I thought it was going to be crap, but it looks like the last few minutes are going to be quite poignant. Go figure, all about how technology can go too far and the potential catastrophic consequences of such. I'll take it off pause in a couple of minutes, but first I'll finish this, help the cleaners at work by taking the trash to the bins, and then watch those last couple of minutes.
I still haven't seen the last ever episode of Enterprise by the way. When I do, will I be disappointed like Lost (and the original Dallas to some people), or blown away like Star Trek IV: The Undiscovered Country?
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
11/11/11 November 11 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 16 days old).
Today I am thinking of television shows that I have watched over the years, and that I watch now. For those of you who aren't so interested then I apologise, but I just thought that I would go on about something that is important to me.
I am a very big fan of Star Trek in it's various incarnations, even most of the Enterprise episodes I have seen. I haven't seen all of them, which is a rarity for Star Trek, because I have seen every episode of all the other versions of Trek. The original series of Star Trek is, in my opinion, a case where the television series was wasted. If the studio behind that original series hadn't have tried to change things but had left it to the people who were making the programme, then perhaps the series would have lasted much longer and been better, especially if they hadn't have kept on lowering the budget every year.At present I am watching the last few episodes of a series called Dollhouse, which was created by Joss Whedon (the man behind Buffy The Vampire Slayer). I heard that changes were made before the first episode was even aired on American television, and that the whole idea of it was altered so much by those changes. Perhaps if the studio had left the creative team to do what they wanted, then the programme may have been better and not had so much inconsistency, and perhaps it would have lasted longer than it was allowed to.Another Joss Whedon show that was cancelled early on was a series called Firefly, which was a space based series. This was a case of it being cancelled before suddenly becoming an incredibly popular programme. Unfortunately the studio behind it had already made their minds up. Because of that, the team behind that series made a cinematic film which has since gone on to become a very popular and much spoken about science fiction film.Star Trek itself is another one of those television series that has proved it was finished early, because it became so popular after cancellation that it spawned a series of films based on the original series' characters, and various different spin-off's (The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, Enterprise, the recent incredible film from JJ Abrams' fantastic team, oh and the Animated Series).
There are other programmes that I have seen over the years that I wonder about. Heroes is a series that I wonder if the studio had tried to change too much, and if that is why it went down the pan? The first season of that programme is genre television gold in my opinion, but then it strayed a little bit each year. I think it has potential for revival if someone has the balls to try it, but I doubt that someone would. I also think that it could make a good film if someone took the time, but again I doubt someone would even think of that.I watched Lost from beginning to end but, if I am being honest, I felt let down by the ending. I thought that I had wasted all of that time watching that series, especially when the studios let them have their own way with the series.
I am watching a television series that is from the same people who were behind Lost, and that is Fringe. Similar to The X-Files, but also different enough as to not be a carbon copy. What can I say, I am the sort of person who absolutely loves Sci-Fi and genre based television. I am looking forward to hopefully watching another series that the people behind Fringe and Lost have developed, which is called Alcatraz. That is different where I think they are looking at things that happened while the prison was up and running, where prisoners suddenly show up decades later in San Francisco, and a team have to catch them all over again.Another programme I have started watching is Alphas, which is similar to Heroes in the way that it is about people who powers, but this time there a group of good people with these powers trying to capture those others who are using their powers for bad basically. Slightly different, but like I said similar at the same time.I suppose where I am going with all of this meandering chatter is the fact that I don't like it when programmes get cancelled, especially US programmes because, in all truth, if we watch the programmes or not in the UK or anywhere other than the US it doesn't really matter, because they could still can the series in the states. It is irritating to me that it is like this. I wish it wasn't, but there we have it.
And so ends a meandering ramble that sort of says something. There are other programmes that people watch which aren't genre programmes but still get cancelled. I am sure that a lot of them get just as pissed off as I do about these things.
Do you know what? I'm just three minutes away from the very end of Dollhouse's last episode now. I thought it was going to be crap, but it looks like the last few minutes are going to be quite poignant. Go figure, all about how technology can go too far and the potential catastrophic consequences of such. I'll take it off pause in a couple of minutes, but first I'll finish this, help the cleaners at work by taking the trash to the bins, and then watch those last couple of minutes.I still haven't seen the last ever episode of Enterprise by the way. When I do, will I be disappointed like Lost (and the original Dallas to some people), or blown away like Star Trek IV: The Undiscovered Country?
Thank you for reading. Please take care.
11/11/11 November 11 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 16 days old).
Sunday, 6 November 2011
Working thoughts
So here we are again at the start of a new week. I am at work, a few hours from the end of my night shift. It may only be a twelve hour shift, but the fact that it finishes at 9 in the morning makes it feel long in some ways. It's the whole thing of it being daytime on my way home. When I've worked at places before it has been from five until five, six until six, or even seven until seven. This finishing time though is just strange. You start later on in the night, so essentially I'm leaving home when most people are settling down, and then on my way home I sometimes get caught up in the hustle bustle of people going into work in the morning.
It's a strange one in my opinion. I sort of enjoyed where the company I am working for had me at before, especially when I was on night shift. There I worked from five until five, so that way my first day off wouldn't be so bad because we actually changed over at around half past four, and that meant me getting in at around quarter to five (it was near where I lived), and then I would be in bed for five. I could easily get up at eleven in the morning after a decent six hours sleep, and then basically enjoyed my time off. Here though that is completely useless. I instead get in around a quarter to ten in the morning, and then am in bed for about ten, and then wake up before one in the afternoon, which makes me ratty for the rest of the day. I can't stay in bed much later than that because I feel like I am losing a day off, and I only get two off in a week, rather than the three days off a week that I asked for when they had taken me on. If truth be told, I'm not sure I would have worked for this company if I knew they were going to mess me about like this, because there were another couple of offers on the table.
When it first discussed in the interview stage, they were okay with it and even said that they would keep me local. I know that I am not travelling far, but it is still not in the local area. I am still driving 13 miles each way for work. That isn't local in my opinion.
A big problem is though that I do actually like the site very much, and the staff as well. I don't particularly like one of the guards, but the other one I understand and get on with. I am just not fond of the fact that I still have to travel for work. That really pisses me off big time, especially when this firm don't pay anything towards your fuel because they apparently don't make enough from their clients to pay expenses. I think they have a problem if they are willing to take such small amounts of money to provide security. They should put tenders in a way that benefits their guards and provides a professional service, rather than the cheapest service that can be offered.
That's enough of me trying to put all of that to rights. No matter what I say or do, security guards in this country at least will always be seen as the bottom rung of the ladder and treated as such, even when security guards are the first people that get their faces smashed in, or get stabbed or, on very rare occasions, get shot by would be thieves and criminals. All that in most cases for a lousy minimum wage. Now I will admit that all of these cases are very rare but, it does happen.
Most security guards work alone on sites, so it is easy for a single guard to be caught out by people on the sites they are working, and who knows what could happen to them. If you value what they are protecting, or you think their job is important then, in my opinion, they should be treated as such. I will admit that in all of my years of working in security, I have never liked it when someone has treated me as less of a person, and it has happened a few times. I go along with the "all men are equal" philosophy, and I speak to everybody on the same level. Okay, I treat people with respect, but that is just basic courtesy and politeness. I always call people Sir or Miss, until they say I can call them otherwise.
What is great though is that I can stay in touch with people who I made friends with at the different places where I have worked over the years. Over the last year alone, the company I worked for before this sent me to so many different Morrison's stores to work security for them, that I have built numerous friendships with people from many stores including Lincoln, Mansfield Woodhouse, and Loughborough. Of course I have maintained friendships from other jobs I have had over the years as well, specifically the job I did for many years in Chesterfield at The Avenue, where I have maintained contact with a lot of the people I worked with, and with some of the staff (one of the staff there in fact is one of my references when I apply for jobs). I sort of miss that place in a lot of ways, but not the travelling there and back, because that was a bloody journey every day from Newark to Chesterfield and back again.
Anyway, I think I will leave it at that now, because that is a lot of chat about work to be honest, and I don't think that people want to hear too much about it, and I probably shouldn't be talking about it too much.
I hope that everyone is okay and has had a lovely weekend. I have enjoyed the weekend, albeit having to work through the whole thing every week (another bone of contention there I might add, because the odd weekend off would have been nice).
Here's to a nice week ahead, although I won't be doing much because the car is playing up again, and I am always scared of taking my cars to a garage, especially so close to Christmas when I need to be thinking about people's presents and the like.
Take care and thank you for reading.
November 7 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 12 days old).
It's a strange one in my opinion. I sort of enjoyed where the company I am working for had me at before, especially when I was on night shift. There I worked from five until five, so that way my first day off wouldn't be so bad because we actually changed over at around half past four, and that meant me getting in at around quarter to five (it was near where I lived), and then I would be in bed for five. I could easily get up at eleven in the morning after a decent six hours sleep, and then basically enjoyed my time off. Here though that is completely useless. I instead get in around a quarter to ten in the morning, and then am in bed for about ten, and then wake up before one in the afternoon, which makes me ratty for the rest of the day. I can't stay in bed much later than that because I feel like I am losing a day off, and I only get two off in a week, rather than the three days off a week that I asked for when they had taken me on. If truth be told, I'm not sure I would have worked for this company if I knew they were going to mess me about like this, because there were another couple of offers on the table.
When it first discussed in the interview stage, they were okay with it and even said that they would keep me local. I know that I am not travelling far, but it is still not in the local area. I am still driving 13 miles each way for work. That isn't local in my opinion.
