some sort of snoopy car thing

hello there

well, you really wouldn't guess that neither i, nor the boys, are particularly all that bothered about cars, would you? the return of Hot Wheels merchandise here is, look you see, the fault of the Pound Shop - i believe Pound Land to be pedantically specific - for waving this at me, on an aisle i had no business walking down, hidden behind several other items.

what is it? as suggested by the title - one of them "does what it says on the box" moments for you, dear reader - it's a car fashioned in the style of the character of Snoopy off of all that Peanuts and Charlie Brown sort of thing.

i could not resist this, not for the prospect of it being mine in exchange for a £1 coin of money. as it turns out this was somewhat prudent, if not wise, as the global proprietor values it at a somewhat higher cost to the consumer, or if you like member of the general public. oh hell yes, they do indeed have a secret celebrity website, for celebs to buy celeb things, but i cannot give you the link, lest your purchasing decisions be swayed by what the likes of OOoooooOOoh Gary Davies and that twat off of Wet Wet Wet, Marti something, say about products.

oh yes i bought this very much for me, figuring that the boys might in passing have an interest in playing with it momentarily. alas no, both have turned their nose firmly up at it. they are just not that familiar with Snoopy, or Charlie Brown, or any of them really. i think i put a Charlie Brown TV special on once and, as i recall, they simply walked off and did something else.

is this a worldwide trend? i mean, the kids having no interest in Charlie Brown? now that i think on, i suppose, it wasn't a cartoon or concept that featured in my English based childhood years, just whilst in Australia.

more of that in a bit, but first if for some reason you wanted to see a snippet of a cat singing the theme off of that thing with the dragons, Game Of Thrones or whatever, here you go.

that video is off of Ben. he didn't create it, but in order to get it off of him, i have had to give him unrestricted access to all my data on that snap book thing. also, Ben says that i have to remember my Twerker account login details so that he can access it and manage my social media presence for me. so i hope you appreciate the cost, whether you see it as major or minor, of bringing this video to you. 

yeah, this is the back off of that Snoopy car thing, with another of them QR codes. nope, i have no idea what it does; knock yourself out if you are so inclined to have a go at reading it and finding out.

Charlie Brown had a mythical, celebrated status in Australia, from what i remember. all and sundry seemed enamoured and excited by the concept, and yet the actual products were rare. i can recall the daughter of some of our parents' friends had the Snoopy Tennis Nintendo Game & Watch thing, and we kids thought it was the coolest thing ever.

also, i think at an airport in Australia (destination unknown, maybe Brisbane, maybe home), we were bought two Peanuts cartoon books between us. we three, in a rare moment, read them quietly between us on that plane, and i can remember us sitting in the lounge at home in England (cor blimey) reading them again and again, so maybe that is an answer to what flight it was we bought them on. i do sometimes wonder, and often lament, just where oh where did all of those acres of time go? damn you, Einstein, with your fancy "time and space are relative" sh!t. ooh la la.

anyway, yes, i am very happy indeed with my class Snoopy car. it's like the Boba Fett of the Hot Wheels world, i suppose.




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

back to books on the bus

hello there

a post that does what it says on the box, i suppose, and as was alluded to, if not suggested, in my last one that went all Val Kilmer on us. after a few pleasant weeks of listening to some vibes on my travels i opted to return to a spot of reading. with two books completed, time for some reviews, then, look you see.

a look at the books that i read? sure, why not.

a quick, spoiler free review of them? certainly. Skin And Bone seems to be a sequel to a book that i had not read. had i read the first, i doubt i would have read this one, so no harm done. rather good. Normal ticks all the boxes as a contender for the worst novel i have ever encountered and i assumed it made it all the way from some proof reader's desk to publication either "for a laugh" or just to say "f*** you, this is what we think of you" to the book purchasing public.

with that out of the way, then, here's a closer look at both novels. be warned, some, as *** POSSIBLE SPOILERS AWAIT YOU FROM HERE ***. you have, as it were, been advised, so proceed with caution if you think you might want to read either of them with a minimal level of knowledge.

as usual, links appear out of convenience alone. 

first up is Skin And Bone, which as indicated above is apparently at least the second in a series of novels. the first novel is pretty much covered clearly within the first few pages. that first novel sounds very much like the protagonist was subjected to 300 or so pages of torture porn in it, so glad to have missed it, thanks.

plot? a recently returned to work police officer of the lady kind is thrust into a series of peculiar, quite possibly linked, crimes. the most interesting of these is easily the case of a lady who burned to death in a house fire but had strangely seemed to have been frozen first.  not helping the investigations much would be a rather wealthy, somewhat prominent family insisting on being involved, on the suspicion that the frozen then burnt to death lady might be their daughter.

it took me about 100 pages to clock that this was set in Australia. this is a most peculiar setting for a crime novel, in particular one which features rather depraved, disgusting and perverted criminals. Australia, after all, presents itself as quite the blissful, peaceful utopia, hence the rather harsh, draconian perhaps and certainly "we don't like you" approach they take to absolutely anyone who even thinks about going to the country. and even then, as was observed at verk, if the people let you in, every element of nature in Australia seems designed to kill you.

it reads really well, it makes use of some contrived co-incidences to get the plot moving and has some twists and turns that someone like Derek Bowie might describe as "satisfactory". this description makes it sound as though i was indifferent to the novel, whereas as point of fact i found it most agreeable reading. it doesn't get too graphic, despite the cover, but there are some rather unsettling images created. should you be a crime fiction fan, which apparently i am going on the books i seem to select, then i would not hesitate at all in suggesting you give this a try.

sssssh. can you hear that? that's the sound of many thousands of people who have written an average or below average novel, have not been able to get it published and have since discovered that apparently Normal by Graeme Cameron was more worthwhile than whatever they did shaking their heads and tut-tutting in between wiping their tears away. seriously, this is crap, as in i had to frequently check that a professional publisher issued this for sale and it wasn't all some sort of horrid vanity project.

plot? Graeme Cameron doesn't appear to know, and yet you want me to give it to you? an unnamed narrator has built a fancy house with an elaborate dungeon. he keeps kidnapping girls but does not interfere with them. he leaves them in the smart cellar or basement prison he has had built (and then killed the builder), leaves them for a bit, kills them and eats them.

