Suzy Mills' random thoughts

Cornbread recipe

2011-09-17T20:16:00.000+01:00

If you've never tried cornbread, you don't know what you're missing. Next time you're having chilli for dinner, try this. It's so darned tasty. The yummy combination of slightly sweet with hints of cheese and the chilli heat is fantastic. This is a tweaked recipe that I found online and made my own. It makes a really nice moist but crumbly cornbread.

2 servings - this actually makes 4 generous chunks of cornbread

50g butter, melted
65g white sugar
1 egg
1 green jalapeno chilli, finely chopped
40g grated cheddar
40g plain flour
45g cornmeal (Should be easy to find. I managed to buy a big bag from Tesco for 99p)
5g baking powder
pinch of salt

Preheat the oven to 150C.
Grease and line an overproof dish.

In a large bowl beat together the melted butter and sugar, then beat in the egg.
Blend in the chopped chilli and grated cheese.

In a separate smaller bowl stir together the plain flour, cornmeal, baking powder and salt.
Add this dry mix to the wet mix and stir until smooth.

Pour the batter into the ovenproof dish and bake for 50-60 mins.
After 50 minutes test with a cocktail stick - if it comes out clean, the cornbread is ready. If not, return to the oven for another 5-10 minutes.

The best damned salsa EVER!

2011-09-13T20:20:00.000+01:00

I recently discovered this recipe for salsa and I have to say it's the best I've ever had (and I've had a few). So I thought I'd share.

It takes a while to take, but it's totally worth the effort.

Makes a cup of salsa

4 plum tomatoes (fresh, whole)

2 cloves of garlic (whole, with skins still on)

1 large jalapeno pepper (whole, leave stalk on)

1 large tablespoon chopped coriander

1/2 white onion (finely chopped and rinsed in cold water)

Juice of 1/2 lime (use a fresh lime, not bottled juice for best flavour)

Pinch of sea salt

Heat a large, heavy-bottomed frying pan over a high heat.

Place the tomatoes, garlic and chilli in the dry frying pan and dry-roast until they are blackened, blistered and soft.

Remove and discard the stalk from the chilli and the skin from the garlic. Pound them to a rough paste in a pestle & mortar.

Add the tomatoes to the pestle & mortar and work them into the chilli paste. If all the tomatoes won't fit at once, do them in batches. Leave as many chunks as you want in your salsa.

Put all the tomatoes, chilli and garlic into a bowl. Add the chopped coriander, onion, lime juice and salt and mix it all together.

Life and death

2011-09-04T16:17:00.000+01:00

I just realised, I keep forgetting to use this blog when interesting or blog-worthy stuff happens. Must do better.

It was the week after all the riots and looting in London (which sadly also spread to other parts of the country). The news was depressing, yet strangely compelling - perhaps due to its constant bombardment 24 hours a day. I didn't want to see, but I couldn't stop watching. Any small glimmer of faith I'd had in humanity had ebbed away over that weekend. Seeing the mindless damage and violence killed me a little inside.
I had to get away and be somewhere far from the constant barrage of sorrow. I'm an empathic person. What is done to others affects me deeply. It's my greatest strength and my greatest weakness. So seeing all this stuff happening really got me down.

We had the week off work and it would be all too easy to sit and watch the news all day every day. Not good for the soul. That's what it was - my soul needed some fresh air. My default place when I really need to reconnect with what's important is the sea. It doesn't matter where I am, so long as I can get close to the sea. There's something very special indeed about the sound, the movement, the smell, the oxygen charged air and the wildlife that you only find in that magical combination when you stand on the shore. Looking out to a seemingly never-ending horizon, the breakers wash away every care I have in the world and in those moments, nothing else matters. I needed that.

We headed to Norfolk, driving along the coast road from Hunstanton all the way down to Cley Marshes. After visiting all the hides, we walked up to the beach. It's a shingle beach, so you hear the sea long before you see it. There were some impressive waves breaking and a stiff sea breeze - perfect.

After a brilliant day we finally headed home, taking a more positive outlook with us. The journey home was pleasant. We stopped off at the supermarket to get some dinner and we were 1/2 a mile from home at 9pm when...

As you enter our village there are double hump-backed bridges. The bridges are narrow - single lane. I know how dangerous they can be, so I always drive over them very slowly. We had passed over the first bridge and were starting onto the second when I saw headlights coming the other way. We were already on the bridges, and there was a car immediately behind me also on the bridges, so we had right of way. In the time it took for me to first see the headlights come around the corner it was only a matter of seconds. The guy must have been going pretty fast as I didn't have time to get off the second bridge. I remember shouting 'He's not slowing down!' hitting the brakes and coming to a stop. He seemed to realise something wasn't quite right, as he braked momentarily, but then accelerated at the last moment - straight at us.

Maybe he thought he'd just go ahead anyway, maybe he was being pig-headed and thought I should get out of his way - I don't know. All I know is that when he hit us, it's a sound I'll never forget. Thankfully, he hit the wall of the bridge first, which took some of the energy out of the impact. He hit the wall with enough force to trash it. He's lucky he didn't end up in the river. If he'd hit us first I don't know if I'd be sitting here typing this now...

My first reaction was to get out of the car as quickly as possible. I had no idea how bad the damage was and I was terrified that the car might catch fire. I tumbled out onto the ground. Only at this point did the pain hit me. My neck was bruised and burned by the seat belt and oh my god, the pain in my chest was excruciating. Boobs and seat belts DON'T GO. I honestly felt around to check whether my left breast was still attached - it felt like it had been ripped off my body.

The guy who hit us was apologising profusely and saying he wasn't familiar with the road. Like that's an excuse. Surely if you don't know a road you should slow down and be more careful. He was either driving his dad's car or a work car - I'm not sure which. He was on his way home from a training course (I wonder if he's insured for business use?) and had followed a diversion because the A1 was closed. Then he'd detoured from the official diversion and was following his sat nav. I can only guess that he was looking at the sat nav instead of the road, or maybe he just wasn't looking at all.

The woman in the car behind us (who agreed to be a witness for me) called for the police and an ambulance, as I was sitting on the floor in agony, crying and a bit hysterical. While we were waiting for the police to arrive a very 'charming' man who was one of the people stuck in the traffic jam which had built up on either side of the bridges wandered over and asked if I was planning on moving my car any time soon, as it was very inconvenient. I told him in no uncertain terms exactly what I thought of him and that nothing was getting moved anywhere until the authorities had arrived. What a wanker! He didn't care that I was hurt, that I was upset, just that I was in his way. There goes my faith in humanity AGAIN...

The other driver claimed there were no warning signs, so he had no idea there was a narrow bridge ahead. Utter bullshit - he just didn't see the very clear warning signs. I went back the next day to take pictures for the insurance company.

This all happened on the Tuesday, at the beginning of our holiday week. Needless to say, the rest of our holiday was destroyed, along with my car. Wednesday was spent having the car taken away, getting a loan car sorted and visiting the doctor to get some pain killers. They told me it would hurt more the next day and boy they weren't kidding. The rest of the week was all about finding new bruises every day and various parts of me hurting to various degrees.

Even now, 3 weeks later I still have to go back to the doctor again. I've been getting sharp pains in my knees (which hit the dashboard) and they're making crunchy noises that they didn't used to make.

About a week after the crash I got the call I was dreading - the car was a write-off. Gutted doesn't even start to describe it. I loved that car. It was the first car I'd ever had that didn't have it in for me. It was reliable and hadn't had any problems. It was in really good condition too. I'm still in mourning for her.

I also found out something I didn't know. When you're involved in a crash that was absolutely not your fault and your car is destroyed, the money the insurance company will give you is nowhere near enough to buy another car. Hmmm - came as a bit of a shock to me.

So I'm out of pocket, through no fault of my own. I've had to buy another car, which has cost me personally £1000 (on top of the insurance money). The other unseen cost is my confidence, which will take a long time to find again.

Thanks for that, tosser who hit me.

The only good thing to come out of this whole nasty experience is the utter relief I feel that Mark wasn't hurt in the accident. If anything ever happened to him, if he was ever hurt, while he was a passenger in my car, I don't think I could cope with that. I'd rather be burt myself than be responsible (whether at fault or not) for hurting him.

I take driving very seriously. I'm acutely aware that I'm responsible for the lives of anyone in my car and those around me. I never take risks, I drive within the speed limit, I pay close attention. Some people may think that's boring, but I don't give a shit about what they think.

In Many Ways - by Peter Carroll

2011-09-04T13:11:00.000+01:00

A friend wrote this book and initially asked me to plug it to help him out. Rather than just plug it for that reason, and because it's a measly 86p to download it from Amazon, I thought I'd buy it and give it a whirl. I downloaded the free Kindle App so I can read it on my laptop and started reading this morning, not knowing what to expect.

I'm totally hooked! It's a brilliant read. The characters are so well described I feel like I know those dodgy Scottish geezers (not that I'd want to).

So I'm recommending this book, not because I know the guy, but on its own merits. If you fancy a really good read, get this. Simples...

Here's a quick synopsis:
In “In Many Ways”, a young man is abducted and mutilated for talking out of turn, and a policeman is murdered as a result – all in a day’s work for Danny O’Neill, Scotland’s most notorious gangster.
Meanwhile, small-time drug dealer and shop worker Davie Argyle has just crossed O’Neill’s path. Davie has been waiting a long time for this. He needs to swallow his pride and convince O’Neill to trust him. Thing is, can he stay alive long enough for his plan to work?
Torture, murder, rock n roll and bloody revenge ensue as pasts unfurl and long-held secrets reveal themselves.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B005JLO9ZC/ravencrestboo-21

Ikea

2011-02-26T09:53:00.000Z

Our new chairs were delivered this morning - just.
When we bought them, we measured the chairs in the shop to make sure they'd fit through the door. What we didn't know though was that they'd arrive in a box the size of a small car.

So the Ikea lorry turns up this morning - bang on time (credit where it's due) and the boxes won't fit through the door. So Mrs Practical here says 'Take them out of the boxes then.' (Yeah, I know - duuuuurrr). Their response was nothing short of horror and went something like this:
'We can't take them out of the boxes.'
'Why not?'
'Because if we do and they still don't fit, we'll have to leave them here, outside.'
'What?'
'Once they're out of the box, you've accepted delivery of them.'
'I know they'll fit, we measured them before we bought them.'
'But what if we damage them? If we scratch them, we have to pay for them.'
'Are you professionals who know what they're doing?'
'Yes'
'Well then, I trust you to carry two chairs into the house without the box. Take them out of the boxes.'
'We're not allowed.'
'FINE - I'll take them out of the boxes then.' Goes to get scissors to open boxes.
'Yeah but, what if they get damaged?'
'FINE - I'll carry them into the house on my own then shall I, while you watch?' Losing my rag now...

