Showing posts with label Saturday. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Saturday. Show all posts

Saturday, 8 August 2020

Homework - #AnimalAugust #5


This week has been another working from home. Using Microsoft Teams means that you can contact people when they are at work so it's not a problem and you don't feel isolated.

This week has also allowed me to listen to a lot of CDs including some that are for sale on Discogs because I don't really play them all that much , although ironically my sale pile is the closest CD group to my CD player. The reason for this is that generally  I am finding 6Music a bit samey , although the DJ banter makes you feel you are with somebody and you do hear new music which is a great reason for listening to the radio.

The Cds I went through include "The Raven" by Lou Reed and the first Stone Roses album, plus a Fotheringay box set  (I am fairly eclectic which you know if you follow this blog, but that's only half a dozen people). Also for the #AnimalAugust we will go for a live take of "The Raven" by Lou Reed based on the writings of Edgar Allen Poe.

On the book front I have finished "Everville" and while it is an excellent book it left a lot of unanswered threads, possibly ripe for a third book of the series. I am now rereading "The Lost" by Jonathan Aycliffe which is a bit lighter than his normal stuff with some wry black humour similar to the recent BBC take on "Dracula".

The weather is good so enjoy your Saturday.

Saturday, 26 October 2019

Charged - #Oktoberfest #31 - Cigarettes and Alcohol - Oasis


A weird thing , last night I switched my phone (a Google Pixel) off and put it on charge. It is always good to switch the off at some point, I do not understand people who sleep with their phone's next to their bed (unless you are on call for something) but it was about 20% charged when I went to bed last night. Switched it on this morning and it was on 2% , yes that's 2%. So although it was off, therefore not doing anything , even if it hadn't been plugged in to charge, it should have still been around 20%, so that is just a little disconcerting. It is on charge now, and though it says it's charging slowly, it's sitting at 60% charged.

I got the PIxel on the recommendation of my youngest daughter Kirsty who pointed out that you don't get all the phone brand crap that you don't want and by going on to SIM only with EE (who still are probably the best network to be with as they are reliable , fast, and have good customer service despite the awful Kevin Bacon adverts , they need to get Brennan Brown and Steve Furst back who did the amazing classy ads for Orange also check here but one of my faves was the Elton John one advertising the dawn of 3G here)

So continuing #Oktoberfest and another reserve is "Cigarettes and Alcohol" by Oasis. Oasis always annoyed me as mouthy Mancs and Beatles rip off merchants, but they actually came up with a handful of decent tunes and this one is OK.

So have a good Saturday everyone.

Saturday, 28 September 2019

More Words


I could have had a one word post title but was getting a bit bored with single word ones and the chane is that I will duplicate something, although that is always a probability.

Today is grey, wet and we have had a lot of rain, it's not even a nice Autumn day, just a drab grey day although it's always up to us to make something of the days that come our way. While sometimes we might feel hard done by I always try to look for the positives in any situation ( well as long as the situation is not really disastrous)  and you can usually find something to be positive about, well I do.

I am listening to Radcliffe and Maconie and they're playing "Future Days" by Can which is a laid back almost hypnotic stretch and I was thinking of including it here, but maybe not. I do remember watching Top of the Pops as a teenager and being shocked when Can were on there playing "I Want More", now that I would share but it's not available on Youtube (the Top of the Pops performance).

I was just thinking I done over 2K posts on this particular blog, and average, these days maybe 250 words a post (I did one of 2K words just to see if I could write that was back in 2011 here and very contrived  but my first one, a sort of mission statement for this blog was about 50 words here) so that is about half a million words that have flowed from my fingers, enough for a very short novel if it made any sense.

I was vaguely thinking of theming my October posts on drink because of the Octoberfest celebration, although I don't actually drink. So here's the thing I will do a post a day and there will be a song included that is drink related although it will be mostly alcohol related it will be anything that you can drink , so that will be thirty one drink related posts . By the way this post is about four hundred words (you can count them).

So what music should we go with, well "I'm Writing A Novel" by Father John Misty seems appropriate, although I am still hoping that inspiration will turn up and I will actually metaphorically put pen to paper and get my arse in gear to produce a pice of lasting art, although in a way tht's what this blog is.

Saturday, 14 September 2019

Morning


Is Saturday better than Friday? Friday has the anticipation of the two day weekend combined with the fact that it's the last day of work , whereas Saturday you can get up when you want , you don't have to go to work but you only have one more day before Monday comes around. This is not true for many people who work in retail, banks , call centres and the like so apologies to all those.

I once read of an American car shop who noticed that most of their sales came on Friday afternoon and Saturday so they changed their working week from Monday to Friday to Friday to Monday (that doesn't seem to make sense but it does) so employees went from a five day week to a four day week for the same pay and profits increased. This model wouldn't work for everything but is definitely an example of how you should always look to improve situations in a way that benefits everybody.

As I said I finished "Brief Answers To The Big Questions", the final Stephen Hawking book in around a week and it is a very interesting, easy and thought provoking read which I would recommend to everybody. My next book is going to be "The God Delusion" by Richard Dawkins, a far heavier tome but I do like Dawkins' sensible and logical arguments although he does, ironically, get a bit evangelical at times. Still I will see how it goes.

I;ve been enjoying the single "Ibtihaj" by Rapsody with GZA . I though "Ibtihaj" was some kind of acronym but it's actually the name of Ibtihaj Muhammad, the first female Muslim-American athlete to earn a medal at the Olympics. The chorus, male backing vocals sounds like a eerie Bowie song like say "The Bewlay Brothers". It is a great sound and I heard it again on Radcliffe and Maconie on 6Music this morning but Chris Hawkins has also been playing it.

Take a listen and definitely check out the books.

Enjoy your Saturday.

Saturday, 27 April 2019

#AprilSongs #27 Saturday Night's (Alright for Fighting)


I originally was going to choose "Book of Saturday" by King Crimson for this but I had got it mixed up with "The Great Deceiver" (this is an acoustic reinterpretation and is rather good but you get the idea) from "Starless and Bible Black" ( What a wonderful and perfect description of dark night from "Under Milkwood" by Dylan Thomas) but the two songs could not be more different, the former in my opinion being fairly insipid while the latter is a brass assault and brilliant album opener. They are both on Youtube so you can check them out.

So then I though well "Saturday Night's (Alright for Fighting)" is one of Elton John's best and maybe a little obvious, but has some great lyrics and one of my favourite couplets:

"I'm a juvenile product of the working class 
Whose best friend floats in the bottom of a glass"

I've found an excellent 1984 live take which shows how good Elton John can be. This is the final #AprilSongs Saturday song and the whole sequence will be complete on the first of May.

Last I night I went to see Half Man Half Biscuit at The Boiler Shop and it was an amazing gig at a great venue. I managed to meet two people who I knew but had forgotten. The first was Clare (I don't know if that is the correct spelling as there are so many ways to spell the name)  from the Glamorous Owl (and if you want to partake in one of their excellent ring making workshops you get 20% off on the site) and I managed to compound my ignorance by not realising she had the names of the band on her T Shirt. She was with Victoria (who now lives in Liverpool) and a very affable Anarchist who I have probably seen at the Black Bull.

The other person was someone I have worked with, but it must be at least fifteen years back, but he recognised me but we had about two minutes at the bar.

Anyway have an enjoyable Saturday, I am off to Edinburgh.