Showing posts with label Time. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Time. Show all posts

Wednesday, 10 March 2021

Making Time

How often do you think "Where's The Time Gone?". As we get older time seems to go faster but that's because we see it as relative to out age. When I was 6 I got six weeks summer holidays from school. That was a week for every year of my life, it seemed like forever to me and when I hit grammar school it was eight weeks. The equivalent holiday time now based on my age would be over a year.

I don't regard time spent watching a program I want to watch as wasted, but often we just sit and channel hop finding nothing and suddenly a few hours have disappeared. It's similar with phones , computers and web based devices, time just disappears.

I regard listening to music , reading , watching TV series I enjoy as time spent well, and it's always good to look at what you want to do and then you do not feel your time is wasted, because whatever you do , it takes time. There is no getting away from that.

This morning I walked seven miles and that took me three hours , but it is my way of exercising and I listened to a few albums even though it was raining. Today is part of me using up my annual leave but I am not wasting it and will be seeing my granddaughter Alexis this afternoon.

I have done sixteen thousand steps so far, but to hit the twenty six mile marathon total I would have to do that three more times and I don't think I could commit to that on a normal day.

So always find something to do , even if it's jus to rest and relax and take things easy. That should prepare you for when you need to do something that involves planning and effort.

Friday, 5 March 2021

Two A.M. Too Late or Too Early?

Thanks to virtually a week off , last night I stayed up while 1:30 AM , I think I could have stayed up all night , not sure how I would have felt today but isn't that why party animals only get up in the afternoon , which then means it's easy to stay up all night,

Now if you are partying or at a rave the question in the title doesn't matter , but if you are just at home is 2 AM too late or too early to watch a film , make some coffee or tea or a bacon butty.

I have the dates for my COVID injections and the systems , while a couple of glitches went through fairly quickly , unlike almost all the contracts outsourced to the government's mates and cronies.

I had planned to try a marathon this week , but the thought of maybe spending 12 hours to do 60K steps in 12 hours  in cold weather somehow lost it's appeal. At some point I will go to top my 15.5  miles but that may be at the end of March , but even then it may not happen, we shall see.

I have listened to a lot of music this week and still written nothing . I really need to learn how to use my simple Kindle recording studio as I can't get anything that links up to my computer to use Audacity to record it.

This week's vinyl included Alice Cooper's "School's Out" and maybe their finest album "Killer" , as well has Hawkwind's "XIn Search of Space" and "Space ritual" and as I write this I am listening to "This Time It's Personal" the excellent covers album by Hugh Cornwell and Dr John Cooper Clarke.

But I will share , what is in my opinion Alice Cooper's finest song , the amazing "Halo of Flies" , love the image the title conjures up and the song is eight minutes of aural adventure. I also found this cover's band Pretties For You NYC doing a cover which I also have to share as it is rather good.

Thursday, 3 December 2020

The Thirteenth Month

I have often wondered why we have twelve months when we say four weekes is a month. If that were so we'd be starting our thirteenth month tomorrow and would probably called Undecember (latin for eleven is Undecim) . Here is an explanation , apparently the romans started with ten months but then tried to match it to the (just over) 12 lunar cycles in a year so a 13 month year would be out of sync with th elunare cycles.

The thing remind me of imperial weights and money systems  (12 pennies to a shilling , 5 shillings to a crown , then there's half crowns , twenty shillings in a pound and twenty one shillings in a guinea. Then sixteen ounces to a pound, fourteen pounds to a stone etc , then you have twelve inches to a foot , three feet to a yard , six feet to a fathom etc.

Then you have tennis scoring which is weird as hell and the Duckworth-Lewis method in cricket for curtailed matches and all the weird scoring possibilities with light stopping play and more.

Metric is a far more sensible measurement system , although people still have problems with our swith to decimalisation fifty years back.

So this is my first post of the month and think I'm going to go with "The Killing Moon" by Echo & The Bunnymen because of the lunar cycles that prompted this post in th efirst place.

