Skiing is not good for your health......

.......  you only just have to look at the list of celebrities who can testify to that [although they will need access to a Mitch Albom Phone to let you know ] .... I am sure that the list of non celebrities is much longer than that... but it seems that as they are not celebrities, there appears no incentive to record in one place their demise..... but they do get recorded, only a couple of days ago ......

Michael Schumacher evokes strong opinions about him, not all favourable....... but I am a strong supporter of his Ferrari Days.... he was part of my memorable weekend in Monza a few years back.

At the end of his glory years with Ferrari, in his final season I took my daughter to Silverstone, and me being me, got my daughter into the pit lane, but not just any old pit lane, this was a M&S pitlane.... my daughter stood in the Ferrari garage, next to Michael Schumachers Ferrari F1 car.... that doesn't happen every day. Michael Schumacher was no where around, but that didn't matter I still got a photo of my daughter and him together in the same shot...... to be fair he was sort of photo bombing her whilst driving an F1 car, but at least she can say she has a photo of her and Michael Schumacher together [sort of].

Things are not looking too good for Michael Schumacher at the moment ...... I hope he makes it through .... just like the great Felipe Massa ... it is possible to overcome a serious head injury...... but I do hope that Michael Schumacher is not added to my list ...... it's his 45th birthday on Friday.

I might be a crap driver [can't ski either.... thankfully] but there is something I share with him.... we are both Capricorns.... if he is a true Capricorn, he will not give up.

 {source - Guardian newspapers}

My only December SoD......

I make no secret of my love of the writings of Mitch Albom..... if you love his writing style, you are hooked..... some say his books are smultzy..... one even accused him...... of being a proselytizer.... I had to google that one.....

And so this week I saw he had a new book out earlier this year...... The first phone call from heaven...

My copy arrived yesterday and last night, I started to read it..... a few pages in I was reminded of a dream I had last month, a couple of days before the anniversary of my dad's death..... I wasn't aware of this book by Mitch Albom when I had the dream...... I only tripped up over the book a few days ago..... I turned the pages last night and passage hit me.... it took me back to that dream.... funny how things can catch you so off guard, it pierces your very soul .......

I don't give a rats arse if some say he is smultzy.... you do don't sell 5 million books with out good reason.... he has me hooked again..... and so now the rest of the book to finish.....

I think the sound track to this book

is probably my only

SoD for December

time for Zed's

....and so I have finally got to a full house of my A to Z of SoD's...

my initial thought was to go for the Zutons, who put on a great show when I saw them at Thetford Forest a couple of years or so ago.... then I thought....nah.... I'll cheat....... then I thought bugger it.....
this is my blog I can do what I like...

so to end the week I have a double header and yeah yeah yeah's one is a cheat......

sing it to me Lady Stardust

whilst I stare at the makeup

on your face

and last but not least

why not have the Zutons

they are worthy of my completed 

SoD's

why why why........

....so this brings me to my penultimate lexicon of SoD's to complete the full set.....

Why why why indeed.... I am often left wondering why ?

But the only why I need concern myself with is which Y to take as my SoD. Looking at my iPod~cum~iPhone my Y artists are somewhat bereft.....

I did think of going for the Yardbirds for 2 reasons, 1 because Jimmy Page was in their lineup once, and Jimmy Page was in Led Zepplin. One of my older brothers is 8 years older than me, so when he was 16 and into music, I as an 8 year, found myself immersed with Ziggy and the Spiders from Mars, stuck on a Heap with Uriah and then getting a whole lotta love from Jimmy and the Zeps..... the 2nd  reason for the Yardbirds........ because from the same formative years...... and again thanks to my older brother there was David Bowies album of cover songs..... Pin Ups...of which one track was Shapes of things to come, originally by non other than the ....... Yardbirds....

But for today I have not chosen the Yardbirds..... I prefer the Bowie version...instead I have gone for the Yeah Yeah Yeahs..... a more upto date track. It sort of reminds me of Camera Obscura in a way...and oh my word the lead singer Karen Lee Orzolek..... she is just so divine and bed bouncy the way she dances around the top of the Empire state building at the end of the song....

Going back to my formative years, the younger brother of a 16 year, to me the Empire State Building was just a dream like place.....something unobtainable only to be seen in American Movies. Given my background on a council estate to go to the Empire State Building was just a pipe dream.....

