Boba Wrist

Hello


i am quite aware, look you see, that for some reason the appearance of any and all merchandise related to Boba Fett off of them Space Battles films draws, if not attracts, a most splendid sized audience to this blog. that is, of course, if you define splendid as being big in the large sense. i'm happy to give you more, then, as showcasing what latest commercial exploitation of a character Disney has made to be thrown my way gives me some semblance of justification in making such purchases.

what is this? well, it's Boba Fett. or at least his head, or if you like helmet. with little sticking out aerial thing on too. what this likeness, presented for your satisfaction in Commodore 64 mode, is attached to is a sort of rubber wrist band thing.

i say sort of, when as point of fact it is a rubber wrist band. one that is red, and one which seems to have Star Wars written on it. in respect of the latter point, i am assuming that one of the "chapters" of the sequence of Space Battles was called this. i am not sure; i think one of them was called Voyage Home or something.

there you go, a somewhat non-Commodore 64 mode look at it, if for some reason this type of thing is more your sort of thing. if it is, you probably won't like much of my blog, but anyhow thanks for visiting.

provenance of this latest Boba Fett bit of merchandise? W H Smith, or is it W H Smiths, for the princely sum of £1 as you can see above; reduced from £2.50. no, i didn't go looking for this specifically or any other such merchandising. i just happened to spot it as i went to get the latest edition of The Viz. good edition too, well worth getting.

indeed the above is not Boba Fett, bit it is Space Battles or if you like Star Wars related. it's a new calendar for my shed, and seems to feature "pre-production artwork" or whatever they call it. £3 it cost. it isn't bad, but sadly for it it's just noth the 2016 Greek Erectus Homo calendar what Spiros got me for, erm, last year.

Spiros didn't go to Greece this year. yes, normally he would indeed make a pilgrimage there once a year or if you like annually, so that he may be with like minded men. on leap years, however, he rather likes going to Turkey. although he went to several Turkish Baths none of them sold calendars, which is a bit of a lost marketing opportunity. besides, as he pointed out, he wouldn't have been to get me one as he had no money in his pockets as he wasn't wearing any pants or trousers most of the time.

more Spiros soon, i promise, including an unspecified liquid specimen. but back to thingie for now.

the luxuriant packaging, you may have observed, encourages you to "collect them all" in respect of the various Fighting In Space characters they have bunged onto rubber bands and packaged.

you may well have noted, or further observed, that there's something decidedly in common with the nine, as indeed there is with all marketing. yes, quite right - no human faces are used for marketing. if they used the likeness of people - say Han, Apollo, Starbuck, Luke, Spock or Buzz Lightyear or whatever - then they would have to pay royalties to the actor to whom the appearance by birth belonged.

the idea that they "just use the popular iconic characters and images" from the films is some very clever marketing bullsh!t, then. but well done to them on that front; the day that i have set up as successful and popular business as Disney is the day i shall cast more stones of criticism. 

that said, it still of course remains truly baffling that Boba Fett did not make a guest appearance in Rogue One, or Renegade Ten as it should have been called, as there were (probably) ten of them and they were far more renegade than they were rogue. in terms of the whole Star Wars timeline, he would have fitted in perfectly. also, it would have explained how come Boba Fett and Darth Vader knew each other prior to their first released on-screen meeting. also also, i would totes hire a bounty hunter to track someone down, rather than send a poor general and some thick stormtroopers.

i would say that i trust this has been of interest to fellow Boba Fett enthusiasts, but as it probably has been i in all fairness should most likely not bother.



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

thirty

hello there


yeah, it's one of them posts again. the kind that you can, look you see, count on certain things being a given. i can assure you, for a start that it's the music of one band in particular that i shall be listening to. my favourite band, like totes ever? when all is said and done, without no doubt or even the shadow of it, of course, to be sure.

thirty years ago today, then. Saturday January 10 1987. Manchester G-Mex Arena. Frankie Goes To Hollywood started their second, and as it turned out final, tour. and i was there.

the above represents what remains of the tour jumper that i got at the gig. the t-shirts are all long since gone, but at least one of the other jumpers off of it (ordered at a later date) survived, as we shall see.the front of the jumper had the colourful fists off of the Rage Hard cover on display, with the name of the band as you can see at the top running down the side of it.

my Gran did indeed add the back part and the name front part off of what was left of the jumper onto my boss black denim jacket for me. the skulls were added, somewhat painstakingly, by me after i bought them off of a sort of goth store down town; the name of which escapes me.

why the skulls? well, they looked very Bad News, and so very metal and very smart. but we are not here to discuss the wonders of Bad News as such.

i would suspect i don't need to say as such, but the above is indeed a smart word search sort of thing you are welcome to save, print and complete. it is out of some suspiciously unofficial looking Frankie Goes To Hollywood annual off of 1985, no less.