So they relented, because I think they might have picked up that I was not going to accept this lame excuse, and they carried them into the house. Guess what? They fitted through the door just fine, like I knew they would.

Honestly, is everyone SO determined to cover their arses against everything and everyone these days that it's got to this situation? I mean, really...
I understand that these blokes were just following the rules, I was annoyed with the rules - they just happened to be in the line of fire.

Sheesh....

I have no love for Valentine's Day

2011-02-13T18:07:00.001Z

When I was a kid, I used to get one or two Valentine's cards each year. They'd always be unsigned and anonymous. Part of the fun was trying to work out who fancied you. :-)

It was a wonderful opportunity to anonymously declare your feelings for someone who wasn't aware they were the object of someone's affection. That was the whole point of Valentine's Day - wasn't it?

These days it's 100% commercial. We're bombarded with cheap, tacky, red merchandise for weeks in advance and everyone has these huge, expensive expectations thrust upon them.

Sales of vomit-inducing teddy bears wearing t-shirts that say "I wuv you" soar. Restaurants charge extortionate amounts for what is normally a set menu and cheap bottle of fake champagne. Flowers are suddenly double their usual price and everyone is expected to buy all this stuff regardless - because if you don't, it means you don't care. Bullshit.

I honestly can't believe that everyone just goes along with what is so obviously just marketing. Tell your loved one that you love them on any other day. Buy them flowers and chocolates or take them out to dinner, just because YOU thought of it. Don't wait for someone to tell you when to show you care. It's 100% more impressive if you do it off your own back.

Open you heart - not your wallet.

A friend in need

2010-11-22T13:24:00.000Z

My friend Bill is one of the most caring, kind and generous people I've ever met.
As well as being involved in his local church and community, and working full time for a conservation charity, he also runs a little place called Cafe Mocha.

Cafe Mocha is run on a not-for-profit basis. It's main aim is to help people who have been out of work, through physical or mental illness, back into work and to offer a community gathering place, for people to meet, enjoy a coffee, get support and make news friends.

On Saturday night, some mindless drunken idiot broke one of the windows of Bill's beloved cafe. It's going to cost him out of his own pocket to get it fixed - but we can help.
A small donation (absolutely anything helps) would be a great help to Bill and the team at Cafe Mocha.
If you'd like to help, please send a donation via paypal to paypal@cafemocha.org.uk

Bill would never dream of asking for help like this, but I can't think of anyone who has earned it more. He's a constant source of inspiration to me, a great friend to many people and a credit to humanity.

Album of the year / Album of the decade

2010-10-29T22:44:00.001+01:00

As it's getting close to the end of the year and the end of the decade, Mark asked me earlier what are my album of 2010 and album of the noughties. I had to think about it for a whole 20 seconds. So, if you're interested, here are mine.

Album of the year 2010
This was a quick decision. Without doubt it has to be Blood/Candy by The Posies. Nothing else released this year has grabbed me by the throat, heart and soul like this one.

What an amazing musical trip! It's adventurous, crossing and mixing styles not only throughout the album, but within the songs themselves on occasion too. There are moments where, to my mind, I can hear reference to Brendan Benson, Nada Surf, Beach Boys, The Beatles etc etc - but it never 'sounds like' those artists. The Posies always manage to create something unique to them. They are their own sound.

My personal favourites on Blood/Candy are So Caroline, She's Coming Down Again, Cleopatra Street and Notion 99. That's not to say that I like those a LOT more than other songs on the album, they're just my favourites. It took me a while to get into Licenses To Hide, but once I'd heard it live, I 'got it' and now really enjoy listening to it.

This much anticipated (by me at least) return, after a 5 year break since their last album, was worth every minute of the wait. I never thought I'd say it, but I honestly think this is their best album ever (so far). I say so far because who knows what they'll come up with next...

Album of the decade 2000-2010
Slightly more difficult to decide this one. There has been some cracking music released in the last 10 years. It's heartening to know that music ISN'T dead. It's alive and kicking, but struggling for breath in the world of downloads for free and a music industry twitching in its death throws. Honourable mention to Doves and Radiohead, who have both made some exceptional music in the last 10 years, as have many other artists.
So in true top anything style - I've chosen not one, but two albums, because I think they score equally and I can't choose between them.

I'm judging this not on technical perfection (though in my opinion my choices are both pretty close to perfection). I'm not judging it on what anyone else thinks, or how popular or successful the album was. Tish and pish to that! I'm judging this purely on how many times I've felt inspired to listen to this album. Whenever I look to our music collection to entertain me, or my iPod to take me away from it all, these two albums have consistently been first choice, over and over again. And it's testament to the music that I've NEVER got bored of hearing them. That I can still be moved to tears or find something new in a song I've heard many times before is all I need to make my choices. So here they are.

Songs From The Year Of Our Demise by Jon Auer

Every hour of every day of every year that Jon Auer laboured over his solo album can be heard in the finished article. Every tear, every bead of sweat is somehow reproduced in these stunningly beautiful songs. I listen to this album at least once a week. It takes me from tears to a massive grin and everything in between - every time. Every emotion gets a look-in. It's a treasure.

Magnetic North by Iain Archer

From the very first song, the very first time I saw Iain Archer perform live (purely by accident, but what a beautiful accident) I was utterly enthralled. I'll never, ever forget standing in front of him as he played this wonderful, intelligent music, while all the 'cool kids' totally ignored him. Magnetic North is an achingly beautiful collection of songs that sometimes punch you in the eye and sometimes give you a warm loving hug. The musicianship is something to behold and his fragile voice, sometimes on the verge of breaking is just mesmerising. Again, once a week at least this gets a spin and I never tire of hearing it - far from it.

Amsterdam - 9th October

2010-10-14T23:02:00.002+01:00

Up and at 'em early after a decent night's sleep and onto the packed 10am train to Brussels. Another beautiful sunny day. THIS is what life is all about - adventures, new places, new friends.
:-)
One of the weirdest things we saw on our trip was on this journey. Matilda spotted it and pointed out the window. In the middle of a field full of cows, there was one cow, obviously very dead, lying upside down with all four legs sticking up in the air. Bizarre... As a vegetarian, I guess I shouldn't have found this amusing, but it was - so ner.
We passed hooker street again, approaching Brussels Nord. Even at 11am the windows are populated by the day shift skanks. I wonder what the girls they keep in the back look like?

We thought we'd have to wait over an hour for our connecting train to Amsterdam, but when we arrived there was a train leaving in 15 minutes only 2 platforms down. Result.
It's a 3 hour journey from Brussels to Amsterdam, but the time flew by and soon we were back in the city we loved so much on our previous trip (a very cold 24 hours in January 2006, funnily enough for a Posies show). This time it was glorious and warm and heaving with people. I was bloody starving by this point. It was mid afternoon and I hadn't eaten yet, so I grabbed a slice of pizza at the station and snarfed it super-quick. It was sooooo good.
It was quite a shock, after spending the past few days in relatively quiet places, to be suddenly thrust into such a throng of people. It's a manic place.
We found our hotel, only 5 minutes walk from the station, got checked in (decent room), then headed out into the late afternoon sunshine.

The real beauty of Amsterdam is that it can be anything you want it to be. It can be a drug-fuelled haze, a trip for seedy unspeakables, a tourist bonanza or just a nice place full of art and culture. It's kind of up to the individual. That's what I like about it, apart from the fact that it's a really beautiful and friendly place.

We walked down to Leidseplein, parked our bums in some seats and enjoyed some quality people-watching over a coffee. It's a great way to kill time. Another quick wander around the surrounding streets then it was time to head to the venue, Sugar Factory. It's the sister venue to the Melkwegg - right across the street. We got our tickets sorted and immediately bumped into an old friend, Carsten. It was so nice to see him after 4 years or so. He'd come from Germany for the show. Amsterdam was our last show on the tour, and Carsten's first. He was going to the next 6 shows, I think. Lucky boy.

We headed inside, bagged a spot at the front, had a drink and a good chat as the place gradually filled up around us. There was a lot of confusion about what time The Posies were supposed to be onstage during the day, so we were a little concerned at how few people were there at the time they were supposed to be starting. Of course, nothing ever quite goes to plan and they ended up starting later, and by then, the place was pretty well packed. Yay!
What a cracking gig! The crowd were great, really into it. The band were really into it and obviously having a good time. They put a lot of energy into the show and I finally got some half-decent photos at this one too (despite the red lights).

Boing!

After the encore, Jon and Ken grabbed the box of CDs and went off to sell merch, while Matt and Darius grabbed the nearest alcohol available. After a couple of minutes it became very obvious that this crowd were NOT going to let the night be over without a fight (in a good way). They just kept clapping, whistling and screaming. Jon and Ken had to come back to the stage and do one more song, which was a real treat. You Avoid Parties, played so sweetly, it brought a tear to many an eye.
We had a fun chat with Jon's friends from New Mexico again (whose names I STILL can't remember). They were having a great time, totally enjoying their retirement and had bravely cycled around Amsterdam.

Outside the venue, it was time for lengthy goodbyes and many hugs all round. Jon gave us a bottle of wine and told us to "Let it breathe". Ha! All too soon we all went our separate ways, heading into the Amsterdam night. I managed not to cry - just...
Mark and I stopped at this amazing place called Maozusa on the walk back. They take a pitta bread, stuff it with freshly cooked falafels, then give you a mouthwatering choice of about 15 different things you can add yourself. Oh my god - it was SO tasty. We stood on a bridge over one of the canals stuffing our faces, totally happy.

We were sad our Posies tour had come to an end, but couldn't really have asked for a better night to end it on. Music, friends, falafels - what more do you need - really?

Liege - 8th October

2010-10-14T21:40:00.002+01:00

Our day started with bumping our suitcases across the cobbles of Brussels again and a pretty long walk to the Midi/Zuid station. Weird looking place - it looks like a big generic office building from the outside. If it wasn't for all the train lines converging and the big B logo outside, you could easily miss it.
We arrived in plenty of time, so went and had a very nice cafe latte and chilled out for a while in the sunshine.
Once you're inside the Midi/Zuid it's all business. It's well laid out and there's loads of information screens everywhere that update constantly with reliable information. Nothing like the UK... Travelling by train on the continent is a real eye-opener and I highly recommend it.

The journey to Liege was only an hour and a bit. Our guidebook was pretty negative about the city, describing it as grubby and unpleasant, so we weren't expecting much. We arrived in blazing sunshine at the groovy new station. The guidebook was wrong!