Roll forward the years...and we had escaped the clutches of Kyle Land and now I was traveling the world. A life on the ocean waves had been my gateway...and now firmly employed in the shipping world but land based, there I was standing on Broadway and only a stones throw away from the Empire State Building. I went to Times Square at midnight, and couldn't believe just how busy and active it was....... I didn't visit the Empire State Building..... I regret that.... I wish I had....

But for now 

I will let Karen O

transport me there

and so we move to the X, Y and Z of my SoD's....

....... I had been thinking that I would have little to choose from, for the X's.... and as much as I would like to say I am/was a fan of X-Ray Spex I am/was not.... although to be fair I see the medical profession are it now seems.... I can see a ready market on eBay for these...as opposed to stupid fooking google glasses....

No, for my choice of X, it was simply a happenstance moment.... a few days back I was driving along in my usual day dream world and I happened to look at the number plate of the car in front.... for some reason this is an act I often do, mostly in a conscious way but always seemingly noting the number plate of the car in front....so on this day, my X offering for today, was staring me right in front of my eyes..... XTC.

XTC have had a bit of history since their formative years, from which I take today's track, but they have reworked some of their material. Perhaps if they were reworking todays SoD they could call it Making plans for Nigella. Now to be fair to the gorgeous Nigella she still has her day in court to come, and who knows the email written by her then caring husband, may well have just been written with malice aforethought.... a stark contrast to the behaviour of his brother Maurice towards his 2nd wife.....

But oh my word

I am sooooo looking forward to

my Nigella Christmas cake from M & S this year

it will be one hell of a relaxing christmas day !

spliff it boys...

I remember exactly where I was.....

...and what I was doing on the day when I first heard this song......

Today's offering is a joint effort, in order to get my Q list endorsed.....

1981, I was home on leave, a cold autumn/winters day and being a poor Deck officer in training I was working on my crappy car. I was in my dad's garage, in what was then my home by proxy....

With the radio playing this song came on, it stopped me in my tracks..... funny how 32 years later I can remember that moment exactly, I can even see my self looking down at that crappy car in the cold listening to today's SoD except it was my former days SoD....

I may age, my mind may sometimes falter, I might get old and disillusioned but there is still music to turn to....

under pressure

always under pressure

but music is my great escape

Freddie...David....

release me

The A-Z of SoD's........

.... I noticed from my SoD playlist that in the style of QI, I have nearly completed the alphabet.

Conveniently, I am 5 short of a full house.....namely O...... Q ....... and the classic X~Y~Z.....

So that mean's a SoD lexicon week.....

Today's offering is O. I had thought of Roy Orbison, who I think is fab...... blue bayou in David Bowie's man who fell to earth, is sublime in the extreme.... and who cannot but think of Del Boy every time you hear Roy Orbison and KD Lang sing crwying..... almost too painful to laugh....

But as much as I love the big O, it wouldn't work for my SoD play list as it would lodge him in the ever hopeful R's..... so today's offering is Orba Squara..... never heard of them ? well if you remember the first lot of adverts for the iPhone.... then you will have heard Orba Squara. It is in fact mainly 1 man and lots of jingly jangly instruments coupled with his jingly jangly voice.

It can be a bit twee at times but on a cold dark winters Monday it can also lift the spirits.... So I will offer up a medley of Mitch Davis in his Orba Squara guise.....

Hit the jingles

hit the jangles

it's super duper day

this last one is not on Youtube

but it is just so bloody super duper

listen to a brand new day

HERE !

The sherpa of heart break........

following on from my suggestion that Lady Chatterley seemed out of place at a Billy Bragg gig....reading a couple of articles since, perhaps I was totally misplaced in questioning why such a posh lady would be at a Billy Bragg convention.....

Reading this article about Billy Bragg in which there is reference to him being described as the Sherpa of heart break, then it's not all about the politics, Billy Bragg has a much wider repertoire... and so for that alone, maybe my post on irony was wrong after all.... how ironic.... posting about irony when maybe it wasn't ironic after all....

So as proof of the wordsmith talents 

from the Sherpa of Heartbreak, 

here is the song he wrote as a tribute to his dad... 

I know what he means

The irony of it......

so there I was, stood with a bag of corn in one hand and a Guinness in the other, but alas as no one else had a bag of corn, there was the risk that my visit to the Cambridge Corn Exchange might have been a wasted visit...... were it not for the arrival of Billy Bragg on stage...... so I dumped the corn, drank my Guinness and took to my seat.....