Monday, 20 April 2020

Killing Time


I play "Words With Friends" since EA Games destroyed Scrabble on Facebook. The main killer for these is the adverts but it does sometime come in handy when you are not reading or working or waiting for a process to finish, but a game came up and was described as a "time killer". I can't remember what the game was , but there were a load of numbers on the screen.

It seems that one game is promoting other games to take up your time. I know people who are addicted to certain games and can understand how that happens. They draw you in and then start asking for money to get you a bit further on. I suppose it's an exercise in market creation but I'll play when I can for free.

I really don't want to kill time but I do enjo games that exercise your mind.

I never wish it was Friday.

Every day I find something to be positive about, something to aim for , something to make you feel good.

Today I have done my lowest daily step total this month, but due an active couple of days I am still ahead of the pace.

I've not written a blog post since Friday and I suppose part of that is essentially being tied to the house, although we still can talk to others via many communication channels , although today I feel I have been extremely quiet.

Working at home today I listened to "Concerts" by Henry Cow and "Casablanca Moon / Desperate Straights" by Slapp Happy both are excellent and saw me through the day , with the Henry Cow being a little more challenging. The Slapp Happy album is more song based (how pretentious does that sound) although very Brechtian in it's delivery and execution.

So obviously it's got to be something from the Slapp Happy album that I will share with you,  I found a live take of  "The Drum" which is fragilely beautifully wonderful. The album is well worth investigating.

Wednesday, 13 November 2019

Time Runs


This morning's post was the 13th post this month on the 13th day of this month and I have done many posts about the number thirteen that you can read here so I won't mention that again (this month).

This morning I got up at the normal time but decided to do some washing and had to package a CD and send it off to Germany from my Discogs store. Given that I laso washed and showered got dressed but all of a sudden two hours had gone and I still had to post the CD.

I got out of the house and noticed the bus I needed to catch leaving the stop down from me, however there was so much traffic that I gently strolled to the next bus stop and caught it there.

There are times where no matter how much you plan things run away from you and you have to deal with it, but other times you take opportunities and things fall into place and at the end of the day things fit.

While it's good to be proactive, it's good to be able to be reactive when the situation calls for it.

So I know a short and almost pointless post, but it provides an excuse to include "Time Is Running Out" by Muse, and Muse is always good.

Sunday, 27 October 2019

Clocks - #Oktoberfest #32 - Milk - Garbage


I was thinking of using "Milkshake" by Kelis for this #Oktoberfest sequence post but then remembered "Milk" by Garbage which I feel is a bit classier if less poppy. Both Milk and Milkshake are drinks though not alcoholic, but I suppose you could always ad your own choice of alcohol , imagine a Baileys Milkshake , now that would be very nice.

Anyway why Clocks.? I woke about 5 O' Clock and went to check if my Google Pixel had charged (though I think it's started losing charge faster) but anyway the time said 4:05 . I thought bloody hell it's losing time. Then I remembered that it was sometime around now that the clocks go back.

Because almost all TV is watched on demand , news papers are seldom taken , and even TV news is seldom watched I had received not a single prompt to put the clocks back. However now that all our electronic connected devices are programmed to reset when they need to we can almost ignore clock resetting (although all my watches and analogue timepieces do need resetting.

If you think about this "The Eighty Minute Hour" by Brian Aldiss could become reality and we wouldn't even know because we tend to trust our electronic devices, the number of times I've left my watch at home so use  my phone to check the time is very high.

The concept of  "The Eighty Minute Hour" is that the controllers slow clocks down during working hours and speed them up out of work, and it so often feels like that is our reality.

Sunday, 9 June 2019

No Time


Just reading the excellent "Notes on a Nervous Planet" and something came up that applies to me. I continually feel that I do not have enough time to do things (may that's a symptom of getting older) but as Matt Haig points out, we can now communicate faster and more easily than every before, we have rapid travel options , washing machines, lawn mowers , microwaves , etc speed up things that took a lot more of our time than they did before.

When I left EE I didn't realise at first that I didn't have to travel, on general three hours a day to get to and from work. That's fifteen hours a week (I was stopped from working from home before I finished), that's sixty hours a month. Given that the average working week is 37 hours (150 hours a month) I gained more than 20% time by leaving. That is a lot of time.