Our hotel was right across the street from the station, so no messing about with cobbles today. We checked into our very nice room with a super kingsize bed and wifi. Woohoo!

We were in Liege quite early, so decided it would be a good opportunity to eat some proper food - something we hadn't done for several days. So we headed into the centre of town and had a very nice curry at the Taj Mahal restaurant. It's a small unassuming restaurant down a narrow back street.
Good food + exceptionally friendly service = big tip.
Suitably full, but not stuffed we set out towards the night's venue - Caserne-Fonke. A quick call to Jon confirmed the details of what time they were on. The Liege show was the only show where The Posies were playing with (actually supporting) another band - Puggy. Never heard of them, but apparently they're pretty popular around these parts.

It was quite a trek, but we really enjoyed walking everywhere on this trip. It gave us a chance to see a little bit of each city that we wouldn't have seen otherwise, and get some much needed exercise. We passed through the wig district - I shit you not - there were loads of wig shops all bunched together in one street. Then walked a long way up the river and over a bridge, just as the sun was setting. It was really pretty.

We found the venue, no problem. We knew we'd arrived when we reached the end of the queue, which ran right down the street and round the corner. Puggy are VERY popular. 1,200 tickets sold for this show. Blimey! We stood in line for what felt like a very long time before we finally got in. We were very thankful to be given backstage passes - the place was heaving with teenagers! And what a place. HUUUUGE, one might even say cavernous. The stage was set up about half way along the 'room', so the dozen or so people backstage had the same amount of room as the 1,200 fans crammed in front. It was so big the van which was parked in a corner looked like a toy in there.

We met up with Matilda, who was on video duties for the night this time, said hello to everyone, had a quick drink, then it was show time already. It was absolutely packed, so we decided to stay in the relative calm available to us and watch The Posies play from the side of the stage. This is something we've not done before. It was interesting to watch the show from a different angle like this. OK, we didn't get to hear the full-on sound out front, but we thoroughly enjoyed the show. It was fun to watch the audience. They seemed to really enjoy the set, despite being born after some of the songs were released! There was lots of clapping and cheering - always a good sign.

Mahoooosive!

They played a great, but short set of beautifully executed songs, but it was all over too soon.
After the show I found this on the wall and had to take a picture.

GET IN The Posies!!!
Hell yeah.

Tired and shagged-out after a prolonged squawk, the guys had a long drive ahead of them to Utrecht, so we all called it a night pretty early - after spending some considerable time trying to find Darius' wingnut, which he'd dropped in the dark while packing up his drum kit. Eventually it was found.
Matilda, Mark and I went outside to find a bus back into town, where she was approached by a man who wanted to offer her a job. Random! Anyhoo, their conversation was entirely unintelligible to us, but seemed to go well.
He offered us a lift, which saved us time and money and gave them more chance to talk about TV stations and web applications (the only bits I understood). It was a bit of a manic ride, but we got dropped off at the station 10 minutes later in one piece.
By this time I think it was only about 10.30pm ish, so we decided to go for a night cap and chat. Around 11pm Matilda found out she'd just missed her last train back to Brussels, so she got a room at our hotel for the night and we ended up sitting outside a bar a couple of doors down from the hotel until 1.30am, just enjoying each others company.
We were interrupted for a while by Victor, a local loon, who wanted to sit with us. Matilda handled him really well and tried so hard to politely tell him that we were deep in conversation and didn't want him to sit down. He was getting pretty pushy and quite aggressive, but she stayed calm and refused to be baited by him. Kudos to you girl.

All in all a great night in Liege. Don't believe everything you read in guidebooks.

Brussels - 7th October

2010-10-12T20:58:00.001+01:00

A leisurely coffee at Antwerp station then onto another efficient and comfortable train for our journey back to Brussels for Posies gig no.3.
Just before you reach Brussels Nord station there's a street you can see from the train, with window after window of hookers, standing around, feeling themselves up and smoking fags. Classy...

We got off the train at Brussels Central station and navigated our way to our hotel for the night, with a lot of help from the map in the guidebook leant to me by someone at work. Thank god I had that. Central Brussels is a maze of narrow cobbled streets. Cobbled streets look great, but they're a bugger when you have a suitcase on wheels. We eventually found our hotel, round the back of the beautiful St Catherines.

We checked in and headed up to our room. I walked through the room, to the window and said to Mark "Did I miss the bedroom?" Checked the only other door, it's the bathroom. Looked again - the "bed" was a fold-out sofa! What the hell?! And you even had to open it yourself. It was seriously uncomfortable, with metal and springs all around the edge. Thank god we were only spending one night. But at least we had internet access. Time to head out to the venue for the night, Botanique.

It was quite a long walk, but we found it ok and even bumped into Martine and Frank on the way. Yay!
Botanique (Botany) is a really lovely arts centre inside the old glasshouse of the Brussels botanic garden. What a beautiful place. Tropical plants and fish ponds all around.
There was some confusion over the guest list, as the woman said we weren't on it. We got it sorted eventually, then went and sat outside on the terrace for a while, overlooking the garden and the city. Lovely.

Gig time! Another great set, with a good selection of old and new songs.

The lighting was great, the sound was superb and the guys were in a good mood, obviously enjoying themselves. What more could you want? Apart from maybe a slightly livelier audience... They really didn't seem to get the signature Posies humour between songs.
Mark was put in charge of Matt's video camera and disappeared to the back to get some footage. He never came back, but I stayed at the front and did some videos with my camera too. It turned out that the sound was SO GOOD at the back, Mark couldn't bring himself to move away once he found the sweet spot.
A particularly lovely version of The Beautiful One brought a tear to my eye.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNp5Up4LgfM

Once the show was over, Jon and Ken were once again mobbed by people thrusting cash at them in exchange for cd's, which they gladly thrust back at them, signed. We met Matilda (a multi-lingual Finnish woman living in Brussels) and her boyfriend Jill (?). Matilda was incredibly drunk and promptly fell down a short flight on stone steps. There's nothing quite like the sound of a floppy drunk body hitting solid ground. It happened so fast no-one could stop it. Before we knew what was happening, she was head-downwards on the steps, with her legs in the air, but she was shouting "I'm ok!" Thank god she didn't fall into one of the fish ponds!
There was a huge crowd at the merch desk, so Mark and I went and hung out on the terrace with Martine, Frank, Matilda, Jill and Darius. A hilarious conversation ensued, with subjects ranging from music to gynaecologists. Matilda was so frikkin funny. Normally I find drunk people annoying, but she was good natured and fun. She kept spilling her drinks, bumping into people and dropping her cigarettes. And BOY can that girl talk!!!! :-)

Once everything was sorted, we all went to the hotel next door for some (VERY expensive) drinks in the bar with Jon, Ken, Matt & Darius, the rest of us and Jon's lovely friends from New Mexico (whose names I can't for the life of me remember). I ordered 2 glasses of wine and a Jamesons and it came to 21 euros. Ouch! 9 euros for a shot of Jamesons? - crikey, you can buy a bottle for that.
Matilda talked AT people a lot. Heehee. BLAH! BLAH! BLAH!

We had a great chat with Matt and Jon - the first chance we'd had to actually talk properly, but everyone was tired, so eventually we left for the long walk back to our hotel across town. We walked with Martine and Frank back as far as the parking garage where they'd left their car. When we got there, the shutters were down and it looked very closed. Uh-oh... Thankfully it turned out they could get their car out and get home. Phew.
Walking back through Brussels was much nicer than Antwerp the night before. Unfortunately, we had to go back to our sofa-bed. I didn't sleep a wink, but when you're having this much fun, shit like that doesn't matter so much.

Antwerp - 6th October

2010-10-11T22:30:00.002+01:00

Our European adventure started with our first ever trip on the Eurostar from London to Brussels!
It is kind of weird, that 20 minutes that you're inside the channel tunnel. It's best not to think about the fact that you're actually under the sea. I busied myself with my ipod and the time flew by, along with the countryside. One thing I did discover is, if you try to look at things close to the tracks when you're travelling that fast, it makes you feel travel sick quite quickly. It's best to focus on the wider landscape.

There was a little less legroom that I was anticipating, but it's still a damned sight better than travelling by budget airline (boooo...). You don't have to worry about how big your bag is or how much your suitcase weighs. As long as you can lift it onto the train, that's pretty much it. It's very civilised really.
It only takes about 2 1/2 hours for the entire journey too. If we'd flown, we'd have wasted nearly that long being at a bloody airport ridiculously early. Plus you have the added bonus of trains ending up IN the city you want to go to, rather than 20 miles or more outside, which many airports are.

Our Eurostar tickets also gave us free onward travel to any station in Belgium, so when we arrived in Brussels, we hopped onto another train to Antwerp. It was only a local train, that stopped at pretty much every station, but hell, the Belgians know how to do public transport! I initially thought we'd got into a 1st class carriage. The seats were big and comfy. Awesome. The ride is noticeably smoother on the continent too. No bumping around or squealing rails in Belgium, hell no.

Antwerp central station - not too shabby.

Our hotel in Antwerp was literally across the street from the train station. Really nice spacious, comfy room. Schweeet! It was already late afternoon/early evening by the time we got checked in, so no time to wander around the city straight away.
After some faffing around we found a very nice woman who helped us make sure we got on the right bus for the venue, Trix. She was just the first of a whole host of super-friendly, English speaking people who made our trip so much easier and stress-free. We got on a VERY crowded bus and headed off into the night (without paying).
After about 10 minutes, she realised that we'd gone past our stop - not her fault, the bus just didn't stop there. D'oh! So we had to get off at the next stop and walk back the way we'd come to find the venue, Trix. It wasn't the nicest area I've ever had to walk through in the dark. It was pretty dodgy looking, so we kept our heads down and tried not to make eye contact with anyone. We got a little disorientated, so I stopped a couple of guys to ask them directions. It turned out they were heading to the show as well, so we walked with them. More nice people! So far, me likey Belgium and Belgians.

When we arrived at Trix we could hear the guys sound-checking inside. They'd got caught in traffic and had arrived later than expected. The doors opened and there was quite a queue to get in, which is always a good sign. We got to the entrance and told them we were on the guest list, which confused them slightly, as they hadn't been given the list. The guy let us in because "You're the first people to ask, and you're English, so it must be true." Ha!
Just after we got in, Ken rushed over with the guest list, looking flustered and busy. :-)

The place filled up nicely and there was quite a buzz in the air. I tried to buy a couple of drinks, after queueing at the bar for a few minutes. Only then was I told I had to join ANOTHER queue to buy drinks tokens. WTF! Apparently, that's how they do things in Belgium. You can't pay for your drinks at the bar, you have to buy tokens in advance, then hand them over at the bar. A token is 2 euros. One token = one drink, which is great if you want a beer. It's a pretty bloody expensive way of buying a glass of water though, as I discovered. Yikes!