But that was not the irony......

Billy Bragg is known for his left wing politics and his music is deemed a reflection of many of his strongly held views...not just politics I hasten to add.... but I only went to listen, because regardless of his self accepted singing qualities, he bangs out a decent tune....

But you would normally expect his audience to be of similar left wing leanings [ as I say I am leaned to the music not the ideology ] but as I sat there waiting for him to appear, the lady sitting next to me piped up...... Oh I say Rupert, Issac would just love one of these mugs [presumably a BB tour mug], the song... I was a miner between the wars is his favourite....

Not sure of the plum supply status in Cambridge at the moment, but for sure this lady was hiding a couple in her mouth as she spoke.... With names like Rupert and Issac in the family, you just know that left wing politics is not their bag, and I doubt they will be sending christmas cards bearing the hammer and sickle....... To be fair she is probably a delightful and charming lady but that was the irony....as I sat at a Billy Bragg concert, that was not the accent I fully expected to hear..... may be like me, she, Rupert and Issac [by proxy], were there just for the music......

So today I dedicate 

the SoD to Issac.... 

a pity you were not there last night,
you would have loved it

Interestingly Billy Bragg himself faces a suitable paradox of lady chatterly who was sat next to me last night, in that he has come in for some targeted criticism [and I do not say it's right] because as this out spoken socialist, he has found his own wealth and lives a comfortable [financially comfortable] life. 

As I say I make no judgement and I am sure he would readily and easily defend him self upon that charge.... he is a very eloquent and articulate advocate, but it must irritate him ever so slightly the paradox he has created from himself.

As an added extra, he sang this one last night 

and it's nothing to do with politics.... 

It's about something just as challenging

I liked this one...

One more day......

....listening to the radio in the car, most of the time is banal wittering and serves as back ground noise.... but....

I was listening to a story being told by Sir Ken Robinson, how he found it difficult to listen a particular Leonard Cohen song..... a song about Leonard Cohen's loss of his mother...and also touches on the death of his father when leonard cohen was a young child.....My dad's dad died, when my dad was a young child.

Sir Ken Robinson recounted how he was driving south for a meeting the following day, and then the Leonard Cohen song came on the radio...... it made him think of his own mother...... did he carry on his journey or did he make a 200 mile detour to see his mother ? ..... he wasn't sure what to do....

He made the detour.....he said he had a wonderful meal with his mother....he was glad he did....

The story reminded me another of Mitch Albom's writings..... For one more day......

Two years to the day, my dad died

I wish I could have one more day

with him

my brian is mush.....

...so instead of trying to write something smart and clever.... 

I will simply offer up a double header SoD

I was going to post.....you don't have to be in the army to fight the war....
if only to illustrate this guys voice does not match his body !
but it appears not on Youtube

But you can download the song free from his website....

http://www.georgeezra.com/

well worth a listen

Cancer may always be shit......but dance me to your beauty with a burning violin

.... feeling pretty fed up with life, far too much work to do, against relentless deadlines [most of which are artificially created by my clients].......

thieving bastards everywhere you turn... whether they be money grabbing no-hopers stealing my paid taxes under the auspices of benefits, or motorway services stations stealing my money under the auspices of stay longer than 2 hours and I will shaft you with a £100 fine...... or the building trade who think it entirely appropriate to put their hand in your pocket, do shit work and then fuck off as if it is perfectly normal or just as bad, they waste...ach erm.... steal your time....

when all of a sudden....

my daughter put this link in my email inbox .

I am not normally a big fan of flash mobs and those who stand around them in awe thinking wow this is cool.... but for Deborah Cohen I will make an exception. My mantra these days always seem to be that cancer is shit...... still is, but I will give Deborah her dues, she is finding one way to make it less shit. I won't join the chorus of rebel rousers who gue....go girl ! go girl ! go girl !...... but I will acknowledge that for her, this is her way of dealing with the shit of cancer....

Reading Deborah Cohens caringbridge web page, I like how she encouraged everyone to share her dance at exactly the same time to the same song.

A vicarious dance between strangers. There are no random acts, you can no more separate one life from another than you can separate the breeze from the wind.....mitch albom all over again....the 5 people you meet in heaven.

It sort of reminded me of my sound track moment I once shared with my wife, as I traveled through Amsterdam Airport and her sat at home.

When my daughter shared Deborah Cohen's flashmob with me, she noted the quote with her own......