another thing off it is to come just now, and the answers if you can't be bothered to do it yet for some reason wish to have the solution. more memorabilia first, though.

that's the other jumper, then, the one that i ordered. if i may say so, it's held up rather well over the years, considering it has travelled the world a couple of times and i did, in my more slender days, wear it very frequently.

this jumper has featured on this blog before, and indeed i have been approached with an offer to purchase. no, just no. whilst i like to be generous, and have parted with items such as my Wild At Heart poster, i can't part with this. it's not terminology i would often use, but there's no other way - parting with this would be to carve up and cast aside some of my soul, it would be to give away some of the essence of what made me.

yeah, i know, less of me would be a very good thing for some of you out there, but hey ho.

cor, blimey, the fun and excitement in activities just do not stop on this particular post, do they? sorry that there's no interactive element and that you'd have to answer to yourself or print or what have you; i would not have a clue as to how to "code" or add an actual game you can play here on the blog.

yeah, some of those questions are a doddle, some are tricky. answers in a bit

as is customary on this day, once again a big, big thanks to Uncle Colin for taking me along, all the way to Manchester on a bus, to see my most beloved band. whereas i suspect he probably does not celebrate the anniversary as much as i do, one can but hope he retains fond memories of it.

for Frankie were, no matter what certain parties say, an absolutely amazing proper band, and really well and true "kicked it" live.

yes, that is the front of the jumper. looking rather more faded than the back, and to the right (or maybe the left) there's some sort of streak of a red paint stain on it. can't remember where or when exactly i picked that up, but i do recall being most annoyed by it.

no, i am not going to run through the whole gig again, done that enough times here. i can't even single out highlights for you, because every single damned moment of it is one that i have, evidently, treasured ever since.

well, OK, Ped's laser red light drumsticks on the go for Lunar Bay. doing one of my favourite non-single tracks, The Only Star In Heaven, early on (i think 2nd or 3rd in the set). Paul Rutherford feeling like he was staring straight at me. the heat off of the flame throwers that went off during War. and, well, on and on and on.....

answers? answers.

the annual also featured a competition. you had to draw a Frankie picture and post it in to stand a chance of winning a copy of their album. an album the annual called The Pleasure Dome, which is why i remain somewhat sceptical about just how official the book was. but still, nice puzzles and lovely pictures in it.

by the way, "Frankie Say" is correct. "Frankie Says" is not. Frankie was the group, i.e. a collective, which is to say that the pluralised version was spot on. you could always spot a bootleg t-shirt as it said "says" rather than "say".

a look at my denim jacket in my preferred Commodore 64 mode? of course.

thanks again Gran. i love and look after the jacket, even if it's unlikely that it fits me any longer. no, i have not dared try it on for a while, probably not since the early 90s.

i wish the world still loved Frankie Goes To Hollywood as much as i continue to. they made the world a better, more interesting place. that said, i hope that all of you out there have a band or musician gave you all that which the Frankies gave me.



switch off your shield, switch off and feel...................

21 + VAT

Hi De Hi


OK, this is going to be another one of them tough ones that's pretty hard to write. do bear with me, look you see, and sorry if i do not get the words quite right.

there are many, many things which i am thankful from taking and learning from my Uncle Trevor. the curious title of this blog post is but one of them, and yet probably the one i have used the most.

21 + VAT was his standard, stock answer as and when anyone had the brazen audacity to ask him his age.i have happily and liberally borrowed that. not to use for myself, however - i advise all of the ladies who are faced with a similar cheeky question to respond with those words.

here and now in this post, though, i am happy to share with you some pictures of what was Uncle Trevor's very first ever 21st birthday, or if you like the one which he evidently celebrated tax free.

the above shows Uncle Trevor in mid-celebration with Uncle Colin, to whom i - and all that knew Trevor and are reading this - am and are indebted to for these images. they were in a box of slides which he dropped off for me, and which i subsequently converted into the images which you see here.

it was to have been another 21st, plus an increasingly high level of VAT, that Trevor would have been celebrating on the day today that i publish this. although it remains a day on which we, family and friends, shall continue to celebrate him, it is with deep regret that i say the guest of honour is not in attendance.

after quite an extraordinary, giving life - one which felt like it had so very much more to give and to get - Uncle Trevor passed away recently. to say that we miss him is an understatement, and yet something those who had the distinct pleasure of knowing him will know exactly what i mean by.

as you can undoubtedly determine for yourself from the above images indeed it was on the button with, if not ahead of the pack on, the subject of the fashions of the day. a groovy fella, that's for sure. certainly more groovy than me, but that's not saying a whole lot i suppose.

