Out with the old and in with the new Part Five

Happy day after New Year (the second of January 2014).  I hope that you're all okay.  Actually, in some places it's actually two days after New Year's Day, so happy third of January to you (Australia, New Zealand, Japan, blah, blah, blah - it's a bit of fun not The Guardian).

The review is still going?!?

I think this might be the last part of this review, but you never know!  I write most of my blog posts as a stream of conscious thing anyway, so I never known how it will turn out until it's all finished and posted up for all to see!

I'll tell you what... I got my rota for next week and I am sort of happy that it's a relatively relaxed working week next week.  Just 48 hours to do next week.  I need to get some practice in ready for FAWM starting in four weeks time anyway.  I won't carry on with that as it's a review, but it's nice after the tiredness of both working over Christmas and trying to fit time in with everyone so as not to become Ebenezer Scrooge!

I tried to do a video to go there of me saying "bah humbug", but it didn't work.  I didn't want to have to upload it to youtube and then have it linked.  Great - joke wasted :-(

Mercury - to do with the Minamata
Treaty on, erm, mercury use. Groovy!

The Minamata Treaty was signed in October, which controls the use of Mercury and that sort of thing - I put that because it sounds highbrow and all that!  Someone is bound to know what it's all about.  It's funny really because the link actually has it as Minamata Conference on Mercury, which sounds like a steadily paced science fiction legal drama.  Perhaps that is more interesting than what is was actually about hey? ;-)

In the same month Saudi Arabia turned down a seat on the United Nations Security Council (mardy beggars), only for the seat to be taken eventually by Jordan.  I don't what she would want with....  Oh, the country Jordan, not that supposed model otherwise known as Katie Price who has zero talent whatsoever...  Okay.

That's a joke that only those in the know would get.  It's also not that funny really, except to me I suppose. :-(

In November the world was shaken by the typhoon known as Yolanda.  More than 6,000 people were killed as a consequence in the Philippines and Vietnam.  It was the strongest tropical cyclone ever recorded in history.  Let's take a moment to think of them and pray if you are of the religious persuasion...

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The Yutu Rover on the moon

There are more world events that happened such as the Chinese becoming the first since 1976 to "soft land" on the moon, where they had the Yutu Rover conducting surveys.

However, everything pales in comparison to the big natural disasters of 2013 in the Philippines, Vietnam, and earlier in India, not to mention the factory that just gave way killing and injuring workers who were working there at the time, and that was in India as well.

One of many babies born in 2013.
I know it's Prince George okay.

July the 22nd did see the birth of Prince George here in the UK though, the son of Prince William and Princess Catherine (they made her even change the spelling of her name - royalty hey, can't have the more common Katherine or whatever it was).

Oh I just chanced across a list of who received honours from our Queen in 2013 and hadn't realised that the wonderful Kate Bush received a CBE (Command of the British Empire - they don't really command anything except for a medal and a small amount of money per year I think).  Some say that she is eccentric, but I would rather think that she wants to be normal but has no choice to work with music - a natural ability.

Dance choreographer Arlene Phillips was made an OBE (Order of the British Empire - again, a title).  I believe that she was the choreographer for the dance troupes on Top Of The Pops during the seventies and eighties such as Legs & Co and Hot Gossip, is that right?  Whatever, their dances didn't make sense all of the time did they?

It's amazing when you look at the full list (as opposed to the media bullet point celebrity list) how many people there are who get them, and how many really genuine wonderful souls there are out there who deserve to be respected with these things!

The list was brought out on December the 28th 2012 though, so does that really count?  Yeah, why not!?!

Poster for a new film
based around the
character Jack Ryan,
created by writer
Tom Clancy (RIP)

Writer Tom Clancy died in October.  He was responsible for creating the character Jack Ryan, as seen in silver screen form in the films The Hunt For Red October (worst Russian accents in history), Patriot Games, and Clear & Present Danger, among others (another is coming out soon with the modern Captain Kirk himself playing Jack Ryan, the actor Chris Pine).  Mr Clancy also was the brains behind a lot of computer games that have his name above the titles.

Japanese composer Akira Miyoshi died in October as well.  I actually didn't even know who he was until I was listening to Classic FM (what??? I love a lot of classical music okay.  Is it a crime?), and they played some music by him that I really enjoyed.  The played more since then and I think to the western world he is a lost great (unless it's just me that hadn't heard of him until I think it was around March of last year).