A big problem is though that I do actually like the site very much, and the staff as well. I don't particularly like one of the guards, but the other one I understand and get on with. I am just not fond of the fact that I still have to travel for work. That really pisses me off big time, especially when this firm don't pay anything towards your fuel because they apparently don't make enough from their clients to pay expenses. I think they have a problem if they are willing to take such small amounts of money to provide security. They should put tenders in a way that benefits their guards and provides a professional service, rather than the cheapest service that can be offered.
That's enough of me trying to put all of that to rights. No matter what I say or do, security guards in this country at least will always be seen as the bottom rung of the ladder and treated as such, even when security guards are the first people that get their faces smashed in, or get stabbed or, on very rare occasions, get shot by would be thieves and criminals. All that in most cases for a lousy minimum wage. Now I will admit that all of these cases are very rare but, it does happen.
Most security guards work alone on sites, so it is easy for a single guard to be caught out by people on the sites they are working, and who knows what could happen to them. If you value what they are protecting, or you think their job is important then, in my opinion, they should be treated as such. I will admit that in all of my years of working in security, I have never liked it when someone has treated me as less of a person, and it has happened a few times. I go along with the "all men are equal" philosophy, and I speak to everybody on the same level. Okay, I treat people with respect, but that is just basic courtesy and politeness. I always call people Sir or Miss, until they say I can call them otherwise.
What is great though is that I can stay in touch with people who I made friends with at the different places where I have worked over the years. Over the last year alone, the company I worked for before this sent me to so many different Morrison's stores to work security for them, that I have built numerous friendships with people from many stores including Lincoln, Mansfield Woodhouse, and Loughborough. Of course I have maintained friendships from other jobs I have had over the years as well, specifically the job I did for many years in Chesterfield at The Avenue, where I have maintained contact with a lot of the people I worked with, and with some of the staff (one of the staff there in fact is one of my references when I apply for jobs). I sort of miss that place in a lot of ways, but not the travelling there and back, because that was a bloody journey every day from Newark to Chesterfield and back again.
Anyway, I think I will leave it at that now, because that is a lot of chat about work to be honest, and I don't think that people want to hear too much about it, and I probably shouldn't be talking about it too much.
I hope that everyone is okay and has had a lovely weekend. I have enjoyed the weekend, albeit having to work through the whole thing every week (another bone of contention there I might add, because the odd weekend off would have been nice).
Here's to a nice week ahead, although I won't be doing much because the car is playing up again, and I am always scared of taking my cars to a garage, especially so close to Christmas when I need to be thinking about people's presents and the like.
Take care and thank you for reading.
November 7 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 12 days old).
Thursday, 3 November 2011
Thoughts on important matters
Good morning, afternoon, evening, night... Wherever you are it is obviously some time or other. That is of course unless you are one of the Bajoran gods from Star Trek Deep Space Nine who do not live in time as we know it. Trust me to find a link hey. What can I say, everyone knows that I am a Star Trek fan by now, and I am not at all embarrassed by it. I happen to think that it is an incredibly clever programme, in it's various different guises.
So, here we are then. In the UK it is around half past three in the morning as I am starting to type out this completely made up on the spot blog, discussing whatever is on my mind right now.
First of all, let's look at who has their birthday today (4th November);
Matthew McConaughey and Sean Combs (P Diddy, Puff Daddy, or whatever he's calling himself these days) were both born on this day in 1969. Malandra Burrows (1965) known mostly for her acting role in the UK sitcom Emmerdale, Karate Kid Ralph Macchio (1961), Chris Difford of Squeeze fame (1954), and more. Well, there are some names to digest aren't there?
Carrying on with the Deep Space Nine thing, the episode Trials & Tribble-ations was shown in the US on this day in 1996 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the first showing of Star Trek's original series in the US. Star Trek Voyager celebrated it with an episode linked to the events in the brilliant Star Trek film The Undiscovered Country, the last to be based solely around that original cast. I say cast because the original crew came back in JJ Abrams' fantastic recent film, which I am looking forward to seeing the sequel to when it comes out at the cinema towards the end of 2012. Hopefully it will come out before the world ends because I'd be well pissed off otherwise.
Speaking of films that I am looking forward to, I am also excited about a new James Bond film in the offing, especially after reading this article on line. Javier Bardem looks like a cracking choice for a bad guy. I like it when they actually pick a foreign actor to play the parts rather than someone doing a terrible impression a la Kenneth Williams french accent in Carry On Follow That Camel. I know, that is meant to be a mickey take, but you see where I am coming from.
Another Deep Space Nine episode shown on this date in the US was the great Season 7 episode Treachery, Faith, & The Great River. The Next Generation showed the brilliant Unification Part I on this day in 1991 (Season 5). Well, that's about all I can find on Star Trek on this day. I bet there are a few people that are glad to hear that hey?
Anyway, what else can I speak about? I obviously know that Christmas is coming up because once more the car seems to be playing up, as it inevitably does at this time of the year. This time however I think it's faulty brake pads, which were only replaced for the MOT at the tail end of September, so they will be covered and won't cost me a penny. That is of course unless they say it is something else entirely, and then money will have to be spent. Bloody typical. I sometimes wonder if it was worth passing my test!
If nothing else, the money I spend on the car obviously gets in the way of me buying a new acoustic guitar to replace the one that is having some problems. I think the damp in the flat is causing the neck to go slightly off, making it a bitch to keep in tune. If I had bought a case rather than a bag for it, then maybe that would have been better? That's just a guess as to what the problem is. Self diagnosis isn't always right. Some suggestions may help. I am thinking presently of just dropping the gauge of the strings I use to 9 or 10 rather than the 13's that I use normally. I'm not sure whether that would make any difference. As I said, suggestions would be welcomed.
Anyway, I have been typing this for so bloody long now and am neglecting my duties completely at work. I had best get on. It is now a quarter to five in the morning. I take time on these things you see.
I have been missing the blogs of my friends Matt Blick and Drew Baxter, but I am sure that they will be back soon with more riveting matters of discussion to while away my time at work.
I will most likely be blogging again over the weekend. Take care and, if I don't blog, have a great weekend. If I do, erm, blog, then, err, still do have a great weekend. Thank you for reading.
4 November 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 9 days old).
So, here we are then. In the UK it is around half past three in the morning as I am starting to type out this completely made up on the spot blog, discussing whatever is on my mind right now.
First of all, let's look at who has their birthday today (4th November);
Matthew McConaughey and Sean Combs (P Diddy, Puff Daddy, or whatever he's calling himself these days) were both born on this day in 1969. Malandra Burrows (1965) known mostly for her acting role in the UK sitcom Emmerdale, Karate Kid Ralph Macchio (1961), Chris Difford of Squeeze fame (1954), and more. Well, there are some names to digest aren't there?
Carrying on with the Deep Space Nine thing, the episode Trials & Tribble-ations was shown in the US on this day in 1996 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the first showing of Star Trek's original series in the US. Star Trek Voyager celebrated it with an episode linked to the events in the brilliant Star Trek film The Undiscovered Country, the last to be based solely around that original cast. I say cast because the original crew came back in JJ Abrams' fantastic recent film, which I am looking forward to seeing the sequel to when it comes out at the cinema towards the end of 2012. Hopefully it will come out before the world ends because I'd be well pissed off otherwise.
Speaking of films that I am looking forward to, I am also excited about a new James Bond film in the offing, especially after reading this article on line. Javier Bardem looks like a cracking choice for a bad guy. I like it when they actually pick a foreign actor to play the parts rather than someone doing a terrible impression a la Kenneth Williams french accent in Carry On Follow That Camel. I know, that is meant to be a mickey take, but you see where I am coming from.
Another Deep Space Nine episode shown on this date in the US was the great Season 7 episode Treachery, Faith, & The Great River. The Next Generation showed the brilliant Unification Part I on this day in 1991 (Season 5). Well, that's about all I can find on Star Trek on this day. I bet there are a few people that are glad to hear that hey?
Anyway, what else can I speak about? I obviously know that Christmas is coming up because once more the car seems to be playing up, as it inevitably does at this time of the year. This time however I think it's faulty brake pads, which were only replaced for the MOT at the tail end of September, so they will be covered and won't cost me a penny. That is of course unless they say it is something else entirely, and then money will have to be spent. Bloody typical. I sometimes wonder if it was worth passing my test!
If nothing else, the money I spend on the car obviously gets in the way of me buying a new acoustic guitar to replace the one that is having some problems. I think the damp in the flat is causing the neck to go slightly off, making it a bitch to keep in tune. If I had bought a case rather than a bag for it, then maybe that would have been better? That's just a guess as to what the problem is. Self diagnosis isn't always right. Some suggestions may help. I am thinking presently of just dropping the gauge of the strings I use to 9 or 10 rather than the 13's that I use normally. I'm not sure whether that would make any difference. As I said, suggestions would be welcomed.
Anyway, I have been typing this for so bloody long now and am neglecting my duties completely at work. I had best get on. It is now a quarter to five in the morning. I take time on these things you see.
I have been missing the blogs of my friends Matt Blick and Drew Baxter, but I am sure that they will be back soon with more riveting matters of discussion to while away my time at work.
I will most likely be blogging again over the weekend. Take care and, if I don't blog, have a great weekend. If I do, erm, blog, then, err, still do have a great weekend. Thank you for reading.
4 November 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 9 days old).
Sunday, 30 October 2011
Sunday moaning blues
Hello friends. How is time treating you?
So here we are again, another ponderous and long night shift, made all the longer and more tedious by a quirk that is irritating me so much.
