This One's Got Lazyitis....

I've been a little remiss I know. Can't-be-arsedness has been rampant and the World has turned and the days have zipped by and the clock has ticked and ticked and ticked and ticked.......

But what have I been doing apart from trying to find a fucking job in Mr Brown's New World Order? (Perhaps that should just be New Order as I've just watched 24 Hour Party People and read the Anthony H Wilson "novelisation". If you know what I'm talking about, great. If not, it doesn't matter. But perhaps you should read/watch films more. To paraphrase a recurring motif from the said work.)

But, yeah, what have I been doing? Well, drinking a lot and playing the Blues obviously. When a man has a resonator guitar, a glass bottleneck and a moon to howl at, that's what a man will do. Well, this man anyway.

I've also been discovering some great music and can personally recommend Cherry Ghost, Newton Faulkner and Steve Earle's latest.

Perhaps the most bizarre thing I have decided to turn my "talents" to, though, is ballroom dancing. And before you point your fingers and snigger, it's fuck all to do with that "Reality" TV show in which the be-chinned one ekes the last few pieces of silver of his career from the BBC. It's the unique way it's funded y'know. And I should know. It's me (and a few million others) funding the fucker. Still, a Brucie bonus (for Brucie), nice.

No, it's not that. It's the fact that Dearest has always wanted to glide across a dance floor with apparent ease in the arms of a suave and simmering hunk with a penchant for the Paso Doble**. So, essentially, there's a gun to my head. I know my place.

I have surprisingly enjoyed it though. Apart from sweating like a pig at the end of the hours session because I've never danced for more than the length of your average pop tune in my life. And I've enjoyed it in spite of the be-buttoned, be-cardiganned bereft-of-an-original-thought-in-their-forlorn-lives fellow learners who shuffle and twitch to our right and left as we struggle to master the basics of the waltz.

Now this has had me baffled 'cos, for all intents and purposes the waltz should be - and is - a piece of piss. But for me it just doesn't work. I feel alien trying to do it. The quickstep and the square tango I can handle, but the waltz......

I even tried practising alone, at home, when Dearest was elsewhere acquiring even more shoes. It's just plain wrong. (The waltz that is. Not, obviously, the Gollumesque search for the precious shoes/boots/crocs/sandals/wellies/fustian feetwarmers. That's apparently perfectly natural.) I sat awhile and gathered my thoughts about why I couldn't grasp this simplest of dances. And then I realised that it feels alien because it is fucking alien. Waltz time is not a natural rhythm. You may think it is because it seems to have been round since time immemorial, but it isn't. 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3, 1-2-3 ISN'T NATURAL! All the dances I've been able to get my head round (and I'm not alone here - Dearest can't grasp the waltz either) have their roots firmly in common time. 4/4, four to the floor, call it what you will, 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4, 1-2-3-4.

It's just natural. You probably walk in 4/4 time. You would have marched in 4/4 time. You would have gone into battle in 4/4 time. You certainly wouldn't have chanced going over the top to the strains of the Blue Danube or Tales From The Vienna Woods. It's not right. It feels, to me, like an 18th century affectation. I would need a wig, waistcoat and pomander to get in the zone.

So, given that I'm 53 and time's flashing by at the speed of light, with the nights too dark and the days too bright, the waltz can fuck off. There are not enough hours in the decade.

It's four-to-the-floor for me from now on. The quickstep'll do for me. Hip-hop, rock, pop. Y'know I reckon that even reggae lends itself.

Now, where's me Old Spice, cardigan and ganja?

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I've also tramped the highways and byways of my immediate surroundings - mostly with the shit-machine - but sometimes not and pointed the soul-stealer and clicked the button and fired up Photoshop and....well.....here's a few of my faves:-



"What was that?"



Trilby.



The evening sun kisses the Arndale as the wheel turns.



This should've been a band. Manchester's fabulous Northern Quarter swathed in Autumnal sunlight.



The fountain in the centre of Piccadilly Gardens, Manchester.



Heaton Park, Manchester. October 2007.

**I can never figure out whether that's irony or sarcasm.

I went down to the crossroads, fell down on my knees......

Sometimes a man needs to succour his soul. This is my latest addition to the guitar bank, a Vintage AMG1 Resonator.

The AMG1 is a bell brass bodied resonator, with a chrome finish and a rosewood neck.

It is a single cone resonator, loosely based upon a 1937 style O National guitar, and is best for blues slide guitar and ragtime finger picking. It plays best in open D and open G, and one slide up the neck transports you straight to the Mississippi delta.

All I need now is a porch.

While Lennon Read a Book on Marx and the Quartet Practiced in the Park............