A great set followed.

Conversations was dropped in favour of Daily Mutilation.

After the show Jon and Ken were positively mobbed by people clamouring to buy the new cd. It seemed to take forever before we even got a chance to say hello. We had a quick chat with the boys, met a lovely new friend, Martine and then called it a night as we weren't sure what time the buses and trams stopped running. When we got to the nearest bus/tram stop it looked like it had shut down for the night already, so we started walking back towards town. It was rubbish night and all the streets were piled high with stinky unspeakables. We got about a third of the way, when we saw a bus, so hopped on it back to town. It was way too far to walk that late at night and after such a long day of travelling. We were knackered. Despite being very tired and the comfortable room, I barely slept a wink.

Next morning, we had a little time to kill, so we wandered around the town for a couple of hours, took a few photos and found a supermarket to stock up on essentials, like orange juice, fruit and water. Then we packed up and checked out to catch our train back to Brussels for the next gig.

Photos from Antwerp

Our adventures with The Posies 2010 - London - 5th October

2010-10-07T17:28:00.001+01:00

5 shows, 5 cities, 5 nights - hell yeah!

Our Posies adventure started off in London at The Garage. Apparently it's called the Relentless Garage nowadays, but that's a stupid name, so I'll stick with the old one.

We sacrificed not one, but two, Posies virgins to the alter at this gig. Our good friend Nick, who has great taste in music and is one of those people who IS prepared to get off his arse and travel for a good gig, was virgin no.1.
Our gig buddy Kate, who is a very cool chick and loves going to gigs, even if she's barely even heard of the band she's going to see was virgin no.2. I'd convinced her to come at midnight the night before the show.

We had a chance to chat briefly to Jon, and I got a rare and pleasant pre-gig non-sweaty hug - which was nice.
Here's the setlist. The only tracks missing from the new album were Accidental Architecture, Notion 99 & She's Coming Down Again. All the new songs sounded frikkin awesome. I'm even beginning to like Licences To Hide now. That's the only song on the album that I didn't instantly like, but hearing it live, it's getting under my skin.

There was a decent crowd in. It wasn't rammed, but it certainly wasn't light on the ground either. It was extremely hot though. Ken commented on the number of people in the audience who were wearing coats, when "It's a million degrees in here!"
We were told the tale of Darius and his stolen passport and thanked as a nation for having great embassies and for inventing sandwiches.

After the show Ken and Jon were swamped with people eagerly buying CDs. Yay! :-)
They were so swamped we left them to it and headed home.

Honourable mentions to other friends present: Henrik, Andy H and his mate Mark. Great to see you guys.
Antwerp next!

Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now

2010-09-29T22:55:00.000+01:00

A play by Colin Smith

On Saturday 25 September we were lucky enough to be in Oldham, just north of Manchester for the last night of a sold out run of Colin Smith's play "Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now".

Let me tell you a little about Colin. He's by far the funniest person I've ever had the pleasure to know.
His wit is absolutely razor-sharp. He's one of those people who seems to effortlessly come out with the type of things that you usually find yourself on the way home saying "Aaargh, if only I'd said xxxxxx, it would have been so funny!" He's a master of accents too, switching from one to another pretty convincingly. He's also a bloody nice bloke and a good friend. An all-round good egg, one might say.

So - Colin wrote this play and The Lyceum in Oldham decided to put it on. Smart move. It was sold out every single night of the run, and on the night we were there, the entire audience seemed to have a great time.

Knowing Colin, I knew this play would be good. What I wasn't really prepared for though, was just HOW good it is. I laughed till I cried and my face ached. It's not all cheap gags. The humour is in equal parts intelligent, witty, risque, borderline offensive (just how I like it) and there's the odd cheap gag thrown in too. The whole cast were brilliant.

I was totally blown away by it and literally rendered speechless once it was over. I even cried a little.

The gist of the story is, this bloke wakes up dead, though he doesn't know it, and he's escorted to the afterlife by a scantily-clad "collector" where he has to endure a series of ridiculous (and hilarious) interviews in order to convince him he's dead and assess his life on earth.
He then has to decide which of his 3 dead wives he wants to spend eternity with. While he's fretting over this big decision he's put into temporary accommodation, sharing a flat with Jesus of Nazareth and Adolf Hitler (best comedy duo EVER). It was almost TOO funny at points. It was so funny it hurt!

The Collector (way better looking than The Grim Reaper!)

Comedy genius!

"Directly or indirectly, how many insect deaths have you been responsible for?"

Nice touch - Jesus reading 'Woodworker' magazine.

Special mention to camp Hitler and his fantastic facial expressions.

I don't even want to give away the ending, as I'm pretty convinced that if there's ANY justice in the world, this play will be picked up and will some day soon be playing in a theatre near you. When it is, do yourself a favour, go and see it. I defy anyone to not enjoy the hell out of this.

Messed up

2010-09-25T02:48:00.001+01:00

It's 2.30am. I've been awake since 2am. I was asleep, but my dreams were so messed up that I awoke clawing at my face, so I decided to force myself to be awake for a while, for a much needed reality check.

I always say I should write down my dreams before I forget them. They're already starting to fade, so what follows is probably going to be as weird and disjointed as the thing that woke me in the first place.

I'm at a festival. Barefoot, walking around the edge of 2 stages. Cables everywhere. There is some kind of acrobatic troupe with people strapped into robot shaped cages, being strung onto a long wire that's pulled them high into the air. I'm trying to get a picture of them with my phone because they look like transformers, but they're moving too fast and it annoys me.

I don't like the music on offer, somehow I end up in a dirty house with 2 Mexican DJs. They're playing some good music and seem nice enough (in a slightly scary way). We're drunk. It's going ok until I'm sitting between them and one of them suggests I take my top off. I'm suddenly aware of my personal space and just how much it's been invaded. I'm terrified they're going to rape me, and I get angry and shout at them, trying to force them to respect me as a person, as a human being. They're laughing at me. They have a very low opinion of women.
Someone knocks on the door. Why are they knocking? Do they know what these guys had planned all along and know not to disturb them? I shudder at the thought. He makes the excuse that he often wanks himself off on that sofa, so people knock. I don't know what to believe. I'm angry and scared, so I run. Back through the festival - suddenly the transformer robot caged people are really scary.

Suddenly I'm in an ultra-modern white house, with floor to ceiling net curtains blowing in the breeze and the first light of dawn cast pink across the walls. I'm creeping quietly but quickly through the house because I need to know how long it'll take me to get in there, kill the woman who is sleeping peacefully in a vast white bed, get out and get back (to wherever I came from) and keep my alibi intact. As I go through the last door in the long corridor she wakes up. Did she see me? Could she identify me? Should I just kill her now or risk coming back to do it at the time I planned?

Another sudden change. There's things crawling on me - on my face. Get them off! I wake up clawing at my face convinced there's something there.
At that point, I decided to be awake for a while. It's less traumatic.

Robin Guthrie at ICA, London - 19 September 2010

2010-09-21T23:56:00.001+01:00

It's not that often that I feel moved to blog about a gig I go to, but this one left me feeling so gushy that I need an outlet.
Early Sunday evening is a good time to be in London. We tubed it from Kentish Town to Charing Cross then wandered leisurely past the tourists taking pictures of each other on Trafalgar Square (taking care to protect our belongings from the pick-pockets), through Admiralty Arch and onto The Mall. Pretty fancy surroundings for a venue, what with Queenie being just up the road...

The ICA is one of those venues that I've heard about for years and years, but never been to until now. It's a very nice arts centre, with art on the walls and a bookshop, as you walk in. The super friendly staff don't make you feel like a scumbag (for a change). We mooched around in the bar for a while and had a nice cup of filter coffee - for only £1.50, which is unheard of in central London, before being politely ushered into the venue.
Nice small/medium venue with pretty good sound, a decent sized stage (with no barriers) and lots of lights. So far so good.

First on were a band that a friend had TOLD me I needed to get there early to see - Daniel Land & The Modern Painters. I'm glad she did. Thoroughly enjoyed their set. Nice wooshy guitars, good songs. I'd definitely recommend them and go to see them again. Thanks for the tip Cath!

Next up were Heligoland. I've seen them before and sadly, this 2nd experience didn't change my opinion. They make great sounds, but (with a couple of exceptions) the songs aren't quite 'there'. Worthy of a mention though is their drummer. Absolutely fascinating to watch. He's so into what he's doing.

Down to the real reason we're all here, sweating our arses off on this exceptionally warm night.
Talking of which...
We've always been weirdo magnets. I don't know why, but they seem to gravitate towards us.
We're chilling out, waiting for Robin Guthrie to come on and this bloke wanders drunkenly up to us and says "What are we all doing here?" The only reply I could think of was "Ummm, we're here to see Robin Guthrie play."
"Yeah, but how did we all end up here? What's it all about? Who is he?"
Oh Jeez...
We humoured him for a few minutes, then kind of ignored him. He eventually wandered away.

After a short wait, a middle-aged man in a green jumper and dark glasses wandered onto the stage. There was no fanfare, no introductions, no applause - he was just 'there' and he was Robin Guthrie. This is the man who was responsible for the glory that is the Cocteau Twins sound and he looks like he's just popped in on his way back from B&Q. If you walked past him buying wallpaper, you wouldn't give him a second glance. I kind of like that. The only recognisable thing about him is those earrings. The epitomy of understated, he has no microphone, so his conversation was limited to the few people at the front who could hear him. He says fuck a lot.
One particularly annoying bloke in the audience, whose hairdo obviously hasn't changed since the 80's shouts out "We've missed you!" Robin instantly comes back with "Well you should have come and fucking visited me then, shouldn't you." We laugh, and I ask Mark to remind me how to spell sycophant.

Recognisable on the street or not, understated or not, one thing you cannot be mistaken about, is the sound when this man picks up a guitar and the effect it'll have on you.
The set didn't start all that well. Technical difficulties meant the first track had to be abandoned and the laptop re-booted before proceedings could continue. This left more time for slightly awkward silences, stupid comments and questions from the crowd etc.
The next period of time, could have been an hour, could have been a day - I lost track of everything... was utterly spell-binding. To try and describe what Robin Guthrie does would be a waste of time. The internet is there. Go and find it...
For most of the set he was joined by the bass player and drummer from Heligoland, who did a damned-fine job of lifting the tunes and added another, very enjoyable dimension. I'm pretty sure that everyone who was there would have been happy to just watch Robin Guthrie noodle away on his guitar randomly, but what we got was a full set of gorgeous tunes, that went from minimal to euphoric and back again.
To be in a crowd of people and see so many beaming faces, closed eyes and swaying bodies is bordering on a religious experience. I remember turning to Mark at one point and saying 'This must be what it sounds like in Heaven."