Last night the clocks changed so I thought "I should get a really decent sleep to catch up." I thought wrong, so wrong in fact that I will be surprised if I make it through the whole shift without falling asleep, which is something that I have frowned upon in the past. My opinion is that if someone is paying you to watch over a place overnight, then that is exactly what you should do.
However this may have to be different tonight, and I feel awful to even suggest such a thing, for last night I just couldn't get to sleep. Too much on my mind I suppose, specifically about money, the looming prospect of Christmas shopping, bills constantly having to be paid, and so many other things that are really not making my mind work any better - paracetamol is definitely my drug of the moment, unlike days ow long gone by in the annals of time (probably for the better). Even a beer nowadays would be like an alien substance to me. How on earth people who are unemployed can afford it so much that they walk past at stupid o'clock waking up people who go out to work so they're taxes can pay for these people to get plastered I have absolutely no idea.... See what I did there?
Anyway, at about 3 o'clock (after the clocks were changed), I decided to just get out of bed and take a couple of paracetamol, while I had a read. I suppose reading isn't such a good idea, but what could I do? I had Sky news on as well (Louise has been following the Michael Jackson thing on there while I've been away on the night shifts). The news was mainly about the passing of Sir Jimmy Saville (have to get the Sir in there since it's only right). Rest in peace Sir James, man of Jim'll Fix It and Top Of The Pops, who thought nothing of smoking a cigar the size of Big Ben in front of a multitude of children, and was never afraid to flaunt that he had money to his name. Anyway, that was an outrageous thing to say and I should not speak ill of the dead, I apologise.
At about 3.40 in the morning I decided to try and return to bed. I remember the bells going on the church across the way up until about a quarter to five in the time we're using now (they hadn't changed the time on the church's clock, CD or MP3 based, of course until someone showed up to ring the supposed real bells for the Sunday service). Boy were they bloody loud, and so were the new neighbours moving more bloody stuff in at 9 in the morning. That moving in of items carried on until probably after midday. Typical!
Anyway, because of the restless night I decided to journey to the Greek god of shopping for pillows for the bed, because we needed a new one and I bought a pair because (a) the decent ones always come in pairs, and (b) it would give us a spare just in case another pillow decided to try and stab me in the eye during the night with the sticky out feathers and such - bloody ducks getting back at me, what did I ever do to them I ask you??? Speaking of which, just started listening to the Howard The Duck episode of Filmsack, which is really great and reminds me of how much I thought that film stunk. So much so that when I was younger and a friend of mine brought it to school on a video to watch (probably a pirated copy I'm guessing), I watched about five minutes and that was enough. I could quite easily have left and gone to the room where fleas were kept to walk all over your balls, if such a room existed!!! That is how much I thought that film sucked! In fact, I'd have probably preferred to have had my balls soaked in honey and then have myself strung naked on a tree with a million beehives on it!
Anyway, losing the plot there I think... So, the pillows are nice, and I will see how nice when I get to lay my head on one of them at about ten on Monday morning, if the neighbours aren't as noisy as they were today. And then I have to get up early to find one of these paypoint places, because you can't renew your TV licence at the Post Office any more. I don't know why I even bother paying for a TV licence, because the channels are all screwy after we had the digital switch over in our area - about three or four times a week for the last however many weeks, I've had to retune the channels because it's lost them all over again, and it's always losing the channels when it's something I want to record for me like The Gadget Show, Alphas, or any of that stuff.
I tell you, I'm not half in ranting and tired as hell mood today. Oh I never mentioned that when I bought the pair of pillows from the Greek god of shopping, they seemed very flat in the packaging. I took them back and the assistant said, "they're vacuum packed sir, so when you pierce the pack, they will expand." At that point I felt tired and incredibly stupid. I could feel the eyes of the people behind me in the queue looking and hear the voices of those calling names. I was happy to go home after a trip to Morrison's (other Supermarkets not so available in the centre of Newark for the time being, unless you have a job that pays over 25,000 per year for Waitrose shopping) and enjoy a jammed-up fruit scone with a cup of Tetley.
We then watched Ice Road Truckers Most Dangerous Roads, had lunch, and well, I never did get the nap that I was hoping for. Boy am I ever ready for Tuesday and Wednesday off. I think I won't be getting up early on Tuesday like I normally do, although perhaps if I don't I may not wake until Thursday and lose both days off.
Anyway, that is the end of today's epistle. I hope that you are all okay and not hanging yourself like the person on the Airplane film.
Take care and thank you for reading.
October 30 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 4 days old)
So here we are again, another ponderous and long night shift, made all the longer and more tedious by a quirk that is irritating me so much.
Last night the clocks changed so I thought "I should get a really decent sleep to catch up." I thought wrong, so wrong in fact that I will be surprised if I make it through the whole shift without falling asleep, which is something that I have frowned upon in the past. My opinion is that if someone is paying you to watch over a place overnight, then that is exactly what you should do.
However this may have to be different tonight, and I feel awful to even suggest such a thing, for last night I just couldn't get to sleep. Too much on my mind I suppose, specifically about money, the looming prospect of Christmas shopping, bills constantly having to be paid, and so many other things that are really not making my mind work any better - paracetamol is definitely my drug of the moment, unlike days ow long gone by in the annals of time (probably for the better). Even a beer nowadays would be like an alien substance to me. How on earth people who are unemployed can afford it so much that they walk past at stupid o'clock waking up people who go out to work so they're taxes can pay for these people to get plastered I have absolutely no idea.... See what I did there?
Anyway, at about 3 o'clock (after the clocks were changed), I decided to just get out of bed and take a couple of paracetamol, while I had a read. I suppose reading isn't such a good idea, but what could I do? I had Sky news on as well (Louise has been following the Michael Jackson thing on there while I've been away on the night shifts). The news was mainly about the passing of Sir Jimmy Saville (have to get the Sir in there since it's only right). Rest in peace Sir James, man of Jim'll Fix It and Top Of The Pops, who thought nothing of smoking a cigar the size of Big Ben in front of a multitude of children, and was never afraid to flaunt that he had money to his name. Anyway, that was an outrageous thing to say and I should not speak ill of the dead, I apologise.
At about 3.40 in the morning I decided to try and return to bed. I remember the bells going on the church across the way up until about a quarter to five in the time we're using now (they hadn't changed the time on the church's clock, CD or MP3 based, of course until someone showed up to ring the supposed real bells for the Sunday service). Boy were they bloody loud, and so were the new neighbours moving more bloody stuff in at 9 in the morning. That moving in of items carried on until probably after midday. Typical!
Anyway, because of the restless night I decided to journey to the Greek god of shopping for pillows for the bed, because we needed a new one and I bought a pair because (a) the decent ones always come in pairs, and (b) it would give us a spare just in case another pillow decided to try and stab me in the eye during the night with the sticky out feathers and such - bloody ducks getting back at me, what did I ever do to them I ask you??? Speaking of which, just started listening to the Howard The Duck episode of Filmsack, which is really great and reminds me of how much I thought that film stunk. So much so that when I was younger and a friend of mine brought it to school on a video to watch (probably a pirated copy I'm guessing), I watched about five minutes and that was enough. I could quite easily have left and gone to the room where fleas were kept to walk all over your balls, if such a room existed!!! That is how much I thought that film sucked! In fact, I'd have probably preferred to have had my balls soaked in honey and then have myself strung naked on a tree with a million beehives on it!
Anyway, losing the plot there I think... So, the pillows are nice, and I will see how nice when I get to lay my head on one of them at about ten on Monday morning, if the neighbours aren't as noisy as they were today. And then I have to get up early to find one of these paypoint places, because you can't renew your TV licence at the Post Office any more. I don't know why I even bother paying for a TV licence, because the channels are all screwy after we had the digital switch over in our area - about three or four times a week for the last however many weeks, I've had to retune the channels because it's lost them all over again, and it's always losing the channels when it's something I want to record for me like The Gadget Show, Alphas, or any of that stuff.
I tell you, I'm not half in ranting and tired as hell mood today. Oh I never mentioned that when I bought the pair of pillows from the Greek god of shopping, they seemed very flat in the packaging. I took them back and the assistant said, "they're vacuum packed sir, so when you pierce the pack, they will expand." At that point I felt tired and incredibly stupid. I could feel the eyes of the people behind me in the queue looking and hear the voices of those calling names. I was happy to go home after a trip to Morrison's (other Supermarkets not so available in the centre of Newark for the time being, unless you have a job that pays over 25,000 per year for Waitrose shopping) and enjoy a jammed-up fruit scone with a cup of Tetley.
We then watched Ice Road Truckers Most Dangerous Roads, had lunch, and well, I never did get the nap that I was hoping for. Boy am I ever ready for Tuesday and Wednesday off. I think I won't be getting up early on Tuesday like I normally do, although perhaps if I don't I may not wake until Thursday and lose both days off.
Anyway, that is the end of today's epistle. I hope that you are all okay and not hanging yourself like the person on the Airplane film.
Take care and thank you for reading.
October 30 2011 (40 years, 11 months, and 4 days old)
Sunday, 23 October 2011
Monday morning thoughts
Happy birthday to:
F Murray Abraham (Actor)
Ted Templeman (Producer/Sound Engineer)
Kevin Kline (Actor)
Dervla Kirwan (Actress)
On this day in 1931 Al Capone was sentenced to 11 years for tax evasion. In 1939 nylon stockings were sold for the first time at Wilmington Delaware. In 1946 the first photographs of Earth from outer space were taken by the V-2 number 13 rocket. In 1962 the US blockade of Cuba began. In 1988 the first album by The Traveling Wilburys was released (entitled Volume One). In 2003 the Concorde made it's final commercial flight.
