Ummagumma

Someone mentioned to me today that Abigail Witchall was 'lucky' because, although it looks like she'll be paralysed from the neck down for life, at least she still has her mind. A mind she can disappear into whenever the pressures of her new life become too much.

To a certain extent, I can see where my colleague is coming from, but I had to point out the massive learning curve that the poor bugger's going to have to go through before she reaches this 'Nirvana' where the mind really does overcome the prosaic realties of having your arse wiped for you, having yourself bathed by strangers and having to communicate via blinking and mouthing soundless words. No more running through the surf, playing games with your kids, making a sandwich, walking a dog, making love. No more clicking your fingers, picking your own nose, scratching.

At the end of the day, no matter how positive and God-loving you are, that's going to wear you down. Deep depression for a start. Worries about your longevity next. More worries about the tenacity of your husband and, even, eventually, your children. Before finally - in about 50 years - coming to terms with a seemingly random piece of barbarism.

Lucky? My arse! I really wouldn't want to have survived something like that happening to me - at that age. Twenty Six is no age to be condemned to complete and utter dependence on others. Certainly not with a young family either.

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Well. Fortunately my father hasn't got Parkinson's disease, his symptoms were a direct result of his own doctor dispensing inappropriate drugs. We all sat round his hospital bed one night and my mother had been reading the leaflet that came with said medication. DON'T GIVE THESE BUGGERS TO DIABETICS screamed the instructions. Side effects include shuffling about like someone suffering from PARKINSON'S DISEASE. Weakness, talkin' bollocks and early death will soon follow. So we showed it to interested nurses and he ended up on different medication, demanded that he be discharged from hospital and is generally giving us all a hard time, as belligerent, frustrated, still-not-a-hundred-percent 76, going on 77-year-olds are want to do.

He's still raging against the dying of the light though, so that can only be good. Unfortunately, he's raging against everything else as well. My Mam, anyone under the age of 90 years on the TV, Lulu on Radio 2 ("What the friggin' 'ell does SHE know about music? It's a disgrace"), and, naturally - and certainly not unfortunately, Michael Howard. Thus our days draw to an end. we've all got this to look forward to peeps.

Enjoy what you've got left and fill it to the brim.

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You know, most of what I have written on this blog since day one has been spur of the moment, get it off your chest, stream of invective type of stuff, designed merely for the salving of my soul. This is the place I can come and lash out, spit venom and vent my spleen. Incoherent sometimes, foul-mouthed on occasion, devoid of wit at others, maudlin even. But this is where I come to release some of the pressures of being 50 years old in an extremely unforgiving industry, with ageing parents, kids fleeing the nest, pensions under threat and the-end-of-the-world-as-we-know-it lurking 'round every corner.

And, most times, I remember, in the the heat of the moment, to save my bile as draft or in a text file somewhere due to Blogger's predilection for crashing and sentencing all of my precious time ranting to so much digital dust. But sometimes I don't. And that really pisses me off. Get your act together Blogger it's happening too often.

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Other news this week.

Tess, the shit machine nearly met her grandad in 'doggy heaven' as she ran out in front of a car speeding in a 30-mile area on Friday evening. The vet reckons that, if she had been a couple of inches shorter, and had the car been going slightly slower, she would've got stuck under the front and acquired wings and a halo within seconds.

Fortunately it was Dearest who was guilty of allowing the dog off the lead near a major road. Mind you she is distraught and chock full of guilt, but at least I can walk around smug as a smug thing on St Smug's Day. Hmmmmmm moral high round..............

Tess was discharged from the vets tonight (thank God). £70 for three consultations, a couple of injections and six painkillers.

£70. I must admit. It was well worth the money. She's starting to grow on me as we both begin to understand each other.

I'll never understand where all that shit comes from though.

Hang Down Your Head

Religion? Fuck it forever. THIS is a disgrace. I thought Mr Bush had put an end to this type of behaviour?

Stoned to death on the uncorroborated account of a twat who hadn't supported his wife for 5 years.

I'm incoherent with rage!

Who's Next?

How the hell have we managed these past few weeks without a Pope? Where has our spiritual guidance been coming from during this interegnum? Who will God rely on to get his message out without a Papal conduit? According to some rumours Birmingham City Football Club are bolloxed without a 'Representative on Earth' being around. Here's hoping the 'clave (cheers Andy) argue amongst themselves until after Wednesday's clash with the mighty Blues of Manchester.

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Well, my Dad's back in hospital tomorrow. Tests for Parkinson's Disease. It never rains but it pours. At least we'll have a better understanding of his needs and why he's like he is once he allows himself to be poked and probed again.

Fortunately he's at a different hospital. One that's a damn site (sight?) more accessible via public transport, cleaner and more modern. Here's hoping he isn't visited by a Tory candidate. It would make the national news - believe me.

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"You can't describe the feeling. When the smoke came out it looked white and I got chills," an Italian student Silvia Mariano, said. Get a life. Not an afterlife. Prick.

40,000 watching the chimney. 40,000? It sounds a lot. But it isn't. Manchester City consistantly attract 46,000 plus for premiership games every couple of weeks or so. Any other premiership team with a ground big enough would hope for crowds of the same size. I ask myself, 40,000 pilgrims hanging around to see who the next representative of their God on earth will be? Pretty poor turn out if you ask me. Especially for the founding church of the Christian religion on this blue planet of ours.

Rivetting TV though. Fuckin' chimney. Rivetting.