• "Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass. It's about dancing in the rain." Thank you for showing me a perfect example of someone dancing in the 'rain'.

• And I realised. It doesn't matter whether we're chewing elephants up bit by bit, hammering walls down on houses, writing countless essays, selling umpteen salmons or simply dancing in the rain... at least we're doing it together. And that's what matters.

So whether it's strangers de-shitting cancer, or daughters who understand the power of love.....

  there will always be a reason to dance......

I was undecided which of 2 tracks

I should use for the SoD

so I'll put up both

and let you decide

Satellite of love....

...more than enough has been written about the passing of Lou Reed, that I am not sure there is anything wondrous I can say, for which anyone would gue... oh I hadn't thought of that....

But as a fan of Bowie/Iggy/Byrne et al,  how could I not be a fan of Lou Reed. In days before MP3's and online ripping of music, we had the wonder of modern science..... the cassette tape....

So in 1980 as a just turned 18 year old, enjoying the sights of Singpore I didn't need to worry about waiting 30 years for digital pirates to rip my music for me..... the locals were doing it with 50p tapes....

All the latest European and USA artists and Albums, and some prior ones too..... and so it was I topped up my collection [yep guilty as charged] and one of those albums..... Lou Reed and Transformer..... from 1972. Not sure if as 9 year old rather than a 18 year old I would have been into the music of Lou Reed, but I sure was in 1980......

and so for today

and I am sure a few days more

it's Lou Reed

taking me back to 

when we both younger than today

...and when the storm is over.... week link part au cinq..

and so the storm is over and it's all beautiful nature......

I remember life at sea and some storms left you wondering if the roller coaster would ever stop......

Regardless of the size of vessel, the seas can be unforgiving...... seeing this picture reminded me of many a storm I encountered when at sea.....

but when the thunder and lightning stops, you are left with this view.......

This was the scene over looking the Indian Ocean from the beach in Perth, WA at 5am on the morning of my dad's funeral......

I suppose that is what you call

beautiful nature*....

*[I do confess to only have one album by Finley Quaye..... the album from which this song is taken and it's highly recommended if you like today's SoD... not sure why he's not more of a household name but he has one of those voices, whereby if your brian is being turned to mush by the storms of life...... calm can soon be restored......]

From lightning strike to thunderstruck..... week link part quatre...

.... For some people F1 may be considered boring, and even some sports fans consider F1 is not a proper sport....but for me, who has always loved sport, watching and participating, and also daydreamed about cars since a young age, admiring a Ford Consul before I could reach the door handle...then F1 cars reach the pinnacle.

Not only do they make a wonderous noise, but an F1 car from any era....... are simply works of art.

During one of my many trips to Essen Techno classica car show, I purchased for a modest price, a signed original photograph of a John Surtees Ferrari.

When I got home, more out of curiosity, I wrote to John Surtees with a copy of the picture, just out of interest like....what a fab bloke. He wrote back within a week, confirmed the signature was his, and despite the photo being taken some 40 years previously he told me all about the car, and even to the fact that the picture was taken in the team garage at Monza. Funny enough john Surtees does not appear in the photograph, but what a top bloke...... the only man to win a world championship on two wheels and fours wheels.... and he was gracious to reply promptly to my letter.....

So as beautiful as John Surtees Ferrari from the 1960's was/is [he said it drove like a pig, and not the one he won the F1 championship a year earlier] for me an F1 car from any era is a work of art.

Regardless of whether you think F1 is boring, I defy anyone to go to a Formula One Grand Prix, and not come home full of the joys of these cars. I was 42 years old before I had my induction to my first F1....... and where else, but the spiritual home of sports cars, the Italian Grand Prix in Monza.

My best mate and I drove through the sunflower drenched fields of France [not literally through the fields] and then through [or more like around] the mountains of Switzerland to arrive in Monza late on a sunny summer/autumn friday afternoon. The 3 days we allowed ourselves for the drive there were fantastic, we admired the view, laughed at the inanity of life and listened to a fantastic sound track. One of those drives you don't want to end....but when it did end what a place to end up at.....on a green field park, across the road from the Monza circuit.

€uro 45 the bloke said in his italianglish..... each ? per night ?.... I asked....no, €uro 45 for 2 people 2 tents [we might be best mates but we do need our private sleep, Morecambe and Wise we are not] and the car, for 3 nights..... a bargain we thought...... after 3 nights we soon realised why it was so cheap. If you can imagine camping on a 24 hour fairground site and then you will know.