The problem is life overload, to watch a TV program or a film , still takes as long as it takes, reading a book takes time, listening to Beethoven's 9th Symphony takes about 70 minutes to listen to (you could play it at 78 rpm but that would sound silly), but basically we do not really appreciate the extra time that modern life is giving use, and we should do.

Writing this takes time, and reading it takes time (though not as much time as it takes to write).

It is a beautiful Sunday Morning and it's an excuse to share the wonderful Flash Mob take on "Ode To Joy" from Beethoven's 9th . I showed this to the lady in the the Oxfam Shop in Helmsley and she loved it because she said it makes you realise what instruments go together to make this wonderful music.

Wednesday, 5 June 2019

Living Without Clocks


This is post number 1939 , 1939 was year in which my mum was born (four years after my dad who was born in the same year as Elvis Presley) . My mum was vivacious, full of life and very supportive and fun. She had me reading before I went to primary school and her and my dad always just told me to do my best, and that was good enough. There was no criticism when I just got 5 'O' Levels and 2 'A' Levels. We lost her in 1989 to a stroke and heart attack, but she is still with me  for her attitude and support thirty years on. She never saw the internet although was proud that I had inveigled my way into IT without the normal required qualifications.

So on to the main point of this post. We are always tied to clocks and time to catch buses, trains and planes , get to work and lots of other things. On this holiday clocks are not to the fore,although there are clocks around the cottage, there is nowhere I need to be for a certain time, apart from to be out of the cottage and get the car back to Enterprise for 11 O'Clock on Saturday.

I think of Catweazle who was confused as to why we lived our life ruled by timepieces. The reason is it gives us a framework to work as a big team, but it is great to dispense with that every now and then. It does relax you when you don't have to do anything or be anywhere for any particular reason.

i-toc
I was going to look for a piece from 1939 but Lauren Laverne has just put on "May You Never" by John Martyn on her 6Music show and that just seems so perfect for the moment.

Of the thing about whether it's the lack of drugs or just tiredness when I just don't want to getup in a
morning,this morning I stretch , got up , shaved , washed and showered, checked my watch, thought it said eight o' clock but it was only seven o' clock (that's my i-toc , that gives me a rough idea of the time) so it's not the lack of drugs, it's just that I'm tired, because this morning I am not tired, and was wide awake before I took my drugs.


It looks lovely outside , so another nice day awaits.

Sunday, 20 January 2019

819


Sunday morning, come down to make a cup of tea, that's the time on the oven clock 8:19 , and I'm thinking "I'm Late" . I'm not the White Rabbit from "Alice In Wonderland", although at the end of the month I will be in Whitby and visit La Rosa where Lewis Carroll once stayed and now has a room named after him, and I will probably nip by as I've not been there for over a year.

The weather is still grey and cold although the sun is hot when it shines through. I am vaguely perturbed by the similarity to the weather and the book I am reading "The Pince With The Silver Hand" where the fog, mist and cold accompany the "gods" of Limbo trying to destroy the world by turning it into another Limbo.




I was looking at the number of programs on my Virgin TV recorder, as well as my DVD / Blu Ray collection as well as my CDs and realise that in my case I have bought things just because I thought I should. Part of it is actually supporting record shops and artists but it seems, especially in this digital age,  we have become magpies, collecting things just to have them rather than to continually enjoy them. Downloading and recording are the worst because you have it then and then it just sits there, often not being watched or listened to. It is nice to be able to enjoy something and having it on tap but I am now listing CDs on Discogs some of which are selling at rather inflated prices, but of people are willing to pay then that's what you list it at. The Pirates "Shakin' With The Devil" compilation is selling for up to £56 but I've put it on at a far more reasonaly £20.

There was something else that I wanted to say but it's now gone from my mind, but if it comes back I will just do another post. So what to choose, there's obviously "White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane, or "I'm Late" from Disney's "Alice In Wonderland" but I am going to go for The Pirates "All In It Together" which I loved as soon as they released it on their seventies reformation. Then I found the video below by "Sons of Pirates". I've not been able to find any more info because there is an American band of the same name but I'm wondering if they are the offspring of Mick Green and Co. Mick Green was also the inspiration for Wilko Johnson. They are probably the Green Brothers, Mick Green's lads here on Facebook.