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Tonight's post brought to you via:-

It's Alright, Ma (I'm Only Bleeding): Dylan, Bob
Rosalie/Cowgirl's Song (Live): Thin Lizzy
Pinball Wizard: Elton John
Song With No Words: David Crosby & Graham Nash
Picture Book: The Kinks
The Look Of Love: Diana Krall
I Am a Rock: Simon and Garfunkel
Everyone's Gone To The Movies (Demo): Steely Dan
Harvest: Neil Young
Spanish Bombs: The Clash
Something New: John Mayall
Faena: Gipsy Kings
Road Ladies: Frank Zappa
France: Keb' Mo'
Woodhenge: Mike Oldfield
Olive Groove: Brom Man
Easy Rider: Chris Rea
Surprise, Surprise: Caravan
I Ain't Ever Satisfied: Steve Earle
So You Want To Be A Rock'N'Roll Star: The Byrds
Reggatta De Blanc: The Police
She Is So Beautiful: Mike Scott
Florentine Pogen: Frank Zappa
Atlantic City: Bruce Springsteen
Cry Me a River: Dinah Washington
Mrs. Robinson: Simon and Garfunkel
Billy the Kid Slide Guitar + Mandolin: SJG – The Stringmen
I Can't Let Maggie Go: The Honeybus
Porrohman: Big Country
Chance: Big Country
The Storm: Big Country
Harvest Home: Big Country
Fields of Fire: Big Country
Inwards: Big Country
In a Big Country: Big Country
Carry On-Questions: Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young
Chain Lightning: Steely Dan
Satin Doll: Charlie Byrd
Visions Of China: Japan
....and many more.........

My Back Pages

OK. Today started fine. Dearest, Eldest, Ed the Blue and myself retired to local number one (blue through and through) to watch Fulham and City scrap a 1-1 draw. Just as the full time whistle blew though, we got a phone call from my Mam; my Dad had fallen in the bathroom and couldn't get up. So off we shot in a Taxi and Dearest and I (bad foot an' all) manhandled him into his favourite chair.

Apparently he'd been trying to shower himself in order to go to the pub this evening. The poor bugger had to give up that idea. Hopefully next week eh Dad?

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After an hour or so we came home and cracked a bottle of wine while we had beef, roast spuds and yorkshire pud. Dearest then expressed a wish to watch a DVD of "Persuasion" - a BBC adaptation of the Ms Austin novel. Consequently I expressed a wish to leave her to it. She was asleep within 15 minutes.

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So finally, I have a look at my regular blogs abd discover that TimesNewRoman has challenged me to answer the following questions:-

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451, which book do you want to be?

I took this to mean which book would you memorise? If so then I'd have to say "The English Passengers" by Matthew Kneale. A darkly comic expose of the clash of Western and Aboriginal morality in 19th century Tasmania. A classic. If it means which book to burn then I'm with TNR - anything that claims to have come from the mouth of God.

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

Mrs Amelia Underwood in Moorcock's "Dancer's at the End of Time" trilogy. I was very impressionable at the time. Strangely, I shared a taxi from Sheffield to Manchester with Moorcock years later. I must write about that.

The last book you bought is:

"Chronicles Vol One" Bob Dylan.

The last book you read:

"A Year in the Merde" Stephen Clark

What are you currently reading?

"Chronicles Vol One" Bob Dylan. It's surprisingly good as well.

Five books you would take to a deserted island:

"The English Passengers" by Matthew Kneale. Because genocide isn't a purely 20th century phenomenon. "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee" by Dee Brown. Because genocide isn't a purely 20th century phenomenon.. "Revolution in the Head" by Ian McDonald. Because I could read this again and again and again and again. "The Complete Pratt" by David Nobbs. I'll need a good laugh. Finally "Old Glory by Jonathon Raban. A masterpiece of travel writing as the author sails a 16 foot aluminium skiff down the Big Muddy. Philosophy, reportage and a masterful ability to bring the landscape to life.

Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 persons) and why?

I will invite anyone who feels the need to dive in.

Cry Me a River

So, so long MG Rover. Nobody wanted to buy your cars but, somehow, as a company, it has been deemed by certain newspapers of the anti-Labour persuasion that you are more than worthy of a shitful of tax payer's money. The Express, Mail, Times, Telegraph and the rest are all castigating the government for allowing the loss of 5 or 6 thousand jobs to happen and demanding some form of State intervention. Now, WTF is that all about?

A private company deserving of State aid? Demanded by the very newspapers that espouse the virtues of raw capitalism: red in tooth and claw? How can this be justified? Ahh, simple; we need to save British English jobs.

Quite, quite commendable. Saving jobs, yes, of course. Such a noble goal, and one that the Government of the day should have made their number one priority. After all, the calamity can't be placed at the door of the blameless managment team who acquired millions of poundsworths of assets for less than a tenner a few years ago. Can it?

S'funny you know, but a few short weeks ago, I'm sure I read in these self-same bastions of the Right that not enough jobs were being sacrificied in the Public sector to finance the tax cuts promised by certain political parties in the run up to Election '05. 22,000 civil servants. All surplus to requirements apparently. Not enough. Sack more of the paper-pushing arseholes cried Fleet Street. No mention of peripheral businesses going to the wall. No mention of us (standard-rate) tax payers having to foot the bill for the inevitable benefits required by a damn site more than the 22,000 dismissed.

Way back in the 70s and 80s. The 'car workers' - as they were so imaginatively dubbed, were the 'enemy within'. The political Right detested the very soil they...err...soiled. Constantly berated them for relying on State handouts to bail them out of their latest catastrophe.

Never, as long as my arse points South, would I have thought that the Daily Express and its ilk would be supporting that industry, and screaming for Government intervention.

Clem Attlee, Hugh Gaitskill, Harold Wilson, Jim Callaghan and John Smith must be sat bolt upright in their graves, smacking their foreheads with the palms of their right hand and saying: "fuck me!" (Unless, of course, they were left-handed. Anybody know?)

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A hobble to local number two was on the cards tonight and most welcome it was too. There's only so much surfing, blog-reading, daytime TV watching a man can do without going out on a random shooting spree.

How many houses have I seen transformed over the past fortnight? How many gardens? People? How often have I lay there, foot elevated, TV on and suddenly snorted awake half an hour later? I despair.