So on the night of our arrival, after some hearty beers we settled in for sleep [in our separate tents]. Given this was our first F1, we did not appreciate just how fanatical some F1 fans can be, especially Austrian fans of Juan Pablo Montoya. These Austrians were parked behind our tent[s]. My mate and I had small tents side by side.....

.......and so to Saturday morning...... what in fook's name is that loud noise ripping out my ear drums...... It seems the Austrians had switched on their music full throttle and in effect converted mine and my mates tents into sub-woofers..... clearly these fanatical Austrian start each day with their F1 rally cry, which is now today's SoD.......

So as we were awoken with our ear drums stripped bare, the sun was shinning, we got the bacon sizzling and with the sound track of F1 cars hurtling around Monza, had one of the most fantastic weekends of my life...... as for the Austrians....they may have got me from my slumber in a most un expected way, but whenever I hear this song, I am always minded of that great weekend.

....and as for the race, well on race day the Austrians had lager for breakfast, and as we bumped into them on the way out of the circuit, it seems they had had lager for lunch and tea and had been snacking on it all day as well. Worse still Juan Pablo Montoya had won the race and they were in sparkling form.

So on return to the fair grou....ach erm...camp site, which was now emptying, as we were staying one more night, we lifted our tents and carried them to the other side of the field..... that night we could still hear the Austrians celebrating...... we smiled very loudly......

So start your engines

line up in your tents

don't plug in your ear plugs

and be prepared to be Thunderstruck.....

A 100 million suns should be a bright enough light...... week link part trois...

....from the heat of the blue nile with their downtown lights we go to the cold of snow patrol and the brightness of 100 million suns....

I did once read that Snow Patrols - Chasing Cars was the most played sound track in movies/tv/adverts, not sure if that is correct but it certainly put Snow Patrol on the map.

Snow Patrol hit my radar with a late night niche TV program Nylon ~ New York/London. The usual rules.... you hear a song and wonder wow... but Nylon was before the days of Shazam....but after a little bit of research and low and behold I was hooked.

And so for my 46th birthday I was given a copy of 100 Million Suns and the following day 10th January 2009, I slipped the DvD into the car radio and on a long drive home after a fab night out...up popped this song.... it is in fact 3 songs wrapped into one....

So strap on the Ray Bans

and see the light....

The week link part deux.....

Petula Clarks downtown gives me the link for song number 2, in other words any excuse to listen to the Blue Nile.....

This came from their second album, Hats... it took at least 5 years to wait for this album to appear, after A walk across the roof tops..... but like any Blue Nile/Paul Buchanan album worth waiting a life time for, as they never disappoint.

So here's to not being disappointed

show me the light Paul...

The week link.....

From the intensity of two 18+hr working days in Warsaw to a Suffolk village hall......

One minute I am absorbing huge amounts of data, trying to analyse the where fores and why fores of who knicked a full truck load of TV's and it's financial implications and then on my return home, I am press ganged into attending my local village hall fashion show.

To be a fair a lot of effort was put into this show and the money raised helps pay for the up keep of things such as the village hall, which to many in my village [including me] is seen as one of the building blocks of community life. We can have all the trappings of modern living, plentiful food, gadgets and their constant upgrades on demand, wall to wall reality shows but you can never ignore the simplicity of human spirit joined by a simple goal like raising a few quid for the village amenities.

There I sat towards the back of the room, watching the audience [mainly ladies] and oh how they laughed and smiled at the banter of the compères..... then there was the models..... not stick thin expressionless no marks..... but village members....Queenie.....oh gosh how she milked the lime light..... she looked a million dollars and boy did she know it.....

And so there I sat, the juxtaposition of my life..... one minute stuck in a Warsaw board room for 2 days as we trawled through reams of documents and emails analysing every word, every detail, as though it was the most important thing in the world.....and yet the following day the most important thing was that no one tripped up or missed their cue.

And so at the end of the fashion show, we CvL [clapped very loudly] and SvL [smiled very loudly] and we congratulated the participants and the organisers for a wonderful evening.........

Two days in Poland may pay the bills, but two hours in my village hall rewards the soul.....

One of the songs that accompanied the strutting models was a song I've not heard for years but always love it...... then it gave me the idea for this weeks themed SoD's..... to be loosely linked by the title...

So for the first week link

let's start by going downtown

Ladies you can keep your rabbits.....I'm a bunnyman !