This pub, above, was my haunt du jour from 1985 to 1990. As a "mature" student I had embarked on a journey of discovery of myself as well as the rest of the planet that resulted in a decent BA (Hons) degree in Politics and Contemporary History. I loved every minute (apart from the Saturday morning exams). I loved the structure it gave to my reading. The purpose it gave to my life. The consolation it brought me during the dark hours when I was holding down a demanding full-time job and studying. The friends, the debaters, the arseholes, but, most of all, the little coterie who canoodled intellectually after every evening of lecture and tutorial in the Crescent. A pub that did not bow to the all-consuming late 80s Thatcherite style and no substance of the day, but actually had a landlord who spat in the face of the Grande Dame and her cohorts.

And now, today, I find out that a) it's under threat from DEVELOPERS and b) Marx and Engels considered it their local during the writing of the Communist Manifesto and some of the rest.

It was a great pub.. It sold real ales. It had proper furniture picked up from house clearances, a black-leaded range with a proper coal fire. A great juke box and great clientele.

Developers eh?

Oh Mama Don't Take My Kodachrome Away.....

It's been a rough few months but I feel that a corner has been turned and that life, if not back to the carefree days of my youth, is at least getting back onto a level playing field. (Mixed metaphor alert!)

I've been crushed by the bureaucratic nightmare that kicks in after the death of a loved one. No Will. Bank accounts. Funeral expenses. Life Assurance. Pension. In short, everything. But it's mostly all done now and I can start to breathe again. It's a good job I've been around to do this because my Mother has not really been capable. Her minds not 100% and most of the stuff that's needed doing has passed her by.

Dearest, Eldest and Youngest have helped as well especially with their insistence that I take some time to myself every now and then. As a result I've been off walking here, there and everywhere taking photographs and trying to get to grips with Photoshop - with mixed results. It's not easy that there Photoshop. No wonder experts command big salaries.

On the sport front I have sat gobsmacked watching the sublime football that Manchester City have been playing recently. Can it continue? Here's hoping. All I know is I've not been this optimistic for decades.

On top of that Tim Henman has finally retired on a losing streak. Nothing new there then.

Anyway, here's some snaps from the past few months.



This is a local bar that overlooks the Rochdale Canal. Built around 1830 it has recently had a refurb and now refreshes the over 25s of the area.



Guell Parc Barcelona. I waited ages for the crowds to disappear and one figure to appear. I like this one.



A family day out in the centre of Manchester on Bank Holiday Monday. I'm a little nervous about candid street photography. So much can go wrong. But this turned out quite well.



Just a load of balls.



Taken during the Gay Pride weekend in Manchester.



A view of Manchester a couple of minutes walk from my house.



A "dog walk" night shot.



A tree. Saddleworth Moor.



The evening sky over Nerja, Spain.



You wouldn't believe this was the centre of Manchester would you?

Well, that's enough for now. I'm off to watch Droylsden FC this afternoon.

Softly, As I Leave You......

I last saw my Dad alive on my 53rd birthday.

Two days later he'd gone.

Two days later he was an ex-Dad.

In the end it was a relief. We'd been called out once to spend all night listening to him gurgle and groan in a NHS ward with a modicum of privacy. We stirred ourselves and readied ourselves for the inevitable but my Dad had other plans. He hung on for 12 hours then rallied.

Two weeks later he finally embraced eternity and we could start to grieve. In the end it had taken three weeks for him to go and we missed the End by ten minutes or so.

For the past two months he had been in a residential care home and he was rubbing along quite well. A TV, decent food and a really caring environment where he could enjoy the occasional pint of Guinness made his last few months tolerable. The hard part was the visiting. The one-sided conversations. The heart-breaking big smiles he'd suddenly give you. The questions he was starting to ask but was never able to finish.......

He still understood certain jokes though and laughed and laughed when I told him any. It was at times like that when he had a sparkle in his eye. For all his trials and tribulations it cheered me that humour still had such a profound effect on him. It could still dig deep into his ravaged brain and tickle whatever it is that it tickles.

And then, one night he decided to get out of bed and fell over and banged his head.

He had a bleed that couldn't be stemmed because he wasn't robust enough to go through the operation. They hoped the bleed would stop of it's own accord but it didn't. I loved him deeply. He gave me life of course, but he also gave me the gene that makes music so important. We had problems, of course we did, but as I grew we enjoyed each other's company more and more.

We had a Socialist Humanist funeral for him. He would have loved that if he'd have been there. As the coffin was wheeled into the Crem "The Birth of the Blues" by Frank Sinatra was played. Half way through a recording that my Dad, myself and my kids did in a proper recording studio years ago was aired before Matt Monroe's "Softly As I Leave You" finished what was a very beautiful and personal service.

We found a love poem he had written for my Mother. I think the entire place was in floods of tears.

See you Dad. I think we did you proud.

Maybe I'll tell you about my shithouse of a "brother" later.

My Favourite Mistake

I reckon there's a "Dawn" and an "OAFC" scraped in this. See if you can spot them. Dawn's probably married with kids by now and Oldham Athletic are in the playoffs to try and reach the Championship.