apparently he is quite brilliant at this as he has never been suspected, let alone questioned or caught. but then apparently he is a complete moron, as for no given or even hinted at reason he has a bizarre reaction to the psychological effect one of his most recent captives has. this seems him, like, totally forget how to be a ruthless, brilliant and emotionless kidnapper, killer and eater sort of bloke. he goes, as it were, from being Morrissey off of The Smiths to being Neil Morrissey off of Men Behaving Badly.

if that all sounds like it's some sort of attempt to blatantly combine American Psycho with the novels of Thomas Harris and a dash of English eccentricity, that's probably because that would seem to be the intention that fails so miserably in execution. there is absolutely no rhyme, reason or purpose to anything that happens - no character development, no motivation and ultimately no engagement whatsoever with any character. i have disgraced myself by reading it and i am ashamed that i purchased it.

the only value this novel has, as far as i can ascertain, is to walk around with it on your head. as it simply isn't even worth sh!tting on, you can be assured that all birds will fly upside down when they spot it from the skies and not soil your smart hairstyle or fancy shirt. i note all positive reviews of the book i have found online have a nice little disclaimer at the end, thanking the publisher for the free advance preview copy. either they were eager to please in order to get more freebies, or they simply assumed this was a rough first draft and were being kind.

i appreciate that many people consider me to be a complete and utter twat. usually i don't argue with them, and concede that they are not too far from the truth. that said, some might be inclined to assume that just because i hated this book that it must in fact be good. please don't fall into that trap.

and, with that, a pause once again comes to my reading. i need at least 3 days to read a book on the bus. even when, as has been the case this week, the bus driver gets confused by road closed signs and has to do some fancy reversing. as i am only on the bus for another 2 days this week and then do not board one for another 5 days, back to vibes for a bit.

hopefully these reviews have, at the least, been of some mild interest to one or two of you!



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

some sort of batman car thing

hi there

i would say nothing, really, but that sets an impossible standard to match. the much beloved TV show Seinfeld, a show which i hold dear to my heart, was famously about nothing, really. try as i might, look you see, i doubt i could produce anything of the quality of even the worst, dullest moment of that show. especially not when i have nothing better to post about than some sort of toy car.

a weekend or two ago i picked up some sort of toy Hot Wheels car for William, i think for the prime price of £1.75 or something. as i took pictures of it for no apparent reason and i have absolutely zero other content of consequence for you right now, here, feel free to have a gander.

amazon, the global grocer as it were, would seem happy to sell you a similar version of this for, at time of going to print, considerably more than what i paid for it. knock yourself out if for some reason you would like to own one similar to this. sorry, couldn't find the exact one online anywhere.

yeah, i do get a bit of a panic when i have not posted anything here for 3 or 4 days. sorry about that.

as far as i can work out, this version of the Batmobile, for there are many, is off of something called Batman Live. at first i was confused by this as, to my knowledge, most take it as a given that the caped crusader is very much alive in his adventures. a bit of research suggests it is Live as in live, as in some sort of stage show thing, in which Batman chases after Joker on a suitable stage. think Waiting For Godot with some sort of discernible, actual plot and it's probably like that, i imagine.
 

yeah, this is the back of the packaging if you wanted to see it. nope, no idea what the QR code does. bonus if it works off of this screen you are looking at.

who was the greatest ever Batman? as in, to play him onscreen, and not just do a cartoon voice? well, the only fair way to judge that is by who got to keep the job the longest. so, in order.

1. Adam West
2. That Dude That Played Him In The 40s.
3. Christian Bale
4. Michael Keaton
5. Ben Affleck *
6. George Clooney
7. Val Kilmer

* yet to be determined how long he will play the part, but i fancy by the end of 2016 he will be up to 4th.

it totally and utterly sucks that Batman & Robin ran for 4 minutes longer than Batman Forever. i personally don't like that George Clooney got to be Batman for 4 minutes longer than Val Kilmer as i really, really like Val Kilmer. but, i cannot interfere with science. if any of the actors lower down on the list had been that bit better at the job, they would have kept the job longer and been higher up.

i would be quietly confident that absolutely everyone reading this disagrees with the Batman rankings above, i know i do. but don't blame me - like it's my fault Val Kilmer can't hold a job down?

no promises, but i will do my best to try and make the next post at least interesting. possibly book reviews, looking at the meagre number of pages left in the one i am reading right now.



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

bus vibes #16 - heads, mentals and $tone$

hi there

wow, up to number sixteen already? it's not a problem for me, and i am pretty sure that it isn't for you dear reader. all two of you, look you see. however, if i am to stick with this numbering system, it means that it can only be in another 53 bus trip times that i can listen to Prince, really.

for the more avid, if not devout, reader, you will be aware that i don't start reading new books on the bus on a Friday, for then it is only the Monday that i will return to it and, being a simple man, i would have forgotten what i read. time for the vibes it was, then. the only problem was that i had no idea at all of what i wished to have a listen to.

circumstantially, or if you like as a consequence, to have a listen to Talking Heads seemed, to me, to be an exciting idea. oddly i fancied listening to True Stories, but i hadn't re-added it after the most recent exercise in blanking my ipod off of Apple. it was, then, to be the seminal, celebrated live album The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads. 

this lavish reissue of the album, featuring an absolute stack of songs not on the original tape issue, covers what for many was the greatest period of creativity for the band, stretching from the debut album 77 through to the much cherished, much admired Remain In Light album. this period rather nicely captures my favourite album by the band, Fear Of Music, so not for me to argue. far more accessible, of course, is the other, rather more celebrated live album, Stop Making Sense. either or both would be pretty damned essential listening in my books. and yes, it is rather rare for any artist to do one decent live album, let alone two. they are, frankly, that good live.

my love affair with Talking Heads, one that lasts to this day, began with the song Once In A Lifetime being rather superbly used to bookend the rather superb film Down & Out In Beverly Hills. yeah, Road To Nowhere was a hit that i was aware of before i saw that film, but Once In A Lifetime led me to the Remain In Light album, and indeed Stop Making Sense.