Friday, 11 January 2019

Tempus

This is Post Number 1800


I don't know if it's an age thing, and maybe that's a sign of getting old, but I oftemn start on something with I know will take an hour or two, but want it completed immediately. This is true of work and walking (understandable) but also watching films and TV progams and listening to albums, which have to take as long as the last.

I always found it amusing that mobile networks sold the favct that you could download a four minute song in two seconds. It still takes four minutes to listen two , and if you don't take four minutes over it then you lose all the pleasure and experience to be gained from giving the song the listening time it requires. It's even more true for albums and films. It is useful if you are downloading before going into a no signal area but that is never the reason pushed as it would imply that signal coverage is not perfect (which it isn't).

It's been a mental week and work and next week is probably going to be madder, I'm sure I will be able to cope.

It is Friday and I am actually feeling tired though it's another early Saturday start with a trip across Slatyford Park to pick up some things from the Post Office Depot. I keep forgetting I could have things delivered to my local Post Office when order stuff from Amazon that won't fit through my letter box, still it does give me some exercise.

I'll leave you with "Shooting Star" by Harper Simon , Paul's lad. It's a few years old but an absolutely beautiful way to leave Friday night ti enter the realms of Morpheus.


Monday, 17 December 2018

Time Split


My mind is all over the place at times and I am very good at lateral thinking, or as most people see it, going off on a tangent. This morning my alarm went off just after 5:30 although I really wanted it to go off at 5:45 but I had set the time fifteen minutes too fast, so I switched the alarm off, then made the effort to set the time so it was just five minutes fast, which meant that I had another ten minutes before the alarm went off.

That meant I had sort of split time getting two lie ins for the proce of one, also meaning that in future I will be actually hearing the alarm at roughly the time it should do. I almost feel like Doctor Who.

It is Monday and the beginning of the final week before Christmas, I've managed to catch up on all my TV, and also added the "Riverworld" books by Philip Jose Farmer to my to reread list. It is an excellent concept but the only downside is that it stops me, or puts off reading new books, and I have a lot of those to get through.

My walking in December has been attrocious, but over the weekend I have got ahead of my required target, so I do stand a chance of actually stay on track. I have done this for nineteen months running now so I want to keep that up. The big wall is the fact that it is dark and cold in a morning so it's not that inviting to walk to work.

The winter solstice is coming up so after that day, 23rd December I think, the days will start getting longer.

So what song should I drag in today. Following "Riverworld" I'll go for Billy Joel's "River of Dreams".

Have a great day everyone.

Sunday, 19 August 2018

The Eighty Minute Hour


It is sort of strange and amusing how when the weekend starts petering out that time seems to go so musch faster. It's basically the fact that on Friday night after the Friday afternoon where the clocks seeme dto stop and hours stretched out to seem like eighty minutes or longer despite the fact you were doing so much and seemingly becoming unbelievably productive.

Then when you get out you have the whole weekend , and full hourglass of being able to take it easy and do as you please. Then at nine o' clock on Sunday night the sixty four hours of pleasure time you had are reduced to eleven hours and seven of thoses you will hopefully be sleeping.

It's like when you are trying to meet a tight deadline (although with devcnt planning you can always meet deadlines as long as everyone does their job and there are no surprises or unexpected hitches).

I've borrowed the title from Brian Aldiss' excellent story which is a wickedly simple concept and I suggest you investigate it further, and you may soon believe it is actually happening.

I always illustrate why time seems to get faster by this concept:

When you are six, you get six weeks summer holiday from school. That seems like forever, a week for every year of your life. To get the same effect now I would need a sixt week summer holiday to see a break as unbelievabley wrong, but we get four weeks a year and I never take more than a week at a time because I don't want endless weeks at work without a break.