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I remembered something the other day that made me smile. This is a Good Thing to happen to me at the moment so I'll tell you about it.

Gather round......

A few years ago we went on holiday somewhere tacky (Lanzarote I think). We were outside a bar called the "Sunburnt Arms" (ho ho) that opened straight out onto the promenade. Inside all the walls and ceilings were covered in replica football shirts that visitors had donated from all over the UK. All the usual suspects were there plus a pleasing sprinkling of lower league clubs.

Now Dearest's eyesight has never been what you would call 20/20 and most of our married life she has worn glasses.

We decided to have another in this most upmarket of establishments due to the lovely breeze we were enjoying. As I returned from a toilet break I noticed Dearest was squinting into the middle distance as she tried to focus on one of the shirts hanging within the darkest depths of the pub.

After a minute or so her eyebrows shot to the top of her head and she said: "Anne Widdicombe? ANNE WIDDICOMBE?".

Naturally I assumed she'd mistaken some shambling middle-aged look-a-like and turned to see. There was no one at all resembling the pre make-over no-nonsense Tory. I turned to Dearest - "where?".

"There - on the front of that blue shirt" she replied. Eyebrows still in orbit.

I turned to look and finally focussed on a Chelsea strip circa 1999 or so. I burst into howls of incredulous laughter. "It doesn't say Anne Widdicombe you blind bugger, it says Auto Windscreens!"

I knew she was blind but bloody hell I never realised it was that bad. But as I sat there enveloped in mirth it suddenly dawned on me that my wife had actually thought that a Premiership football club would be sponsored by Anne Widdicombe; and the major sponsor as well!!

Can you imagine - and I mean just try and picture it - Chelsea FC running out at Wembley next Saturday with Anne Widdicombe plastered across their chests.

I'd love it me. Just love it.

Just Walkin' the Dog

I'm still waiting for a date for my operation. The latest news is that it will definitely before August (waiting list quotas an' all that). In the meantime I'm a little between the devil and the deep blue sea so I've been pulling the walking boots on while I still can and heading for the hills and dales. For company I've been taking the shit machine with me.

The pic above was taken from the top of Werneth Low - a local country park that provides spectacular view across the Lancashire, Cheshire plain and the Pennines and Peak District. It shows Manchester City centre. The tallest building you can see on the left is the recently completed Beetham Tower. It's the tallest residential building in the UK apparently. Well, until some other city builds a bigger one. Half way up it there is a Hilton hotel that the general public can grace via the Sky Bar. The views are stunning. eldest and prospective Mrs Eldest booked into the VIP suite as a special treat a few weeks ago and loved it.

Here's a few snaps from my recent forays.



The cenotaph at Werneth Low.



Looking towards Oldham and Ashton-u-Lyne



Steps Tandle Hill



It's a rusty thing on a mill wall by a canal.



Walkway over the M60.



A red farm vehicle.



Pub and Peveril Castle, Castleton, Derbyshire.

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In other local news there's been a massive fire in Manchester City Centre today - I was able to see the smoke from our bedroom window and you could smell the smoke the minute you opened the door. It looks pretty severe and there is a possiblity that some homeless folk have been caught in it. Poor buggers.

Another building caught fire. One that had been converted to apartments (or flats as we used to call them). I bet the insurance companies as well as the residents are frantically checking the small print of their policies. Those residences in the Northern Quarter cost an arm and a leg so there's a lot at stake.

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Big Sam Allardyce has resigned as manager of Bolton Wanderers and the rumours persist that the hefty head honcho is earmarked as City's next manager.

No. No. No.

I'm not knocking Sam. He's done a great job with very little at Bolton but I don't think he's the type of coach who can build a team for the long term. Bolton are where they are today due to his ability to cajole the likes of J J Okotcha to end their careers at the Reebok. As a result he has been able to produce the over-achieving Wanderers we now see fighting for a European place. It's not building a team for the future though is it?

So. Big Sam? Well thanks but no thanks.

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Speaking of Manchester City Football Club, I have finally given up my season ticket. The last game I actually attended was a tedious City display as Reading beat them 2-0. City haven't scored at home since New Year's Day! Coupled with my increasing disgust at the prices being charged for everything from pies to programmes, the whole match day experience has become an expensive ordeal. Something that I have looked forward to less and less as the season has progressed.

Next week it's the Manchester derby and I'm not going. I've let a friend have my ticket. The spark's gone. The light has flickered and died. Time to move on.

From now on I'll watch City live in the pub. Most games are screened live in our area so it shouldn't be a problem. For my live fix I'll be at Droylsden FC for their first season in the Conference.

Come on the Bloods!