.... after listening to Echo & the Bunnymen yesterday I had forgotten just how good this band is....

Sadly they are a man down from the original line up, after Pete De Freitas was killed in a motorcycle accident in 1989. Plus the Bunnymen had been through bit of an hiatus during this time.... but having seen them at the height of their popularity in the early 80's and more recently since their reformation.... they loose nothing of their appeal.

I love some of the current bands and music, as I think my SoD's can testify.... but there is still some great music since the 70's & particularly 80's. It is true that some 80's pop sync has not lasted well, but you only have to look at the likes of David Byrne and his ilk to know that some music can be played and replayed in any era and still sound good.

So put away your rabbits 

and get out the bunnymen

It's Monday.....

... and I was going to prattle on about how it was only a jooooke.... not a very funny one but a joke never the less....but instead of commenting about Adrian Chiles jokes about poles, it seems later this week I'm off to Poland* instead, so may be I'll get the joke there..... so instead of prattling on,  I was minded of this song....so I am listening to the whole album whilst I do proper work [as opposed to improper work .... like say a pole dance].....

This album, probably their most seminal work, takes me back to my formative years studying to be a ship's officer....

Hit it Ian...

and some 27 minutes or so
into the album and I remember
I love this song....
almost as much as pies

*[Once more I take to the air with Wizz Air....... I do so hope it's not another case of Whiff Air ! ]

Maria de Villota......

So it's Friday morning, and desert Island disc time again, and this time instead of my doctor being the reason for me listening....it was Jewsons fault this time....

And so I am listening to Carolyn McCall, the very intelligent and articulate CEO of Easyjet. But I did start to wonder if really Desert Island Discs is merely a narcissist charter. Truthfully, we are all narcissists to a greater or lesser extent, even blogging lends it's self very well to those of us suitably afflicted...... but on DiD the interviewees talk about their lives whilst the divine Kirsty blows smoke up their arses and then we get to listen to the personal taste of the interviewees music and if it matches ours...we gue.... oh yeah I agree, I like you...... and if it don't, our mind switches off....

Carolyn McCall is a very successful person and I like how she de-genders men by calling them blokes, she doesn't have to prove she is any male equal in the boardroom, she is clearly the boss.

There is no doubt that when her DNA was put into the blending tub, she got a very healthy smattering of cleverness [with only a teenie weenie dash of smugness that she got the xx chromosomes]..... you cannot but admire both her wit and wisdom and what she has made of her life..... she has many admirable traits.... but I was listening against the back drop of the just announced death of Maria de Villota.

You may not have heard of Maria but she offered up, and I think delivered many of the admirable traits that are exhibited by Carolyn McCall.........Maria was intelligent, smart, winning in a man's world, attractive, successful..... so listening to how successful Carolyn McCall was/is and yet Maria de Villota's life ended today at a mere 33 years old without the chance for her to achieve her full potential. On Monday she was due to promote her autobiography...... Life is a gift.

Now don't get me wrong, not for one second do I in any way denigrate Carolyn McCall for there is much to admire about her, but it's the contrast of 1 life good -vs- 1 life lost.

2 comparable women slightly overlapping generations, but for Maria De Villota it seems like there was her 360 degree sliding door moment last year.

She was on the cusp of breaking onto the front row grid of Formula One, a very male dominated world and then one day during a test drive at Duxford Airport, at the end of her run, for reasons which have never been identified her car ran straight into a stationery equipment truck.

She was lucky to survive, but she lost her right eye and with it her hopes of making big time in F1. I for one would have loved to have seen her race with the big boys and show them a thing or two.....but here we are little over a year later and she has left this world.... the cause of her death far too early for us observers to know.

I would have liked to think that Maria De Villota in some years to come, could have been on Desert Island Disc's telling us [in a narcissistic way] all the wondrous things in her life.....like the time she became the first woman world F1 champion in the bloke dominated world.

****************************************

Be open to your dreams, people 

Embrace that distant shore 

Because our mortal journey is over all too soon

****************************************

are they taking the piss......

I saw the BBC headline for this link ..........   Print your own bladder  ....and my only reaction was.... why ? ...... why the hell would I want to print a 3d version of my own bladder ?

But who knows...... maybe this bloke had and he was testing it out ? Maybe he is a waterboy.....it looks like he was ready to exhibit the whole of his moon......

Since first posting this, I then saw this with my next click on BBC dot com......