Stuntman/Director Hal Needham on
the set of Smokey & The Bandit with
Burt Reynolds & Jerry Reed

Singer Noel Harrison also died in October, and he was responsible for the sublime Windmills of Your Mind song.  We also lost the film director and stuntman Hal Needham in October and of the films he directed, the first two Smokey & The Bandit films and The Cannonball Run films really jump out at me as they were films that I absolutely loved as a kid, and still do because of the fact that they take me right back to being a kid laughing at that silly "put on" laugh of Burt Reynolds (who nowadays looks like a Madame Tussauds waxwork - I won't say gone wrong, because when I went I wasn't sure what they were all supposed to be anyway).

Actors Martin Shaw and Lewis
Collins (RIP) in a typical "shot"
from The Professionals

Add to that we lost the one of a kind musician/songwriter Lou Reed in October as well.  Walk On The Wild Side to me is still such a cool grooving song with very risque subject matter (although The Kinks song Lola was similar in subject but predated WOTWS by a good few years).

In November we lost the British actor Lewis Collins, most famous for his portrayal of the character Bodie in the top action thriller series The Professionals.  I also remember him from the film Who Dares Wins, where he played an undercover SAS soldier, which is a film that I still love, though I am not sure how I would feel about watching it again now that he has died.  I have that sort of thing - I was saying to Louise that it is like watching Patrick Swayze in Point Break (underrated film).

Actor Paul Walker (RIP) in
the film Flags of our Fathers -
a favourite film of mine

The actor Paul Walker, famous for the Fast & The Furious franchise as well as being in the films Flags of our Fathers (a fantastic film, but not as good as it's companion film Letters From Iwo Jima) and Varsity Blues, also died in November.  The in-production seventh film in the F&F franchise is being worked on at the moment, and they were meant to be filming new additional footage and refilming bits.

Nelson Mandela (RIP)

On the fifth of December the world bid farewell to the great activist and eventual President of South Africa, Nelson Mandela.  For many many years he was imprisoned for being an activist for freedom and human rights in South Africa and...  Well, he was just so much to so many people.  What wikipedia says about him doesn't even do him justice - "South African anti-apartheid revolutionary, politician and philanthropist"...  He was a man who cared for all and gave his all for what he believed in.  A lot could be said about this man, and I cannot even start in this "review" of a year.

On the 14th of December we lost the British actor Peter O'Toole, most famous I suppose from the films Lawrence of Arabia and The Lion in Winter.  I haven't seen either of those films!  Shock horror I know.  I have seen him in Supergirl (hmm), King Ralph (don't remember much of it) and Ratatouille (I love Disney Pixar films - didn't see him in it though as it was animated and he was a voice).

Lastly, but not least, we lost the American actor James Avery, most famous to me as Uncle Phil in the Fresh Prince of Bel Air television series, which brought the acting abilities of Will Smith to everyone's attention internationally.  I still love that show, and Mr Avery had a great ability to mix comedy with seriousness in that role.  I saw him in Star Trek: Enterprise as well and other things, but it's as Uncle Phil that I remember him the most. I was sad to hear about it.

A fairly recent photograph of a charity event that the "family"
from the Fresh Prince of Bel Air tv show reunited for, that
features the late actor James Avery (far left)

There were of course other events during the year, there were other films released, other artists released music, and other people were born and died.  I can't really give a list of everything that happened in the year, but I can write about the year from my perspective.

As I look to what is now 2014 though, I see the potential at least in my own life of things moving forward.  I try to remain positive and full of humour, even if the world around me throws arrows and builds walls for me to climb over.  It is just the way that life seems to be.  I endeavour with my sweetheart Louise to get through the barriers and come out at the other end excited by what is ahead.  It is that fight to get there which instills such feelings of joy and excitement.  Sometimes if things were easy then we wouldn't get quite so much from them.

During 2014 I look forward to taking part in the songwriting challenges known as FAWM and 5090 again, because I had fun taking part in them for the first time during 2013.  I made some great new friends taking part in them, and I worked with some fantastically talented people.  All of these things forced me in no small way to look at how I had become lazy in my approach to songwriting.  I know I am no Mike Batt, Tim Rice, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Lennon or McCartney, Paul Simon, or any of those guys, but I am a better songwriter now than I was at the beginning of 2013.  I believe that.  Even if I'm not, I have some more great friends now.

Here's to a fantastic 2014 then.  I hope that you all have some great moments ahead for you this year.  Let's try and smile than we did last year hey.

Thank you for reading, please take care.

January 2nd 2014 (43 years, 1 month, and 8 days old).

Finished at last!  I'm satisfied with that!