Sorry if this is a bit of a downer, it's not meant to be so I'll leave you with "Time Capives" from "Journey by Arthur Brown's Kingdom Come, a wonderful band who were one of the first to you the Bentley Rhythm Ace Drum Machine which once went on a fifteen minute drum solo that they couldn't stop. Ah when things were mechanical in the pre digital age.

Sleep well.

Sunday, 31 December 2017

Two Thousand and Seventeen Years So Far ... and I Want More


Five years ago I published a pretty good post about getting older here  with one or two useful profundities (if that's a word, well it is now) , and as we come to the end of 2017 we start thinking about what we will do in the new calendar year. Personally it's going to be another year of doing more, rising to challenges , rediscovering my social mojo, actually playing on the virtual orchestra I have stashed in our back room, actually watching TV series , seeing films and reading books.

I have four recent books of fiction to get through two by Philip Pullman and two by John Niven which I'm looking forward to, and well as numerous new challenges at work which will be great fun to take on.

Some days I would like a longer lie in, but today was typical, I woke up at seven and thought I may as well get up wash and shave and shower , then maybe go back to bed, but then I think I may as well get up.

This year I have started walking maintaining a rolling Million Steps every three months and that has reduced my insulin intake by over sixty per cent. I might do even better if I lived off cucumber lettuce and kale but that would be very boring indeed, although cucumber subs are a great alternative to bread subs and therefore better for you , even though they may not seem that appetising. They are best eaten in summer and I used to make them a lot when I worked from home.

I've got to give thanks to everyone who has been there for  me , helped me, made me laugh , encouraged me , played  games with me , eaten with me, and made this a great year for me. I know 2018 will be even better.

So what is a great playout record for 2017. In September we lost Holger Czukay, but in the seventies I remember him and Can lighting up Top of The Pops with the brilliant "I Want More" which is a perfect sentiment to see out the old year and see in the new.

Happy New Year everybody .... Make it Brilliant.

Sunday, 16 October 2016

How Many Numbers - #ALifeInNumbers #24


There are a hell of a lot of songs that feature the number "24" but there was only ever one contender for this. I often wonder about our temporal and up to 1970 monetary number collections.

Before we went decimal it was 2 farthings to a halfpenny , two halfpennies to a penny , then you had a threepenny coin and a sixpence and twelve pennies made up a shilling, known as a bob.  Then you had a florin (two shillings) a half crown (two shillings and sixpence), a crown (five shillings) before hitting the ten shilling note (today's fifty pence piece)  going up to the pond (twenty shillings) and the guinea (21 shillings, work that one out). I've probably missed out lots of other coins and number collections.

Then we come into time. Sixty seconds in a minute, then sixty minutes in an hour , that's all good and consistent. Then we have 24 hours in a day, seven days in a week , 28 to 31 days a month, 12 calendar or 13 lunar months in a years or 52 weeks or 365.25 days in a year, that seems a little inconsistent. I seldom speak of my employers, but when I was at Littlewoods time was tracked in deci-days, that is  one tenth of the seven hours and 24 minutes that made up the actual working day which works out at 44 minutes and 24 seconds per unit. It's one of those things where someone tries to merge two systems that are at odds with each other. Malcolm McLaren's "House Of Blue Danube" is an impressive musical example merging 4/4 rock / dance time with 3/4 waltz time featuring Bootsy Collins, Jeff Beck and the music of Strauss.


Half Man
Anyway back to my 24 choice . It's "24 Hour Garage People" by Half Man Half Biscuit from the album "Trouble Over Bridgewater" and while you can get the original version by clicking on the title , the definitive version was broadcast on Andy Kershaw's Radio 3 program in 2002  live from the Brampton festival and is available for download free here along with lots of other sessions and broadcasts.

This song about the drudgeries of a twenty four garage , and the fun you can have with people behind the perspex screen when they decide to be miserable narks , although working in a garage would send me into dark places I think especially if you got annoying customers, but really everybody has to play ball and work together to get the best of things out of situations.

Anyway enjoy "24 Hour Garage People" and if that's not enough check out "House of Blue Danube" before enjoying the rest of your Sunday.