i should probably do a mega, fan-wankery overlong tribute to Talking Heads at some point, i guess. for now, though, it is perhaps sufficient to say that they didn't do a bad album, and it's frustrating that they ceased to be a going concern by the arrival of the 90s. their last album, Naked, suggested that whilst they perhaps didn't have as much to say at the end of the decade as they did at the start, they all the same were saying, or if you like singing, interesting things.

what's that above? oh, just some train tickets. yes, i am going on a journey at some point within the next couple of months. these tickets are really confusing. i mean, why do i have ten separate tickets for one return journey. it looks like some of them i have to show in conjunction with each other or i will not be offered the passage i paid for; whereas some suggest that if i show them to a railway employee it could be that i experience the full rendition experience if they are displeased.

yes, i am indeed sticking with the Commodore 64 mode pictures for here, and indeed the videos off of the proper ipod were taken with my ipod touch for a change. hope you like. 

after selected highlights of The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads, it was on to Mental As Anything, specifically the Cats & Dogs album. which you can only buy as some sort of download thing, i think. although my Dad has the CD somewhere.

how to describe it? a perfect piece of throwaway pop that has endeared and stayed with me for, oh, 33 or so years. they say that the songs you love in your youth are the ones that stay with you forever. yep, can pretty much sing the album for you, although not as well as the band, so rather get their versions than ask for mine.

much like Split Enz, outside of small pockets around the world there is not much love outside of Australia and New Zealand for Mental As Anything. that, i would like to think, is simply because the people, or if you like the kids, simply are not aware of them. they did, of course, get a flash of fame with Live It Up off of Crocodile Dundee around 1986. as great as that song was, however, i will always love this album that bit more.

a snip of my favourite tune? why sure. that would be If You Leave Me, Can I Come Too?. it's just brilliant, it is. here's the intro.

man, i love that dur-dur-dur-durrrrh searing psychedelic bass or guitar on it. i've never worked out if it is the bass or the guitar; i don't care i really just love it.

i have a bit of a dilemma with all this train business, do i not? i mean, it's a fair few hours that i am sat on one, so i expect i will have a bit of a listen to some vibes. do i start off "train vibes" too, then, or something like that?

i have had a look at these tickets a couple of times now, and i am none the wiser as to which i show when, or to who. i think that if anyone at any point asks me for a ticket i shall just hand them all over and tell them that they must decide which one that want to inspect and do whatever the hell they like with.

where is it that i am going? i shall tell you when i have been and gone, thanks. although, as a means of a preview, i believe my travels shall include a visit to a canal of some picturesque value, apparently enhanced by the recent addition of a disused, possibly distressed oil drum.

finally, with it being a friday afternoon that i returned home for the weekend, i went with some Rolling $tone$ for the journey. actually, this is the music of the Rolling Stones, i suppose. it all heralds from a time when money was important, for sure, and certainly earned, but it was not the sole purpose or reason for them doing what they did. is it now? ask Ronnie Wood's selection of divorce lawyers.

Grrr! is the most recent of some 30 best of / greatest hits collections that exist of the band. it is also, i am happy to report, nowhere near as bad as the lame, lousy, this will do name of the compilation suggests.

it's better than the one before it, Forty Licks, for instance, as in this three CD set they have found space for the cracker of a tune that is We Love You. and a nifty one called Heartbreaker, which you can hear a snippet of just now. basically, though, i suppose that when it comes to the Stones, practically anything they did between, say, 1964 and 1981 would qualify for any best of compilation.

you don't really need me to tell you all that much about the Stones, for their life and works have been fairly well recorded all over the place. here, then, as suggested at in the previous paragraph is a snippet of a top, perhaps slightly lesser known, Stones classic.

where, if for some reason you are unaware of the Stones, should you start with their music? basically any compilation you like. i would say the cheapest would probably do, but the $tone$ don't really do cheap releases. for an album, Let It Bleed is my favourite one, easily.

i believe, should i get the requisite or sufficient levels of sleep in advance of it, that on Monday i shall start reading another book. as and when i do have some vibes on the go on the bus, however, i shall surely be sure to post an update here, if for some reason you are interested.



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

the face of body volt

hello there

a post that was not really my idea, look you see. for some reason my chum, Mr J Granville (yes, the celebrated musician, not that i name drop), suggested after my exploits earlier in the week that i should put myself forward as the "face of body volt". as i had nothing particularly more interesting to post here right now, i decided to go with it.

for those of you who cannot be bothered to click on this link right here - and let's be honest, no one is likely to be throwing or if you like casting any stones about that, in truth - i turned to body volt earlier in the week as a sort of crutch.

not a crutch, i suppose. more of a stick sort of thing that one would lean upon for support, and maybe to assist them with walking and other related movement of a civil speed. but you get my point, no point getting hung up on semantics or arguing over the right word.

yes, indeed, that is an image of the body volt in full on Commodore 64 mode with dither on. or, possibly, off. i can't remember, sorry. either way, it looks smart.

body volt has developed something of a cult following at verk this week, as it happens. all and sundry are almost certain that it offers no real benefit, support or help to any form of distress or type of ailment. and yet there remains, lingers perhaps, an incredible lure which sees a number of us want to once again delve into the liquid that is water which has had one of the body volt tablet thingies dissolved in it. the theory, perhaps, is that if you take it often enough then it will have some sort of effect, even if it is but a placebo like one.

do i particularly want to be the face of body volt, as my friend suggested that i should be? it would on one level be an honour if any Slovakian concern requested that i be the face of their product, but in truth i believe the answer is no. however, if i did want to be, and for some reason the producers of Slovakian theoretical energy boosters pursued a form of minimalist advertising which relied heavily on seducing consumers with how things look in Commodore 64 mode, here is how it would look.

there would, no doubt, be a television advertising campaign to go along with the posters as above. most of the generation today cannot handle or tolerate any sort of message which is longer than two seconds, so for them here is the two second version of the advert, should it all ever happen.

for those of us over the age of twenty two, yes, for sure, certainly we are indeed capable of having our attention held for considerably longer than two seconds. in some cases, full attention to an advert has been paid for as long as eight seconds. an advert for that specific market - possibly the actual, likely market for body volt - will be along in a bit.