The Carnival Is Over

Ah well Manchester United are through to the FA Cup Final probably to be closely followed by Chelsea. It looks like Manchester United or Chelsea are going to win the Premiership and there's a strong possibility that one of the two will be lifting the Champion's League trophy some time next month.

*Yawn*

Manchester City have now all but secured another season in the Premiership so I suppose I should be thankful for small mercies. But when I actually stop to think about this I end up thinking "and?" Another season of mid-table mediocrity with maybe a sniff at the Carling Cup and that's it. Boring, boring, boring. I've been reading the sports pages in the national press today and, as usual, they are creaming themselves over the "best league in the World". Hardly. "The best top four in the World" matybe but the rest of us can't hope to compete with the cash cows at the top.

And it's going to get worse. From next season the bottom club in the Premiership will receive around £30m. £30m to get relegated as the worst team in the division. That £30m will probably be enough to buy promotion within a couple of seasons and then another guaranteed minimum £30m. This will then create yet another glass ceiling in the Championship and the poor buggers in the lower half of the table and in the current Division One will find the financial gulf growing ever wider.

Money, money, money. It's killing the game in my opinion. So much so that I have not renewed my season ticket and I have started attending a local non-league club's matches. (Droyslden FC - top of the Nationwide North league and maybe a couple of games off promotion to the Conference proper). The match-day experience is brill even if the football leaves a lot to be desired.

Yesterday Youngest and myself got a taxi to the ground and had a couple of pints in a local before paying a tenner each to enter the ground and have another beer in the excellent social club. We then stood in the sunshine and watched a semi-decent game which ended in a 1-0 win for the bloods.

Pie, peas and gravy as well. Lovely. Next week there's a few more United and City mates coming with us to watch the crunch match against Harrogate. Now I remember what made me love football so much. Local passion and pride. Selfless volunteers painting, repairing, helping. Players playing for a love of the game rather than an over-inflated wage packet. A thoroughly enjoyable experience.

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Since I took my redundancy I've been dragging the shit-machine up hill and down dale snapping away with my new camera and generally toning up and shedding a few pounds. Sadly though the lure of the pub and my local's superb Dobcross bitter generally proves too much and the ounces and pounds creep back. Still a corpulent status quo is something I can live with at the moment. What does worry me though is I'll be seeing the doc next week and I should finally get a date for my foot operation. When I've had it I'll be out of action for 6 to 8 weeks. Immobile and thirsty I'll be bloody huge before I'm back on my feet again.

Comments?

Spanish Bombs......

A midnight flight from Barcelona on Friday, after three pissed-wet-through and one glorious-azure-skied-pleasure-to-be-alive-day. Add to that my newly acquired unemployed status and, well, I really should be blogging more.

I really should be doing a lot more actually. Taking the dog for a daily walk shit doesn't, in all fairness, get the ol' cardio vascular system working that much. It's more a "'urry up I'm sick to death of standing here waiting for you to shit what you've got to shit before I dive in with my trusty "doggy bag". I should be at the Cutting-Edge of technology somewhere: explaining how to add four columns in MS Excel. Beating an understanding of the two times table into a recent graduate. Or simply trying to draw as much Pension as possible and "downsizing".

I spent a lot of time taking photographs with my new Pentax K100D. A lot of camera for a very reasonable price. Furthermore, all my old Pentax K lenses should work with it - albeit in manual mode but, hey, that's why I bought it.

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I love the place (Barcelona). This must be our fourth or fifth visit and, apart from the weather, this was one of those "we know what we're doing and where we're we going" holidays. Parc Guell, the Noucamp, the beach, las Ramblas and if you take into account the fact that our hotel was smack dab in the middle of the Gothic Quarter.........Superb.

The bed was King Size plus. "Where are you?" queried Dearest. "In the North West corner of the bed" I replied. We could both do "stars" and still not touch. Add to that free internet access in every room (should've took my laptop) and an Internet and Photoshop corner on our floor and you couldn't go much wrong.

They had a reasonably priced restaurant with live jazz on Thursdays and Fridays and the breakfast was brill. If you're going to Barcelona get yourselves in there.

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We did all the usual, Gaudi this, Gaudi that. Tour the Noucamp (now that's what I call a trophy cabinet - are you listening the board of Manchester City?), the Joan Miro museum and the whole Montjuic thing.

I've never really been a Miro fan but it was raining and we were stuck up Montjuic in that fine rain that soaks you through so in we went. Hmmmmmm. I can hear all the philosophical "what is Art" debates raging in my head but when the culmination of a life's work becomes three huge white canvasses (the size of a living room wall) with a single black line drawn on each, then it's time to either a) disappear up your own fundament or b) start painting fucking landscapes and fruit again.

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Coming home along the M60 at 3:00am I had to keep coughing and generally making a noise in order to keep the drowsy taxi driver awake. I made that much noise (on account of my fear) I fully expected him to turn around and say "are you talking to me?" Frightening.