there's Trevor reading one of what looks like many of the cards he got for this, his one and only tax free 21st birthday. the look of dedication he has in reading it says much about him. outside of the occasional folly all of us are subject to, he never ever took anything for granted and always, always accepted gifts with gratitude. he never expected but always loved it when someone took the time to give him something, and was always by far more appreciative and touched by the thought behind it than whatever it was.

watching on is his Mum, my Gran. it was all too recently that she, too was taken from us in this life. i have no doubt at all that she was there, in whatever comes next, greeting Trevor with a big hug and an infectious smile, but berating him and asking him what the bloody hell he had come along so early for.

soon we shall go through the formalities of laying Trevor to rest. we will not, and cannot, be going though any such action of putting aside memories of him.

the sadness is pretty hard to deal with. as ever, i deal with things by writing, and for some reason share those writings here. i can hear him now, though. get on with it, nephew, he's saying. the greatest joy Uncle Trevor ever had was every single time he made someone laugh and smile. to feel sad right now seems to go against all that he believed in and loved in life, but i just can't help it.

more, some other time, perhaps.

thank you for reading, and thank you, friends and family far and wide, who have been so supportive over the last while.


dig what you dig, love life and all it has to give, and be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!



 

eighty two

howdy


i would not, look you see, be at all surprised to find that there are a few more, but anyway. today, with today being the 8th January, is a day on which two of the most celebrated musical artists, like, totes ever, do, or sadly would, celebrate their birthday.

David Bowie is very much one of them. my blimey goodness, it is a year since we said farewell to him, give or take a few hours. but he's not the subject of the post for the day today. no, the one that i cannot and will not say farewell to, The King, Elvis Presley, is the birthday boy for the day today.

the above, as you can so very clearly see, are two albums off of The King, Elvis Presley. for me, though, they are two albums off of my Mum & Dad. my Dad came across them, so to speak, and has posted them on to me. nice one - very much appreciated, and indeed very well done Royal Mail and whoever else for getting them to me in time for they date of his 82nd birthday.

yes, sure, there's a non-Commodore 64 mode picture on the way, but for now if for some reason you can't work out what they are, they are the deluxe editions of Way Down In The Jungle Room and That's The Way It Is. with the latter very much being something i've wanted for a while.

Elvis - That's The Way It Is as a film is arguably rivalled only by Stop Making Sense featuring Talking Heads as the greatest ever capturing of the essence of an artist at their greatest on film. the movie covers him recording some songs and getting ready for one of his legendary Las Vegas residency stints.

as a record, That's The Way It Is is far more than a simple soundtrack. on this "legacy" edition you get a while show off of one of those residency gigs, but also the songs recorded and a few of the live cuts which partially featured in the film.

if for some reason you've never seen Elvis - That's The Way It Is then it is absolutely totally suggest that you find and have a watch of. as for this album, well, it's superb. the 70s output of The King, Elvis Presley was so extraordinarily brilliant that it would be hard to say just one album personifies the best of the era, but this comes darn close.

Way Down In The Jungle Room features, ostensibly, the final recordings of The King, Elvis Presley. this is true at the least of what we know was recorded and what we know exists. maybe one day more will surface, but for now, as the saying goes, this is it.

provenance or origins of the recordings? i am sure someone else has written it better than me somewhere on the internet, but these recordings hail from 1976. The King, Elvis Presley, was living a somewhat hectic life, with heavy duty performance commitments being a barrier to his recording new materials. the record label elected to install a recording studio in his home, the mythical Jungle Room at Graceland.  

at least i think that Way Down In The Jungle Room is supposed to be representing the final known recordings. i mean, i don't know - the booklet and CD artwork is a little non-committal in this respect. my apologies, then, if these are known to be not the final recordings. for a start, i would wager that there were some more shows after these recordings that got taped.

so is Way Down In The Jungle Room any good? oh goodness me yes. there's always a danger with musicians in assuming that the last recordings are going to be lesser, as that's what they did towards the end of their career. with The King, Elvis Presley, these were all at a time when absolutely no one thought anything other than he would be recording and performing for at least as many decades ahead as he had done that laid behind.

anyway, i need to get on with some top level listening to these records, thanks. your time would probably be better spent doing the same, rather than simply reading of my musings.

thank you very much indeed once again, Mum & Dad - a lovely surprise and exceptionally happily appreciated and welcomed into my collection! and thank you Katie for addressing the envelope!