All of this in just one day. I wonder what tomorrow and the week ahead will bring. I just thought I'd see what happened. After all, these are just a few things from looking on the internet, and there were more on the sites that I looked at.
That's just a little something I thought I would write.
I've spent tonight at work doing a few things. By that I mean some thinking, watching Fringe some more, lots of playing games on Facebook, and downloading some more episodes of the great Filmsack podcast. It was suggested to me once by my friend Paul B Edwards that I have a go at doing my own podcast, but I''m not sure if I have the confidence to do that. Besides which, there are already some great podcasts out there, such as Paul's Punky Radio show.
It's a shame really that my friend Drew isn't still doing a podcast with my great friend (and ex-band mate) Andy Dobb. I enjoyed that show. I have however lost track of what's called the Skeptical Podcast Of Doom, which is a real shame. I need to catch up with that. I am hoping to actually listen to every film sack that there is.
Actually I am hoping to find the time to catch Mr Dobb's group Elm Tree Row perform a gig somewhere soon, because I love what I have heard but, and I know this may seem like an excuse, hours at work, limited time off, and fuel for the car have got in the way. There are a lot of my friends bands that I would love to catch up with.
Oh hell, just remembered that I have some DVD's to send to a couple of friends who have moved to the US. They wanted me to record the rest of the Doctor Who series that was on. I have put them all onto disc for them, and must get them sent over. I will do it next week when I'm a little more flush.
I have set my recorder at home to record the series Alphas, which I am hoping will be a good show, although it sounds very much like Heroes to me. We will see.
Anyway, that is the end of a pretty nonsensical and very rambling blog.
I hope that you all have a lovely day today, and a lovely week because I may not post another blog before the end of the week.
Thank you for reading, please take care.
October 24 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 28 days old).
F Murray Abraham (Actor)
Ted Templeman (Producer/Sound Engineer)
Kevin Kline (Actor)
Dervla Kirwan (Actress)
On this day in 1931 Al Capone was sentenced to 11 years for tax evasion. In 1939 nylon stockings were sold for the first time at Wilmington Delaware. In 1946 the first photographs of Earth from outer space were taken by the V-2 number 13 rocket. In 1962 the US blockade of Cuba began. In 1988 the first album by The Traveling Wilburys was released (entitled Volume One). In 2003 the Concorde made it's final commercial flight.
All of this in just one day. I wonder what tomorrow and the week ahead will bring. I just thought I'd see what happened. After all, these are just a few things from looking on the internet, and there were more on the sites that I looked at.
That's just a little something I thought I would write.
I've spent tonight at work doing a few things. By that I mean some thinking, watching Fringe some more, lots of playing games on Facebook, and downloading some more episodes of the great Filmsack podcast. It was suggested to me once by my friend Paul B Edwards that I have a go at doing my own podcast, but I''m not sure if I have the confidence to do that. Besides which, there are already some great podcasts out there, such as Paul's Punky Radio show.
It's a shame really that my friend Drew isn't still doing a podcast with my great friend (and ex-band mate) Andy Dobb. I enjoyed that show. I have however lost track of what's called the Skeptical Podcast Of Doom, which is a real shame. I need to catch up with that. I am hoping to actually listen to every film sack that there is.
Actually I am hoping to find the time to catch Mr Dobb's group Elm Tree Row perform a gig somewhere soon, because I love what I have heard but, and I know this may seem like an excuse, hours at work, limited time off, and fuel for the car have got in the way. There are a lot of my friends bands that I would love to catch up with.
Oh hell, just remembered that I have some DVD's to send to a couple of friends who have moved to the US. They wanted me to record the rest of the Doctor Who series that was on. I have put them all onto disc for them, and must get them sent over. I will do it next week when I'm a little more flush.
I have set my recorder at home to record the series Alphas, which I am hoping will be a good show, although it sounds very much like Heroes to me. We will see.
Anyway, that is the end of a pretty nonsensical and very rambling blog.
I hope that you all have a lovely day today, and a lovely week because I may not post another blog before the end of the week.
Thank you for reading, please take care.
October 24 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 28 days old).
Thursday, 20 October 2011
Night shift talk
So it's the old Thursday night Friday morning shift again, and I am at the old laptop. What a surprise hey!
I'm busy playing all of the Facebook related games that obviously take me so long to do everything on that I don't actually get the time to catch up with people on there, and am still so very much in the dark as to what anyone is doing! All those "friends" farms to sort out, the games of Scrabble I have on the go, the mafioso's that need knee-capping, the Bejewelled Blitz scores that I have absolutely no chance whatsoever of catching up to, and that sort of thing (I don't do Yoville much now because, to be honest, I'm sort of trying to figure out what you can do on there now).
I'm also obviously doing the old Twitter thing, as well as this here Blog. I'm thinking about writing something for the other blog, but probably won't because I find myself now trying to be a bit more fluid with what I am writing on there. That plus I am seriously thinking of adding a video to that blog for the next part. I'm still thinking about that, and it would mean Louise videoing me so that it's a good picture that everyone can see what is happening. Well, as much as you can if it's showing that it is me as well. I'll think about that one. I did find some video footage on youtube already that teaches the solo. If truth be told, I got fed up with those videos and just worked it out myself. That is the honest truth.
While Louise was out on Tuesday (after my two and a half hour's sleep), I was meaning to carry on working on Maybe I'm Amazed and Kreen-Akrore, but for some reason I found myself doing a recording of So Bad from the Pipes Of Peace album instead! Why on earth I did that I don't know because it's a falsetto for one, and number 2 is that it's an album from 1983, which means that my blog won't reach there for a while yet if I carry on chronologically. It would be a while if I was just sticking to one artist at a time, but if I decide to go the alternative route of doing them all chronologically, then there are probably nearly twenty albums before that comes up. Perhaps I should keep trying the song, because that way my voice may eventually get there without resulting to dropping the tuning of the guitar by a semitone :(
I'm here sat watching the cameras at work whilst doing all of this because the laptop is right next to the monitor, hence being able to do it all at the same time. It also helps that I have qualifications in typing, so I don't always have to look at where my fingers are to be able to type things up. I am a little out of practice though with all of that, so a spell check comes in handy with that side of things.
Actually, I think I'll have a listen to Kreen-Akrore again from Macca's first album while doing some of this, so I can get a gist of where I'm going with the piece because I'm not sure if what I have recorded already isn't right for it. I know that I am doing my own versions of the songs and everything, but I still have to remain sort of close to the original.
I'm fed up of the laptop having a little mouse thing near to the space bar because I keep nudging it and the bloody cursor moves and carries on typing somewhere I don't want it to. Pain in the backside!
Hmm, I think I may have gone a bit too far with the percussive rhythm track, and I have only started on the intro. Some revision may be required. Let's see.
On Wednesday me and Louise did a spot of visiting, which was nice of course, but we were silly by not eating anything while we were out, so hadn't eaten from lunch at about 2 in the afternoon until we got back in, when eventually something was cooked for around ten. Still, was nice to go out and see people because we never really have the time (or the fuel) to go anywhere.
Anyway, I think I may leave that as it is because I will probably blog again over the weekend, and I would hate for people to get bored, if they haven't already.
Take care of yourselves, and thank you for reading.
21 October 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 25 days old)
I'm busy playing all of the Facebook related games that obviously take me so long to do everything on that I don't actually get the time to catch up with people on there, and am still so very much in the dark as to what anyone is doing! All those "friends" farms to sort out, the games of Scrabble I have on the go, the mafioso's that need knee-capping, the Bejewelled Blitz scores that I have absolutely no chance whatsoever of catching up to, and that sort of thing (I don't do Yoville much now because, to be honest, I'm sort of trying to figure out what you can do on there now).
I'm also obviously doing the old Twitter thing, as well as this here Blog. I'm thinking about writing something for the other blog, but probably won't because I find myself now trying to be a bit more fluid with what I am writing on there. That plus I am seriously thinking of adding a video to that blog for the next part. I'm still thinking about that, and it would mean Louise videoing me so that it's a good picture that everyone can see what is happening. Well, as much as you can if it's showing that it is me as well. I'll think about that one. I did find some video footage on youtube already that teaches the solo. If truth be told, I got fed up with those videos and just worked it out myself. That is the honest truth.
While Louise was out on Tuesday (after my two and a half hour's sleep), I was meaning to carry on working on Maybe I'm Amazed and Kreen-Akrore, but for some reason I found myself doing a recording of So Bad from the Pipes Of Peace album instead! Why on earth I did that I don't know because it's a falsetto for one, and number 2 is that it's an album from 1983, which means that my blog won't reach there for a while yet if I carry on chronologically. It would be a while if I was just sticking to one artist at a time, but if I decide to go the alternative route of doing them all chronologically, then there are probably nearly twenty albums before that comes up. Perhaps I should keep trying the song, because that way my voice may eventually get there without resulting to dropping the tuning of the guitar by a semitone :(
I'm here sat watching the cameras at work whilst doing all of this because the laptop is right next to the monitor, hence being able to do it all at the same time. It also helps that I have qualifications in typing, so I don't always have to look at where my fingers are to be able to type things up. I am a little out of practice though with all of that, so a spell check comes in handy with that side of things.
Actually, I think I'll have a listen to Kreen-Akrore again from Macca's first album while doing some of this, so I can get a gist of where I'm going with the piece because I'm not sure if what I have recorded already isn't right for it. I know that I am doing my own versions of the songs and everything, but I still have to remain sort of close to the original.