I keep coming back to this phrase - Orwellian.

The war against Asiatica is going very well I believe.

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Incidentally and for the record. I am with Youngest on this. I DON'T want Malcolm Glazer to take over Manchester United. I'm absolutley convinced he will break up the current agreement to sell all Premier league games under one umbrella payment, thus ensuring that the likes of Crystal Palace still get a payout from Sky (or whoever in the future) everytime United, Arsenal or Chelsea are on TV.

Now that would create an insurmountable wall between the top three or four and the rest.

The next thing after that of course, would be franchise football. Surely?

You Can't Always Get What You Want

Ahh well - I'll still be voting Labour. Lib Dems = local politics for local people. Who knows? Maybe when and if Proportional Representation comes in? 'Till then however.........

Who should I vote for?

Your expected outcome:

Labour

Your actual outcome:

	Labour 8
Conservative -43
	Liberal Democrat 67
UK Independence Party 0
	Green 26

You should vote: Liberal Democrat

The LibDems take a strong stand against tax cuts and a strong one in favour of public services: they would make long-term residential care for the elderly free across the UK, and scrap university tuition fees. They are in favour of a ban on smoking in public places, but would relax laws on cannabis. They propose to change vehicle taxation to be based on usage rather than ownership.

Take the test at Who Should You Vote For

Walkin' Spanish

Sheer boredom made me drag myself and my enfeebled foot back to work yesterday. A mistake. This morning found me on the phone to my boss letting him know I wouldn't be in again. I had hoped that a little exercise would, perhaps, be just the job. Wrong. On top of that, I was next to useless at work anyway. Couldn't lift, drive or walk any significant distance. That only left paperwork - or what passes for it in today's modern, almost paperless office - and if wanted to be as bored as that I would've stayed at home for certain.

So, more phone calls to my doctor and I have finally got an appointment for Thursday morning at 8:40. No doubt I'll be as mobile as Michael Flatley by then.

And what a week I picked to be incapacitated with next to nothin' to do but read, cogitate or watch TV. The Pope pops his clogs, Tone calls an election and Prince Bloody Charles marries his mistress.

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The nonsense of all religion is, for me, encapsulated by the singing and chanting to a Big-Man-Who-Lives-In-The-Sky while swishing a fancy ball with smoke coming out of it over the Pontiff's coffin. If the perpertrators of this act had been living in some South American rainforest, cut off from 'civilisation' for centuries, we would have smiled and said "ahh poor, unsophisticated savages" as the Discovery channel, or somesuch, allowed us a 'unique insight on a tribe who still lived a pre-industrial life'. As it was we were witnessing a Western, European country in the 21st century.

Furthermore, if that wasn't medievil enough, in an age of mass, instantaneous communication, we will discover when the all-male conclave have elected a new Pope via the emmission of white smoke from a chimney somewhere in the Vatican. White smoke. Not a web site, TV broadcast or owt modern, but white smoke. I guess their God doesn't approve of digital, or, come to think of it, analogue, technology. He must've give up on his 'creation' not long after the invention of the printing press.

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Actually I wrote about the Pope's funeral the other night and thought I'd lost the post after Blogger went Tit's Up - as it frequently does. I've just re-discovered it and I'll post it at the end of this. It's quite weird how my scribbles can change so much - about the same subject - in a couple of days.

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The election is boring me shitless already. When the fuck did politics become as sanitised as this?

I'm not listening anymore. There's no passion. Why? Well, sadly I really do have to point the finger at the media - and Murdoch's gutter press/TV in particular. Sadly because I believe a free press is vital in a Democracy. Sadly , in a Democracy that is reaching the Bread and Circuses stage of its development, the free press has become an Orwellian palliative - pandering to endless, mindless obsession with good-looking, intellectually-airbrushed celebs. We'll be declaring war on some previously unknown continent next, and lying blatantly about 'our' success. It started in the 80s - the Devil's Decade, when Thatcher (*spits uncontrollably, curses vehemently and punches wall*) was madeover from a frumpy, strident-voiced asexual horror, into Judge Dredd (with added domination).

As this obsession with media image took root, every politician was churned through the same 'consultancies' and we ended up with the sterile, don't-say-the-wrong-thing-for-fuck's-sake-the-Media-will-pick-up-on-it, pile of shite that we are presented with today.

Does anybody out there remember George Brown drunkenly pontificating on the night of JFK's death? Powell's 'Rivers of Blood' speech? Churchill being profoundly pissed in the House of Commons? Heseltine swinging the Mace in rage? John Nott telling Robin Day he'd had enough and walking out of the BBC studios? Neil Kinnock talking of taxis delivering redundancy notices in a Labour council-controlled City?

Sad and devoid of interest. Fuck it. I'll vote Labour. I can't handle Tories. Deep within they're selfish twats who, in my experience, always analyse situations on a what's-in-it-for-me basis. The Lib-Dems I quite like. The Lib Dems round here though gave us a councilor who spent most of his four years in office living in Amsterdam, not turning up for surgeries and generally being the subject of much pissed off correspondence to the local Rags.

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Which brings me to Chuck and Camilla's nuptials. Well, what can I say? Just get on with it for fuck's sake. But don't - purlease DON'T - bore the fuckin' arse off me by ensuring it's rammed down my throat on ALL major TV channels.

Even Dearest wanted to watch it to see Mrs Parker-Bowles' dress! What is it with wedding dresses? Overpriced fairy frocks that are never worn again. Pointless.

Dearest's obsessive fairy-frockery combined with my incapacitation meant that I was subjected to this 'small' wedding for far longer than I would've wished. Before I left the lounge and hobbled up to my eyrie however, I witnessed a sight that will stay with me for the rest of my life.