am i being paid to do this? no. do i actually endorse body volt? no. i mean, i don't have anything against the stuff, but it would not cause me any hardship if someone said i was never to have it again. as far as i know it has yet to cause any significant illness or fatalities, so it's probably fine to use if you want to go down to the pound shop and get some.

if you find the above advert somewhat sultry and a bit sexy in a seductive way, don't worry as that was entirely the intended effect of it. i am very pleased to learn that it worked to that extent, if it indeed worked.

actually i might well get some more of this and give it to Spiros. obviously, if i did do that, i would encourage him - egg him on, so to speak - to have considerably more than the recommended dose of it, just to see what happens. he would be the Bez to my Shaun Ryder, if you like. "go on mate, have another", i will say, assuring him that, honest, nothing will go wrong and even if it did i would call the requisite, relevant medical professionals to attend to his plight.

the eight second advert? certainly.

i don't know if it shows, but i wrote, directed, produced and lensed that all by myself, all in one take. as such i am terribly proud of it. if for some reason i appear sideways in the video, sort of sorry, but that's an issue, or if you like quarrel, between Blogger and Apple products. and your device, presumably, as it looks ok to me.

what sort of reaction am i expecting to this, me being appointed the face of body volt by someone living in Belgium (or wherever) that has never even actually handled the product, let alone has anything to do with it? in truth i think if they ever notice it's possible a cease and desist letter, as well as a takedown notice, might come along from the manufacturers of the stuff.

the other side is, of course, a good deal more scary, in that it has decidedly dangerous implications. if people, be they the manufacturers of body volt or the potential market, look at my life, like what they see, get envious of it and then determine that using body volt is the key to the door that opens up their way of making their own life like my life, they must be in something of a sorry state to begin with and be full worthy of the complete sympathy of anyone.

don't get me wrong with that one. i am of course happy with my life, and things are going on nicely, cheers. i would not, however, hold up my existence as some sort of flag waving celebration of a healthy, well balanced way of living. if for some reason it does in fact seem all healthy and that, well, thank you very much indeed, but i fear i must disagree with you and encourage you to read up somewhat on what healthy actually means in a practical sense.


if you go off and give the body volt life a try after this, please note that i did not, in a very legally binding sense, at any point recommend or endorse such a decision. that's on you, that is, and whatever happens is between you, the pound shop, and whoever it is in Slovakia or wherever that makes it.

should for some reason body volt or anyone else want me to be the face of their product, i can confirm that i do indeed have a price and have no hesitation whatsoever in being a commercial sell out. make an offer, and it does not need one as high as you might think to secure me.


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

a touch of home at home, as it were

hello there

well, that's me sort of back to square one because of me, then. i had this rather brilliant, elaborate plan for my (considerably) better half's imminent birthday, look you see. but then the stuff all arrived way earlier than i thought it might, and it just seemed incredibly mean not to just go right ahead and hand it all over.

by all, well, here is a picture of most of it.

yes, that's right, a whole stash of South African food and drink stuff. well, when i say drinks, cheap coffee and something that in our house shall always be known as "green cola".

be warned, for this post shall contain sentimental hygiene, advice, lament, regret, nostalgia and maybe, if we are all very lucky, one or two words of wisdom which may benefit the more random person browsing the net looking for a word or two on their own trials, tribulations and travels.

on a practical level, for those of you in England, indeed the United Kingdom entire, looking for South African food, save yourself from my headache and just go straight to a website thing called The South African Shop. there are a few to choose from, but this one clearly worked for me.

and when i say worked, i tried hard to find one to take an awful lot of money off of me. i will not name names as i hope they get sorted, but the first site i went to crashed on the shopping trolley, so i could not check out. the second wished to send me an authorization code before it would let me shop. three days later and i am still waiting for it. yes, some businesses bringing SA products to the UK would very much have decided that the SA Post Office business model should come too.

service levels of the place i used? superb. free, next day shipping on orders over £50, and the prices they had on everything were very good - better than or equal to what other stores had, with a discount thrown in if you ordered certain amounts of products. also, from what i could work out, they have a loyalty programme in place which seems to suggest frequent orders will work out very nicely indeed.

not that we will be ordering that often. good comparative prices are one thing, in particular when compared to the cost of importing the products in the first instance. however, it's still an expensive sort of treat thing. this 2l bottle of Creme Soda, for instance, works out at R93 when you translate the £ cost. blimey.

oh yes, this is indeed mielie pap. the 75% of my family that you all like will be having this for breakfast. no, i most certainly will not be - toast and marmalade, thank you very much indeed.

i figured after nearly a year and a half away my (considerably) better half was due some tastes of her home country. this was indeed prompted by the recent great act of generosity by my sister. however, it comes with danger.

one of the greatest bits of advice i ever heard was not directed at me and possibly came many years too late to make an impact. a gent told another that when you move country, just forget all about what was and where you are from, and be that of where you are now. clutching to a past and how things were pretty much stops you from settling in. but that should not stop you from indulging in a taste and a sense of home when you can.

i am, of course, very much at home now. my (considerably) better half and the boys too. with regards to the latter, friends, teachers, relatives and passing strangers speak of the boys in kind words, saying they act, talk and behave like they have lived here their whole lives. that's fantastic, of course, and makes it all far easier for us as we go onwards.

i didn't get quite such an easy ride, really. not that i would change a single thing of how i grew up. well, maybe the peculiar sense of isolation i seem to perpetually have, although in real terms i of course am not alone. i don't think i've had a just blend in, be the same identity since 1981. when i went to Australia i was the English boy, when i returned to England i was the Australian, when i went to South Africa i was the English gent (well, gent-ish), and now back home in England i suspect a few view me as possibly being South African. go figure. perhaps i should just go work for the UN or something.

oh indeed that is Ricoffy you see there. a small jar, for i do not miss it all that much. it was cheap in SA, but not necessarily nasty. it is, i believe the only one of these treats that i shall sample myself. will it give me a peculiar sense of being homesick? i highly doubt that, but i hope it brings back some fond memories. ones that i will, in fairness, have anyway.

the important, if you like overriding thing here is that three people are very, very happy with me in this house at the moment. i am pretty sure they usually are most of the time anyway, but it's nice to be able to do something like this once in a while.