I left the ICA with a spring in my step, a tear in my eye, a glow in my heart and a deep feeling of joy. I kid you not. All was right with my world in that moment.
Not even the 'severe delays' on the Northern line or the diversion off the A1 through Hatfield on the way home came close to putting a dent in my mood. A mood which has so far lasted 48 hours and shows no signs of declining.

Robin Guthrie should be available on prescription.
Gush over...

Trying to find...

2010-08-21T18:56:00.000+01:00

In the hope that this might be picked up on a search engine some day.

My mum is trying to trace her brother.
He was born Christopher Kelvin Newman on 6th September 1945 (06/09/1945) in St Albans, Hertfordshire, UK.

His mother was Elsie Newman (nee Gordon). She was married to Maurice Martin Newman in Tendring, Essex, UK in 1938, but Maurice was absent for an, as yet, undetermined amount of time in the 1940's. During that time Elsie had another child, Jean Christine (my mother) with George Kelvin Sutherland.

There was no father's name on Christopher Kelvin's original birth certificate. Christopher was given his mother's married surname, Newman on his birth certificate, but it's unclear whether Maurice was his father.
We suspect his father was George Kelvin Sutherland, who was in the Royal Corps Signals.

Christopher was adopted and we have no idea what his name changed to, so can't trace him.

Mushroom & black bean quesadilla

2010-06-14T20:25:00.000+01:00

I need to write this recipe down so I don't forget it. I just made it up and it's delicious.
Thought this would be a good place to do it, instead of a scrap of paper. This way other people can see it if they're interested.

I made this up as I went along, so there's nothing scientific about quantities used.

6 flour tortillas
1 cup brown rice to serve
Soured cream
Grated mature cheddar cheese
A small piece of hard cheese (eg Parmesan or veggie equivalent)
1 small onion - finely chopped
2 cloves garlic - finely chopped
1/2 orange pepper - chopped
1 hot chilli pepper - finely chopped
4-5 mushrooms - chopped
1 can black beans - drained

Put the brown rice on to boil for 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to around 200 C.
Fry the onion, garlic, chilli and orange pepper in a little olive oil for about 5 minutes.
Add the chopped mushrooms and cook for a few minutes.
Add the black beans and cook for about 5 minutes.
Add the crumbled hard cheese and stir in, with a generous dollop of soured cream.

Divide the mixture between the tortillas - only covering a quarter of the tortilla. Add some soured cream and grated cheddar.
Fold the tortilla in half, then in half again, to make a triangle.
Arrange in an ovenproof dish, scatter with grated cheddar and cook in the oven for 10 minutes.

Serve with brown rice and soured cream.

I would add a photo of the finished product - but I ate it....

Mugged by a horse!

2010-05-22T10:25:00.000+01:00

Last night it was a beautiful evening, and I'd been shut indoors all day working, so we decided to go for a walk. We needed milk, so we walked along the river Ivel from our village to Sandy - about a 3 mile round-trip.

Once you're past the ugly factory (the factory is ugly, they don't manufacture ugly there), it's a lovely walk along the quiet river bank. There's a small weir about 1/4 mile along the river. I love the sound of falling water - and the smell of the Ivel gives me such strong childhood memories. We used to swim in the river during our summer holidays, and I remember everything smelling of the distinctive river smell.

Over the bailey bridge onto the opposite bank, the path winds along the side of the river. It's very peaceful, despite being sandwiched between two busy roads. We had a fantastic moment when we came across a whole family of long-tailed tits. It was hard to count because they kept moving around, but I think there were about 9 tiny babies. They were SO cute and seemed totally unfazed by us, even though we were standing just a few feet away. Mum came along after a few moments and called them all to her.

We also saw some birds nesting in a hole in the sandstone blocks of Girtford Bridge. They came and went so fast we couldn't see what they were though.

Once we'd got our milk, and impulse bought some yummy looking croissants, we headed back. I fell into a hole, nearly broke my ankle, twisted my knee and back. Ouch!

Next was a bloke walking two dogs. One of them was on a lead, but the other (a lurcher I think) came running at us full-tilt barking and snarling. NOT GOOD. I'm not a dog person. I'm very nervous around them, they are loud, smelly, stupid animals that are only just domesticated. I just don't trust them, and when one is staring you down, growling and barking I get totally freaked out. I tolerate dogs at the best of times. So many dog owners just don't get that not everyone loves their dog. They seem so offended if you're scared. They always say the same thing "It's ok, he won't hurt you, he's just being friendly." I'm sorry, but that doesn't help if you're frightened of dogs. I don't blame the dogs, it's the owners who are generally responsible for their behaviour.
I had to shout to the owner of this dog and ask him to call it to him. He just didn't get that I was scared. He still didn't put it on a lead. It came back for another go at us a minute later. This time I was pretty much frozen with fear. Mark was brilliant. He stood between me and the dog and protected me. He's so awesome. He'd do anything, ANYTHING to protect me. I love him so much, but I digress...

The dog experience put a bit of a downer of our pleasant walk for a while, at least until we were well out of sight of it. The rest of the walk back was just nice. We saw a swan, several ducks and other water birds, and watched a tern diving into the water. They are incredible birds, so agile in the air - almost bat-like.

Back past the ugly factory, across the cycle path and through the spooky tunnel under the old railway line. When I was a kid I used to be so scared of this tunnel. I thought it was really long and dark. It's actually only about 20 feet long. It's fine, as long as you don't look at the walls and roof of the tunnel, which is completely covered in spider webs and nests. Just look at the floor and keep walking...

Walking back along the riverside towards the weir there's a pretty white horse in the field. When we'd walked past him on the way out he'd pretty much ignored us. On the way back it was a very different story. Mark was carrying a plastic carrier bag with our milk and croissants in it. Maybe the horse's owners always bring him carrots in a plastic bag? Whatever it is, the horse became VERY interested in Mark's bag as soon as he heard it rustling. So interested in fact, that he WOULD NOT let Mark get past him.
Every time Mark tried to get by, the horse got in front of him. It was trying to shove it's mouth into the carrier bag and it was not giving up. Eventually it managed to knock the bag out of Mark's hand. It started slobbering all over the bag, trying to get it's nose inside. Mark finally was able to get past the pesky creature, but now our shopping was on the floor. I quickly nipped in and grabbed the bag, but the horse WANTED IT. In the end, the only way to get away was to give him one of our croissants to distract him, then leg it.

It was so funny, watching Mark getting mugged by a horse. But when an animal that's 4 times your size is shoving you and getting in your face, what can you do? We walked the rest of the way home, with our horse slobber covered carrier bag, laughing and making up exaggerated stories of the 20 foot tall killer horse, with big teeth and claws, wearing a balaclava and a bullet belt, brandishing a knife and demanding "croissants or death".

I shared my remaining croissant with Mark when we got home. xx

RIP Alex Chilton

2010-03-26T21:30:00.004Z

Thursday 18th March 2010 started like any other day. I woke up, had a shower, grabbed a cup of tea and woke up the laptop to see what happened in cyber-land overnight. As I have a bunch of friends in different time zones, my morning surf is usually a good catch up. The laptop came to life, and within 20 seconds my whole fucking morning came crashing to a sudden and very unpleasant stop.
All I could say was "Oh god!" Mark was getting ready to leave for work at this point. He asked me what was wrong and I could hardly believe the words coming out of my mouth, even though I was saying them. Alex is dead...

We just looked at each other, dumbfounded. Mark stood totally still for about a minute, trying to take in the unpleasant reality before us, then he put on his coat and left for work. I found out later that he got about half way to work before he lost it. I wasn't so together. I just sat here and cried. I made no effort to hold in how I was feeling. Even now, a week later I'm finding this difficult to write. I had to leave some time before I could talk about this, but not so long that the emotions aren't fresh. This way I can speak from the heart.

Alex Chilton was, to me and many others, a musical legend. He didn't seem to see it that way. He was a reluctant 'hero'. I'm not going to write an obituary here. There are dozens of them out there on the internet already - google it. He was also only 59 years old. That's not old. How could he be dead? That's not right. It can't be true. But the sad truth was right there, being confirmed by the people closest to him.

We only met Alex on four occasions. I wouldn't be so presumptious as to say we were friends. We were friends of friends I guess. This didn't prevent his death from hitting me so hard that I found it hard to breathe.
Alex had a reputation for being a bit strange and having no time for gushy fans. As they say, forewarned is forearmed, so when I met him I did all I could to not be a gushy fan, even though the voice inside my head was shouting "Oh my god, it's Alex fucking Chilton!". In fact I avoided talking about his music all together. In my experience, when you meet someone you've worshipped from afar, the very best thing you can do is just talk to them about normal shit. Treat them like a human being and generally, they'll act like one. Rock stars only act like rock stars because people treat them like rock stars. In my personal experience, Alex was charming, friendly, funny and fascinating to be around.

So what's the point of this emotional rambling? I want to put all my memories in one place. I want to convey what a huge impact this man and this band have had on my life. I want to reflect, gather my thoughts and memories of good times and maybe smile while I do that.

The details are hazy, but we first heard of Big Star around 1991. An earlier encounter came in the form of 2 covers (Kangaroo and Holocaust) on the first This Mortal Coil album, It'll End In Tears from 1984. I've always loved those 2 songs, but at the time, never made the connection.
An interview with Mike Mills of REM and a review of Teenage Fanclub's new album Bandwagonesque in the Melody Maker both mentioned Big Star. Two very good reasons to check them out. We found a vinyl copy of #1 Record for £6.99 from Parrot Records in Cambridge and the rest in history.

Fast forward to 1993. There's a huge buzz of excitement as Mark and I travel to the Reading Festival with a couple of friends. We could hardly believe our luck. Big Star had re-formed. We'd played those albums to death for a couple of years and now we were getting to see them live. That was something we never thought we'd be able to do. We'd read that there were two original members, plus two new members - a couple of guys from a band from Seattle called The Posies.
The Posies were also playing at the festival, so we thought we may as well go and check them out while we were there. Good move. That was the beginning of a very special part of our lives. But that's a whole other story... At this point, in 1993 we were just a couple of other people in the crowd, lapping up the Big Star goodness.