I'm fed up of the laptop having a little mouse thing near to the space bar because I keep nudging it and the bloody cursor moves and carries on typing somewhere I don't want it to. Pain in the backside!
Hmm, I think I may have gone a bit too far with the percussive rhythm track, and I have only started on the intro. Some revision may be required. Let's see.
On Wednesday me and Louise did a spot of visiting, which was nice of course, but we were silly by not eating anything while we were out, so hadn't eaten from lunch at about 2 in the afternoon until we got back in, when eventually something was cooked for around ten. Still, was nice to go out and see people because we never really have the time (or the fuel) to go anywhere.
Anyway, I think I may leave that as it is because I will probably blog again over the weekend, and I would hate for people to get bored, if they haven't already.
Take care of yourselves, and thank you for reading.
21 October 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 25 days old)
Monday, 17 October 2011
Waffle, scoffle, hoffle and boffle
So, how is everybody? What's been going on with yourselves? Me, well, same old same old I suppose. Working, very little play, and all that kind of thing. You know how it is I'm sure.
At last I got another blog up on the series of blogs I am doing on the "post-Beatles careers of the foursome", a description that I think is more explanatory than the previous one of "ex-Beatles' solo careers", where someone pointed out that Wings and the Plastic Ono Band were technically bands as such. So because some smart alec said that I have had to look again at what the mission is for the series of blogs.
I have given a lot of thought to that in fact, and have decided that obviously it's still a very far reaching and all-encompassing subject. I will possibly look at other members of Wings' contributions, but not to such a degree as of course Paul McCartney's songs since I am discussing the careers of the ex-Beatles and not ex-The Moody Blues, ex-Thunderclap Newman/Stone The Crows, and all of that. We will see, because in all truth their material wasn't featured all that much.
It's an interesting thing to look at what material was worked on through the many websites that I have come across where they discuss such things as songs Denny Laine and Henry McCullough wrote for Wings' second album Red Rose Speedway, which were not used due to record company intervention apparently. A shame really, since having heard Denny's song I Would Only Smile, I really like the song, and the version featured on Denny's Japanese Tears album is I believe the Wings recording from 1972. Not completely sure about that, but it sounds like it could have been.
Anyway, enough about that because if you wanted to read more on that then you would have gone to Marv's Musical Ponderings wouldn't you? It still needs a different title I think.
Work is staying much the same at the moment, with my days off being Tuesday and Wednesday. That sounds good until you look at the fact that Monday's night shift finishes at 9 in the morning, and then I have to drive back to Newark, park up somewhere (not outside my door since Newark Council don't allow people who live in the centre to park outside where they live between eight in the morning and six in the evening. That has always been a bugbear of mine, especially since there is a council car park on the street where I live basically, so what would be the problem with disabled people parking there about three yards further from the market place?
With that in mind, obviously I am in bed for much of the day on Tuesday just to get a few hours sleep so I don't feel like an extra from Shaun Of The Dead! Then Louise is out on a Tuesday anyway, which is probably good at the moment, although that looks like being changed to Wednesday instead, which would be an absolute pain in the arse because it would mean never having a day together! Sometimes life can treat you like a shit, by treading on you and then wiping you off the bottom of it's shoe.
At the moment though, Wednesday is good, because we get the day together. This week ahead we're hoping to get some visiting in of my family. That will be nice, as I miss my family.
This past Sunday (yesterday I suppose) was good because Louise's mum and dad came around for dinner, which we provided! I know, shock horror. It was difficult making the room for the table to come out, but they did get to sit at a table while me and Louise sat on the settee to eat. We had casserole, followed by Chocolate flavoured Bread & Butter Pudding with custard. It was nice to have some time with them. It especially helped that Saturday night shift finishes at midnight, and the Sunday shift starts at 9 at night.
Tomorrow then (Tuesday), I will be getting in and then getting to bed around 10 in the morning, and then get Louise to wake me at about 1 after three hours sleep. The afternoon will then probably be spent doing some recording at home. I have a couple of bits to add to Maybe I'm Amazed and I need to continue to work on Kreen Akrore, both of which are songs from McCartney's début album so are for the music blog series.
I will see what else I get time for, because I'm not sure if I might take it a little easier tomorrow and not do so much. I'm looking forward to actually finishing the work on covering Macca's first album, because it'll be nice to have a break for a few weeks from it, before I get on with whatever I decide to do next. I'm not sure whether that should be Lennon's Plastic Ono Band album, Harrison's All Things Must Pass, Starr's Sentimental Journey (which won't consist of much anyway, other than a review really since all of the songs are covers of standards). I might on the other hand just continue with Macca's career and get on with Ram. I've not yet decided. More work would be needed for the others I suppose because at least there is a decent chord songbook for his material, whereas the others are less fortunate in that way.
I do know that doing that blog seems to be getting me back to being a musician and thinking more about music. In fact in some ways it making me better with some aspects, not least keyboards, which I had been really lazy with before.
Anyway, I have carried on listening to some great podcasts, particularly two that have become my very favourites - Punky Radio and Film Sack. The former I have spoken about a lot before, where it is my friend's Paul & Tony playing music and chatting about all sorts of things, but they make me laugh every time it has be said. Laughter is great, especially when I am driving to work and back. Film Sack on the other hand I don't think I have spoken about much before. This podcast is one where a group of people watch a film, and then get together to chat about it, basically taking it apart. These can be films that are classics, duds, and anywhere in between. Normally it is dictated by something apparently called Netflix, whatever that is! I'm British, so have no clue whatsoever.
I also carry on reading a fair few blogs, most of which I have mentioned previously, and I try to avoid work as much as possible if I'm being honest. The more time I can spend at work on my laptop doing very little, so much the better from my perspective.
Of course I am open to people suggesting blogs and podcasts for me to check out, because I am very much a slave to the internet.
I think I'll stop waffling there and get back to, ahem, working. Thank you for reading and please take care.
October 17 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 21 days old)
At last I got another blog up on the series of blogs I am doing on the "post-Beatles careers of the foursome", a description that I think is more explanatory than the previous one of "ex-Beatles' solo careers", where someone pointed out that Wings and the Plastic Ono Band were technically bands as such. So because some smart alec said that I have had to look again at what the mission is for the series of blogs.
I have given a lot of thought to that in fact, and have decided that obviously it's still a very far reaching and all-encompassing subject. I will possibly look at other members of Wings' contributions, but not to such a degree as of course Paul McCartney's songs since I am discussing the careers of the ex-Beatles and not ex-The Moody Blues, ex-Thunderclap Newman/Stone The Crows, and all of that. We will see, because in all truth their material wasn't featured all that much.
It's an interesting thing to look at what material was worked on through the many websites that I have come across where they discuss such things as songs Denny Laine and Henry McCullough wrote for Wings' second album Red Rose Speedway, which were not used due to record company intervention apparently. A shame really, since having heard Denny's song I Would Only Smile, I really like the song, and the version featured on Denny's Japanese Tears album is I believe the Wings recording from 1972. Not completely sure about that, but it sounds like it could have been.
Anyway, enough about that because if you wanted to read more on that then you would have gone to Marv's Musical Ponderings wouldn't you? It still needs a different title I think.
Work is staying much the same at the moment, with my days off being Tuesday and Wednesday. That sounds good until you look at the fact that Monday's night shift finishes at 9 in the morning, and then I have to drive back to Newark, park up somewhere (not outside my door since Newark Council don't allow people who live in the centre to park outside where they live between eight in the morning and six in the evening. That has always been a bugbear of mine, especially since there is a council car park on the street where I live basically, so what would be the problem with disabled people parking there about three yards further from the market place?
With that in mind, obviously I am in bed for much of the day on Tuesday just to get a few hours sleep so I don't feel like an extra from Shaun Of The Dead! Then Louise is out on a Tuesday anyway, which is probably good at the moment, although that looks like being changed to Wednesday instead, which would be an absolute pain in the arse because it would mean never having a day together! Sometimes life can treat you like a shit, by treading on you and then wiping you off the bottom of it's shoe.
At the moment though, Wednesday is good, because we get the day together. This week ahead we're hoping to get some visiting in of my family. That will be nice, as I miss my family.
This past Sunday (yesterday I suppose) was good because Louise's mum and dad came around for dinner, which we provided! I know, shock horror. It was difficult making the room for the table to come out, but they did get to sit at a table while me and Louise sat on the settee to eat. We had casserole, followed by Chocolate flavoured Bread & Butter Pudding with custard. It was nice to have some time with them. It especially helped that Saturday night shift finishes at midnight, and the Sunday shift starts at 9 at night.
Tomorrow then (Tuesday), I will be getting in and then getting to bed around 10 in the morning, and then get Louise to wake me at about 1 after three hours sleep. The afternoon will then probably be spent doing some recording at home. I have a couple of bits to add to Maybe I'm Amazed and I need to continue to work on Kreen Akrore, both of which are songs from McCartney's début album so are for the music blog series.
I will see what else I get time for, because I'm not sure if I might take it a little easier tomorrow and not do so much. I'm looking forward to actually finishing the work on covering Macca's first album, because it'll be nice to have a break for a few weeks from it, before I get on with whatever I decide to do next. I'm not sure whether that should be Lennon's Plastic Ono Band album, Harrison's All Things Must Pass, Starr's Sentimental Journey (which won't consist of much anyway, other than a review really since all of the songs are covers of standards). I might on the other hand just continue with Macca's career and get on with Ram. I've not yet decided. More work would be needed for the others I suppose because at least there is a decent chord songbook for his material, whereas the others are less fortunate in that way.