hopefully not too much of this has come over all sad and woe is me, as that was surely not the intention. it's all good, believe me. and i hope this has helped some people looking towards similar shopping!




be lekker to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

bus vibes #15 - the joshua tree

hi there

yes, a return to bus vibes and, most decidedly, one that i suspect will be the least read one that i ever do. it's the title; look you see. today it still remains terribly trendy and with it to dismiss the band U2, and these days you don't actually have to watch, look or listen to something to be dismissive of it and somehow gain credibility via a virtual network. hey ho.

what, regular readers may ask, happened to a return to reading? well i finished a novel this morning, and don't fancy starting a new one with one day of the week at verk left, so some vibes it was to be this afternoon, and shall be tomorrow.

if that's why i was on the vibes this afternoon, why exactly would i go with The Joshua Tree, probably the most played album by me in the last year or so, instead of something new? just felt like it.

i'm not going to bother trying to convince anyone that is determined they hate U2 - Bono in particular - to give them another go, or make any effort to explain that they are wrong. there is every chance, of course, that they are not wrong - dig what you dig, skip what you don't.

so,with that out of the way, i can go off and admire some 9 of the 11 tracks on here. which two tracks do i skip? for the benefit of the haters, so that they may feel that they have had a worthwhile experience reading this, i find Bullet The Blue Sky dull, unimaginative, monotonous and, at its conclusion, cringeworthy. alsoTrip Through Your Wires is just one bloody horrible noise, in which the band seem to pretend to be rednecks.

the album, i think it is fair to say, is best and perhaps most fondly remembered for the first three tracks on it. three astonishing, incredible, brilliant and arguably career defining songs. they would be Where The Streets Have No Name, I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For and With Or Without You. seldom, i think, has a concert been played in the last 28 years by the band that did not feature at least two of those.

all three songs, as is the case with most of the stuff on the album, are astonishing, soul searching and soul bearing statements, touching - for me at the least - nerves which are raw and emotions which are safe, secure perhaps even. damned be this modern world that does not allow musicians the freedom, the backing and the support to be able to craft anything quite like this anymore.

a standout moment for me, however, would be Red Hill Mining Town. and it's that song that i have selected for a somewhat poor quality sample for you to partially enjoy here. recorded off of my ipod touch, no less. yes, i have The Joshua Tree available to me to hear on every device i have.

Bono, or whoever does the lyrics, is my definition, or if you like personification of an exceptional, gifted writer. if for you he is talentless, then how sorely i wish i was nearly as talentless as he is. in a song already rich with vivid, rich and amazing images, he drops this :

i'm hanging on
you're all that's left to hold on to

that's an entire story right there, in a handful of words (give or take). as per my discussions of Accidentally Like A Martyr by Warren Zevon, i am in awe of that genius like ability some writers seem to have to tell so much with so few words. my understanding is that Bono was never able to carry the high notes of this song off live when they worked on sets, and so - somewhat frustratingly - the band has never played this amazing song at a gig. our loss, i say.

tempted to purchase the album to give it another try? good. although i would suggest you be wary of getting anything beyond just the standard version of the record.

the deluxe edition, pictured here, is interesting but far from essential. the interesting part is the DVD of them live in Paris. it was, i believe, recorded only a few months, if not weeks, after the album was released. which is to say U2 were not the biggest thing in the world. it's kind of strange, considering how flamboyant everything got, to watch four lads take to the stage with no props and no expectations from a distinctly indifferent crowd.

also on the DVD is the video for Red Hill Mining Town. it was intended as a single, but apparently the band ditched it because they didn't like this video. oh. 

CD 2 of the deluxe edition, the so-called "bonus disc", holds no lost, previously unknown gems. the best of the b-sides featured long ago on the 2CD set Best 1980-1990, the rest did not for good reason. so yeah, as has been widely reported, Adam, Larry, Bono and Edge really don't need your money enough to justify paying all that much to get this deluxe version. i got it for £15 i think; if you see it at that price go for it, any more rather not.

what will i be giving a listen to tomorrow? no idea. if it's of any consequence i am sure i will make a post of it here for you to enjoy, get angry about, ignore or be indifferent to. whichever it is, with the exception of the ignore one many thanks for reading all the same.




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

for my brother

hello there

well, the day today is, assuming you read it on the day, a pretty big one for my dear brother. it's not that this post exists purely for his amusement, though - thank you for taking the time to read it, and i hope you enjoy the indulgence of a quick look at some things which he has, over the years, considered to be quite class and, at the time and indeed now, declared to be the best thing ever, look you see.

where to begin? well, how about with a bit of television. here you go, here's a quick image from the opening credits of one of his top TV shows.

just what, you may ask, the hell is that? well, it's someone on top of a train, grabbing on to one of them bar things that they only seem to have in America by trains, presumably solely so that people who find themselves on the roof of a train may have something to grab on to.

who is it grabbing away? well, it's a stuntman who is pretending to be Lee Majors, who in turn is pretending to be a stuntman. not pretending, portraying. yeah, it's The Fall Guy.

i confess i did quite like The Fall Guy, but i would not say it is the greatest ever thing to be shown on tv. my brother would take a slightly different view of it to that, hence me today being perfectly happy to put the above clip on here for your entertainment.

for many years as we grew up Richard would write into the celebrated TV show Jim'll Fix It, asking of Jim could fix it for him to jump out of a plane on a bike like what Lee Majors did in The Fall Guy and then like that dude did in the first Cannonball Run film. for many years he lamented that his wish was never fixed; now i suspect it's the case that he's somewhat delighted that the host of that show did not take, as it were, a shine to his request. who knows, if he had put at the end of the letter "i will do anything and i won't tell, honest, even when you are dead", he may have had his wish granted.

one of my fondest memories of growing up was the three of us sat around the most celebrated video game machine in history. yes, the Atari. people born after the 80s can surely have no idea how revolutionary this device was.

oh yes, that is indeed Pac Man. Richard was absolutely boss at it. Gillian and i usually sat around watching Richard play it. he had the skill, ability and patience to polish off maze after maze on this game, hour after hour. quite a talent, really. i was awful at it.