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

further paint doodles for the year

hello there


i know that quite a few of you have an appreciation for the artistic ambitions of my (considerably) better half. that someone so talented lumbers along in life with me is, look you see, something that i also know several of you ponder.

whilst i cannot answer the latter element above, the former is something i can do some business on, as she's quite kindly passed on a further three doodles of a quasi painty variety for me to place here.

the above, so it says here, is entitled Roseberry by Moonlight, for that is the name which my (considerably) better half gave it. as is her will and right, i suppose, for she did create it. and besides, the name pretty much does what it says on the box.

i suppose these painty doodles are not exactly painty doodles, since paint in the traditional sense did not feature as such. no, these images have all been done on some computer programme, or if you like app, that she found, downloaded and had a mess around with.

Star Gazer, or if you like Stargazer, is the name given to the one above. ooh, i note that both variations on the name meet the exacting, somewhat challenging standards of the spelling checker what i have here on this blog, believe it or not.

what's the name of the app or programme what she has done all these on, then? i have absolutely no idea at all, sorry. i didn't ask, and if i was informed of it i either wasn't listening or have since forgotten. and, presumably, forgotten that i have forgotten. these things happen.

this third and, for now, final painty doodle has been named Sunset At The Beach by my (considerably) better half, assuming that i have the file names all the right way around. which i try to do, to be sure.

it is, as ever, an absolute delight to showcase but a fraction of the many and vast talents which my (considerably) better half has here at her disposal. all i can do is hope that you like what you see too. if not, well hey ho, thanks for looking, and hope there's something out there which you do.

more as and when, dear reader, more as and when.




be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

the snow globe

heya


indeed i do know, look you see, that the gifted trinket of a snow globe is normally something that one would associate with Christmas. Christmas has, depending on how you look at your glass, either just gone or is quite a while away. but we are going to look at a snow globe here anyhow.

not just any snow globe, of course. no, this is a bespoke snow globe. handmade, no less, and sort of, by Spiros. yes, reader, that Spiros.

it would indeed be traditional to have something of a Christmas, or plain winter, theme for the image inside a snow globe. you are correct if you think that. but this is Spiros that made this. his ideas of Christmas, all things festive and stuff to do with winter, differ from the rest.

as i would think you can make out this snow globe what Spiros made, in the loosest sense of made possible, features the likeness of a gent. a profile picture or power shot if you like. and not just of anyone.

before we go on, however, i do appreciate that a snow globe is best shown off via the medium of moving images, or if you like a film, rather than from a stagnant look. to that end, then, for those of you who can play video back off this blog here is a video of the globe of snow in action.

the image, or should i say as you will see images, inside the snow globe are of the former house boy and personal assistant to Spiros, a chap i will not name here. no, no reason not to, i simply cannot be bothered. although yes i would not be able to use the special name Spiros called him by.

in some circles, it is true, the houseboy of Spiros was often referred to as "the Kato Kaelin of Scandinavia", only without the high profile and lucrative frequent appearances on CNN during the 90s. he was a chap with a fondness for measuring men for clothes, and indeed for dismantling without ever quite fixing broken clocks and other such timekeeping devices.

where is the houseboy now? the last Spiros heard was that he'd gone off to be some sort of duck minder, or possibly to be the ostensible lead vocalist in a tribute band to a rather obscure band off of Europe, the name of which escapes me for the moment.

for what reason did Spiros craft this snow globe for me? he happened to wrestle the snow globe off of someone during a fight, i believe, and decided to discard the original pictures in it so that he may place these images you see in. i was quite happy to accept, of course. in particular as some Marlboro was also in the very same package.

anyway, thank you once again Spiros!



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

it's big and it's bland, full of tension and fear

bon adjour, mon fellow avec fashionista gendarmes


wowee, look at that. it seems, going on my quite outrageous opening there, that it is true - being fluent French is a doddle.


at the incredible risk of this becoming one of those "new year, new me" sort of things, i thought for some reason you'd all like to see the road which being a slave to fashion had taken me down thus far into 2017. i have, look you see, acquired some new threads and that, and indeed have once again been busy with my hair.

yes, that's right, as this is all me, me, me or if you like moi, moi, moi in respect of fashions and trends, a good many, or indeed an awful lot, of images of i shall appear here. go get out now, then, whilst you can still clutch to a shallow piece of dignity.

the above image is very much me mid-shave, so to speak. well, as the last few images of me / moi over Christmas have somewhat shown, my beard was getting somewhat out of hand. time to trim it down a bit. yes, beard fans, i shall allow it to all grow back again, no doubt even more greyer than what it was.

what perhaps doesn't come through as clearly as would be usual with the magic of Commodore 64 mode is that this image shows me with my moustache and chin shaved, but with absolutely massive sideburns on the go. yes, indeed, this was an effort to make myself look like a true acolyte to The King, Elvis Presley.

did it work? we shall see later but no. for now, though, a shave does not a fashionista make, and so on we go to see what many a splendid set of threads i now have.

