Some Positives

I know I haven't been too positive on my posts and have been ignoring certain things. So I got the Nintendo WII out and did the Tennis and Boxing , before finding it was seventy four days since I last used thing. I'm just a pound lighter so the good news is I haven't put on weight. It's too easy to put things away and just forget about them and we should never do that , I am atrocious for doing it.

The second thing was installing RunKeeper on my phone. This product looks like it actually works. I have no intention of taking up running, but walked about a mile and burnt 130 calories according to the app.

I included the Chariots of Fire  opening , because it's one of the most archetypially English musical pieces , obviously composed by a a Greek (Vangelis) , and also one of the lads on the beach was a trainee for me when I was at Littlewoods back in the day.

Anyway enjoy what's left of the weekend, another week awaits ...

Coincidences and Connections

Last night I watched three unrelated programs bar the fact that they were BBC programs. Line of Duty was the first and I've been following this amazing series since the start, not for the squeamish and with plot twists to to tie your brain in several knots. It is police and crime with Dennis Wise look a like Martin Compston one of it's many star turns.

Next up was Shipwrecks: Britain's Sunken History concentrating on the destruction of the Spanish Armada on the Irish and Scottish Coasts, and how the survivors became integrated into to the local communities.

Next up was Shetland , currently on season 2 but something I noticed , based on the Raven Black books by Ann Cleeves. First up was the fact that the main detective is DI Jimmy Perez (the Armada connection) played by Douglas Henshall, next coincidence was that Mark Bonnar who plays DCC Mike Dryden in Line of Duty plays Duncan Hunter in Shetland.

Then, and she didn't know I was writing this, Fiona told me that Ann Cleeves was actual one of the protagonists of Peter Jackson's film "Heavenly Creatures" , so that was unexpected. There is an article here. Though that was fairly difficult to track down.

So an amazing number of coincidences and connections in a very small number of items this weekend. It's amazing how easily things can spread out and become connected. The seven degress of Kevin Bacon is probably true , but for obvious reasons I'd rather not co there, despite the fact he was in one of my favourite films Tremors.

Rename The Post Office Tower "The Tony Benn Tower"

Tony Benn and a few of his achievements

Saddened yesterday at the news on Tony Benn's passing, one of the only politicians you could trust, who actually wanted to make the world a better place , not just line his own pockets. Almost everyone will have more things to say about him, and I couldn't do him justice , so just search the net , read some books about him and learn some lessons from his vision. I was shocked at work as no one seemed to know who he was , my own daughters (admittedly in their thirties know who he was and why he was important. It is just sad that they place more importance on X-Factor or Big Brother than people like Tony Benn (admittedly there aren't that many.

This post was only going to have a fleeting mention of the man, but it says something that this has spilled over into more that a couple of words. A lot of people will be unaware of the technical revolutions in communications and other walks of like that he helped kick start. One little thing is the commercialisation of stamp design , he was a prime mover behind the Post Office Tower in London, maybe they should rename it the Tony Benn Tower, and also behind Concorde and Radio 1! See here.

We should start a campaign to get the Post Office Tower renamed the Tony Benn tower.

A brilliant man , a brilliant mind , and an incredible loss.

Oh and here are ten of his greatest quotes.

How Does This Happen?

You wake at 5am, and are wide awake, not sleepy at all, bed is suddenly so comfortable you don't want to leave, but you have to get up. You're not really getting any benefit because you know you have to get up , so eventually you succumb and get out of bed, get washed , shower , perform ablutions and it's still half an hour before you leave for work.

Then it kicks in, you are so sleepy and want to go back to bed, yawning , and so tempted to get back into bed. Radio 6 keep playing Queen snippets,  but I'm sure that couldn't be anything to do with it , could it.

Thought of the Cure song to go with this though I suppose I could have had Queen , but I like The Cure better.

Hope you all have a good day.

How Bad Were The Eighties Really?

I've just finished Danny Baker's series of shows on the seventies , eighties and nineties and the eighties usually come in for extremely harsh treatment due to New Romantics and A Flock of Seagulls hair styles. But Baker's show opened with The Clash playing Should I Stay or Should I Go at Shea Stadium , New York. The program was only half an hour long and while Prefab Sprout and The Pretenders are not exactly my cup of tea (although when both bands are good they are very very good and Prefab Sprout's last album is an absolute beauty) , the quality of the music never faltered , finding space for Ivor Cutler's Shoplifters before having the great man introduce The Smiths Boy With The Thorn In His Side. The show closed with New Order playing The Hacienda.


This post seemed to be getting fairly monoparagraphic so I thought I'd insert a break.

Incidentally a friend from Facebook had mentioned the Fall's I Am Curious Oranj in various  orange related posts last week, and then Danny Baker played Big New Prinz in situ with the dancers / ballet for which the music was commissioned.


When you add bands like The Cure , Sisters of Mercy, Bauhaus  you have to admit there were a lot of great bands round in the eighties. As I've said before 95% is always rubbish , it's up to you to track down the good stuff. I've probably mentioned more bands in this post than any other previous post but there is a lot of great music round all the time, find and enjoy.

Back Now

And off to work soon. I've spent the weekend driving back and resting and not really doing much bar watching some catch up TV such as the brilliant Elementary, Blacklist and Arrow and the truly atrocious Hostages (good idea for a film not a TV series but although it's not been recommissioned it'll be a staple of daytime TV in future ). I am watching Hostages just to see how bad it can get, apparently based on an Israeli TV series, like the excellent Homeland, which went off the rails after the first series but still kept your interested to due to excellent scripting and compelling characters.

Also noticed in the proliferation of betting shops a "Set Your Limits" campaign. Don't they realise that anyone addicted to slot machines, daily lotteries , or the proliferation of betting options will not do that , the only people who will are those in complete control. Then you add the facts that William Hill are looking to open shops 24/7 because slots and electronic casinos are open 24/7 , then combine this with one staff member per shop, and Paddy Power  taking bets and joking about the Oscar Pistorius , see this Guardian article, and it shows that they are only interested in one thing.

Tonight I have a meeting at my local practice' patient forum (details here) so am going to away from the house for 13 hours again today , but it's good to be involved with these things and you can't complain about things if you don't get yourself involved.

Anyway I know that this is not my normal sort of blog post, and I apologise, but when I get home tonight hopefully I can post something more positive and uplifting. Still enjoy your day, I know I will.

Friday Feeling

Well it's Friday and it's the last day of the holiday , but has been a great week.I found out the guy who runs the farm we are staying at restores vintage cars for a hobby so hopefully I'll get some photos of those before I leave. The weather has been mostly excellent and is very sunny again today.

It's almost eleven o' clock and I've still not switched on my phone , which I have used quite a lot as a camera. It's amazing now how mobile phones are replacing cameras and music players because they are capable of doing all these things.

Add that to Instagram and Facebook and you can be completely connected and let everyone know everything you are doing but whether that's a good thing I'm not to sure.

I've just seen a black ladybird with red spots , apparently seeing a ladybird is lucky, so who knows what may happen , but there's always something good so I know that will come true one way or another.

Although it's Friday the song "Saturday Gigs" by Mott The Hoople is playing round in my mind so I'm going to include that, ain'y Youtube useful?

Anyway I'm going to enjoy the rest of the day and hope that you do too.