as. mostly, you can see in this video i made of me having a go earlier.

there's no doubting that games now are somewhat different. i do, however, rather miss the simple and basic pleasures of this sort of game - ones at the time which seemed like the greatest things ever.

so, if The Fall Guy was a much celebrated TV show by Richard, what then would be the film that he considers the greatest ever work of art what cinema has produced? this one has a fairly simple answer.

oh yes, it is indeed Convoy. we had a video of it that was recorded off of the tele in Australia. we watched it again and again, we did, both in Australia and back in England. of us all, Richard took quite the shine to it, and was often prone to recreating the convoy experience by going off on his BMX with his mates and riding in a convoy. whether other people on the road appreciated it or not.

a snippet from the opening credits? surely.

i think i am right in saying that Convoy is the only time in modern history that an entire film has been based on a 3 minute pop song. i mean, sure, there is Tommy, but that's a film based on a rock opera of an album.

it is a rather smart film, when all is said and done. worth watching if for some reason you've not seen it, and worth watching again if you have.

another Atari classic? oh, go on then. i think i would be right in saying that this one is one that Richard and i had an equal level of respect and love for. absolutely brilliant, it both was and shall always be.

River Raid was probably the most advanced game we had on the Atari. it also required some skill, as there were a few very narrow stretches of water you had to navigate to blow up boats and helicopters. if you were skilled enough - which we were - you could fly over the fuel to fill your tank, right, and then still shoot it so you got the 100 points for blowing it up.

oh go on then, a little video clip showing off the spectacular sound and gorgeous graphics.

we could never understand, right, why if you were in a plane - known as they are for being in the sky - you could only fly over the river. if you tried to fly over the land on the side - if you like the grass embankments - you crashed and blew up. i am sure this made sense to someone at Atari in Japan, or wherever.

well, this has all brought back some very fond memories for me, and hopefully for Richard too. if it has done the same for you too, dear reader, well then so much the better.




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

the purple barrier

hello there

these pictures are, as point of fact, mostly from Monday. except, look you see, the ones that i took yesterday, which was Tuesday. unless i am very much mistaken. sorry, you of this generation that want everything instantly, that it took so long to get them posted, then.

what are all these pictures of, then? well, there's a hint to a hefty percentage in the title, but let us rather have a bit of a gander instead of speculating and discussing, dear reader.

here's something unusual to start - yeah, a selfie.

indeed, vanity would usually prevent me for sharing a picture which suggested hints of a double, perhaps triple, chin that i have on the go, but i quite like this one. i feel as though i have the sort of aggressive stance on the go that Daltrey did at gigs with The Who. and blimey, that hair and beard of mine is going all the more grey these days.

but, you didn't want my quasi narcissism here; you were promised purple barriers and here is your first look at those purple barriers.

this pic has come out rather well, considering it was taken with my bluebbery in zoom mode from an office window at verk. as you can see, they are a mighty shade of purple, them barriers are.

what do i think about them purple barriers? if i wrote of that now, i would have nothing to say later, when they feature again. scroll down if you are all that bothered, i suppose. 

speaking of being all that bothered, some of you were quite interested to know more details about the items i got in the post yesterday, specifically the unsolicited yet very welcome items of pornography from Spiros.

whereas i am not going to post the rather more obscene elements of what Spiros sent me i feel it is safe to show this extract off of the Sunday Sport. he was rather keen for me to see it.

as i think you can make out, this is a story of a TV show that's all about people in Russia getting very drunk (who'd have thought) and going off fishing. the article suggests that a British version of the show will be made in the near future, to be shown "late night on Dave or something".

Spiros is very, very excited about all of this. to the best of my knowledge he is gloriously indifferent to the world of fishing, but he is rather enthusiastic about alcohol. also, the idea of falling into an unspecified body of water whilst sh!tfaced has always been an ambition of his. to this end, then, he has proposed that we get a head start on this TV show. should i ever go to visit him in the city he has given me every assurance that he has found some splendid canals by which we can get drunk and then attempt to fish in. i, as you can imagine, dear reader, cannot wait.

Monday, oddly, was the kind of challenge for me that pretty much every day must be for Spiros. no, i did not have a raging hangover, or soiled strides, but i did have a remarkable lack of sleep. a lack of sleep with good reason, but all has turned out well so there is no need to discuss that further.

i did need some assistance, however, to get through the day at verk. i thought about getting some fancy vitamin supplements or something - Berocca, i think they call it. i then, however, thought that Pound Land would have something similar at a considerably lesser cost. to this end, as you can see, they did.

Body Volt, coming from some sort of unspecified, presumably eastern European country (i think maybe Slovakia) is marvellous stuff. and an absolute bargain too, as this tube contains 20 fizzy tablet things that you dissolve in water for the cost of £1. when it comes to medicines, or health, i am a firm believer in going as cheap as humanly possible for myself, whilst sparing no expense whatsoever for the other 75% of the family; which are the members of my family that you all, i am quite aware, like a good deal more than me. that's not really an issue, i would be inclined to agree with that point of view, really.

back to the purple barriers you say? fine, no problem. here is another look at them, only this time taken outside, and indeed taken very much at ground level. sea level, if you like, although you can't actually see the sea in this picture.

what do i think of purple barriers? mostly i think they are smart. they are eye catching, distinct and distinguished and certainly stand out. they are clearly purple as some sort of branding exercise, and as a consequence would, you would think, be easy to identify if stolen. not that we considered stealing them, honest.

also, though, purple barriers are a silly and, frankly, f****** dangerous idea. the idea of a barrier is to keep people away from danger. a significant part of that working, you would think, is them being visible. at night, i would wager, purple barriers are not quite as visible as those crappy orange or magnificent yellow ones most companies tend to use.

speaking of danger, verk. no, as a standard part of my job i am not usually exposed to danger. which can, as you can surely appreciate, sometimes make things a little dull. so we create our own danger.

oh yes, what you are seeing here is what you are seeing. it's a live, armed, fully operational (plugged in) toaster, right next to two bathrooms which can produce as much water as you like. also, the carpets have been soaked in water for good measure.

yes, putting a warning up is cheating a bit, i suppose, but there you have it.