And then back to the hospital to see my Dad who is improving mentally but not physically. We're hoping that we can get him into the old folk's home at the end of our street. If we're successful we'll be able to take him for a pint of Dobcross in the local every now and then.

It's great our local now. It's still a City supporters club and the new, young landlord is going for CAMRA status. He's already had an honourable mention in one of the magazines and he's now looking to putting on a mini beer festival. It would be great to get my Dad along to that. The problem is fitting his couple of pints in with his Draconian pill-taking regime. Blood pressure, diabetes and everything else means whatever is introduced into his system is going to have some effect.

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A barbecue at Eldest and Prospective Mrs Eldest's yesterday, Quorn and salads and wine and beer to a soundtrack of CSN, early Chicago, Creedance Clearwater Revival, Canned Heat, Zappa, Stones, Beatles............all Eldest's selections.

Class. Later we all retired to the local and finally to bed.

Today Dearest and I went and watched City attain Premiership safety with a decent 3-1 defeat of Fulham at Craven Cottage. God bless Arabic sports channels.

And tomorrow I finally find out what happens to Sam Tyler. Can't wait. Things have changed since 1973.

My comments have disappeared again. I'll add another post.

Please be upstanding for....The Queen...

Broken

My comments seem to have disappeared. But only for the last post?

Hands Across the Water

Well. So much to tell you and, yet, so little inclination. My four year anniversary as well. The strange thing is that there is so much going on in my life that I should be committing it to paper/screen on a par with Keith Waterhouse. Still.

Dearest and I have just returned from a weekend in Cologne. Curate's egg. 'Nuff said.

My Dad went into Respite on Monday. He's back in Hospital today - blood sugar as low as a low thing listening to "Low" by David Bowie. It's hard.

In other news, I finally got accepted for redundancy. I know I should be over the moon, but I really am very wobbly with this, even though I knew I had no option but to accept the "King's Shilling".

Twenty Eight years it's been since I last had an interview and, as I peruse the classifieds, my bowels loosen more and more. Prelimanary telephone interviews, role-play, presentation-giving after the formal interview..........??????????

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And to top things off TNR has "tagged" me. My five secrets.

Well, first off - and given the synchronicity between myself and my Kilmarnock-supporting alter-ego - I find it truly remarkable that I too was a trainee carpet salesman. Christmas 1971 found me hawking the Axminsters, crap suites and £1.25-a-square-yard-shite on the corner of Princess Street, Moss Side, Manchester.

I had worked there about two weeks over the Xmas period when, one testicle-shrinking, raw afternoon, the 5 foot 2 inch owner ("Piggy Mills") and his 69-year-old-acolyte had to go somewhere. I was "in charge."

Being a long-haired, loon-panted liberal I set about my task with woeful worries about "selling" stuff, surrendering to CAPITALISM and putting the hard-earned of the Proletariat into the pockets of the MAN.

As it was, after three hours I only had one enquiry. A West-Indian couple (still rare in those days: even in Moss Side) entered. They were interested in a three-piece suite they had seen in the window. I showed them the same suite indoors and asked them to try it out. See how it felt etc etc etc etc. I was seventeen! What did I know about selling?

As I struggled with my financial dichotomy Piggy Mills and Bob returned and immediately (and I mean immediately) started screaming some of the most abusive, racist crap I've ever, ever heard in my life. All of it along the lines of " get out you b*l*a*c*k s*c*u*m": "We don't serve your kind in here........."

I got a right bollocking.

I told him to stick his job up his tiny arse.

It was a fucking long walk home from Moss Side to North Manchester.

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Dearest and I called off our big church wedding two hours before it should have happened. People had come from all over the world. We got married in a Registry office a month or two later.

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I was once convicted of "chicken rustling". Already dead.

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I was once propostioned by a twenty-five stone bloke who offered me a fiver (a lot of money in 1972) for a "play around". Brought up proper-like, I answered "not tonight thanks" and ran for my life.

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And finally, as I have written before, I'm fairly convinced that Hindley and Brady picked me up in their car circa 1965. It was always a vague memory, but what brought it home was the fact that, watching a documentary on it a few months ago, I realised that Brady didn't drive and the couple who picked me up were odd because the woman drove. I'm sure I only escaped because the gates at Clayton Bridge Railway crossing shut and I opened the door and ran and ran and ran and ran.........

It was years later when the significance hit me. Here's my originaql post:-

Sometime in 1965 at the tender age of 11 I stupidly got into a car with a man and a blonde woman after they had stopped and asked me for directions. I couldn't explain properly - or so they said - so they asked if I'd show them. Adults you see, in those days you were taught to be polite to them and, well the polite thing to do was to comply with their request. The minute we moved off I realised to idiocy of what I was doing and I become very scared. Neither of them spoke to me as we drove along. It was only afterwards I remembered that they supposedly hadn't known where to go. Fortunately for me we came to a level-crossing and a train was coming. We stopped and I quickly opened the door and ran and ran and ran.