A minibus approached the scene of the nuptials. The crowd cheered and whooped and waved and fluttered flags and fainted and orgasmed (possibly). That minibus was chock-full of fuckin' wastrels. Arseholes who haven't done a day's work in their lives. Ordinary folk (well apart from obvious tendencies to elevate pricks to stations far higher than they deserve) screaming and whooping and clapping and acting irrationally because a bus-full of dickheads with blue blood drove by. Shocking. And all to a soundtrack of gushing, psychophantic twaddle from the mouths of the BBC, ITV and all the other TV stations that we can now pass our days watching.

And, of course, the day after, Chazza and his Missus are attending Church; because without the Church telling everyone that they have a devine right to rule, they'd just look twattish and full of themselves wouldn't they?

Medievil.

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Here's the post about the Bob Hope from the other evening as promised:-

It's The End Of The World As We Know It (and I feel fine)

Am I missing something? Was there this much outpouring of the "world's" grief way back when? The "world's" press (BBC included) are falling over themselves to rewrite the right-wing pontificating cult-leader's past and make him out to be a rational voice in a planet driven by geo-political necessities. He was an intellectual inadequate. He BELIEVED he was the representative on Earth of a supernatural being who no one has ever met, seen or talked to. Just like a Witch Doctor. A supernatural being moreover who made the Earth and the Universe in one short week.

They were singing and chanting and incanting tonight in St Peter's Square - just like pre-industrial tribes paying tribute to a water god or some such. Fuckin' medievil if you ask me. But then again nobody will ask me tonight will they? Spoils the way it plays on Fox or Sky or even the BBC.

So long Karol, you have shuffled off your mortal coil just like all those AIDS sufferers YOU condemned to death with your nonsensical intransigence over condoms. Not to mention all those extra mouths to feed in parts of the world where food was at a premium. Frankly you did fuck all to help. A rain dance or two might have helped. Rain dances are as relevant to the modern world as "Holy communion" in my book.

For now, in an age of t'Internet and the rest, we will witness the election of a new Pope being broadcast to the world via white smoke from a chimney. Finger on the pulse or what? Set up a web page - or even a blog you jostlers, you career men - you wankers, you inadequate rain-dancers.

The media (BBC Radio 5 mainly for me) are talking this reactionary, ill-educated waste of space up like he was worthy of attention. He isn't, he wasn't. He believed he was God's representative on Earth. In any other walk of life we would have called it like we saw it. We would have called him a nutter. And quite correctly in my view. And now all his colleagues have started the shenagigans that go with attempting to elect a new Pope.

Good luck, in the meantime I'm off to bed.

Here We Go Round The Mulberry Bush

Well, there you go. As widely predicted, the Election will take place on May 5th. The Queen apparently 'graciously agreed' to dissolve parliament earlier this morning and Tone turned up outside his gaff to inform the assembled hacks.

Cue floodgates of spin, analysis, reportage, claim, counter-claim and shite between now and the end of the hustings.

In the meantime, as I sit here with my bad foot elevated and iced as advised by the nice lady from NHS-Direct, I can't get an appointment with any of my local GPs until Thursday 21st April. Not much changed there since 1997 then. What has changed though is that I can now attend a local NHS walk in centre open from 7:30am to 10:30pm. This place is staffed with doctors and nurses and is available for those illnesses/injuries that don't justify a trip to A and E. So, credit where it's due and a big thumbs up to Tone and the crew.

I'll let you know how I get on.

****UPDATE****

Well, that was painless - apart from the clinical forcing of my foot to places it hasn't been since last wednesday. Less than an hour to see an assessment nurse and then, if your condition dictates, a doctor. Pretty efficient I'd say. A little like doctor's surgeries used to be like before they introduced the pointless appointment system. Must've looked fuckin' great on paper that. You're either friggin' ill or you're not. Consequently you need to see a doctor. It never used to be too difficult. You turned up, waited and you were seen to. If you were dying and and the surgery was shut, the locum would come out and see to you. These days you can't get an appointment because of the number of inconsiderate twats who make 'em and then don't have the courtesy to cancel. Near enough 30% of appointments aren't kept at my local Health Centre.

I'd give 'em a 'three strikes and you're out' ultimatum. "Well you couldn't be arsed to pick up a phone, call in or even write to let us know you weren't going to turn up , so now we can't be arsed treating you, so die you bone idle waste of space."

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PC problems at the mo'. My home desktop is playing up, constantly freezing, won't talk to my iPod and is generally unreliable. A reload of the OS hasn't helped either. Looks like friggin' hardware again - memory maybe. I just hope it's not the motherboard. In the meantime I've got a borrowed IBM Thinkpad T41 with an ASUS PCMCIA wireless network card so I'm not completely cut off from the blogosphere. Just as well with my present inabilty to amuse myself otherwise. Well.....apart from the obvious......

Life on Mars Earth

So, after the excitement of meeting Doctor Who in my own space and time, Wednesday saw me booted and kagouled taking the shit-machine for a run round Dovestones Reservoir. Sandwiches, flask of coffee, spare sweatshirt and lashings of Kendal Mint cake (only joking), and off we went.

Less than half an hour's drive from my front door and we're there. I leave the dog in the car while I slip into clothing more fitting to the howling winds and constant drizzle. The dog spots 20 or 38 ducks waddling about not 10 feet from the car and goes as crazy as a fundamentalist as she attempts to fling herself through the reinforced glass in my Volkswagen Polo. Finally I am wind and rain proof and the dog is on the lead. Off we go.

The first thing she does of course, is crap in full view of everyone. A party of 10-year-old schoolchildren found the episode worthy of whistles claps and shouts. Highly amusing. Anyway 30 minutes later the pair of us are well up the valley and miles away from anyone in weather like this. Blowing a gale; that fine rain that soaks you through finding its way hither and thither. The good thing was the fact that I could let the dog off the lead for a good run. The last dog we had (Sally O'Malley the Red Setter) would just leg it the minute freedom was sniffed. Tess the Shit Machine is different. She gets worried if she can't see me. So much fun was had hiding.