did anyone, you may ask, have harm befall them? were warnings ignored and someone went ahead and activated, or if you like detonated, the toaster? was the herd trimmed?

as far as i am aware, and do forgive the dramatic pause i have inserted by starting a new paragraph, absolutely no one fell for this cunning, devious yet utterly, utterly brilliant trap. the day after this image saw no signs of an explosion or burnt flesh. a failure? yes, no, maybe. perhaps we shall try and lure someone in with it again, or perhaps we shall simply obey all that health and safety stuff.

another look at that drunk fishing stuff? sure, why not.

i am, i suppose, looking forward to doing all of this with Spiros. i really think, though, that he is using it as yet another exciting means to meet men who like the sort of things that men do with men that he likes.
 
the other items that Spiros sent me - the ones that shall not feature here - mostly involved a password for a website. on that website, i quickly found, i could - if i so wished - watch videos of ladies bathing, or if you like washing, certain parts of their body that normally you would think they would opt to do in private.
 

back, to end, then, to this magnificent Body Volt stuff that i got off of Pound Shop.

did it help me? yes, no, maybe. i got through the day OK, and if this stuff helped, well then so much the better.

i am not really a selfish type, and so was quite happy to share with my colleagues. few dared try them, but those that did had some interesting insights.

one colleague, a professional raver, likened the experience of drinking it to how, obviously in his imagination as he would not do anything illegal, it would feel if one were rushing away on some sort of pill or powder based narcotics designed to enhance the rave experience.

another said that the ingredients, which you can sort of make out here, are basically the same stuff that, i mis-quote somewhat, "what they give in them tablets to people who have got AIDS". i am unfamiliar with what goes into such tablets, alas, but do feel free to read the ingredients on the tube that you can see here and determine, if not ascertain, for yourself if that is indeed the case. if it is, well then bravo to Pound Land for making them available at such an attractive, accessible price level.

right, that shall do for this post, then. sort of sorry if anyone has taken any sort of offence to anything in this post, or any from the last 11 years, but hey ho, do try and learn to take some things with a pinch of salt, and indeed simply ignore or disregard anything that causes you upset.



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

our sincere apologies

hello there

today i received not one, not three, but two interesting items in the post today, look you see. well actually yes three if you include yet another catalogue from Royal Mail, but i do not find that particularly interesting.

one of the two items, which i am going to decline to show you here, was an unsolicited item of pornography from Spiros. as a nice touch, Spiros had drawn an absolutely massive penis on the envelope too, although someone had made the gesture of an effort to cross it out.

the other item, to which the sender had interestingly, perhaps wittily, seemed to change my name to "Sara Lee" on the address bit, was a battlefield of confusion and contradiction. the sender, and this will be no surprise to most of you that know him (for it is a he) had opted to use insufficient value postage stamps on the item. hence the yellow sticker.

before we go into the dirty, nitty gritty elements of what exactly it is, oh yes you are seeing right. because the sender, twat that he is, tried to short change Royal Mail by 20p, they were apparently of a mind to charge me not only the 20p in question, but a further £1 as a "handling fee". cheers for that. but hang on, what's that i wrote - that they were of a mind to charge me? i imagine that is what the sticker is all about, but they certainly did not charge me this. and no, i didn't kick off and argue with them to get it delivered at no cost at all to me.

what was in the parcel? why, it was some "exclusive" artwork for the new President Ray Gun single / ep / we got itchy in the studio and recorded something. their second, as point of fact. i am on first name terms with their bass player, you know. bass player and, i note from the artwork, the synth player too.

how is it that i came to get all this class artwork for Vaporizer, the title of the release which is not a title of any of the songs on the release? quite simple, really. the bass and synth king of the band misjudged the demand for the new single and artwork by - i kid you not - precisely 1000%. yes, one thousand percent. a bit ambitious, and that is not to be faulted. so as a consequence of this ambition, it seems the most loyal and most dedicated of President Ray Gun fans, "Rayyers" if you like, since "Gunners" is used by football fans in London, are being rewarded with as many copies of the artwork as the bass king can shove in an envelope.

the amount of copies of the cover that the bass supremacist could shove in an envelope evidently exceeded the restrictions imposed by the value of the stamp he placed on the aforementioned envelope. so how is it, then, that i still came to receive this somewhat spectacular package?

the one side of the padded envelope (nice touch) was torn, so it all arrived in a swanky plastic bag, as you can see here. Royal Mail have thus offered their sincere apologies about this. yes, it is a good and fair question, that is - are the apologies limited to the envelope being damaged, or does it include an apology for delivering President Ray Gun stuff to me?

that is indeed an unmarked, yet used, blank CD off of Tesco. it was in the envelope to. theoretically it is probably a copy of the new single / ep thing. if it is, that's interesting, as i did not request or order it, and i am f****** positive that i did not pay for it.

i think his inclusion of this disc is some sort of sign that he hopes, or expects, that i will play the music on it and comment on it in a positive, encouraging way. i am not sure that this is going to happen. i mean, yes if i had actually asked for the music, but i hadn't - i just wanted some of the artwork that he was offering to send to the, as it were, fans.

also, i have no confirmation that it is the music of President Ray Gun (which, if you ignore the bass and now the synth you will find is actually pretty good) is in fact on this CD. it could all be one of those entrapment set up sort of things, designed to send me off to spend time on the Jimmy Savile ward of the nearest police station.

i have absolutely no idea what else to say about this except thanks, i guess, to all involved in getting this through to me. it is greatly appreciated and i will treasure it.



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

win 5-0 and there is nothing to see here

hello there

every now and then i will do a post about that sport that i love above all others - cricket. credit or condemn that as you will to some early formative years in Australia, a place where there is cricket and then there is everything else which needs doing when there is no cricket on.

today was a pretty big day for the realm of English cricket. Andrew Strauss, bewilderingly now England's "director of cricket" (the last i heard was that his ambition was to stand as a Conservative candidate to become an MP), has announced that there is no return for Kevin Pietersen. the door to his being selected again has been firmly closed, despite Kevin Pietersen doing not just what was asked of him to win his place back but considerably more.

it's interesting that Strauss cited "trust issues" as being the reason for Kevin Pietersen having his career finished. i am sure there are trust issues, but not quite how Strauss paints it.

beyond the news of Pietersen not being selected ever again somehow being leaked to the media before he was told, there was this gem of an incident.

yes, i would be fairly certain that the above is the only time that someone has used that word on television and gone on to become the director of the sport he was ostensibly commenting on.