the above is indeed a box of Tokyo Laundry, or if you like 東京洗濯 or if you like even more Tōkyō sentaku branded boxer shorts of the underwear variety. they would indeed normally be an item of clothing far too luxurious and expensive for my wardrobe, but they were on offer at a really splendid price.

no. there will not be a picture of me modelling them, or as it were one of me dressed in them and them alone. whilst there is a somewhat select, small and if i may say so quite perverse group that would very much like to see such a sight, i dare say i would do the world a very great favour by not making such a scene public.

i am, however, perfectly happy to share an image of me wearing the smart new shirt that Spiros sent me, despite the fact that the angle and lighting all seems to accentuate if not highlight how grey my hair would seem to be going around the ear side area of my head.

no, surely, it must be the flash or a trick of the light. my hair cannot be going grey.

yes, indeed, that is the Zama jacket off of Jozi taxi rank i am wearing too. but we've seen and discussed that before, with particular emphasis on the fact that, despite what Zama said, it isn't very good at all in deflecting the crisp (hello, Faye) coldness of the English winter. we are here for the shirt.

Spiros, as enthusiasts of my friend or if you like bum chum are aware, is a very important man. he's the greatest legal mind of his generation, as well as an ace fighter of taxi drivers, and so dresses with some style and finesse. and, dare i say, expense. he has decided that i too should dress so, and thus sent me on a shirt which probably has a monetary value higher than the remainder of my wardrobe combined.

i must say it is a really bloody nice shirt. these expensive clothes do tend to deliver what you pay for, which is a superior cut, skilled seam stitching and a great deal of comfort.

back, then, for a while, to my beard shaving exploits. as i wrote above, but you have probably long since forgotten, i did try and style my sideburns to look like The King, Elvis Presley. i solicited the opinion of the boys about this and their opinion differed from mine somewhat.

they reckon that it looked quite smart all trimmed down as it was, and that i should leave it like that. not because they thought it made me look like The King, Elvis Presley though. no. they said it made me look like that Wolverine bloke off of that film and show, X Men or something like that.

i believe that they meant this in a complimentary way. they are, after all, not to know that the bloke who played Wolverine is Hugh Jackman out of Australia and indeed the film Australia. if i were to wish my hair be compared to anyone out of Australia, it would of course be Jason Donovan. or maybe Merv Hughes.

back to boxer shorts of the underwear variety? sure.

yes, i splurged. some shop called Zaxxon or similar had a massive sale on, offering three sets of pairs for £20, when normally one packet would cost about that. so, i stocked up. the other brand what i bought was called Cross Hatch, i think, and no i shall not be modelling them for pictures on here, thank you.

some of the Millennial type of people in my office have asked if, now that i have a fancy and what they call "proper" phone, i am going to get me on that Tinder or Grinder or Twerker thing. when i asked what exactly that was, i pointed out to them that my (considerably) better half assures me i am as point of fact very happily married. when they say i should just do it "for a laugh", i regret my age shines through, as i would not wish to either be an obstacle to those seeking genuine relationships - be they long or short in terms of term - and nor would i wish to horrify the unsuspecting with a gander at me. so no, thank you, no shots of me in my classy new garments.

what exactly is Spiros up to right now? as the greatest legal mind of his generation he must, of course, take time to unwind and relax. this is not always done via the approach of starting fights with taxi drivers or, for that matter, via meeting men for short term yet mutually beneficial friendships in public lavatory facilities. no, every now and then he quite likes to chance his arm down at a casino.

this would be the modest yet splendid winnings which Spiros has recently obtained whilst tossing the dice of fate and chance. sufficient enough, he assures me, to get some ale in, and indeed to summon a taxi so that he may take a short ride and then give the cabbie and absolute braying with his fists of steel.

where is it that Spiros goes and gets all his fancy, la-de-dah, greatest legal mind of his generation clothes from? Savile Row, of course. or somewhere quite close to it. Spiros has an unusual preoccupation with his inner leg measurement, as it happens, and often goes through to his bespoke tailor of choice to have it all checked. Once or twice a week he is off there, and from time to time he lets me know if the tailor "tickled his Winston" with the tassel on the tape measure, as he words it.

a look at the packaging for my smart new undergarment sort of boxer shorts in Commodore 64 mode? sure.

yes, i am indeed rather looking forward to having these beauties on. it is not so often, to be sure, that my skin makes contact with such pleasantries as designer, branded threads. most of the fashion houses, as it happens, would not care for someone of my size to be seen wearing their clothes, and so they simply do not make items for the more generously proportioned gentleman.

back. to sort of semi finish off this post, to the smart blue shirt off of Spiros, then. here is an image of me excitedly wearing it very early in the morning, long before the sun had elected to rise over our pleasant land.

why blue? a trick of the trade. in terms of psychology, blue tends to generate a sense of trust and confidence in people, which is why so many financial institutions try and weave blue into their branding. it is widely known that a natural affinity towards green is supposed to be a sign of intelligence, so some play on this by branding themselves green, happily taking money off of those who think that they are being clever by using a green branded service. whatever works, baby.

if fortune smiles on me i shall, hopefully, expand in some further, erm, expansion of my wardrobe. it would not, i suspect, be much of a surprise to you to find me updating this blog as and when i do such a thing with a gander at the items of clothing.


thanks, as ever, for reading!