Are you Happy now TNR? :-)

When I was a kid, me and my mate Graham adored Ancient Romans and Greeks. Our favourite though was Leonidas and the three hundred Spartans. Quality story (and true to boot). As we left the Matinee, our duffle coats flapped wildly behind our pre-pubecsent frames. Heaven.

I was looking forward to seeing the new interpretation - "300" - until I watched the trailer and Leonidas is heard saying "we're in for a wild night tonight".

WTF?

"Fuck me, they're Persian. D'you reckon they've got Kebabs???"

USA, for fuck's sake sake make an effort.

Let Us Pause In Life's Troubles.....

Some pretty famous faces in there, all performing a Stephen Foster song from the 1850s.

There is reason why some songs last so long.

Incidentally, Seth Lakeman was the DOG'S BOLLOCKS.

Lay me Grace and Bake me Pie I'm Starvin' for me Gravy....."

Dearest and I went to visit my Dad today. Back in hospital he is and not really very well. We arrived and eventually found him fast asleep. So, what do you do? Slope off or wake him? We decided to wake him and I have to say he was not 100%. He talked vague bollocks for a good 5 minutes. Mind you, I've accused him of talking vague bollocks for the past 15 years or so.

He doesn't read, watch TV or listen to the radio/walkman any more. He struggles to remember words, family names, days of the week.........

Eventually I started quizzing him about Germany. I spent one afternoon in the place when we all went to the World Cup from Amsterdam. I was that impressed I booked a weekend there for Dearest and I.

"You've been to Germany haven't you Dad" I quizzed.

"No not me. Never been".

"Yes you have - Dearest and I gave you a trip down the Rhine as a pressie for your Golden Wedding Anniversary".

"Oh aye. Yes...that fat bloke Manfred who owned the hotel.............................................. ......................................" End of conversation.

I just hope he has fabulous dreams because it seems he sleeps 15 - 20 hours a day.

Life....go easy on me. Love, don't pass me by.

Does it really "come to us all?"

How Can This Be Love?

I've just returned from the "Theatre of Base Comedy" (© Stuart Hall, City fan and BBC broadcaster) as angry about a mere "game" of football as I've ever been in my life. I've just heard Stuart "I'm a Patriot me" Pearce's blasé post-match interview. Who the fuck does he think he is? I'll tell you what is: a clueless, here-today-gone-tomorrow undergraduate at the Manchester City Academy for footballing under-achievers.

Mr Pearce that was CRAP!!! Reading at home - and we play 3-5-2 with no width and a baffling reliance on the long ball. Samaras played like he didn't know what a football was. £6 million and he falls over the ball instead of kicking it. Vassell? How many more chances does he need? Dabo? What is he for? Beasley? Overpaid, over-hyped and over-here. It was that bad that, when it started getting foggy I was praying for the ref to blow the whistle and call it off. It was a farce.

I fear another relegation battle come April and May. It is written. Our last home game of the season is against the Red hordes from Salford - a Wayne Rooney back heel into Weaver's net and down we go as United secure the necessary points to clinch the title after a late surge from Chelsea and Liverpool. IT IS WRITTEN.

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On the left you can see the little bit of public art commissioned by Manchester City Council to commemorate the Commonwealth Games of 2002. I took this pic this afternoon just before the debacle referred to above from one of the spiral walkways at Eastlands. Directly to the left is the area where Manchester's "Super-Casino" is to be built in the next few years. It's going to regenerate the area apparently. Again. I say again because the area has been regenerated to death over the past few years and it is still referred to as "one of the most deprived areas in the UK".

Are we allowed to say "Regeneration isn't working"? I was privy - at a very early stage - to some of the meetings of politicians, businessmen and women, faith leaders and educators involved in the embryonic grand plan for East Manchester. An East Manchester that, at the time, was best described as decaying. An area full of dying heavy industries, demolition and sink estates.

Now, OK, these days that same area has a world-class velodrome, football stadium, tennis centre, athletics track, 24 hour ASDA Wal-Mart and a few other bits of businesses unconnected to the "SportCity" that now occupies the site of Manchester Steel and Bradford Pit. But could it be that local folk aren't employed there? Possibly because they lack the skills to do so? Could it be that these businesses and services are managed by commuters from places like Wilmslow, Didsbury and Saddleworth? Even the minimum wage jobs are taken by foreign students with a minimal grasp of the language. The sink estates have been tidied up and repaired but the communities in them would still appear to prefer the "Social" or petty theft and drug dealing to get them through.

Regeneration benefits nobody but Big Business and the smug ego-driven politicians who climb into bed with them in order to get their face on the TV and a cushy little number once their political careers are over. It seems to me that some areas are in danger of being regenerated to death. The same will happen in East Manchester - more and more of the upwardly mobile will move into the newly thrown up "City centre apartments" (at £750,000 or so) - and the poor will have to find somewhere else to live.