Strauss was of course rather referring to the time Pietersen sent text messages to, arguably the single biggest dickhead ever to play cricket, Graeme Smith. text messages that Pietersen was quite in the wrong to do. be friends with whoever you want off the pitch - especially your opponents in the gentleman's game of cricket. but when you are actually in the middle of a Test against them, i don't think so.

there are already acres of text about this matter across the internet, and many acres more to come. i will try and be as quick as i can, then. Andrew Strauss needs to be proved right in this decision. for that to happen, best England beat Australia in the Ashes 5-0 this year. when you select a team - any team - it's really as simple as selecting players you believe would be capable of beating the opponents comprehensively. i, and many others, would consider Kevin Pietersen a player that could be part of such a team.

the Australians call Kevin Pietersen FIG JAM, as in "f*** i'm good, just ask me". what many forget is that this is intended as something of a compliment. many Australians have pointed out what a good cricketer he is, and very few non-Australians ever get that accolade from an Australian.

i hope, for the sake of the England cricket side, that Strauss has this right and we go ahead and win the Ashes 5-0. that said, it will be interesting to see what happens if, by chance, Australia win the first two Tests within 3 days.


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

socks

hello there

as the title of this post suggests, what's on offer here is, for the most part, socks. no, that's not a euphemism or anything sordid like that, i do mean socks as one would wear on their feet. if, look you see, they had feet upon which to wear them.

socks to you, normal person, might be a rather straightforward, fuss free and relatively easy matter of necessity. not so much for me, dear reader. i have size 13 feet and, for the most part, socks are designed to fit a maximum capacity of a size 12 foot. this means that, normally, i must wear socks which are somewhat tight on my feet. no more, thanks to that nice man Mike Ashley and his Sports Direct shop. he had some socks in stock that go north of suitability for my size. nice one.

Mike Ashley is of course, for many football fans, a man that should be referred to - indeed knighted as - Mike Goldfinger, for he truly has the midas touch. football purists, from Sunderland all the way through to Middlesbrough, are in awe of the sterling job he has done with Newcastle United. we are all slightly jealous of him doing to the team that which we wish we could; but all the same we wish for him nothing less than many more decades of doing what he is doing.

for me, giving money to Mike Ashley via Sports Direct is exciting. i get to live the dream. every penny i give to Sports Direct has the potential to be used towards hiring a legend of football, be it Dennis Wise or Joe Kinnear, to serve Newcastle with honour and distinction. to that end, then, i also bought some rather fetching new size 13 boots of a sort of hiking and walking around nature.

yeah, Dunlop ones. they do the tyres and that, which are known for the most part for being for road surface use, so they must be really smart at making shoes and things for your feet too. wonky logic, perhaps, but logic all the same.

indeed this is one of those posts that i have composed, for the most part, to let the regular readers know that i am around. every now and then, right, when i have not posted for a couple of days, i feel an obligation to do so, even if i don't have that much of interest for the general population.

like, for instance, when i feel a need to show off a fancy new wireless mouse that i bought. yes it is indeed a Trust branded mouse, but as you can see i angled the flash so it blocked that out so it did not seem like i was endorsing them.

how am i getting along with my wireless keyboard and mouse? pretty much OK. there was a bit of an incident this morning with the mouse, right, where i couldn't switch it on. put it down to fatigue or being really tired if you are of a mind to be kind, but as it turned out i was just being a great big fanny and not pushing the "on" switch all the way to "on", so as far as the mouse was concerned it was not, as point of fact, "on". my (considerably) better half was somewhat less of a fanny whilst i was out at verk and had a fiddle with it. it was she who discovered that i was being a fanny and put it on properly.

i have decided on a course of action in this respect. as Pound Land charge a mere £1 for a pack of 8, 11 or 12 (never 10, for some obscure reason) AAA batteries, as in the kind this mouse needs, i am just going to leave the power button set to "on". the sleep mode seems pretty good anyway. 

do them fancy new boot things of mine have, by any chance, a steel toe at all? why yes, dear reader, look. it says so on the front. i think that's a nice touch, having it written there. when you think about it, the circumstances under which someone would be reading that is at a point when they are likely to discover that they do, as it were, have steel in them.

yes, indeed i do miss certain friends from my former place of verk, one that i can hardly believe i left over 2 years ago, when i have such fancy new boots. Zama in particular, from what i recall, was always happy, eager and excited to test the patience of any heavy duty boots that i had just obtained.

how will i test the patience, indeed temperance, of these boots? a good question. thus far the boys have been most and splendidly kind in testing them in one way for me. when they see that i have them on they view it as their cue to take a foot each, jump up and down on it and ask if i can feel it or, more pointedly, if it hurts. so far no, it has not hurt, no matter how hard or frequently they choose to jump. very kind of them indeed, i am sure you will agree. and, no doubt, congratulate them on their efforts to try and induce a little bit of pain and suffering with my otherwise, for the most part, wait for it, equilibrium like relaxed and at one with all kind of lifestyle that i try to have.

but, dear reader, the velocity must be tested. i must test these boots in an impact sense by hurtling them, as they are upon my feet, as fast as i can at a soft, almost fleshy like surface. perhaps very much fleshy, covered with an armour of regular clothing. i shall, over the next eight to ten weeks, make the effort to travel to some sort of metropolitan place - a city, if you will - and see if i cannot test them properly.

another look at my socks, only with a £10 note for purposes of scale? why surely.

i have indeed, regular reader, gone back to reading on the bus - a somewhat interesting novel that i had no idea was Australian until Sydney featured, as it happens. this means that the celebrated, well read (thank you) bus vibes posts are taking a break for a short while. but i suspect they will return.

well, that will do. i should very seriously, as some of you shall be aware, get an early night tonight. towards bed, then, is where i shall soon be heading.

i trust that all is well with you, wherever you are and whoever you are. and many thanks once more for taking the time to read this.



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