I do know that doing that blog seems to be getting me back to being a musician and thinking more about music. In fact in some ways it making me better with some aspects, not least keyboards, which I had been really lazy with before.
Anyway, I have carried on listening to some great podcasts, particularly two that have become my very favourites - Punky Radio and Film Sack. The former I have spoken about a lot before, where it is my friend's Paul & Tony playing music and chatting about all sorts of things, but they make me laugh every time it has be said. Laughter is great, especially when I am driving to work and back. Film Sack on the other hand I don't think I have spoken about much before. This podcast is one where a group of people watch a film, and then get together to chat about it, basically taking it apart. These can be films that are classics, duds, and anywhere in between. Normally it is dictated by something apparently called Netflix, whatever that is! I'm British, so have no clue whatsoever.
I also carry on reading a fair few blogs, most of which I have mentioned previously, and I try to avoid work as much as possible if I'm being honest. The more time I can spend at work on my laptop doing very little, so much the better from my perspective.
Of course I am open to people suggesting blogs and podcasts for me to check out, because I am very much a slave to the internet.
I think I'll stop waffling there and get back to, ahem, working. Thank you for reading and please take care.
October 17 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 21 days old)
Sunday, 9 October 2011
Another catch-up
So after Monday's night shift, which finished at 9 in the morning, I went home and got a little bit of sleep. Well, three hours I think anyway. Then myself and Louise had a day in basically, except for me doing the shopping if I remember correctly.
Wednesday saw Louise being out for the whole daytime, and I took advantage of this by doing some work on the music for the other blog series. I'm not sure of when I worked on what with each song, but over time then and during Friday, I worked on parts for Teddy Boy, Singalong Junk, and Maybe I'm Amazed, including my replacing the solo to the latter, which I had first done by whistling it when I put the lead vocal down.
By saying that then, you will see that Tuesday and Wednesday were both days off. Thursday saw me working 9 at night until 9 in the morning, and then Friday was 5 in the afternoon until midnight. Saturday I had the same shift times as Friday, and now tonight I am working a 9 until 9 again.
I am continuing to enjoy catching up with the series Fringe, and am doing a lot of thinking here and there about things. I keep thinking a lot about how I could get back to doing music again if only the people I work for had stuck to my original request for working 4 shifts only per week, with the occasional fifth shift. You may look at that and wonder, but some may not realise that the majority of security work is based around 12 hour shifts. This then would make it a maximum of 48 hours per week. I think that is plenty of hours personally.
This would then allow me the time to work on music, visit people, and actually be able to enjoy time off. I know, I am moaning again here. I'm sure there are some out there who are thinking, "why doesn't he just get on with what he has and stop bloody moaning?" You're right of course. There are people who are far worse off than I am, and I should be glad of everything that I have.
I pay my bills, and I don't really owe anything. I'd be happier if I got paid more money per hour, and as I said I would like more time off. I'd like to be able to see people more often, and I would love to get to some gigs. I do however have the problem that with so little time off, I have to prioritise, and that means deciding between doing these things or having time with Louise. This is for no other reason but that there is so little time, and she is most important in my life. I'm sure that must be the same for all couples.
I am happy with the progress I am having with the other blog though, especially considering that the next song I start working on from that initial album will be the last song off that album. I am however wondering if I should actually do a recording of that song. To be a completist I suppose I should, but I'm not sure how to even start working on it, because it is an incredibly experimental piece. It's another one of those things that I have to think about.
Anyway, I'll finish this blog right here and now, so I can get back to watching Fringe at work. I'm presently on episode 13 of the third season.
I thank you for reading, and hope that you are okay. Take care.
October 10 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 14 days old)
Wednesday saw Louise being out for the whole daytime, and I took advantage of this by doing some work on the music for the other blog series. I'm not sure of when I worked on what with each song, but over time then and during Friday, I worked on parts for Teddy Boy, Singalong Junk, and Maybe I'm Amazed, including my replacing the solo to the latter, which I had first done by whistling it when I put the lead vocal down.
By saying that then, you will see that Tuesday and Wednesday were both days off. Thursday saw me working 9 at night until 9 in the morning, and then Friday was 5 in the afternoon until midnight. Saturday I had the same shift times as Friday, and now tonight I am working a 9 until 9 again.
I am continuing to enjoy catching up with the series Fringe, and am doing a lot of thinking here and there about things. I keep thinking a lot about how I could get back to doing music again if only the people I work for had stuck to my original request for working 4 shifts only per week, with the occasional fifth shift. You may look at that and wonder, but some may not realise that the majority of security work is based around 12 hour shifts. This then would make it a maximum of 48 hours per week. I think that is plenty of hours personally.
This would then allow me the time to work on music, visit people, and actually be able to enjoy time off. I know, I am moaning again here. I'm sure there are some out there who are thinking, "why doesn't he just get on with what he has and stop bloody moaning?" You're right of course. There are people who are far worse off than I am, and I should be glad of everything that I have.
I pay my bills, and I don't really owe anything. I'd be happier if I got paid more money per hour, and as I said I would like more time off. I'd like to be able to see people more often, and I would love to get to some gigs. I do however have the problem that with so little time off, I have to prioritise, and that means deciding between doing these things or having time with Louise. This is for no other reason but that there is so little time, and she is most important in my life. I'm sure that must be the same for all couples.
I am happy with the progress I am having with the other blog though, especially considering that the next song I start working on from that initial album will be the last song off that album. I am however wondering if I should actually do a recording of that song. To be a completist I suppose I should, but I'm not sure how to even start working on it, because it is an incredibly experimental piece. It's another one of those things that I have to think about.
Anyway, I'll finish this blog right here and now, so I can get back to watching Fringe at work. I'm presently on episode 13 of the third season.
I thank you for reading, and hope that you are okay. Take care.
October 10 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 14 days old)
Friday, 7 October 2011
Thoughts based on the passing of Steve Jobs
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| Steve Jobs |
I had already done some work experience with the other two local papers at the time in Mansfield, the Observer and Recorder. Those were mainly office based and actually writing up stories, including one I happened upon on my way to the Recorder office, which was at the back of the main post office in Mansfield at the time. It was an accident on Harrop White Road, where I girl was hit by a car.
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| Steve Jobs with Apple Macs |
When I went to work experience with the Chad, I went a few times. It was something that the local social services had sorted out because I wasn't in a local school of course, instead being far away at a school for being naughty, which I've gone into a long time ago, and don't want to bring that up again.
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| iPod Classic |
I was taken out of that section, where they used AMSTRAD computers by the way, and was given the job of assisting the computer maintenance man there, whose name was Rick something or other. You have to remember that this is a long time ago, when a hard drive was bigger than a washing machine! Absolutely true that. Down there he was helping to sort out the failing AMSTRAD's and the Apple Mac's that were being for the Publishing program they used. When I used that for the first time it was amazing, I really loved it, and thought that it looked great. You look back on that original Apple Mac now and you think, "how ugly is that?" Back then though it was completely different, and looked amazing when put up against it's nearest rival, which was the PC, and they were cumbersome, enormous, and actually very boring visually. Even looking at the picture I've included here reminds me of how I thought they looked so good.
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| iPad |
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| iPhone |
Anyway, that's my reminiscing then for the time being. Thank you for allowing me this little dalliance, and I hope that you all have a fantastic weekend ahead. Take care.
October 7 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 11 days old)
Monday, 3 October 2011
A bit of a moan
Here we are then, it is the early hours of Tuesday October 4th, and I am sat at work looking forward to a couple of days off.
When I say a couple of days off, that is one of a few things that is niggling me about work at the moment. I won't go so far into that to be honest, but this being my first day off I finish my shift at 9 in the morning after a 12 hour shift, and then I will be going to bed because I am bloody tired. When I get back home I will have been awake for around 24 hours. Obviously then I will be going to bed once I get home, and then I will be getting up sometime around mid-afternoon, which means not much of a day off.
The second day off will be spoilt by Louise being out all day basically, and then I can't get carried away on the Thursday because I will be back to work. If it wasn't for all of these little niggles, then the site would be perfect I suppose. Because of all of the niggles though, I think it will be a good idea if I get looking for something else, and then that would be much better for me.
Since I last posted though, I have been at work every night. Yet another niggle that I have, because I really wish that I could actually enjoy time to be able to do things and, in all truth, I thought that I had it when the company I am working for said initially that they would be able to work around me - a give and take basis. This has changed into a take from their point though, with no give at all. To be able to work around they said that I would have to discuss it with the other officers on the site, which is absolutely ludicrous. They are the employers after all. I know that everybody wants some semblance of organisation in their lives, but the other officers won't give at all.
If you want to know what's pissing me off then I will tell you. Apparently every Thursday from now on I work from 9 at night until 9 in the morning, then have to drive back home (the site isn't in Newark where I live), and then I start again at 5 in the evening. That is an eight hour difference between shifts and, quite frankly, I actually like to get some time to sleep and look relatively presentable before I go to work and feel that this isn't as such. One of the officers here said, "well I only need 4 hours sleep a day." I said perhaps that is an age thing, not meaning to be ageist or anything, but I think he saw it that way. We will see. I can't say that I am that bothered. What's the worst that could happen? I could be pulled off this site and assigned to doing what I was doing before covering sites nearer to where I live with better hours.
Anyway, here I am then looking forward to what little time off that I am going to get. There isn't much that I can do, because unfortunately I don't have the luxury to share any time with my better half like the other two guards on here seem to. There, that is it in a nut shell, someone has to get the blunt end of the stick, and it always seems to end up being me. Well, screw that!!!