We got to see Big Star again on 9th August 2001 at the Mean Fiddler in London (a venue which has since been closed down due to constant breaches of fire regulations). It was a Posies / Big Star double bill. A dream gig for us. The Posies played an acoustic set and Big Star played a full band set. It was an absolutely rammed to the ceiling, hot and sweaty gig. We were crammed shoulder to shoulder with people, all grinning.
This is where Mark's brilliant memory comes in. Alex was having trouble with his guitar amp and ended up kicking it at one point. Steve Mack (That Petrol Emotion) was in the audience.

Our next Big Star encounter was many years later and under very different circumstances in another country.
Connect Festival, Inveraray Castle, near Glasgow, Scotland - 2-3 September 2007
Day 1 was spent trudging through miles of mud, all of which seemed uphill to get to the festival. After some wrangling and confusion over the validity of our wrist bands, we managed to get backstage. We were introduced to Norman Blake - EEEP! Sheltering from the rain we were treated to a stage-side view of the Teenage Fanclub show, then Mogwai. Awesome. It was also the first time we met Guitar George Borowski (another legend in his own lifetime and one of the sweetest, infectiously happy people on the planet). We hung around for Primal Scream, but spent most of their set sitting on the spare drum risers backstage, just chilling out and staying warm and dry. A long trudge back down the muddy hill back to the car was 'interesting' in the dark. We were driven back to Glasgow with carrier bags on our muddy feet.

On day 2 we made our way from our spit and sawdust b&b to a very swish hotel in Glasgow. Waiting in the lobby lounge, feeling out of place, I noticed someone who looked familiar walking by. It was Alex. At that point I was still pretty nervous about meeting the man, the legend, so when our friend Jon did introduce us it was a quick hello and oh my god, I don't know what to say, so say nothing.
There followed a quite surreal experience. We all piled into the minibus, Alex, Jody, Jon, Ken and his wife Dom, a friend of Alex's, Mark and me. It was quite a long drive out to the festival. We mostly all kept to our individual conversations, but there were moments of hilarity, shared by everyone. Such as Alex launching into the Walker Texas Ranger theme tune.
When we finally found the backstage area, which was pretty well hidden near the 'other' stage, we found a nice set-up. There was a porta-cabin per band, conveniently arranged in alphabetical order around a gazebo tent seating area. Big Star were a couple of doors down from Bjork. Of course Bjork had several porta-cabins, because she's Bjork. I almost bumped into her actually. As we walked past she came out of the door and I had to take evasive action. She probably would have punched me if I'd bumped into her! :-)
We watched The Polyphonic Spree's show, which was quite something to behold, then it was time for Big Star. Hooray! But where's Alex? He's nowhere to be seen around the stage. Show time was rapidly approaching and no-one knew where he was. Mark was dispatched back to the backstage area, through the dark and the mud to look for him. No sign of him in the porta-cabin. He was about to give up when he caught a 'certain smell' as he walked past the seating tent. Inside he found Alex, sharing a joint and having a nice chat, oblivious to what time it was or where he was supposed to be. Mark said he looked like a guilty kid who'd been caught misbehaving. Bless... So Alex was found and duly escorted to the stage, and the show went according to plan.
They rocked the place.

Shepherd's Bush Empire. 28th August 2008

We were lucky enough (thanks again to our good friend Jon) to be guests at this show. We arrived at the Empire and promptly got totally lost in the maze of corridors and stairs. It's a crazy place. Eventually we found everyone, said quick hellos and left them to it. Pre-show is never the best time to talk to people. They have lots on their mind. Ken was busy learning a bass line to one of Alex's random last minute additions to the setlist - a classical piece by Elgar, I think. So we headed down to the bar and spent 20 minutes chatting with 2 really nice ladies from the Caribbean.

We had great seats for the show, up in the box overlooking the stage. Another fine Big Star performance was, as always, over too quickly. We headed back up to the dressing room and had a quick glass of bubbly before we had to leave to get a tube train back to the car. Alex was conspicuous in his absence. It wasn't until we left the venue by the side alley door that we found him, smoking fags and chewing the fat with Jody and a couple of other people. Poor Jody was horribly jet-lagged and exhausted, having just flown to the UK that day. Alex was in a great mood. We had a quick chat - I've no idea what about, and we were on our way. I vaguely recall inviting them round for a cup of tea when they were in our neck of the woods a few days later. Unfortunately, they never did.

The Rhythm Festival, Clapham, Bedford. 3rd September 2008
The most random festival ever. Despite this festival being only about 10 miles away from our front door, we'd never heard of it until Big Star played there. Running since 2006 (who knew?) it's held at Twinwood, an old WWII airbase museum. If I remember rightly, it was a lovely day that day. Everyone was in good spirits and we hung out for a few hours, talking about this and that. Jody was telling Mark about the time he played on the same bill as Jimi Hendrix, many, many years ago.
I found this tiny clip of video today that I forgot all about. Jody had just noticed that Steve Cropper was on stage. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49hElIByxWM
Alex was in a great mood that day, which can be seen in the videos I shot of the Big Star show. He seemed to warm to the kitch-ness of this little festival. It had no pretensions. It wasn't fancy or trying to be fashionable. I guess he liked that. Jody was fascinated by the history of the surroundings. Twinwood is the airfield that Glenn Miller took off from and was never seen again.
The Big Star set was on the main stage in the arena, but it clashed with (wait for it) Chas 'n' Dave on the other stage. About 10 minutes before Big Star were due to go on, the entire arena emptied like someone pulled out the plug and the audience went down the plug-hole. Shit! We were left standing there, with a few die-hard Big Star fans, while everyone else chose the Chas 'n' Dave show. No fucking way! Thankfully, it was more of a changeover period, and soon more people started to appear. We also suspect that a lot of people realised that Chas 'n' Dave is only tolerable for one or two songs, and they came back when they got bored. So Big Star ended up with a pretty packed arena, eventually. It was a great show - a really good set.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGboO6F_3ok
I remember Jody and Alex complaining that they didn't get enough time to spend with Jon when we kidnapped him at the end of the night.

Serpentine Sessions, Hyde Park London. 1st July 2009
Remember the heatwave of 2009? Well the 1st of July was slap-bang in the middle of it. After spending several days just being lazy and sitting in front of a fan, Mark, Jon and I had to get off our arses and get on a (thankfully air conditioned) train down to London. After waiting in the longest taxi queue in the world for what seemed like hours, we finally got into a (horribly un-air conditioned) taxi and headed to the Columbia Hotel on the edge of Hyde Park. We killed a couple of hours there, staying indoors where it was cool, while various people were interviewed for a Mojo feature. Eventually we headed into the park to find the stage. That should be easy huh? Big tent in a park, can't miss it...

I had no idea Hyde Park was so HUGE. We walked and walked and walked and sweated, with no sign of anything that looked like a stage. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing though. It meant we got plenty of time to talk to Alex. This was the longest time we ever got to spend with him. He was coping with the heat so much better than we were. He was used to the humidity of the deep south, so a hot day in London was nothing to him. We talked about this astrology thing that he was really into. It's based on a pack of cards. I didn't really get my head around it, but Alex told me I am the nine of spades. Mark is the king of diamonds, which made his day.

So after what must have been half an hour of walking, we still hadn't found the stage. We were walking along by the Serpentine, checking out the ducks when out of the heat haze an angel appeared. OK, so it wasn't an actual angel, but it was 2 golf buggies that had been sent out to pick us up and take us the rest of the way. Hooray! So Jon, Mark and I jumped on one and Alex and Ken jumped on the other and we bombed off across the park. Awesome. That was fun.
We weren't sure when or where we were supposed to pick up our guest passes, and we'd been told there was a very strict policy on guests backstage, so we'd been expecting to part company with the guys at some point. In the end though, we were driven straight in and dropped off with the band. Best to keep quiet in those situations... This bloke came up to me and said "Hi, I'm Mark and I'll be your stage manager today." I just said "Hello" and tried to not look like the impostor I was.
So we ended up spending the whole afternoon sitting in the sunshine, chatting with Jon and Alex and listening to Blur soundcheck. They were playing the next day. Yay, free Blur gig! Yay, free drinks! Yay, no-one asked us who we were or what we were doing there!

There was a lot of confusion about what time Big Star were supposed to be on. The organisers kept changing the time. At one point they wanted to put them on an hour and a half earlier than the advertised time. Everyone was getting pretty stressed out, except for Alex, who remained as cool as a cucumber throughout. In the end, they had changed their stage time (at very short notice) to half an hour earlier than the advertised time. Consequently, when they took to the stage there was nobody there. We're talking tumbleweeds here people. This was pure and simple bad planning on the organisers' part. It was not good for the band and it was not good for all the people who had paid good money to see the band and ended up missing the beginning of the set. Alex was philosophical about it. He said "I take particular pride in playing really well in front of no people." And they did - play really well I mean. It was a blinding gig - on of them were on top form and obviously enjoying themselves.
Thankfully, as soon as Big Star started the first song, you could see confused people listening, looking and then running towards the tent. It soon filled up. Next time I looked behind me there was a sea of faces singing along and grinning.

It was such a beautiful warm evening. We stayed in the park till about 10pm, just enjoying the evening and catching up with the lovely Henrik and his friends.

I took a few photos of grinning fans with Jon for them. Most were probably not as cheesy as ours though. Haha!

Then we managed to cadge a lift on a buggy back to the edge of the park. In the cool of the evening that was fantastic. We tried to convince the buggy driver to take us all the way to the train station, but he couldn't do it. We hailed a cab and headed back to St Pancras.

The train journey back home was 'interesting' and hilarious. There was a guy sitting near us wearing headphones and singing at the top of his voice in Arabic. Though none of wanted to say it out loud, I think we were all thinking "Is he about to blow himself up?" I know that's terrible racial stereotyping, but we all looked to see if he had any wires sticking out of his jacket. Jon summed it up best, saying "Yeah! Get down with your bad self..." Heehee.

Though of course we could never have known it at the time, this was to be the last time we saw Alex Chilton. But to be honest, what a memory to end on.

We even toyed with the idea of blowing all our savings to go to the Big Star shows in the USA this year, but we decided against it. After all, we'll have other opportunities to see them right? How tragically wrong. It's taken me literally hours to write this blog, over 2 evenings and I still don't feel like I've even scratched the surface of what Alex Chilton's music and the music he influenced has meant to me for so many years. That will never change. It's just sad that an era has ended so abruptly and so unexpectedly. Like I said at the beginning of this long and rambling blog, Alex and I weren't friends, but his loss has hit me as hard as that of anyone. I feel so bad for his family, his band mates and his friends. He was a unique individual and he'll be sorely missed.
It's equally tragic that Alex passed away just days before Big Star were due to play at the SXSW festival in Texas. I have a lot of admiration for Jody, Jon and Ken for going ahead with that show and turning it into a tribute to their friend, despite the emotions being so fresh and raw. It was a wonderful thing for them to do. I only wish we could have been there.