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

some fanny snow fell

hello


waking up in order to head off to verk is, look you see, a somewhat provocative thing at this time of year. some - many, as point of fact - would describe it as depressing. not because of what lies ahead as one earns a living, but rather because we're embellished with so much darkness. i would not wish to state it as fact, but due to our position on the planet and the vagaries of how we rotate about the sun i think at this time of year we only experience some 25% of the daylight we do in summer.

what makes this somewhat slightly less enjoyable is the fact that we are now firmly within the window in which snow may well fall. which, kind of, it did this morning.

the above image does indeed show my car, or if you like 'wheels' or if you like even more 'ride', beautified by the touch of snow. fear not, though, for as the title of this post alludes to it is only fanny snow, and not the proper, hard man stuff.

it was not too surprising that some snow eventually fell upon us. as part of the English way of doing things we have been greeted all but daily with forecasts of "major snow havoc" coming since, oh, October. but of course the moment they stopped forecasting or predicting it, what with weather bureaus being little more than sangomas with technology, it would start.

as i woke and opened the curtains i was greeted with the familiar fluffy white ways of snow gently drifting down past the street lights. oh no, i said. as i looked down around the ground, however, i said oh yes. for whatever reason this snow was not quite so big and clever as it thought it was and thus was not able to dominate the roads or paths too much. it seemed to melt away to nothing upon touching the ground. which, rather thankfully, meant no really treacherous driving conditions had to be faced down.

it did, however, have enough about it to cling to our cars.

i am not convinced you can make this out, but if you stare at the above - like one of them "hidden image" picture things - you might just be able to make out the likeness or visage of one Luke Skywalker. whilst we had no snow warnings we did get news of a massive frost forecast, so i elected to put my boss deflector shield on the car last night in anticipation of it. not as well as could have been done, sadly, as some snow sneaked below it, and formed as frozen ice on the screen. as opposed to, say, boiling ice.

my most dapper and very useful sunroof was pretty much frozen closed by the snow which fell and stayed on the car overnight and through the earlier parts of the day today. i say pretty much, but i have no idea as i did not attempt to engage the mechanism which opens and closes it. sometimes, dear reader, it is enough to just assume, and there is no need to test a notion for factual accuracy.

another look at the Luke Skywalker deflector shield under snow, but only this time in the more stylish format of Commodore 64 mode? surely.

no, the sky wasn't really purple, that's just the sky being made all the more awesome by Commodore 64 mode. although i would confess that yes, no you can't see young Luke any clearer in the above.

indeed i have placed the deflector shield on again this evening, on the off chance that more of this stuff falls. hopefully not, but i suspect that at some point soon we shall have to contend with the stuff in a non-fanny, full force sort of way for a little while.



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

star wars lava lamp

hi there


something of a glance back, look you see, rather than forward. i was browsing certain files held within the many drives of my computer (well, the one) and found some images that i had forgotten about. images and, indeed, a most splendid video.

of the numerous gifts which, in his infinite wisdom, Father Christmas bestowed upon our family, one - or rather two - that would be of some interest in a broader sense would perhaps be some Star Wars branded lava lamp things. whilst there are two in our house, for in the pursuit of fairness both of our children were to receive one, it's just the one of them on display here. i assure you both are the same, and indeed very much do the same job.

yes, as would be standard, the above does indeed show off the glory of the lava lamp in Commodore 64 mode with scan lines most decidedly on. yes, for all you strange people who for some reason do not appreciate the clarity which Commodore 64 mode brings to the world, there are some images below not in this particular format.

some law has somehow been broken in, i suspect, the boys being given these as gifts. the box for the Star Wars lava lamp makes an awful lot of fuss in stressing that it is not some sort of toy, and advises that it is only meant or otherwise intended for use by those who have an age which exceeds 14 years.

we, which is to say my (considerably) better half and i, would like to think we've done as decent enough job of parenting as required that both of our children understand that "lamp" does not equate to "toy". that said, should the constabulary or other such authorities call in i will not hesitate in instructing them that it was all the idea of my (considerably) better half, and that i was too scared to stop her.

there above is indeed the lava lamp of Star Wars in non-Commodore 64 mode for your viewing pleasure, and with the lamp very much doing its thing.