Plus points are that I have at last been able to catch up with one of my favourite series, Fringe, thanks to someone who has SKY putting them onto disc for me a while ago, so I have caught up to episode 8 of season 3 tonight. They are on Season 4 in the US now I believe (and on SKY maybe, I wouldn't know - I miss SKY).
Anyway, here's hoping that everyone has a lovely day today. I will most likely catch up again during Wednesday since I can't really do much of anything else.
Take care and thank you for reading.
October 4 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 8 days old)
When I say a couple of days off, that is one of a few things that is niggling me about work at the moment. I won't go so far into that to be honest, but this being my first day off I finish my shift at 9 in the morning after a 12 hour shift, and then I will be going to bed because I am bloody tired. When I get back home I will have been awake for around 24 hours. Obviously then I will be going to bed once I get home, and then I will be getting up sometime around mid-afternoon, which means not much of a day off.
The second day off will be spoilt by Louise being out all day basically, and then I can't get carried away on the Thursday because I will be back to work. If it wasn't for all of these little niggles, then the site would be perfect I suppose. Because of all of the niggles though, I think it will be a good idea if I get looking for something else, and then that would be much better for me.
Since I last posted though, I have been at work every night. Yet another niggle that I have, because I really wish that I could actually enjoy time to be able to do things and, in all truth, I thought that I had it when the company I am working for said initially that they would be able to work around me - a give and take basis. This has changed into a take from their point though, with no give at all. To be able to work around they said that I would have to discuss it with the other officers on the site, which is absolutely ludicrous. They are the employers after all. I know that everybody wants some semblance of organisation in their lives, but the other officers won't give at all.
If you want to know what's pissing me off then I will tell you. Apparently every Thursday from now on I work from 9 at night until 9 in the morning, then have to drive back home (the site isn't in Newark where I live), and then I start again at 5 in the evening. That is an eight hour difference between shifts and, quite frankly, I actually like to get some time to sleep and look relatively presentable before I go to work and feel that this isn't as such. One of the officers here said, "well I only need 4 hours sleep a day." I said perhaps that is an age thing, not meaning to be ageist or anything, but I think he saw it that way. We will see. I can't say that I am that bothered. What's the worst that could happen? I could be pulled off this site and assigned to doing what I was doing before covering sites nearer to where I live with better hours.
Anyway, here I am then looking forward to what little time off that I am going to get. There isn't much that I can do, because unfortunately I don't have the luxury to share any time with my better half like the other two guards on here seem to. There, that is it in a nut shell, someone has to get the blunt end of the stick, and it always seems to end up being me. Well, screw that!!!
Plus points are that I have at last been able to catch up with one of my favourite series, Fringe, thanks to someone who has SKY putting them onto disc for me a while ago, so I have caught up to episode 8 of season 3 tonight. They are on Season 4 in the US now I believe (and on SKY maybe, I wouldn't know - I miss SKY).
Anyway, here's hoping that everyone has a lovely day today. I will most likely catch up again during Wednesday since I can't really do much of anything else.
Take care and thank you for reading.
October 4 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 8 days old)
Thursday, 29 September 2011
A thursday posting
Shock horror - a post today!!! I know!!! It's been a while since I've been able to find the time in the week to be able to put together a blog, but I thought that it could be interesting to see how it goes.
How is everyone? I feel like a hermit out here in the sticks, learning songs, writing a little, but stuck with the creative streak that I can do very little with. Guitar has been out a good few times recently, although most times it's been to do with the other blog series that I am working on. More on all of that later, if I remember to talk bout it as I am making this up as I go along.
Saturday then I worked at that site where there is no electricity, but where I can go to the next door site to get a drink, warm, and all of that stuff. The bloody vehicle they had me sit in though broke down while I was there. I went to look around the site, and when I came back I unlocked the vehicle, put the key in the ignition to start it so that I could use the radio, light and heater, and it just wouldn't do anything. Then, idiot that I can sometimes be, I thought that I could possibly push start it - a land rover!!!
Of course this was in vain, as it was I'm guessing much like "pushing an elephant up the stairs" (wonder who works out that pop culture reference). When it did move, I could quite obviously see a pool of oil big enough to potentially sink the Bismarck! Another problem with my predicament now though, was that I had a land rover in the middle of the road which had to be moved before vehicles showed up to go to the other factories on the same industrial estate.
After much sweat and toil, I got the vehicle back outside the gates of the site I was on, and then went to the neighbouring site for a well earned cup of tea. While there, I called the office to report the vehicle problem. After not too much of a wait, someone showed up and we towed it back to the office, whereupon I got into my own car and returned to do the last hour or so. I actually parked my car at the neighbouring site, while I walked over to the site I was on and had a look around. When I returned for another cuppa, the guard on that site said, "I'll swap with you for your next shift because you can't sit in that little thing all night." Winner, I accepted the shift swap over. Funny really, because he looked nothing like Noel Edmonds, Keith Chegwin, John Craven, or Maggie Philbin. Good swap though.
So, I was on that site on Sunday, and then from the Monday I had no idea what I was doing. I was given a rota on the previous thursday to that but told, "don't take any notice because that will be completely different to what you will end up doing." Great, just what I need, a week where I can do absolutely nothing because I never knew when I would be working. As it turned out, I was contacted on Wednesday with my shift pattern.
So at this moment then I am on a new site in a place where I have never even heard of before, let alone know my way back. I followed someone to get here, and then was very quickly shown around, and that is it really. I am a little worried about the journey home in the morning, but at least tomorrow I'll be on a site that I am used to, before Saturday night when I am somewhere that I have once again never been to, but it is said to be a regular site for me. We will see won't we!
During the time off, I have been trying to help Louise with housework. Basically that's code for probably getting in the way really. I would have liked to have gone out but, quite honestly, I was never sure when I would have been contacted to go into work!
On Tuesday I started work on the Paul McCartney song Maybe I'm Amazed from his début album for my other blog series on the albums of the post-Beatles album careers of the members therein. That is becoming a bit of a weight at the moment to carry, but in another way it's very interesting because it's almost like I'm going back to my roots in a way. The first music I remember is that which my mum and dad listened to, and they were both fans of The Beatles, and of their careers afterwards. There was other music that influenced me throughout the years though, but that is where my memory of music starts from.
Anyway, that means that I am now almost finished on the songs Momma Miss America, Teddy Boy, Singalong Junk (basically I need to add some more instruments to Junk itself, and take the vocals out), and Maybe I'm Amazed. All that would be left after they are finished would be the last song on the album, Kreen Akrore, which I have no idea what I am going to do with.
Today I have been helping more with the tidying up. I still wish that we could make more room to get around, because the living room at least would be nice to have some space in, and the kitchen as well I might add. I never realised how much stuff we both had I suppose. That's another lesson to learn next time - get a bigger place!
Anyway, about these here blogs then. When I got to work this evening I thought it would be a good idea to do some editing on how they are viewed because, I quite like how a few other blogs I read are set out, with a blog per page, rather than so many per page. This way it's easier I suppose. I just need to work out how to organise it so there are separate pages for my other blog where I can have different entries that have more information, a contents page, and the like. I'm still learning, but am most definitely used to blogging now for sure.
Anyway, I hope that everyone is okay. Please take care, and I hope to catch up again soon.
September 29 2011 (40 years, 10 months, and 3 days old)
Friday, 23 September 2011
Another Saturday catch-up blog
Here we are then with yet another of my general blogs. As some people may know, I worked at Lauren's again last weekend for the day shifts on Saturday and Sunday. After that it was a case of the next three days off, and then back from Thursday for night shifts on the row.
First of those days on the site where I am sat in a car because there is no base there to sit in. Electricity and water are not available, but I can go to a site across the way where the company I work for have a guard available. The second night (Friday) is at Lauren's, and then finally the last two nights are back to sitting in a car listening to podcasts and doing some reading.
The last few days have been irritating to say the least since the digital recorder at home isn't keeping the digital channels, so isn't recording shows. I'm especially pissed off because I love Gadget Show and will have to miss it because of being on nights. There is also a series on about the history of the cinema, which I have already put the first three parts of the 15 part series onto disc for future viewing. That is on Saturday night on More 4 and I have obviously wasted my frigging time there!!! I don't know, I think modern technology actually isn't as good as people make it out to be.
The car had it's MOT on Monday and failed on three points, so those had to be sorted and all of it had to be paid for. Road Tax to pay now as well, then water rates at the beginning of October, and it's all about money isn't it! Add to that now that I will probably have to buy a new bloody recorder so I can watch the couple of programmes that I watch, since I am at work or in bed when the programmes I want to watch are on.
I know that people will suggest the old iPlayer and the likes, but this uses a lot of my dongle up, so I have to be selective with what I do online to a point. Also, since I have started to put that History Of Film onto disc, then I would like to keep doing so because otherwise it's a waste of resources, and would damage the ozone if I just throw away a DVD.
While Louise was out on Tuesday I started on the song Momma Miss America for the music blog that I do, which needs to be looked at as two pieces. If you don't understand what I am on about, then just read about it when I post the blog about the song in the next few days or so.
I also put a couple of new ideas of my own down that I made up during that time as well, which I was happy with.
I also had the dentist on Tuesday, and collected the car that had now passed it's MOT. Wednesday was actually a day in, but not helped by the recorder playing up. I basically spent all day taking everything off the hard drive and onto discs. Then after clearing the hard drive, I did a full system reset, which seemed to work, until I switch the machine back on and all the channels were gone again. What a great use of my time that was. I've since tried to keep it working every day since then! Setting it up again and again, only for it to lose everything when switched off and then turned back on later. Why flaming bother?