They say you should never meet you heros because it'll lead to disappointment. I disagree.

So next time a band you love are playing a gig and it's a little far away and you can't really be bothered to go or it'll be a late night on a week day, think about it. Don't assume you'll have another opportunity. You just never know...

Not a review

2010-03-25T20:53:00.001Z

I realised I didn't write anything about the most recent Kizilok gig. It was way back on 31st January. I started this blog weeks ago and just remembered that I never finished it.
So here goes...

This isn't really a review as such. I'm way too biased to write a review, because 1) Mark and I are both in the band, 2) Ian and Andy are our best friends 3) We're recording the album, and 4) I fucking LOVE this music.

It was only 2 weeks before the gig that Mark got a call from Ian (Mr Kizilok himself) asking, no telling him that he was going to be playing bass. The phone call was funny to listen to. Mark said "Yeah" and "Uh-huh" a lot, then hung up. His next words were "What the hell have I just agreed to?" He looked like a rabbit in the headlights.

The last time Mark played live in front of an audience was when Melt (our old band) played at the Lazy Sunday festival in Bedford, 1993. So it's a big deal to get up there and do it again. Scary stuff!

In those 2 weeks he not only had to learn and practice all the bass lines till they were tattoo'd onto his soul, but we also had to create backing track new mixes of the 6 track set. Quite a lot of work.

Mark practiced every single day until he knew the bass lines. Then he practiced some more, learning to play them standing up, which is very different from playing them slouched in a chair. Then he played them in front of me - a small step towards having people watching you.

Mark was as nervous as hell, which is understandable. I was just as nervous for him, if not more so.

The gig was on a Sunday night at a central Manchester venue called The Tiger Lounge. We went up a day early, to make as much time as possible for practicing. Mark had practiced a lot on his own, playing along to the backing tracks, but as yet Mark, Ian and Andy hadn't actually played together. Ian and Andy hadn't also hadn't heard the new guitar part Mark had come up with for one song. In fact, I hadn't even heard it.

On Saturday afternoon Mark and Andy ran through the set a couple of times. It was sounding good and they seemed to be comfortable playing together. It was missing the vocals though.
Saturday evening Andy had a gig, so he left us at his house and Ian came over to hang out and run through the songs with Mark. It was great to be there to witness the birth of the next part of Kizilok's evolution. I was just so excited to hear them play together. Everything went smoothly, with no hitches. The real revelation though was when they came to play the song Ray, which already had bass on the backing track. Mark had written a new guitar part and Ian and I were both pretty blown away when he played it to us. They were both so into it, swaying together, totally connected through the music. It was pretty powerful stuff. When the song finished we all just stood there grinning at each other.

The gig itself was the usual. Disorganised and frustrating. Soundcheck took too long (doesn't it always...) and the venue opened before Kizilok even had a chance to set up. First on means last to soundcheck. Unfortunately this meant they ended up soundchecking in front of the audience, which is never ideal. Ho hum, such is the lot of the support band I guess. There was the usual confusion over who was using whose gear, what was supposed to be supplied by the venue (and wasn't). Same old, same old. Nothing's changed.
The sound was a bit ropey (nothing's changed there either then) and when it came to Kizilok actually playing, you could hardly hear a thing. Some things were too loud, others were too quiet, they couldn't hear themselves, let alone each other, feedback etc etc.
Personally (and here comes the I'm biased bit) I thoroughly enjoyed it. I was beaming with pride at Mark and loving every minute. You won't get a critique of the music from me. After all, this isn't a review. I got video of the whole set, so you can make your own mind up if you want to. I'll tell you now though, if you don't have anything nice to say to me about Kizilok, best not say anything at all. Hahaha...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TJY8hPrF0eQ

It wasn't a bad sized crowd and it was the right crowd. A good mix of friends who were oozing love and support and people who were there to see the headline band Music for Aborigines. They seemed to like Kizilok anyway, which gladdens my heart. The reception was good, the applause was loud and genuine.

All too soon it was all over. Mark breathed a huge sigh of relief and went to the bar, where he had to deal with something he's not used to - fanboys! It was hilarious to stand back and watch as he tried to deal with the strangers who were coming up and shaking his hand and telling him how much they enjoyed the Kizilok set. Highly entertaining.

Mark and Ian practicing.

All smiles after the gig. Andy, Mark and Ian.

After Kizilok there was another band on before Music for Aborigines. They weren't really our cup of tea so we went to hang out outside in the freezing cold with various people and just generally catch up with our northern friends. At one point Mark and I were standing outside the venue when this VERY drunk guy staggers up to us and tries to sell us a pack of parma ham. Random or what?

The Music for Aborigines set topped the night off nicely. Love this band. Love these guys. Andy Whit was a rockin' front man at this gig. I could write another whole blog about MFA. Maybe I should some time...
I'll leave it with this for now. My favourite MFA tune, played a little shambolically, but with love.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cbjgg4FbRqc

Crazy friends

2010-02-14T10:22:00.000Z

As soon as I found out that one of my all-time favourite bands would be playing one of my all-time favourite albums live in their home town, which also happens to be one of my all-time favourite places to visit - I got kind of excited.

Maybe a slightly less vague way of saying that would be:
Oh my GOD! The Posies are playing "Frosting on the Beater" in Seattle. PLUS they'll be showcasing new songs for the album they're just about to record. Eeeep! Want to go, want to go....

So off I went to see how much flights would be, only to find that the cheapest available was going to cost us £900. This seemed a little extravagant for a weekend away, even my our adventurous standards. Disappointed, I decided it's not going to happen. There's no way I could justify that kind of spend. So I let it go and filed it under "Would be nice, but totally unattainable."

A very dear friend of ours, Andy P in Seattle does not give up so easily. He has now started an online campaign to get us to go. Bless him, it's so sweet of him to want us to be there, as much as we'd love to be there.
He's SO determined that we should go that he's actually set up a Facebook group, which is totally bonkers.
I think it's a joke - a wouldn't it be cool if... situation. Only it's getting harder and harder to tell, because people are actually pledging money to help towards the cost of our flights.

Ummm - I can't help but be all English about this and be totally freaked out by people being that nice. We don't cope well with this type of thing. We're not good at accepting compliments or gifts. It's a weird mix of being really touched and happy that anyone would go to this kind of effort - mixed up with "Aaaargh, they're being all nice and drawing attention to me!"
Hahaha... it even sounds stupid to me.

All of our friends in the USA have already been so generous to us when we've been over there on holiday. They willingly give up their precious holiday, their time, invite us into their homes, drive us around, feed us - anything to make us feel at home and make sure we have a good time. We already feel like we owe them so much - and yet here they are again, being so kind.

It's hard to know what to say.

2009

2009-12-31T19:48:00.002Z

February
17 - Iain Archer + Snow Patrol + others @ The Kings Head, Crouch End, London. John Martyn tribute
24 - Errol Brown girl's night out @ Royal and Derngate Theatre, Northampton

March

April
4 - Burning Codes @ Max Club, Kettering

11 - Music for Aborigines @ Retro, Manchester

15 - Doves @ Corn Exchange, Cambridge
25 - Iain Archer + Foy Vance @ Jericho Tavern, Oxford

27 - Iain Archer + Foy Fance @ Dingwalls, London

May
12 - I am Kloot @ The Junction, Cambridge
15-17 - Kizilok, Music for Aborigines, The Midlife Dementia Show live, Spencer, Bushart + others @ Into The Valley Festival, Clitheroe

June
9 - Athlete @ Northampton

July
1 - Big Star @ Hyde Park, London
11 - Music for Aborigines @ The Railway, Greenfield

13 - Iain Archer + Athlete @ The Junction, Cambridge
19 - Mark Burgess and Bushart @ The Roadhouse, Manchester

25 - Teenage Fanclub + I am Kloot + Super Furry Animals @ Ben & Jerry's Summer Sundae, London

August
Dinosaur Jnr @ The Junction, Cambridge

September
3-9 - Seattle USA - visiting Jon, Michelle, Darian, Andy, Gabi and Alex, inc Jon Auer @ Radio 8-Ball Show, Bumbershoot

10-15 - San Diego USA - visiting Vinny, Jodi, Vern and Viv

October
3 - Burning Codes on the back of lorry @ Market Harborough

3 - Twelve Strings @ The King William, Wilmslow, Cheshire
9 - Doves @ Univ of Hatfield

22 - Rue Royale @ Harpur's Cellar Bar, Bedford

November
2 - John Vanderslice @ Upstairs at The Garage, London
6 - Trespassers William @ Luminaire, London

December
18 - The Sun and The Moon (full original lineup) @ Academy 3, Manchester (videos)
28 - Chameleons Vox @ Sub 61, Manchester

Polish night

2009-11-18T13:06:00.001Z

Last night I went out for a meal with some friends. We decided to do something different from the usual curry hit, so we went to a Polish restaurant. I was pleasantly surprised.

I had borscht, for the first time ever. It's a clear beetroot soup, full of complex flavours like peppercorns and juniper berries. They made a vegetarian version of it for me, made with mushroom stock. It was really delicous.
For my main course I had something I couldn't possibly pronounce. It was mushrooms, peppers, onion and very finely sliced courgettes in a spicy tomato sauce. Yummy too, but very rich. I only managed half of it.

We had a great laugh and thoroughly enjoyed the meal. We were supposed to go on to the cinema to see The Men Who Stare At Goats, but we took so long over eating that we missed the film, so we went to a nearby pub to round off the evening.

Enough already!

2009-11-18T12:51:00.000Z

Not 15 minutes after I finished typing and posting my previous post, they were at it AGAIN!

I've had enough of this, It's actually really stressful listening to other people argue.
I stormed out of our back door and shouted at him 'WILL YOU PLEASE, JUST, STOP!' then closed the door and walked away before he had a chance to say anything.

The look on his face could only be described as incredulous. Like he had no idea why I was pissed off.
I got the feeling that the next words out of his mouth would be, to her 'See what YOU'VE done now!'

I just couldn't keep quiet any more. I don't want to get involved. Domestics are best left WELL alone.
Sigh...

O.P.D. - other people's drama
SUCKS

Warning signs, alarm bells and BPD

2009-11-16T20:11:00.000Z

The young couple who live next door to us fight A LOT. They're very, very young. Too young really for their situation. He turned 18 the day befroe their baby was born. She's still not 18 yet. They are trying to have a grown-up relationship, and be parents, and they are so obviously not ready for it.