i appreciate that a still image of a lava lamp does not reveal the full wonders or dynamics of what the lamp does. to this end, then, for those of you able to play back video as it features here on this blog, here is the lamp in all sorts of lava action.

as i think you can more or less make out, the movements of the lava lamp of Star Wars features a most splendid sort of space battle. there is a mixture of the ostensible bad guys space rockets and the ostensible good guys space rockets, all floating around as if they were contesting combat.

are they any good? yes, i suppose so. for just south of £20 a pop, they are not what one would call cheap, but are presumably of a reasonable price for something that is a lava lamp and is, further, a Star Wars branded thing. Disney didn't buy Star Wars to be charitable with it, to be sure.

the box off of the lava lamp, so that if you are inclined to own such a splendid thing yourself you know what it is you are looking for? of course.

 

oh, i see it is in fact called a "galaxy battle light" rather than a Star Wars lava lamp, well, same thing, give or take, more or less and so forth.

anyway, if you are a fan of either lava lamps even when they are not called lava lamps, or are in that small bracket of people who for some reason like Star Wars branding, i trust this has been of some passing interest to you. should you happen to be a fan of both lava lamps and Star Wars, well then so much the better.



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

the first painty doodles of the new year

hello there


if i were to begin, or if you like commence, this post with the phrase art for art's sake you would no doubt conclude that i'd watched a most splendid documentary off of the BBC last night about the popular pop band 10cc. as much as i am indebted, look you see to, 50% of the band - Godley and Creme out of the group made, amongst many others, the video for Frankie's Two Tribes - it would be a misleading start to this post, for it has nothing to do with the band, as such.

my (considerably) better half was messing, or if you like mucking, about with her tablet shaped computer thingie yesterday. tablet in the sense of a slate you would write on and not tablet in the form of a pill one would pop, of course. and my, the word pop keeps featuring, or if you like popping up, here in this post.

anyway, she opened up the much revered MS Word program off of Office 365 on it and discovered that there was a picture editor / creator thing included. and so, as is her will and want, she got busy testing out what you could do with it.

which is how the above image came to be about, so to speak. although my (considerably) better half does not consider the picture you see, which is no portrait of me, to be anything special, it is the first artistic work what she has done this year thus far, and so i felt it worthy of sharing.

what is most remarkable, i suppose, is that the picture / painting / doodle thing within Word these days is far more powerful that the much beloved MS Paint program that came with versions of Windows up to and including XP. the version of it that is with Windows 7 is actually very smart and has quite a few features.

another image from the "family selfie" sessions we had upon the stairs of our home recently? sure.

if for some reason you would like a preview or advance notice of a post that is to come, that beard of mine you can see in the image is no more. it was getting all too far long and scraggy, really. so yes, images of the cutting are to be here soon. well, eventually.

right, our most smart new vacuum cleaner thing is absolutely layered with features and functionality. doing the vacuuming unprompted and all by itself is, alas, not of this number. off i go, then, to make merry with the machine.



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

the visit

heya


late last week, or if you like towards the end of last year, we have an extra special visitor to our home. Gran let it be know, look you see, that she wished to visit. and what Gran wants Gran very much gets, thank you very much, and anyone who says otherwise must come at me with such a claim.

mostly the purpose of the visit was, other than to get out and about, to come and see what the boys got for Christmas off of Father Christmas. highlights of these gifts are matters you can see somewhere or other on this blog, in some different corner.

as part of the English way of doing things, however, it would be both an act of folly and downright rude not to offer, and indeed accept, that fine and most splendid beverage that is tea.

oh yes indeed, fancy cup enthusiasts, Gran is very much drinking from perhaps the most splendid and magnificent, if not regal, vessel for tea which we have. it is a chalice off of Woolworths in South Africa, carefully transported all the way here across seas filled with sharks, Somalian pirates and so forth.

no, it is not a cup i have ever used myself. it is reserved exclusively for the more senior members of the family as and when they call in. like, for instance, my Dad should he ever drop in. nothing but the best for him, and this is the one he would complain the least about being handed.

yes of course it was Yorkshire Tea which was served. why would you even ask such a thing, what on earth other sort of tea would you have if something as superior as Yorkshire Tea exists?

anyway, with tea done, onwards to have a look at the gifts of Father Christmas. gifts that the boys were very keen and happy to show off.

the boys dazzled, as you can pretty much see, their great grandma with a vast array of toys off of Star Wars, with them being both from the most recent two, Mission To Moscow and Renegade Ten, or whatever they were all called.