After an hour and half or so of walking round the two main reservoirs, we found ourselves on a hillside. Boggy and slippy and just plain awkward underfoot. There was a small stream between us and the main path and I soon spotted some stepping stones. "That's the way for us" I thought, and off we shot.

Funny things stepping stones aren't they? These had obviously been there since time began. Rooted they were - rooted. So, confidently, I place my Hawkshead-booted foot on stepping stone number one. No problem. Stepping stone number two however was the wobbler; all my (substantial) weight on the fucker and the next thing I am face first in two feet of ice cold, peaty H2O. Refreshing.

I shot out like a bat out of hell. Soaked to the skin with a very stiff breeze shrinking my testicles to the size of Fenning's Little Healers. No matter - careful fondling would have them back to their previous glory in no time. What worried me more though was the fact that I had obviously damaged my left foot. More upsetting was the fact that the car was a good two miles away. Suffice to say it took fuckin' ages getting my knackered body - and the over-excited dog back to the car park. Nearly two hours of absolute agony.

Couldn't get a mobile signal either - I could've died. Face down with my dog frolicking in the water not five feet from my cadever.

Ah well, could be worse I suppose. I mean, look at the Pope. The poor bugger's off to meet his immediate boss soon. All three of 'em!

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So, back home after a couple of hours excrutiating walking, followed by a rush hour trawl through Oldham towards Manchester via every road work requiring temporary fuckin' traffic signals between here and Lower Slaughter. Left foot an' all. The clutch foot.

By the time I got home and packed it with ice, I was beginning to fear the worst. Eldest had a look and with the benefit of his footballing experience, he reckoned it was probably a severe sprain or tendon-ligament damage. Rest it and all would be fine.

Two days later and it's no better - indeed it's starting to swell like a swelling thing. Ice packs help - but the tell-tale puffiness soon returns.

On the plus side though, I've not had to take the dog out since. Result.

Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

Dearest and I are off this week so a trip to Manchester was on today's agenda. As is usual, the moment we arrived we split up. If there's one thing that familiarity has bred in us it's a healthy understanding that shopping together usually results in blood being spilled. (Mine more often than not).

I headed off to Waterstones to cash in my Xmas book tokens. 3 for 2 offers wherever you looked so I grabbed a copy of Dylan's Chronicles and a few others and sauntered outside to listen to a jazzy duo in the spring sunshine that dappled St Ann's Square.

After half an hour or so I ambled down St Ann's Street towards Deansgate and stopped to look at the sporting and cinema-related overpriced tat highly collectible memorabilia before the rendevous with Dearest. As I turned the corner of the shop to look at the window that butts onto the side street I almost bumped into a Time Lord. Doctor Who was there in front of me in all his Mancunian/Salfordian ordinariness throwing an empty sandwich wrapper into a rubbish skip. At least I think it was a rubbish skip and not some portal into a parallel universe. Come to think of it - was it really a sandwich wrapper? We may never know.

I stood staring at him - and him at me. I was thinking "I know this guy from somewhere". He was probably thinking "who's this fucking nutter and why's he staring at me as though he's about to say 'alright mate, how's it going, long time no see' or something". Then it hit me. It's Doctor fucking Who and here I am staring at him with a half smile playing about my lips. Luckily an old dear called him, although she didn't call him "Doctor" but "Chris". A bit over familiar when addressing a Time Lord I thought but then again he could have been lying low. He nodded at me as though acknowledging gratefully that I hadn't blown his cover and melted into the crowd arm in arm with his latest 'assistant'.

Must tell Youngest's Darlin' that I've met Christopher Ecclestone and his mam in the flesh. She'll be green with envy. She considers him to be serious eye-candy.

One Of Those Days In England

A pleasant change today as I took myself off to Boundary Park to watch Oldham Athletic take on the might of Hull City in a relegation/promotion dog fight. I've been starved of live football for the past few weeks due to a combination of City playing away and Internationals interfering with the domestic fixture list.

I love the atmosphere in these lower division clashes. The parochialness (is that a word?), the shabbiness of the grounds, the fervour of the supporters. Hull, for example, brought 3,000+ to the match today and they were in fine voice even when their team had fallen behind and they knew that their tenure at the top of the division was probably about to end. Oldham, by comparison are fighting for every point they can muster to keep themselves in their current division. You could sense the tension in the crowd, the baited breath, the explosions of fury at every disputed decision that went the way of the opposition.

I sat with Higher-Than-a-Ten John and his wife. The Easter Monday sky above was heavy and threatening and the flood lights were needed as kick off approached. British Summer Time my arse! In stark contrast to the City of Manchester stadium where my seat is on the back row of the third tier, my seat today was a mere 15 feet from the touchline. You can hear every curse, every crunching tackle, you can see the effort and determination etched in the faces of the players. The winces of pain. The sweat and the snot.

The spectators provided a running commentary peppered with the sort of witty dialogue that the likes of Bennett, Tinniswood and Nobbs would kill for. The players and officials can probably hear every word too which makes half the stuff even funnier.

Anyway, for Oldham a 1-0 win and another 3 points in the bag. For me? One of those days in England: full of nostalgia, full of inner happiness. Full.

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And then, after we had eaten we turn on the TV and there's a tsunami alert after another earthquake off the coast of Indonesia. It's pretty much in the same place as the last and there's panic in Indonesia - Aceh in particular.

It's a good job it's just a natural phenomenon though isn't it? I mean, I'd hate to believe it was somehow all the work of an omnipresent creator wouldn't you?

I expect the Happy Clappys are already practicising their "He moves in mysterious ways" speeches ready to churn them out ad infinitum as and when. It's probably got something to do with the fact that we are all self-indulgent twats with no time for the One True God. Well, either that or he's upset at the outcome of the Schiavo appeal. It seems odd that he seems to moving mysteriously just after the Christian religion's most important dates in the calender - Christmas and Easter. No doubt the Muslim Not-Happy-and-definitely-not-Clappys will be reading significance into that.