Do you really need to drink eight cups of water a day?

This headline caught my eye, because one of my top 10 is a drink of water. Reading the article I did think...blimey I'd have never worked that out ...... drink more water and you pee more....

But no matter how isotonic I make my body by my water intake it will never make me a finely tuned athlete but it still tastes good. I recall working in the Middle East in the height of their summer in my younger days. Walking around the deck of a ship on cargo duty under the Dubai midday sun and then tasting that first sip of ice cold water mixed with the first gasp of air conditioned air and there was nothing on the planet that could beat it.

For sure, fast cars, pretty women, sex, money all can bring a sense of euphoria to the party but at that second of consumption in that heat I would take the glass of water any time. Of course in the less warmer climes of good ole blimey, water still tastes good...but 8 glasses a day ? I might be a waterboy but I am definitely only a 1-a-day man....and I have no intention of getting my ars....ach erm moon out to flash anyone....... 

 

 

 

arses redux.....

...... I must be getting old..... now they are arguing over the origins of the twerk .....

Is Iggy of this world ? what in god's name is she prattling on about in the video interview ?..... 

who knows maybe I am not of this world..... 

twerking is bigger than us

talking of ars......ach erm horses.....

.... I see that John McCririck seems to be making bit of a horse of him sen.....

Every time you hear him wittering on these last couple of days, he keeps banging on about how channel 4 fired him because of his age.... and that it is outrageous and he will fight on behalf of all those who are targeted by this particular .... ism

I'd like to think the BBC report was spot on [but who can tell these days] but assuming accuracy in the reporting of JM's comment:

McCririck admitted there had been plenty of complaints to Channel 4 about his behaviour, and accepted descriptions of him as "nasty, revolting, rude", "boorish", and "obnoxious and sexist".

But he added: "I was fully aware that Channel 4 approved of it because they kept on having me on their programmes."

So what JM hasn't yet worked out, is that by taking him off their programmes they no longer approved [tacitly or otherwise] of his "nasty, revolting, rude", "boorish", and "obnoxious and sexist" behaviour.

So McCririck was fired not because of his....... age......... but because ......by his own admission..... he was/is {delete as appropriate} ..... nasty, revolting, rude, boorish, obnoxious and sexist in his behaviour.

I reckon John McCririck is odds on favorite to lose his case against Channel 4 et al. When will so called celebs learn..... control your behaviour .... it's not big and it's not clever....

Cue 2 great SoD

and they're under starters orders

it's neck and neck

oooh dear McCririck has fallen at the first hurdle

still not to worry

U2 and Icicle Works are romping home

for this one

usual rules

phone off

speakers on
full volume

hit it Ian

what a complete arse......

... we are a funny breed.... maybe it's because of the wide access to stories across the internet and it's somewhat instantaneous nature that we see so much, that at times can be ...... is there a truely a parallel universe ?

There you are, seeing the reported suffering of children in Syria, brutality in Keyna, financial mismanagement by governments all around the globe, the frustrations of Mark Neary [and he's not alone it seems], and then with the next click you are greeted with this......

I am shakkin my ass baby......

I looked at this and thought are these people really serious, they have gone to all this trouble, with Big Freedia organising it........ just looking at some of the people, it's like nothing else matters in the world but they must writhe their arses in a rhythmic manner, one women is damn near orgasmic when the GWR bloke confirms the WORLD record for twerking.......

But hey hang on a minute..... when I thunked about it some more, perhaps I am the dumb ass.... here I sit bashing away at the keyboard bleating about the things in life that make me bleat [not all the time though] and here I sat looking at all those asses being twerked....... maybe I'm the dumbass. They are out there smiling and doing something that makes them feel good.

I agree, it's not much good to the children of Syria or those who suffered in Keyna, not much chance of bailing governments out with a twerk [its the twats in government we need to worry about] and I'm sure that twerking is not the answer to Mark Neary's challenges..... but looking at those faces [yes I did look at the faces and not the asses ....or should that be butts, as corrected by one interviewee] and gosh they were all smiling.... may be I am a dumbass after all.....

only one SoD for it,

I see ya baby,

I see ya

to end the jingly jangly week....

...to be honest I think we'd need a 56 day week, because for a jingly jangly week there's load of songs I could choose...but still, for this week I choose this one as my last jingly jangly SoD...for this week at least.

We met by a trick of fate.....

or was it... 

 a 360°sliding door moment ?

its a jingly jangly week.....