Thursday I started working on (and almost completed work on) Teddy Boy for the aforementioned music blog I'm doing. I was pleasantly surprised that I got so much done so quickly. Then I took Louise for her dental appointment, and to see her dad.
So, that was Thursday, and we all know I was working nights that night. Friday I got in from work around half six in the morning, got to sleep around seven, got woken up about a quarter to one, and Louise was going out. That was basically what we saw of each other - the ten minutes before she left.
I then got up, grabbed breakfast, tried to get something up on the recorder, which I couldn't. I did look through a few bits at home, and was hoping that I could set my stereo up in the living room because, in all honesty, the bits had been set up on top of a unit since very soon after we had moved in, but I had never got the speakers out and set it up. Today I could see why I hadn't - because the speakers are too flipping big to fit anywhere in the room without someone tripping up over them.
That was about an hour and a half spent doing that, well spent time again hey. You'll find I do that a lot - waste time on things that I can't do anything about.
The laptop was on anyway because I had done the "Follow Friday" thing on Twitter (where you make suggestions for people to follow on there), so I decided to get to work on recording the second half of Momma Miss America. First I had to listen to the song and learn it. Since it was a "jam piece", I stayed close to the original, but again did my own take on it. It was a jam after all! In fact, I still have work on that to do...
I did try to get the recorder to work again, but couldn't. Had to get ready quickly because I had forgotten to get my food ready for work. So, within a very short fifteen minutes, I got everything ready, and left for work, stopping off on the way to see if Louise was okay where she had gone out to. I was in a rush, but surprisingly still made it to work for half past four. Now, I can't go any further than that because, I am actually sat at work now on that shift.
I hope that you all have a lovely weekend. Please take care and thank you for reading.
24 September 2011 (40 years, 9 months, and 29 days old).
First of those days on the site where I am sat in a car because there is no base there to sit in. Electricity and water are not available, but I can go to a site across the way where the company I work for have a guard available. The second night (Friday) is at Lauren's, and then finally the last two nights are back to sitting in a car listening to podcasts and doing some reading.
The last few days have been irritating to say the least since the digital recorder at home isn't keeping the digital channels, so isn't recording shows. I'm especially pissed off because I love Gadget Show and will have to miss it because of being on nights. There is also a series on about the history of the cinema, which I have already put the first three parts of the 15 part series onto disc for future viewing. That is on Saturday night on More 4 and I have obviously wasted my frigging time there!!! I don't know, I think modern technology actually isn't as good as people make it out to be.
The car had it's MOT on Monday and failed on three points, so those had to be sorted and all of it had to be paid for. Road Tax to pay now as well, then water rates at the beginning of October, and it's all about money isn't it! Add to that now that I will probably have to buy a new bloody recorder so I can watch the couple of programmes that I watch, since I am at work or in bed when the programmes I want to watch are on.
I know that people will suggest the old iPlayer and the likes, but this uses a lot of my dongle up, so I have to be selective with what I do online to a point. Also, since I have started to put that History Of Film onto disc, then I would like to keep doing so because otherwise it's a waste of resources, and would damage the ozone if I just throw away a DVD.
While Louise was out on Tuesday I started on the song Momma Miss America for the music blog that I do, which needs to be looked at as two pieces. If you don't understand what I am on about, then just read about it when I post the blog about the song in the next few days or so.
I also put a couple of new ideas of my own down that I made up during that time as well, which I was happy with.
I also had the dentist on Tuesday, and collected the car that had now passed it's MOT. Wednesday was actually a day in, but not helped by the recorder playing up. I basically spent all day taking everything off the hard drive and onto discs. Then after clearing the hard drive, I did a full system reset, which seemed to work, until I switch the machine back on and all the channels were gone again. What a great use of my time that was. I've since tried to keep it working every day since then! Setting it up again and again, only for it to lose everything when switched off and then turned back on later. Why flaming bother?
Thursday I started working on (and almost completed work on) Teddy Boy for the aforementioned music blog I'm doing. I was pleasantly surprised that I got so much done so quickly. Then I took Louise for her dental appointment, and to see her dad.
So, that was Thursday, and we all know I was working nights that night. Friday I got in from work around half six in the morning, got to sleep around seven, got woken up about a quarter to one, and Louise was going out. That was basically what we saw of each other - the ten minutes before she left.
I then got up, grabbed breakfast, tried to get something up on the recorder, which I couldn't. I did look through a few bits at home, and was hoping that I could set my stereo up in the living room because, in all honesty, the bits had been set up on top of a unit since very soon after we had moved in, but I had never got the speakers out and set it up. Today I could see why I hadn't - because the speakers are too flipping big to fit anywhere in the room without someone tripping up over them.
That was about an hour and a half spent doing that, well spent time again hey. You'll find I do that a lot - waste time on things that I can't do anything about.
The laptop was on anyway because I had done the "Follow Friday" thing on Twitter (where you make suggestions for people to follow on there), so I decided to get to work on recording the second half of Momma Miss America. First I had to listen to the song and learn it. Since it was a "jam piece", I stayed close to the original, but again did my own take on it. It was a jam after all! In fact, I still have work on that to do...
I did try to get the recorder to work again, but couldn't. Had to get ready quickly because I had forgotten to get my food ready for work. So, within a very short fifteen minutes, I got everything ready, and left for work, stopping off on the way to see if Louise was okay where she had gone out to. I was in a rush, but surprisingly still made it to work for half past four. Now, I can't go any further than that because, I am actually sat at work now on that shift.
I hope that you all have a lovely weekend. Please take care and thank you for reading.
24 September 2011 (40 years, 9 months, and 29 days old).
Sunday, 18 September 2011
What makes today any different?
Today I'm thinking of something very different, but also something that I am making up as I go along. I hope that it is of interest to you.
I find it fascinating when I see these posts on Twitter, Facebook, and the like where they will either see "on this day in..." or "happy birthday today to ..." someone or other famous. It's probably of no interest to some people, but I actually find it interesting that King Tutankhamun's tomb was discovered on November 26 1922, and I was born on November 26 1970. Like I said, I am just interested in it, it's a sort of "ooh, that's interesting" sort of thing.
Today for instance is the birthday of cyclist Lance Armstrong, actor James Gandolfini (The Soprano's), actress Jada Pinkett Smith (although I can't remember what I've seen her in, was she in a Matrix film?). Jimmie Rodgers, Frankie Avalon (real name Frances Avellone), and Deedee Ramone (real name Douglas Colvin) were both born on this day as well. Then there are also Greta Garbo (actress) and Samuel Johnson (author, essayist, etc) who were born on this day as well.
Samuel Johnson has so many quotes, such as "Of all noises, I think music is the least disagreeable", "Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful", and "Do not accustom yourself to use big words for little matters." (For more of his quotes check here).
Other events on this day include;
The list is absolutely endless. Unfortunately, rock icon Jimi Hendrix died on this day in 1970. Like I said, I don't know if it's of that much interest to people, but I find it interesting that these things happened on a specific day. I haven't given a full list of everything because, to be honest, if I have made you curious in any way, then you can always take a look yourself. There are some awful things that have happened on this day as well, such as Hitler attempting to order the deportation of Danish Jews in 1943, although he was unsuccessful in this request.
The classic song More Than A Feeling by Boston was released on this day in 1976 (yes, 35 years ago today). All of the members of KISS released solo albums on this day in 1978. In fact, this date is very important with reference to KISS, because on this day in 1983 they appeared for the first time as a band without the obligatory make-up. These facts were from this site.
Today for instance is the birthday of cyclist Lance Armstrong, actor James Gandolfini (The Soprano's), actress Jada Pinkett Smith (although I can't remember what I've seen her in, was she in a Matrix film?). Jimmie Rodgers, Frankie Avalon (real name Frances Avellone), and Deedee Ramone (real name Douglas Colvin) were both born on this day as well. Then there are also Greta Garbo (actress) and Samuel Johnson (author, essayist, etc) who were born on this day as well.
Samuel Johnson has so many quotes, such as "Of all noises, I think music is the least disagreeable", "Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful", and "Do not accustom yourself to use big words for little matters." (For more of his quotes check here).
Other events on this day include;
| 1947 | USAF (U.S. Air Force) forms |
| 1955 | Willie Mays hits record tying 9th home run at Ebbets Field (ties Joe Adcock) |
| 1962 | Rwanda, Burundi, Jamaica and Trinidad admitted (105th-108th) to UN |
| 1973 | West Germany and East Germany admitted to UN |
| 1977 | U.S. Voyager I takes 1st space photograph of Earth and Moon together |
| 1980 | Soyuz 38 carries 2 cosmonauts (1 Cuban) to Salyut 6 space station |
| 1997 | Seve Ballesteros and Nick Faldo elected to World Golf Hall of Fame (one for my friend Chris there) |
Showing my, erm, more obvious leanings towards science fiction, the Star Trek series Enterprise had the first episode of Season Two aired in the US on this day in 2002. I wanted to find films and television stuff about today, but couldn't.
The classic song More Than A Feeling by Boston was released on this day in 1976 (yes, 35 years ago today). All of the members of KISS released solo albums on this day in 1978. In fact, this date is very important with reference to KISS, because on this day in 1983 they appeared for the first time as a band without the obligatory make-up. These facts were from this site.
Beatles history though... Both the singles She Loves You and Help were spending their third week at number one in the UK (1963 and 1965 respectively).
Feel free to leave any more events that you find interesting about today's date.
Anyway, thank you for the time reading this. Please take care and I hope that you are having a lovely weekend.
18 September 2011 (40 years, 9 months, and 23 days old).
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