At least this time round the poor bugger's have had some warning. Warnings provided by the endeavours of the scientific community I might add - not a fucking Angel or 'owt like that.

As my old mate Couldn't-Give-a-Shit-Mick used to say:

"If - and it's a fuckin' big if - God exists, then he's a twat pure and simple."

Jesus might be wanting me for a Sunbeam

I'm back and I'm truly, deeply and indeed, madly dis-a-fucking-pointed. For the first time in my life I have witnessed a local church being extended FFS! Extended! Furthermore it's of the happy, clappy, born again, in-yer-face persuasion. This can only mean one thing: happy clappy types knocking on my front door - MY FRONT DOOR - to tell me how I too can become a smug bastard like they are. Happy in the deranged certainty that they are most definately going to Heaven after they are through with this veil of tears. Well, if any of you are reading this - YOU CAN FUCK RIGHT OFF. I've got a dog now and I won't hesitate to set it on you, you pious, patronising set of outright twats. Mind you, the dog'll probably lick 'em to death. Then again she might've just finished licking her arse - *grin*

The 21st century - the 21st friggin' century - and churches are expanding. whatever happened to the Enlightenment? Churches on one hand and mosques on the other. I can't get away from the medievil tossers...therefore I'm off out for a pint and the football.

That'll upset the fuckers.

All We Are Saying.........

....is give Pearce a chance. But first......*clears throat*...Happy Blogday to me, happy Blogday to me, happy Blogday OccupiedCountry, happy Blogday to me. Yes it's been two years to the very day that I decided to join the blogosphere. And what a two years it's been. Some good, some bad, mostly just middling. On the whole though, it's been fun. At the moment however I've hit a fallow patch so I think I'll just hang loose for a while.

See you soon.

Hellhound on my Trail

Good grief. I've just received this month's pulsating copy of The Word and who's in it but the bloody PM. Everywhere I go at the moment the bugger's following me about with a 'vote for me' glint in his beady little eye.

He's talking to Mark Ellen erstwhile member of Ugly Rumours and musical colleague of the aforementioned politician. And what's he talking about? The music he grew up with, the bands he used to go and see and his aspirations of being a rock star. He was lead singer in the group and - from what I've read - very much the product of the musical era he grew up in. Mark Ellen explains:-

"I think it only fair that WORD readers should get a precise mental image of their Prime Minister onstage in a rock band. And here it is - in possibly too much detail. The opening number was always 'Honky Tonk Women' - Jim on the cowbell, then the guitar, then the bassline, then we gave you the nod and in you came from the wings - dressed in and this may be stressful - a hoop-necked - T-shirt, massive flares and long hair with a fringe at the front. One hand on the hip, Jagger-style, and a wagging finger. I may be exaggerating - but only slightly - when I recall that your opening words on one occasion were "Well awright Corpus Christi Alternative College Ball, we are the Ugly Rumours!"

The first concert he ever saw was Ten Years After, he listened to King Crimson, The Doobie Brothers, The Incredible String Band, Tyrannosaurus Rex and went to see Atomic Rooster, The Who, Free and Wishbone Ash.

That's my Prime Minister proving to me just how OLD I am. My Prime Minister listening to all that stuff I - and many others of my ilk - listened to. Can't imagine the Harolds MacMillan or Wilson ever having their heads turned by anything but the prospect of high office. Although Wilson successfully pinned himself to the coat-tails of Beatlemania, I bet he hated everything they did - apart from, maybe, "When I'm Sixty Four".

And Tony still hankers. He sent Bono a photograph of him (Bono) addressing the Labour Party Conference with himself (Tony) in the background. And a note: "it should have been the other way round".

I bet Neil Kinnock's rigid with envy, Prime Minister AND able to use the phrase "Well Awlriiiiight" in its proper context.

Ahhhh. Jeeeez. Shucks. I might vote for him after all.

I've Got To Get A Message To You

Right, I've finally said "so long" to Haloscan as my comments provider as they tend to dump all comments after a few months. They probably want untold amounts of moolah, greenbacks, dough, bread, coin, drafts and notes to keep them a little longer so they can bugger off. I have enabled Blogger's own comments system for, as far as I can tell, reading the small print, those comments are permanent. So go on, get a message to me and leave something to be unearthed by digital archaeologists in 2105.

This telephone box on the left is about half a mile from my house. Somehow it survived the wholesale destruction of such boxes way back when. A few years ago there was a rumour it was to be replaced. The locals however, were up in arms against the idea. I'm glad they won. I don't even know if it works and I - and the locals too I shouldn't wonder - will probably never need to use it. It just looks good and reminds us older folk of the days when it was still bliss in that dawn to be alive. Of Two-Way Family Favourites, The Billy Cotton Bandshow and pimply National Servicemen wishing Mum, Dad and sister Carol all the best from some BFPO on the frontline of the Cold War. Who remembers the A and B buttons? I wonder what sort of dial-up connection we would've got all those years ago?

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Time to leave these warm premises in order to take our canine bundle of fun and happiness for its nightly lead-pulling, pavement-fouling, discarded-fast-food-grabbing, human (I think)-sick-eating, total-disregard-of-"Master" drag walk. Fortunately the iPod comes into its own at times like this. Match the clothing to the weather, stick those tell-tale earphones in, set it to 'shuffle' and off I go. Oblivious to man, beast - or mugger.

After that, back home for a last beer, some late night aural delight and then bed for a sound night's sleep with only good dreams.

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Dearest woke early this morning and pottered about the house like she normally does. No massive pain after the knee-op at all. Later she absconded with Eldest to choose some furniture for his new house. It looks like he'll be out of here in a few weeks. The last to fly the nest. Sheesh it only seems two-minutes ago I was telling him to act his age. Oh, hang about, that was a few minutes ago - just before he headed to Manchester to meet a frustrated Youngest as he arrived back from Man United's failure to beat ten-man Crystal Palace.