Still, a casino. That'll be nice.

I Keep Singing The Same Old Song

I see Tony has given the Catholic adoption agencies a couple of years to stop discriminating against Gays. In the meantime I presume it's OK to kick out applications for gay adoption, requests to book the Church Hall for a Gay disco or, God-forbid, a civil wedding. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O'Connor said he was disappointed, but said he hoped there might still be some way the agencies could "continue their work".

I can't see how Mr Murphy-O'Connor, I really can't. After all it's the WORD OF GOD isn't it? I don't think there's a grey area that allows you to challenge what the Lord hath forbidden.

Mind you, with a bit of thought you could perhaps ditch this particular command - after all if you can make limbo disappear I reckon you can do anything. And there is a precedent - you completely ignore Our Father when it comes to eating shellfish, wearing different fabrics at the same time and stoning adulterers to death so I guess you'll be able to mealy-mouth your way around this as the months drag by.

The be-frocked apologist went on to add "the move risked forcing religious people out of public life"

Well here's hoping Cormac. Here's hoping. We could start with Tony and Ruth.

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It's amazing how this unholy trinity of Chavdom are all claiming that Endemol/Channel4 edited Celebrity Big Brother to make them look like the boorish, ill-educated arseholes that they actually are. Foul-mouthed, uncouth, bullying and, yes, racist.

With a bit of luck they will all drift into the obscurity they obviously deserve, the obscurity that evidently frightens the life out of them.

Ken Russell got it right - along with the so-called punk rocker: in came the Goody family and out they went - sharpish.

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Some pleasant bastard scratched practically every car on our side of the street the other night - including mine and Dearest's. Now I can understand burglary, theft and the like. I can appreciate the fact that, at the end of it, the burglar has something tangible, and usually useful, to show for his or hers efforts. But mindless vandalism? I don't get it. I'd actually punish it far more than the other crimes (which usually involve drug-addiction anyway). Tie 'em to a lamppsot with barbed-wire and invite the local community to abuse their human-rights for a week or two.

That'll learn 'em.

They Call it Stormy Monday

Haiku time.......

I am still alive
Though pissed off and downhearted
Wish it was Friday

The Pretty Things are going to Hell

I see the God-botherers are out and about again. I like the fact that denying them the freedom to deny others their freedom is denying them their freedom. It's an odd world the religious one. It must take all your time up just running around making sure nobody is being offensive to God. It must be really hard finding folk who are just sat there, on their own, being quietly homosexual and visiting the wrath of a vengeful God on them. I'd be knackered at the end of the day I can tell yer.

It's funny how they only trot out "what the Bible says" when they want their prejudices supporting though isn't it? I don't see any of the smug fuckers campaigning to ban shellfish. And they should, for, as stated in Leviticus 11:9-12:

9 These shall ye eat of all that are in the waters: whatsoever hath fins and scales in the waters, in the seas, and in the rivers, them shall ye eat.

10 And all that have not fins and scales in the seas, and in the rivers, of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which is in the waters, they shall be an abomination unto you:

11 They shall be even an abomination unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh, but ye shall have their carcases in abomination.

12 Whatsoever hath no fins nor scales in the waters, that shall be an abomination unto you.

Deuteronomy also:

9 These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat:

10 And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.<

So, that takes care of prawns, lobster, crab, cockles, winkles and I guess angels on horseback won't be gracing the tables at any evangelical gala luncheons in the near future. I don't see any demos outside fishmongers though - or perhaps I missed them?

Similarly I haven't seen hordes of believers outside Marks and Spencer protesting against people who wear clothes made of more than one fabric (Leviticus 19:19) a habit that I personally find absolutely disgusting. (Honest!)

Still it's nice to be able to pick and choose your "Laws of God" isn't it?

The oleaginous, smug pricks.

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Speaking of oleaginous, smug pricks, I see everyone's favourite celice-wearer is back in the headlines and brazenly swanning around in differing fabrics to boot. Rumour also has it that, to add insult to injury, the occasional prawn cocktail has slipped down her blasphemous throat.

Still God helps those that help themselves as some rich twat once said.

It's the hypocrisy I can't take. From Blair, Dianne Abbott, Lord Falconer, Keith Bradley, Harriet Harmon and many others. "Do as I say not as I do". Just like the Tories over a decade ago. Seriously, if Cameron can get his act and his Party together there could be a very interesting General Election in the offing next time round.

I still blame Thatcher though.

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"I may not have succeeded in halting the war, but I did secure the right of Parliament to decide on war," reads the headstone of the late Livingston MP Robin Cook. It's hard to remember a time when politicians with something to lose still held on to their convictions and sacrificed their careers in the face of it.