anyway, they were most impressed that their great grandma recognized things off of Star Wars, Darth Vader in particular. they, i believe, forget that there was such a thing as their dad being young, once, and thus do not thing that great grandma had already been through all this Space Battles stuff. it was to be once, famously so, that my Gran stood and queued with me to meet Darth Vader himself, outside of Romer Parish on Linthorpe Road. don't look for it, it's not there any more.

the above is indeed Gran, or if you like the boys' great grandma, having a go with the Jurassic Shed latex and puppet thing of a velociraptor that was delivered. yes, Gran be quite aware of the wonders of Jurassic Park too, she used to watch me try and snatch T-Rex eggs on the Sega Mega CD game.

we had a most splendid afternoon of it all, then. hopefully we shall have chance to do it one day again, soon.

anyway, let me go and have a gander at what this New Year is all about and up to so far. some cold wind and sleety sort of rain for the most part so far, but things change.



be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Faith

Hello


At some point during 2016 – middle of the year rather than the December period - I quite randomly, look you see, fancied having a listen to Faith off of George Michael. As opposed to, say, the album off of The Cure of the same name.

My options for doing this were, as it happens, varied. I could have trawled through my boxes to find my copy of it on CD. This is something I didn’t do, but will get around to for reasons that I shall mention later, if I remember. Also not done was either buying a download or obtaining a less than record industry approved download. The latter would have been somewhat guilt free, since I already own it, but still – it’s nice to have a proper record in your hands.

So, I bought another copy, then. Cheap. Not ₤1 cheap from Pound Land, no – from what I remember I got it as part of a 2 for ₤1.50 deal off of Pound Land, so effectively, if admittedly conditionally, I paid 75p to give it another listen. Bargain, yes, for sure, to be sure, but it still irks me how we’ve all stood back and allowed music to be so devalued.

When did I become aware of the fact that I really rather liked George Michael? The latter days of Wham!, really. After being (as you’d expect a teenage boy, jealous of how teenage girls craved Andrew or George and not them) exceptionally dismissive of the more ultra-pop tunes that made them big, the last couple of singles off the band were ones that would lure any music lover. Or someone with a passion for top vibes. I’m Your Man and Edge Of Heaven were, are, by any standard, amazing. And so I followed to see what he would do next.

Yes, of course, silly, I Want Your Sex was also a very, very good way to lure in as many teenage boys as teenage girls. I recall buying the 7” of it for a dear friend, someone who was a big fan of George but was not allowed to get or buy the record directly. But, that’s not the story here.

I can recall my Mum giving me a funny look and asking if I was sure when I asked, in November 1987, if I could possibly have the George Michael Faith CD for Christmas. I said yes, and could I please have the “picture disc” version of it. If CD was new in 1987 then a picture CD was uber-new. There were, I think, four CDs released in late 1987 which featured the album cover artwork on the disc itself. One of them, I am sure, was Springsteen’s Tunnel Of Love, but all I remember is wanting, and getting that last Christmas my immediate family would all be together in England, the Faith one.

With the sad and, even by 2016 standards, overwhelmingly unexpected passing of George Michael a lot has been written and said of him, his music, his life and his “controversies”. I recall one broadcaster had someone on that they believed was an “expert” on music. This I take it to be as a result of him being stood in a room full of records, for he revealed himself to be a whole level of “expert” I’d not experienced before, as for some reason he declared Listen Without Prejudice Vol 1 to be George’s debut solo record. He, then, is in for quite a treat when he discovers Faith, the record most commonly seen as George Michael’s debut solo album.

Let me see, what could I possibly add to all that’s been written and said of Faith and George Michael over close to 30 years and all the more recently?

There’s always been one thing about the Faith record which I find staggering. It’s perhaps all the more amazing with each passing year, the way the world of music has moved. Of the 9 tracks proper on the LP (the CD featured a bonus remix and a bit off of the 12” of I Want Your Sex), 7 were released as singles. All of them went top ten, I think, and from what I recall at least four topped the USA chart.

This was in a time when for a single to chart people had to go into a shop and buy a physical copy of the record. Allow that to sink in. If you take as fact that Faith was a massive selling album, people who owned the record still went off and bought some 78% of it again to have the singles from it. Did they buy for the b-side? No, from what I remember they were always just instrumentals of the a-side.

Faith is a record you put on and just enjoy from start to finish. Not a lot of records get made that way any more. Back when Faith came out, however, it was the intended – and often successful – aim to do this with every release a band or artist made. For Faith to stand out then, in a time of amazing music being made and released in significant volumes, is perhaps praise enough.

There will be, understandably, a period now where people “stream” the musical legacy of George Michael, or maybe pick up one of the perfectly competent “best of” sets out. I’d encourage those of a mind to do this to rather find a copy of the album Faith, with the CD being arguably the best way to hear it. Not everybody does it, but everybody should.



Be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!