Call yourself an Elbow fan?

One of the albums of the year, right? [right, Prycer?]

You've bought the cd, it's crossed over into that meal time listening/pile of cd's by the kitchen stereo, where do you go from there? 

Well, you go and see them play what you feel to be one of the gigs of the year. That's what you do..

Then what? From the merch stall you might buy an arty book/tour souvenir? One step ahead of you, chum..

But... Prycer has taken it onto a new Elbow appreciating level....

Boom! How d'ya like them hops?

Oh yeah, you like that don't you

Boomchickawaawaa..

The full reveal...

Many thanks to Prycer. A generous gent.

Going through a Ben Folds phase..

Ben Folds - Brick (Radio Mix)

Latte and a magazine in the Map Centre Cafe...

Flat White and a NZD 20 note. A brief bit of kiwiana at Costa this morning..

Salad, yeah? Stalky stalky bits.

If you ever need cheering up, watch this...




You're welcome.

R.E.M. Galveston

I've been looking for this for ages. I saw this once (and once only) when the tv programme first came out. I had never heard this tune before but just hearing this 30 seconds of it made me seek out the original on vinyl...

[File under 'rampant unchecked nostalgia']

What is a blog?

What is a blog? I am not really sure. Different things to different people. For me, it is something that I don't really think about as something for other people to see. It's primarily a collection of things that interest me, odd things and things that i want to remember. Like a diary i suppose. I was thinking about this the other day. When we moved to NZ I used to keep a journal/diary thing. It wasn't so much written down stuff as it was a blank book that I stuck ticket stubs and photos in to remind me of the things we did.

Clearing out some stuff from home (see earlier blog about football programmes) turned up a few similar items to the things I used to put in the NZ journal. Why have I kept this stuff so long? There's no value to it.    It's not even things that I dwell on for that long when I actually come across them again.

If this blog is just a way of me recording things primarily for my own benefit then wouldn't it make sense to blog these artefacts, and kick them up into the 'cloud'? That way I could chuck out what are actually meaningless bits of paper, but could still retain that brief blast of nostalgia when I come across the photos of the items on old posts from the blog.

And when I get older (if I am still putting random photos on a blog) I can look back on a few decades of random thoughts and random photos of random pictures of random bits of paper. And, providing that Google doesn't go bust and junk all the info from their particular bit of the cloud then these digitised memories will carry on somewhere...forever? 

So for purely selfish nostalgia and for zero interest to anyone else...

Here is, with no particular meaning or relevance...

The contract for my first job, for the local supermarket. £2.20 an hour? Sharks.

Some ticket stubs from when we started to go to the cinema at Basingstoke on a regular basis. 1994. A golden age of cinema. Ace Ventura, Cool Runnings, The Mask. I saw them all. Yes, these can definitely go in the bin now. 17yrs i've had these. [why?] Still, nice depth of field shenanigans going on here..

More to follow..

Well and truly in the Apple cult..

"If I hadn't seen such riches i could live with being poor". Who said that then? James, I think.

Alternatively..

'If I hadn't ever used a macbook i could live with windows vista'. There. I said it. I am a fully paid up Apple cult member. Ah well. 

I received a one off bespoke furniture commission on Saturday. "Do you think you could put up a shelf to fit that gap today?" "What, today, as in 'finish it today'?" "Yup" "What, the day before C's party when we'll be in a stress about getting things ready?" "Yes, it'll be easy!" "Errrm"

So I went away and researched the piece, sent some samples back to the customer and came up with a design. Or rather i measured the space and scribbled the details on a scrap of paper that i scrumpled up and stuffed in my back pocket and off to B&Q I duly went.  Bit of wood bought and cut. Support bits cut and tapered and drilled. Bit of varnishing done... 

Here is the varnished bit compared to an unvarnished bit..

And here is the main plank thing....

And I'd love to say 'bish bosh bash' it is now up on the wall and rocking some paperbacks and photo frames...but...it's not. [And I probably wouldn't say 'bish bosh bash' in any case.]

More updates soon on how it's going... (I know this isn't that interesting but Prycer asked me to put some pictures of the shelf up on the blog)

This is so good.. Agree?

Last minute football

Today, 14.30 and we decide to make a last minute decision to take in a bit of FA cup first round action. Hereford vs Yeovil. 16.50 and it ends 3-0 to Yeovil. Pretty poor display from Hereford. Anyway, here is what the Nokia made of it.. 

Recent purchases..

I picked these chaps up when I was home recently. There's a really good off-licence down there that specialises in world beers. I often look out for any NZ beers they might have in. The holy grail I haven't yet come across since we came back to the UK? Mac's special reserve. If you see some let me know...

Prycer lobs a vinyl cat in amongst THE RULES pidgeons..

Look what Prycer had up his sleeve on monday (they were big sleeves)...

The vinyl edition of Dan 'roi des regles' Michaelson's recent release. It came in one of those bags that they give you if you buy the Guardian at a music festival. A tote bag? Maybe that's it. Tote is also a type of socks and gloves you can get in petrol stations, no?

But wait, here comes the pay off..

Ltd edition of 50! Sacred blue. That trumps my ltd ed of 100. Good work Al.

A trip home..

Hometown Fireworks.

Hometown Glory. The Nokia comes up trumps again.

Look what came in the post (A 'The Rules' special)..

Remember The Rules? Remember who's The Rule daddy?

Here we go. This is going to be good..

Sweet mary. Ltd edition of 100! Number 61, oh yes. But look closer...

Ltd edition but its sellotaped up! Dilemma. To cut the tape is to depreciate the value. What to do?

Tape cut. Card sleeve. Top marks. Now the final hurdle. To unwrap cellophane or leave pristine?

Decision made. Here it all is. Cheers Dan. King of The Rules. Again.

Recent Reads

Here is another entry in the very irregular series. Four books and what I thought of them.


In the order of how I'd most highly rate them;


1. Bill Bryson - At Home.
Very interesting read. Easy going, thought provoking, well researched. Slightly smug, slightly repetitive but overall a book I'd recommend to others. Its basically him doing a walk round his house, stopping at all the different rooms and talking about how domestic living has evolved- i.e. why we come to have salt and pepper on the table, how cutlery evolved. Its interest works in that it makes you see the history in the things we see every day and take for granted. 8/10.


2. Chris Evans - Memoirs of a Fruitcake.
An insight into an interesting stage in his life. He had and lost loads of cash. Made loads of rash purchases, drank way too much and generally acted like a proper jack the lad. Wish fulfilment right? Quite a cautionary tale, and when you see how Gazza turned out you can see how the wheels could have well and truly come off. Again a very easy to read book and worth checking out. 7/10.


3. Louise Wener - Just for One Day.
Another memoir, this time from the singer in the band 'Sleeper'. I saw this band a few times back in the day. Interesting from this point of view but ultimately its not quite as enjoyable as Evans' book. Quite a cautionary tale for people wanting to be successful in the music industry, and written around the time that 'indie' was a commodity that the big record companies were taking over. 7/10


4. Howard Jacobson - The Finkler Question.
Good read. Interesting discussions about Judaism, and Israel, and relationships and bereavement. But...I think where this book falls down is in the publicity for it. The publishers have branded it with all sorts of quotes about how side splitting hilarious it all is. I didn't laugh once. I don't think I even smiled. Mismarketing, definitely. Nevertheless a good book. Quite London-y, all about different places in London, and people who work in the BBC etc. Its like how sometimes books and films can be a bit too 'New York'ish. This is too London ish. 6/10.