Tuesday, 13 September 2016

This Has To Be Quick


I've been getting into work later , essentially with buses disappearing between 8 and 8:30 or just being very slow. I'm sure that that I used to know off blog posts in ten minutes, after all they are just diary entries aren't they?

Recently some of my posts have taken up to an hour to complete, yes they may need links and pictures, and sometimes it's difficult to find just exactly what you want but I really wanted to find out if I could write this and leave the house by 7:30 , I started it at 7:19 , it's now 7:27 , so I am not going to do it , maybe another five minutes,

The music I've chosen is "Where Were You?" by The Mekons which was originally on Fast Records (see what I did there?) and I've bookended it with the live and studio versions.

Oh and it's the 13th , and the number 13 can be lucky , it's just the way you look at things , I'm thinking Bakers Dozen.

How Do You See It?
Anyway you still have two hundred words of mine to pick over , and yes it's taken me about quarter of an hour to write this, enjoy the music and  have a brilliant day.

Tuesday, 5 July 2016

Beach Canaries



This was originally going to be called "Time" but about half an hour the phrase "Beach Canaries" came in to my head, it's probably the name of a band and if it isn't it should be.

Anyway what this was basically about was that recently I seem to keep not having enough time to do the things I want to do. I do get them done but often times seems to run away. Maybe it's a sign of getting older. When you are six and you get six weeks summer holiday that's a week for every year of your life , it's like nearly forever, now six weeks comes and goes just like that. Actual time still last the same length ... I think.

A Long, Long Time
There's a science fiction story called "The Eighty Minute Hour" by Brian Aldiss in which the concept is that the controllers slow down the clocks when you are at work and speed them up when you are not. Would you know?  And how often have you looked at the clock at work and almost believed that it's stopped or going backwards.

Some morning when I go to work I am sure I leave at 7:30 but still get through the door at 8 for what should be a fifteen minute door to door excursion. Late buses , traffic jams , and forgetfulness also contribute.








The biggest benefit from leaving my previous job was the 60 hours a month traveling time I got back, and because of that I now commit myself to doing a lot more, seeing people , watching films , going to gigs , I've actually joined a band . So really I am filling up my time. I never sit and think , where is the time going and don't have an answer. I know where it's going , and I am enjoying it.

I love any excuse to talk and meet friends , and share fun times , and that makes life very enjoyable.

I will get a handle o this , and was going to write this this morning but ......

Last week my alarm clock woke me with piercing electronic screeching. I shut the thing down and it had reset itself to factory settings. I reset it all and the following day it did the same so , it was binned. I've spent a week with no alarm , until this morning. I got the new alarm, set and it went off at quarter to six this morning. I showered and went to get dressed and noticed the clocks and watched were reading 7:15 . Had I really spent 90 minutes getting washed and showered? NO , I had  set the clock and hour slow , so getting out to work was a bit of a rush.

Anyway that;'s just some thoughts about time and maybe a good song to have would be Buena Vista Social Club and Coldplay's Clocks from Rhythms Del Mundo.

Have a brilliant Tuesday my friends.

Sunday, 25 October 2015

Clocks Gone Back #26- 1982 - Blancmange - Living On The Ceiling


Today is the day of the Sunderland vs Newcastle United Derby . Sunderland have won the last 5 and not lost in the last 7 that's like every match this decade almost. This is the only match that seems to matter to Sunderland supports , mainly because they seem to get tonked by everyone else. Can't say Newcastle are that much better , but what do I know , I'm a Preston supporter, and we also have Australia vs Argentina in the Rugby World Cup today which may match the excitement of of yesterdays close match between the All Blacks and South Africa. I wouldn't be surprised by an Argentinean victory as they are well organized and are not there as cannon fodder. The fact they are semi finalists says it all.

Jerome Kaino's second try of the tournament gave New Zealand an early lead

Anyway I've just finished putting all my analog clocks right , and just rememberd I need to do the same for my heating I think. I will check this after I post this.

So my musical Odyssey , I hit year 26 and have chosen the excellent Blancmange - Living On The Ceiling , a brilliant duo who's music has a great cutting edge and they still tour today.

Have a great Sunday everyone , the sun is shining and you did get that extra hour in bed.