The two of them are in Rockworld at this very moment with a gaggle of mates, phoning me and texting me, letting me know what they are listening to in the deepness of their inebriation. Kids eh?

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Anyone else out there already bored shitless by the juvenile shenanigans of our two major political parties? 'Cos I am and I'll tell you this: If I - a political animal in many respects - am bored, then 75% of the bloody country must be. The argument has all the finesse of a playground fracas. "You started it", "no I didn't", "yes you did", "didn't", "did", "didn't", "did", "didn't", "did", "didn't", "did", "didn't", "did". Everything is spun, on all sides - and I include the Lib Dems in this. Every politician is so frightened to death of saying anything 'off message', controversial or thought-provoking that the whole process has atrophied.

And they wonder why nobody's paying attention?

Arf!

World On Fire

Credit where it's due, but....altruistic gesture or clever marketing ploy? After all, how often does Ms McClachlan need a 'big-time' video for her down-home, folky offerings? Still at least that's $149,985 to the world's poor although it strikes me that it wasn't just Sarah who worked cheap. Somebody videoed her lip-synch. Somebody else synched the lip. An artistic type produced the graphics. Somebody, somewhere lent his or her editing skills to the whole kit and kaboodle. Yet another prepared it for the web....the list goes on.

None of 'em mentioned in dispatches.

Unless, of course, Sarah is a Multimedia wizard who can turn her hand at anything?

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Well anther day with Dearest being rent asunder by blokes with knives. Her knee this time so not as traumatic as the great hysterectomy fright of 2003. She still had to undergo full anesthetic though. Which ALWAYS scary.

Because it was a simple operation, the NHS sub-contracted it out to a private place in Pendlebury. Private room with TV, shower, toilet, bath. Fully automated bed. A la carte menu (with wine at a reasonable tenner a bottle), plus a million operatives constantly traipsing in and out to verify that all the light bulbs were working, there was enough toilet paper, the bathroom was clean, there was enough shower gel or hair shampoo or shower caps or............

When all Dearest actually wanted was to get it over with.

Twelve-o-clock we got there - as instructed. The clock struck five before Dearest disappeared into theatre. I finally got her back home at half-past-eleven.

With a really fat knee.

How Come

Well, back to the training course today for a little more nonsense masquerading as “instruction”.

The course was held in a new, custom built office block erected on land that used to belong to Royal Ordnance. The much reduced Ordnance factory still manufactures what ordnance factories tend to manufacture about a quarter of a mile from where I sat frantically trying to think of things to do to keep me awake. It was hard but I think I managed it, although, at one point, I was very much aware of that “just woke up” feeling. Eyes suddenly wide open, brain thrutching like buggery to understand what had just happened and an obvious gap in logic between what the tutor had just said compared with what he was saying now.

Eventually the tutelage ended and us scholars packed up and headed home with a sigh of relief and a profound sense of two days of our precious lives wasted. Ho hum.

I got back to the office at about 5:00pm. I read my emails. I checked out the workload for tomorrow and, before I left, caught up with world events on the BBC website before pointing the Polo at North Manchester.

And that's when I read this. And I felt ashamed. Ashamed of moaning about naive training courses and all the rest of the work-related stuff I usually moan about. I thought of the car journey this morning. The jams on the M60 and M61. The jams getting off the M61. The endless queues as we approached the numerous roundabouts that are seemingly de rigueur in this part of the Red Rose County. I felt ashamed at my impotent raging against the machine that closes local offices and workshops; moves places of work a good 30, 40, 50 miles away; builds more motorways and “bypasses” to “ease” the traffic and forces the new proletariat to spend hundreds of pounds a month on cars and petrol in order to get to these new Jerusalems. I felt ashamed.

A woman at work died today. I bet she watched Eastenders last night, or bathed her kids (if she had any). She may have gone for a meal or drink with her boyfriend or husband. Perhaps she simply fell asleep on the sofa and woke, cursing at another lost evening, just after Newsnight. She got up this morning, showered and dressed – maybe thinking “I'm not keen on this top, I must go shopping at weekend”. She had probably traveled along the same roads as I did to get to the same place.

I made it back. She didn't.

Substitute

A pointless day today. An eighty mile round trip to partake of a Windows XP training course that wouldn't tax a three year old. I now know how to install it and add users. I'd love to say none of us knew that before we attended but I don't, with my hand on my heart, think I can. Y'see this is what happens when multinational corporations underbid for contracts in order to win them. They have to save a fuckin' lot of money, usually at the 'customer interface' end. Cue: redundancies, figure-fiddling and cutbacks, cutbacks, cutbacks. Seven of us dragged from all over Northern England to be patronised as a result of the client demanding some training be given to deal with the "new" operating system being deployed over the next few months.

Any self-respecting support person would have familiarised themselves with this ancient OS years ago surely? What we needed was an advanced, tailored to our particular network configuration, in-depth wallow. Not a friggin' Mickey-Mouse pile of crap that allows our Lords and Masters the right to say: "we invest in our people, look at all the courses we provide". Honestly, it wouldn't have taxed Noddy.

Back again tomorrow to learn how to switch the PC on. Probably.

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Last night Eldest and I trundled off to local number one to watch the Mighty Blues annihilate struggle against lowly opposition.

They didn't disappoint. 2-0 down after twenty minutes or so and we were both of the opinion that a profoundly embarrassing drubbing was on the cards. The ale flowed and was quaffed with all the urgency of the nerve-shredded City fan. So much so that by half-time we had drunk five pints each. Mind you, by half-time we had pulled it back to 2-2. More beer was required and acquired.

