I am 43 today. Bit of an indeterminate age, isn't it? Neither micklin' nor mucklin' I'd say. Still, at least I STILL GOT ME ELF *cough*.
Thursday, July 31, 2008
43
I am 43 today. Bit of an indeterminate age, isn't it? Neither micklin' nor mucklin' I'd say. Still, at least I STILL GOT ME ELF *cough*.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
A Cynic Is A Disappointed Romantic
Steely Dan - 'Babylon Sisters' (1980)
Friday, July 25, 2008
Posting Percy
Yes, my six week search is at an end, and did this track get emailed from Arkansas, downloaded from DivShare or lifted from Lime Wire? Friends, it did not. Ally bought it in a record shop and posted it to me to rip.
Does Feargal Sharkey approve of this sort of thing? Will Mortlake Sorting Office soon be writing me a stern letter to warn me about 'single sharing'?
This is a Dusty Seven; expect crackles and heartache.
Thank you Mistress Ally and bona, bona lavs x
Percy Sledge - 'Any Day Now (My Wild Beautiful Bird)' (1969)
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Running On Empty
Coming back from that wedding a while ago on the straight, flat, through-little-villages A38 North East of Bristol in the wake of the Great British Fuel Blockade, my fuel gauge pinged to tell me I was running low on petrol, and dammit but every garage I passed for the next ten miles or so was closed.
After twenty, the gauge hit zero - "DH there is no petrol left, stop now" - and I was nowhere in site of a town or a filling station or a layby or a duck and, no choice, no option, I just kept on driving, convinced any moment it'd just run dry, judder to a halt, stop Unsafely, strand me here in Chipping Cum Bloody Bog Nowhere Gloucestershire, 3 hours from Home and Bed and Loved Ones and Everything and DAMN, DAMN!! BLOODY DAMN!!! but, no choice, no option, TWENTY FIVE I just kept on driving, kept on driving and........that's what this past fortnight's been like.
No liquid left. I've been running on the vapours in the tank. I've been hearing my own voice talking and I'm listening to it from two metres away across the room and it sounds like someone else's voice (have you ever had that?) and it's been, you know, hard work.
Breathing in those vapours...
But, hallelujah, now I've STOPPED.
Not in a grass ditch or on a dangerous corner, as far as I can tell, but at a point at last (and that is what happened against all odds in Chafing Slightly, Gloucs) where I may perchance Refuel, at a price. And that is good. And now I really need to swap this View for Another, for a week at least, and on a budget, and all things shall be fine. Most likely.
But where on earth shall I go? Eh?
Not camping, noooooohhhhhh!!!!
Trembling Blue Stars - 'Outside Looking Elsewhere' (2007)
Alright Colin ?
Actual fuel gauge not pictured. Mine's a nice digital one. Counts down mile by mile. Stressing you up nicely.
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Let The Music Have Its Way
This feels like the first weekend in ages we haven't had Things To Do. This is a good thing; for surely a person every now and then needs space - to quaff of the vino, chop the tomatoes, sniff the fresh basil* and cuddle the persons close to him while the groovy music plays...
Friday, July 18, 2008
The Best Part Of Breaking Up
The most famous record by The Biggest Australian Beat Group Of The 60s! True! And no, I didn't know that either until I Wiki'd them just now. But I love this record. It's on that 60s summer pop compilation CD I mentioned in comments. It has to be one of the best Friday songs ever doesn't it?
Gonna have fun in the city
Be with my girl she's so pretty...
Our two break up for the school summer holidays today - hugs for the teachers that are leaving, emotional moments in the playground, carrier bags full of a year's paintings, poems and plastic milk bottle elephants all coming home; six weeks of holiday ahead of them. Six weeks. *gulp*
I always wanted an American Graffiti/Big Wednesday type summer of hot rods and colas and days at the beach and I wish they all could be California girls but it never quite worked out like that.
It was more Why Don't You Turn Off Your Television Set And Do Something Less Boring Instead.
When's the Whizzer And Chips Summer Special out?
The Easybeats - 'Friday On My Mind' (1966)
Monday, July 14, 2008
Bless The Weather
Saturday, July 12, 2008
Meanwhile...Saturday Night Filler
Obviously I also dance like this. Especially at weddings. And just as they do for John, people clear the floor for me. What can I say? It's a gift.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Friday Reggae # 6
Well, it's been a while.
I might bring back the prawn curry with coconut milk tonight too.
Hey. I know how to live.
The Melodians - 'Sweet Sensation' (1970)
Builders, Bugs and Ballyhoo
So I seem to have done a Vicar-style 'blogger disappears without notice or trace' thing this week, and I'm sorry - it's been Buggeration Factor central round here since Tuesday when I picked up a nasty, intrusive and bastard-hard to remove adware 'trojan' that hijacked my browser and pumped endless online casino ad sites and pop-ups my way whenever I tried to go about my innocent, everyday internetty business. I tried loads of that free spyclean software in attempts to remove it but a) none of it worked and b) some of it helpfully contained spyware of its own. Oh, deep joy.
In the end I had to buy this which, fingers crossed, seems to have done the trick.
All of this frantic and time-swallowingly stressful malarkey was happily also accompanied by the hammer, bang, saw, drill, thud and occasional deeply off-tune whistle of a bunch of builders who appear to be actually demolishing the house next door and our very own counterpoint in Terry the nice Irishman who had a good noisy go at sorting our bathroom floor midweek.
And it rained most of the week. And I drank too much wine on Wednesday night (can you blame me?). And somewhere in the midst of all this I also had to earn a few honest quid.
Bloody Nora, get life back to normal.
Anyway - how are you?
Echo & The Bunnymen - 'Bedbugs And Ballyhoo' (1987)
Monday, July 07, 2008
Friday, July 04, 2008
Finally busted, Madam Marie
Thursday, July 03, 2008
It Should Be On Eight Track Cartridge
In the easy listening bureau de change one Glen Campbell is worth at least ten Bobby Goldsboros.
The kind of record that would make my Auntie Haulwen in South Wales come over all unnecessary, and understandably so.
He was once in the Beach Boys you know.
Words and music by the great Jimmy Webb.
Glen Campbell - 'Honey Come Back' (1970)
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
Love At Second Sight
I'm not sure many people remember The Bible, which is a shame; frontperson Boo Herwerdine's songs were heartfelt, literate, inventive, melodious - and they looked like they might make it big for a while. They were big in our final year student flat (Wood Street, Walthamstow, just down from the Whipp's Cross roundabout, scarily distant from...bloody everywhere worth being).