...how about this oldie for a jingly jangly Thursday

you're my brown eyed girl

hit it Van !....

sod the news...sod being pissed off....it's Wednesday SoD...

....a jingly jangly Wednesday SoD

same rules,

same volume,

same jingly jangly feeling

To continue the jingly jangly theme...consider this as.....

a Jingly Jangly Tuesday SoD.... 

The news is still miserable, Damien Mcbride is still a twat, his publisher is an even bigger one, and Webber punished for thumbing a lift....thfra....

so usual rules apply....

put the phone on the hook...

mobile on silent...

plug in the Bose speakers....

crank up the volume to it's highest setting...

and I defer you not to feel jingly jangly

A jingly jangly......Monday...

......song from a very young Paul Weller.... and the alternative ?

Reflecting on the madness in Keyna..... so today I shall stick my head in the sand, arse in the air and instead reflect on a warm summer like jingly jangly Monday song instead.

That's a very expensive coffee......

£500M for a Costa Concordia .........

When you consider the apparent stupidity of the circumstances of the way the Costa Concordia came to grief with the loss of 32 lives, it's hard to imagine how a ship of that size could have [should have] ended up on her side on the rocks in the first place ....

My whole adult working life, has been dominated by ships and shipping. The first ship I saw close up and dangerous was at the tender age of 16.5 years old and it was the ship that would be my home for the next 4 months.

I had signed up to the Merchant Navy and yet I had never seen a ship, let alone been on one. Up to that point I had not been in possession of a passport. Also at that time I couldn't even swim, but some how I was walking up the gang plank armed with a sea survival certificate....but that is another story.....

So there I was a young boy stood on the deck..... there's a joke somewhere in that....there I stood looking at this mammoth ship thinking I'll be truely safe aboard this ship. When ships are in port they seem immovable objects and you cannot imagine them coming to grief..... This ship was relatively small in the world of ocean going ships Mv Border Shepherd [she was not that rusty when I sailed on her] and one of the biggest ships I sailed on was the British Trident*** at nearly a qtr of a mile long, but the reality is no matter how big the ship is, once you get to sea... then there is no guarantee you will survive the mercy of the weather [or the stupidity of Italian skippers] .... but just look at the recent events for the MoL Comfort.

And so watching them raise the Costa Concordia from it's watery grave, you can only but marvel at the skill in getting the vessel upright once more.

The cost of £500M is quite eye watering when you think about, a few years ago many might have simply said leave her to rot and waste away, some would still say it now..... but we live in changing times, and so the money was spent and the engineering work done**. They estimated about 12 hours to get her up to the vertical.

So about half way up, and some dickhead of a BBC reporter asks one of the senior salvage engineers a question..... [BBC reporter] You said it was going to take 12 hours but now it seems that it will take much longer what's gone wrong ?...... Now at this point the engineer gave a thoroughly polite answer and said...... nothing is going wrong, all is going to plan...... what he should have done is taken the microphone off the reporter and shoved it up the reporters poop deck ! What a twat that reporter is....... Salvaging a vessel of this size cannot be timed to the minute..... this was a one off, that took over a year to prepare and not forgetting the £500M spent, so I think the salvage team can be given quite a bit of leeway in not worrying about rushing to meet the 12 hour deadline......

Whether the cost was good value for money is a debate for a different forum, but for this week at least, one can only but marvel at the salvage whilst you sip and slurp your very expensive Costa....

As Desert Island Discs is about to return.... 

As it is Friday..... 

if I was on my Desert Island, 

this is the song* I would be humming 

as my SoD

*[SoD footnote:  I had originally planned to use the great EC's version of this, but as I have not yet aired this band and as this version is very commendable, I chose....... Suede]

**[Salvage footnote: I wonder if we will spend this much recovering wind turbines from a watery grave once they have passed their serviceable life ? ]

***[Ships sinking footnote: The British Trident recovered the crew from the supposedly sunken oil tanker the Salem. It turned out the Salem had not sunk. Part of the clue was when the crew of the ship were recovered from their life boats, they all had packed suit cases with them. When your ship is sinking, packing a case would not be a high priority. As it was, the Salem had not sunk and instead the crew were changed, the ship painted with a new name, and her precious and valuable cargo of oil was sold to the South African Oil Company, as at that time there were trade embargoes on South Africa as a result of apartheid.... oh what a tangled web we weave..... and so as a bonus SoD here is a great track......]