Just think, had he lived he could be sat on the backbenches still saying "I told you so" at every opportunity.

You Can Never Hold Back Spring

See that? On the left? Well, that's my Album Of The Year!!

Not Springsteen - although, for me, he was a CLOSE second. Certainly not Dylan - although the initial euphoria made me hope and pray - and, perhaps, invest too much "genius" into, what is essentially an old man singing and playing basic blues, in the end I had to accept it for what it was.

Perhaps in a few years the "proper" music critics will realise that the very wonderful 1st volume of "Chronicles" does not necessarily mean a great album will follow. We'll see.

The Waits' album though is a mishmash of tear-jerkers, rockers, sea shanties, Kurt Weil-like ruminations and general Tom-ness. Youngest and Mrs Youngest bought it for me and I can't explain just how receptive I am to the bitter-sweet gorgeousness that is Mr Waits, when he's on form. Bar room ballads accompanied by accordians, wheezing harmoniums, banjos, overstrung pianos, guitars, brass, mandolins, ramshackle percussion and a voice like "sand and glue".

What more could you ask for?

Incidentally, he's been "on-form" most of his entire life.

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They also bought us tickets to see Seth Lakeman in February. I haven't heard that much - but what I have I like. Looking forward to it.

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Eldest and his newly acquired Geordie "proto-Mrs Eldest" presented me with Shaun Goater's autobiography, a Tommy Cooper DVD (I've always loved him) and this:-

Woodstock! The Director's cut! An extra 40 minutes of "brand new footage".

Sadly the Hendrix footage exacerbates his poor performance. The Who though, once again shine through - what a fucking band they were!

1969 (I think?) The Who were playing The Free Trade Hall in Manchester. My mate and I had tickets. To say we were looking forward to it was an understatement. It was The Who in their pomp. "Tommy", "The Who Sell Out", plus all the hits.........

My mate though, decides that strong drink will be needed and, as we were only sixteen at the time, Whisky Mac (probably 14% proof - a combination of Whisky and Green Ginger Ale) was the ideal pre-gig tipple.

"Fuck off Graham" I replied when he proferred the syrupy shite, "I've come to watch the band, not end up vomiting all over the audience."

Graham was not to be deterred though as he had renounced society - what with his waist-length blond hair, his Victorian drummer boy's jacket (purchased a few month's earlier on our first trip to Portobello Road) and his packing in of school that very term.

So, as we trundled towards the centre of Manchester on the 76, this scourge of the establishment downs the full bottle.

Miraculously, it appeared he was OK by the time we reached the guy on the doors of the venerable Hall, and this is after a walk of half-a-mile from Piccadilly to the Fields of Peterloo. We edged through the crowds of infinitely older, trendier folk than us. Up and up and up and up and up and up. The Gods they call it. They should've called it something mountainous. I got vertigo and I was sober. God knows what Timothy Leary's Acolyte - in his Hippie zenith experienced.

I can't remember a support act - but it was a long time ago - in fact, I can't find a reference to this gig anywhere on the net. Could it have been a year later or earlier? A different gig? At the Free Trade Hall? I doubt it. Although it was a terrifically long time ago.

Anyway - I remember The Who coming on stage to rapturous applause. I remember (I think) power chords from Townshend. I certainly remember my " best friend" saying "I'm gonna be sick".

We were sat in seats angled at 45 degrees almost. When it came it drenched ten to twenty seats in front us us. I slammed his exploding head down into the footwell. He was strong with the strength that drink-induced projectile-vomiting bestows. Up it came. Time and time and time again. The more I forced his miniscule pate down, the more he reappeared and the more the audience were sprayed.

I don't know how we got out alive - all I know is I wasted my ticket. A ticket I had queued up for hours for.

Years later my "mate" ended up inside for dealing. Like a prick I still visited him in one of Her Majesty's finest.

The hedonistic twat nearly got me arrested but, being the loyal fucker I tend to be.......I still never thought he was takin' the piss. After all, smoking a joint in full view of the guards during a visit was perfectly natural in his world by then - and which "screw" would admit that dope was rife in the establishment he was passing time in?

Until the woman he called his "partner" - the same one I picked up and drove a 400 mile round trip weekend after weekend (with no offer of "petrol money") to see him in his cell - OD'd not long after he was released.

Soon after he phoned up and asked if he could live in my loft.

"You won't know I'm there" he reasoned.

"And where are you going to shit, shave, piss and cook Graham?"

When you have a wife, two kids under the age of fifteen, a job and a mortgage, self-indulgent druggies like the best-mate-I-first-met-on-my-first-day-at-school need to be dropped like stones.

He really did have an intelligence about him that I think a hell of a lot of Grammar School kids from the 60s who ended up doing degrees had. How they dealt with it in the years that followed was another matter. Glass ceilings, Monty Python:-



Happy New Year everbody....Everwhere.....