Then the most surreal thing I've ever seen occurred. Delia Smith of TV cook fame appeared on the pitch (she is a director of Norwich City FC BTW), and started to harangue the home fans for not getting behind the team. There she was - microphone in hand - shouting "WHERE ARE YOU? LET'S BE 'AVIN' YOU" at her own supporters. At first I thought "is this something to do with "Red Nose Day"? But then I remembered RND is strictly the Beeb. Mr Murdoch wouldn't get involved with that would he? Not enough profit.

Eldest got it right though: "Too much brandy in the pudding love". 'Nuff said.

Anyway, after Delia's inspirational girly, passionless, buttock-clenchingly awful, on-live-TV-seen-in-every-tap-room-in-the-land plea for atmosphere, the home crowd clammed up - more than likely bemused to fuck - and City went on to clinch the match with a Fowler scuff in the first minute of extra time. Quality.

Today the radio and newspapers have been full of Delia's faux pas. Still, we've all woken up the morning after regretting a few words spoken in haste and drink and had to deal with world's press haven't we?

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I'm back on a "jazz" kick at the moment. It's all Mr Metheny's fault. Bringing out intelligent albums with only one track on them, it shouldn't be allowed. But it has been allowed and I bought a copy and listened and loved and, as a result, I have dug out Miles and Louis and a few others. Retrospective bliss.

All those well-recorded brass instruments triggered a Pavlov-like 'let's look for more of the same' investigation of my extensive but haphazard CD, mini-disk and cassette collection. As usual serendipity* takes over and I rediscover gems from the past. Recently it has been Chicago. Often called the poor man's Blood, Sweat and Tears (who were actually shite), they were a force to be reckoned with between 1969 and 1971. Three double albums of hard rock, noodling jazz and catchy pop. Beautiful. If you ever want to hear some exquisite Jazz-rock with a pop sensibility (and some of the best horn arrangements in modern music) check out Chicago Transit Authority, Chicago II and Chicago III. Don't, and I mean DON'T, bother with anything else they ever did, for they embraced corporate America and disappeared up their own arses.

C'est la vie.

*What a gorgeous word to describe a gorgeous situation.

Some Things Hurt More, Much More Than Cars And Girls....

"Evolution is a dirty lie invented by socialist/communists to destroy the moral fabric of america. By teaching children that they came from apes, there is no need for them to have moral values. Thank God for the evangelicals who prevented this moral corruption. There aint no monkey down my family line. Jesus saves, Jesus heals. He is the king of kings and the lord or lords."

Get yourself over to Tim the Atheist's website (on my blogroll) and have a look at the truly marvelous attempts of the pro-creationists to justify the nonsense of evolution and the rationality of the Big-Guy-Who-Lives-In-The-Sky. Foul mouthed mostly. Pseudo intellectual occasionally. Beyond belief (geddit????) mainly.

Enjoy.

You Say Tomato and I say Tomaarto.....

Well. There's no accounting for taste is there? I mean there just isn't. Take this evening for example. There I was constantly switching between Arsenal and Liverpool whilst Dearest washed and ironed, when I suggested we relax with the first series of The Beiderbecke Affair. I've just joined Amazon's 6 DVDs a month for £9.99 rental service. It sounds great. No late fees. Delivered to my door within 2 days, and a prepaid pack to post them back. With Amazon's fantastic "strength-in-depth" selection you can't go wrong.

So, first off, what do I order but The Beiderbecke Affair. 1985 it was. I watched it religiously. I thought (and still think) it was a superb, understated example of a very British sense of gentle humour. Alan Plater at his best. James Bolam, Barbara Flynn, Colin Whately and a host of character actors that anyone over the age of 25 would recognise immediately, all mouthing exquisite dialog. Dead-pan. Glorious.

Well. That's what I thought anyway.

"This isn't funny" says Dearest after 10 minutes or so.

It's only been on 10 minutes and already the dialog between D.S. Hobson and Chief Supt Forrest has cheered me immensely. The next thing Dearest is playing with the bloody dog, which is getting more frisky as each minute passes. She combines this with 'watching' quality television that requires close concentration to pick up all the nuances.

Mind you, Dearest condemned Father Ted and Phoenix Nights to unfunniness as well, until she started to pay attention, put a little effort in and start to reap the dividends.

I realise that trying to watch all three DVDs with my Darlin' will be a pointless exercise punctuated with the usual "who's that"? "Why's he/she doing that"? "What's going on here"? All questions that needn't be asked if you had paid attention.

So I turned the DVD off and put the TV back on. Cherished was on. The story of Angela Canning's three cot deaths. Dearest was rapt.

I guess I'll never make a TV scheduler. And, to think, I have ordered a load of Cracker DVDs next. Dearest loves Cracker.

I think I'll talk and play with the dog all the way through.

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Speaking of TV series, it's amazing how much my approach to them has changed as years go by. I still look forward to the ones that catch my eye and resolve to watch them in their entirety. The Rotter's Club for example. Needless to say my busy, busy lifestyle makes a mockery of these rash decisions and I invariably miss an episode and, as a result, the entire raison d'être for carrying on with the rest is lost. Consequently I stopped making the effort.

But now we have video and DVD editions of some of the greatest TV ever broadcast, we can watch safe in the knowledge that we won't miss ONE minute.

All thirteen episodes of Brass for example. £11.97 from Amazon

Raise you're hat to: Art and Technology.

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Regarding Red Ken and his refusal to apologise to a right-wing Daily Mail/London Evening Standard journalist for comparing him to a Nazi, how can that be Anti-Semitic? Surely when you call someone a Nazi you are being Anti-Nazi? Still, at least those particular newspapers (and Saint Tony) have had a field day. But, surprisingly, look at the BBC's 'Have Your Say' pages. The vast majority are supporting Kenneth. In fact the last time Ken got so much support, Saint Tony was giving him as much shit as he is now.

Remind me. Who had the last laugh?