What's Going On?

Hello, how are you doing?  I hope that you are well.  I know, I've used a Marvin Gaye title, and I'm not sure but I think I used it before for a blog?  My memory is famous for not being all there.

At present I am about 2 or so hours away from the end of a shift, after which I can look forward to a day off - yippee!  I am so looking forward to that.  I can use that time to try and catch up with the sleep I have missed, as well as all of the other things.

So, what have I been up to then?

Welcome to Wetlands Animal Park

Well, surprisingly I had Monday off this past week as well.  After I woke up at about midday I basically got ready for going out.  I got in from work at about seven that morning, so don't judge me all right.  Then we went to the car and used the gadget known as "crapnav" to lead us to the Wetlands Animal Park that is between Lound and Sutton near Retford.  The "crapnav" basically took us up the A1 far past where I think we should have got off, and then it had the gall to make the following suggestion - "at fifty yards perform a u-turn back onto the A1."  Yeah right, like I am going to do that!  Stupid machine.  There was an exit about another 50 yards further on, which I took and then carried on where the machine told me to go, as I didn't have much choice really considering that I didn't know where I was anyway.

Prairie Dog picture taken on Blackberry

Once we got there we had a great time, and it was such a lovely place.  I posted a photograph that I took while I was there onto both Twitter and Facebook using my Blackberry (that Louise nicknames the Raspberry, because it constantly irritates her when it beeps) of a Prairie Dog.  Later on I placed numerous photographs taken by myself and Louise there onto Facebook.

We took absolutely loads of photographs while we were there, and my sweetheart is on about paying to get a whole load of them developed into actual physical photographs and placing them into a special item.  I know, I felt like mentioning to her that it is the 21st century now, and that people just don't those things any more.  It's just so passée.  Oh well, if that's what she wants to do, then who am I to argue, especially with all the things that I have cluttering up the place (four guitar related instruments, two mandolins, ukulele, keyboards, percussion, about two dozen harmonicas, tin whistles, blah, blah, blah).

I have been at work every single night from the Tuesday, which explains why I am looking forward to my day off.  I am also tempted to ask at work if they can sort out me having the first Tuesday in September off in order to go to the First Tuesday Songwriting Group again, because of how much fun it was last time.  The more I go, then eventually I won't have to rely on "crapnav" for that journey!

Ukulele

Speaking of the ukulele, I have been taking it onto a specific site with me at work and playing it.  Most of the times I have ended up writing something, or learning something.  Titles that I have written using it are My Sweet Louise and Dream Time.  Other than that I have learnt to play tunes on it such as Another Day by Paul McCartney, Medicine Jar by Wings (not one written by McCartney, but by guitarist Jimmy McCulloch), Maneater by Nelly Furtado, Children of the Revolution by T Rex, Rock Around The Clock by Billy Haley & His Comets, No More by Elvis Presley (from Blue Hawaii), and a few others.  Let's just say that I have it bad for the ukulele now!

I got sidetracked there, and apologise.  Before I went back to work on the Tuesday night shift, I met up with my friend Paul, who I had not seen in far too long.  He and I were in a band named Shadowplay many moons ago now, and we were catching up.  The band split up, but all of us stayed friends.  Paul was the one who really started me off on the musician route.  I've spoken about Shadowplay and that before, but needless to say that we went through an awful lot.  He helped me through some very difficult times.  When it was the trio of me, Paul, and Andy, we were solid in every way.  Paul always was an incredible musician, who I still admire so much.  For him to say the other day that he was impressed meant so much to me.  Andy was the one who forced us to better ourselves.  He made us learn more and more, pushed us to become tighter.  We met up outside of rehearsals and gigs, where we would discuss set lists for gigs, with each one of those gigs having slight differences in their sets.  Then when rehearsals we rehearsed like crazy.  We would be there for anything up to six hours constantly ploughing through the set list song after song after song, honing every aspect of it.  We were an amazing live band even if I say so myself.  We knew what we were doing.  We never made any mistakes on stage that I can remember.

Between them they take a relative beginner and made me into what I am now in a musical way, and from a friendship point of view they helped me through those times I mentioned and took me through it all.  Friends forever.  Needless to say, me and Paul had a great time.  He came to Newark to see me, and we never stopped talking about everything.  What we were both up to, our memories of the band times, and so much more.

Paul, Andy, and me Bowl In Hand 1997

Anyway, since then I have been at work every night.  I did a rough demo of the song I took to the last Songwriting Group, which Louise came up with the title to - Sometimes.  Simple title, although there are so many more songs with exactly the same name (I can think of Max Q and Erasure off the top of my head).  I did my usual record it using the laptop's built in microphone thing, because every time I try to update my vista based machine to 7, it just goes crazy and I have to put Vista back on again, so I can't use my expensive pod hardware/software package that would mean me being able to record a hell of a lot better quality recordings at home.  In fact, it would probably cut down on some recording at the studio.  I say some, because there are still some things that I love about recording in a studio, such as drums, keyboards, percussion, piano, and some other things.  Other than that, I love the rapport with engineers and people who will come up with things that you never would have thought of yourself.

Anyway, I did a rough home demo of Sometimes, which actually consisted of four acoustic guitar tracks, a thrown away ukulele track, a mandolin track, acoustic bass, triangle, lead vocal, and two backing vocals.

So, I think I will actually finish this post now, because I have taken an hour to write it and now only have an hour left, during which time I have things to do.  I have been doing my job at the same time as well of course.

That means that I will now wish you a good day/evening/night/morning, whatever depending on your place in the cosmos.

Inspiration and real life Superhero
Neil Armstrong, rest in peace.

Speaking of the cosmos, I found out on Saturday that the great and more than inspirational Neil Armstrong had died.  He was more than an inspiration, he was so much more.  When I was a child, there were still spaceships going out into space exploring.  Most of us who were kids back then looked on in awe, wanting to be astronauts so that we too could make "one small step for a man (or woman), but one giant leap for mankind".  He, Buzz Aldrin, and the others involved in that mission are true super heroes.  Their actions brought about feelings that unfortunately are now distant memories.  There is no more exploration because the world cannot afford it, but I hope that one day it will carry on.  People may still wonder why it is necessary, but even as a child born in the seventies, they inspired me and others of my generation.  We may not have gone anywhere far in our lives, but they gave us hope.

Please take care, and thank you for reading.

27 August 2012 (41 years, 9 months, and 1 day old).