I can't help but listen to their fights, because they are very loud and our walls are very thin. I'm seeing a very unpleasant and frightening pattern emerging, and if I'm right, there's no happy ending to this. It all seems far too familiar. It's reminding me of a very bad time in my own very dim and distant past.
I know a fair amount borderline personality disorder. I've made it my business to understand it, so I can recognise it in people, long before they do.

Every time they have an argument, he does ALL the shouting. She always stays very quiet. You never hear her voice raised. He gets very aggressive and insulting towards her.

A few weeks ago he was shouting at her for a couple of hours because he'd asked her to get some cash out of the bank and she forgot. Bearing in mind that she's looking after a 3 month old baby, it's kind of understandable that it might slip her mind. It went on and on, with him telling her she had disrespected him and she doesn't care about anyone but herself yada yada yada. If she tried to speak up, he got even more angry and accused her of talking back to him.

On Saturday, this weekend, they had a huge ding-dong. Well I say 'they', but once again, all the noise was coming from him. He was lying on the ground outside our back door, in the rain, sobbing and wailing and being very melodramatic. He was screaming that he loved her and asking over and over again 'Why do you treat me like shit?' She stayed calm and tried to get him to go indoors for nearly an hour. He cried until he was physically sick all over himself, and he had spit and snot hanging from every orifice. She did eventually manage to coax him back indoors, but in order to do so she pretty much had to say everything he wanted to hear. Things like 'It's my fault', 'I'm sorry' and 'I'll change'. This really worries me. His over-the-top drama was nothing but emotional manipulation. I've seen it myself, a very long time ago. When you're in that situation, you'll basically say anything to calm them down and make it stop.
I wasn't party to everything that was said, but if I had to guess, I'd bet some of these words came out of his mouth in some form or other. 'You MAKE me do this.' 'I'm going to hurt myself and it'll be your fault.' 'You don't love me as much as I love you.'..... I could go on, but you get the picture.
He did go indoors for about half an hour, but the crying never stopped. The next thing I know, there's crashing and bashing and he's outside again, throwing the wheelie bins around and running off.
Again, it's all about control and manipulation. It's similar to the contrived way a teenage girl might 'trash' her room when she throws a strop. Everything messed up, but nothing actually broken...

The sad thing in all of this, is the poor kid. To be subjected to so much bad emotion at so young an age, can only be harmful. Never mind the fact that she was left completely alone for over an hour, crying and probably cold, because the door was left wide open while he freaked out outside.
What is all this going to do to her, long-term?

I feel a little sorry for this guy. From what he's told me, he comes from a very fucked up broken family. His mother is a particularly nasty piece of work. I can only feel 'so' sorry for him though. We can do two things with what we learn from our up-bringing. We can do as they did, whatever the consequence because that's all we know - or we can break the mold and make our own choices and create our own moral boundaries.

So now it's Monday, and they're having another row. Or should I say, he's shouting at her again.
If I'm right, and I sincerely hope I'm not, it's only a matter of time before this shit gets physical and he starts to hit her, then beat her. It's a very sad pattern to see emerging.

Winter in full swing

2009-11-13T22:56:00.000Z

I guess it had to happen sooner or later.
Summer dragged itself out as long as it could, and it's been one of the most beautiful Autumns I can remember. The lack of wind and rain meant the leaves stayed on the trees for a long time and we got to look at all the lovely colours for much longer than usual.

This weekend is going to be as grim as a grim thing on a grim day, so we've stocked up on essentials and plan to snuggle up and not leave the house unless we run out of tea bags or the sun decides to come out. Neither is likely (tea bags were on offer so we bought two boxes).
With 80-90 mph winds predicted, indoors is the place to be this weekend.

It gives us an opportunity to carry on with the studio re-build. Mark has stripped all the cabling from the mixing desk and rack units. We need to clear the room, get the window replaced with a double-glazed one, then cut down the mixing desk table, so it's just the right size for the new mixing desk, then start all over again, wiring everything up. It's going to take a while to get all that done.

I also need to make a start on making the rest of the house respectable, ready for my parents visit in two weeks time. Believe me, two weeks is only just enough time to tidy this place. I'm cooking dinner for them when they come and visit, so we'll also need to reclaim the dining table, which has become the temporary studio, and home to the iMac, 16 track etc etc. D'oh!

Meh...

2009-11-13T22:43:00.000Z

I made some cupcakes from a recipe I found online the other day. I guess it was only a matter of time before I made a duff batch. The recipe was for apple sauce cupcakes, which sounded really nice. I even MADE the apple sauce for the recipe fresh from cooking apples.
I'm not going to post the recipe this time though, because it was quite disappointing. The walnuts over-powered the whole flavour and they came out more like small cakes, rather than light and fluffy cupcakes.
They weren't unpleasant, just not the best I've tried.

Next...

Weird noises

2009-11-13T22:38:00.000Z

It's really grim here today. It's been raining pretty much all day, and now the wind has picked up as well. They are saying that overnight tonight and all day tomorrow is going to be the worst storm of the year so far. Winds of 80-90mph and torrential rain.
The weird part though is something totally new to us.
Every time there's a gust of wind, the chimney (which is blocked up) is acting like some kind of weird amplifier and generating this bizarre noise. It's kind of like when you blow over the rim of a bottle, but much louder.
We've lived here for 10 years and this has never happened before.

Carrot cake cupcakes

2009-11-10T22:27:00.001Z

To make 12 cupcakes
The quantities may seem slightly weird on this one. That's because I cut them in half from a recipe for 24 cakes, which I thought might be too many.

Just under 1 cup of plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 tbsp orange juice
1 1/2 cups grated carrot
1/4 cup chopped walnuts
1/4 cup chocolate chips

Heat oven to 375 F
Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg at medium speed until blended.
Gradually beat in the sugar and brown sugar.
Add vanilla, vegetable oil and orange juice and mix until combined and smooth.
On low speed, mix in one third of the flour mixture. Add in thirds, mixing each time until smooth.
Fold in grated carrot, walnuts and chocolate chips.

Divide between 12 cake cases.
Bake for 18-20 minutes.
Cool on a wire rack, then top with buttercream frosting. (I cheated and bought a tub of Betty Crocker ready made vanilla buttercream frosting. It was very nice.) I also went nuts with decorating them with chocolate curls and sugar stars.

Touching and touched

2009-11-05T14:13:00.000Z

I got the sweetest message today from one of my male friends. I won't name him, to spare his blushes, but I was so touched by what he said, I wanted to share it.

The Midlife Dementia Show were kind enough to play not one, but two Summer Jets songs on their radio show this month, which was awesome and very much appreciated. One of the songs they played was 'Need to Know', which is about a very real situation that myself and some close friends got embroiled in a few years ago. It was unpleasant for everyone involved, and the whole thing could have been avoided, but for some really bad decisions made by some very messed up people, who drew too many people to a very bad place along with them.

The song is written from my perspective and it's about my decision to walk away and not be involved when the shit hit the fan - and consequently lose someone I thought was a friend. Turned out I made the right choice......

Anyhoo - my friend found the lyrics (and the song) so moving that he couldn't help but cry. He had to leave the room to regain his composure. He emailed me to tell me how beautiful the song is and what a strong emotional effect it had on me. I take this as a HUGE comliment.

Here are the lyrics to Need to Know (from memory).

Can I say to you, I told you so. It won't help now, but you need to know.
Can I hold your hand, and heal your heart. And help you cope and not fall apart.
Let it go, just let it go. Don't blame me I told you so.
Let it go, you need to know.

So what happens now, where will you go. Where can you hide, and will you let me know.
Hiding far away, down by the sea. I'll reach for you, if you reach out for me.
Let it go, let him know. Don't hate me I told you so.
Let it go, just let it go. Don't blame me I told you so.
Let it go, let him know.

Sucker-punched, he laid you out. Promised the world and there was no doubt.
But deep down you knew, this couldn't last. A crazy future from a shady past.
So I'm stepping back away from this. I hope you find what was in your wish.
I'm not judging you, these things take two. But the consequence was something that you knew.

Will you ever learn to stop yourself before you burn? (You need to know)
Will you ever learn to stop yourself before you burn? (You need to know)
Will you ever learn?

To hear the song, go to www.myspace.com/summerjets

Vinny the artist

2009-10-29T23:10:00.000Z

THE most amazing thing we brought back with us from our trip to the USA in September (apart from a tonne of wonderful memories and an obbsession with cupcakes) was this painting.

This picture REALLY doesn't do it justice.....

Our amazing friend Vinny painted this picture especially for us. It's a road in El Cajon at dusk. The sun has disappeared behind the hills and there is just an amazing glow left in the sky, but the stars are already visible.

I can't decide what I love the most about this painting - the curve of the road, knowing it's a real place I've been, the cat's eyes, the twinkling lights of the city, the beautiful sky, the silhouette of the hills, or the fact that Vinny painted it especially for us.
All of those things make this one of the best gifts I've ever been given. It's very special to me.

Vinny is a very talented artist, yet very modest about it. He has so many of his beautiful paintings around the house. Jodi is also a very inspiring person to be around. She's so creative and will happily sit and draw or paint for hours. She makes amazing fantasy pictures from a blank piece of paper. Creativity just flows out of those two.

No wonder their kids are such amazing, creative and free-thinking people.

Moo!

2009-10-29T22:58:00.000Z

I finally saved up enough cow points to send off for my free cow kite. Yay!

It's as big as me!

I love the udders and the gormless look on his face.

Many cow friends went to cow heaven when I traded my hard-earned herd in for this.

My herd was named after all my friends, so thank you all. In my cow heaven it's sunny and warm and there's plenty of yummy grass to eat. No one was eaten.

Adventures in cupcake land - part 2

2009-10-26T16:31:00.001Z

For my second cupcake adventure I decided on chocolate chip. Mmmmm.....

Yes - that's a real photo of MY cupcakes, not something I found online!

To make 12 large cupcakes (you'll need muffin sized paper cases for this one, or make 14-16 fairy cake sized ones).

For the cupcakes

1 1/2 cups of plain flour

1 cup caster sugar

2 tablespoons cocoa

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 teaspoon vanilla essence

1 cup warm water

1/2 cup chocolate chips

For the frosting
125g butter, softened
200g icing sugar, sifted
4 tablespoons cocoa
A few drops of vanilla essence, optional
A splash of milk, if needed

Heat oven to 400F, 180C.
Combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a bowl.
Make a well in the centre.
Add vanilla essence, oil and most of the warm water.
Stir until moist. Add more water in needed to get consistency of thick batter.
Stir in chocolate chips.
Divide between 12 cake cases and bake for 15-20 minutes.
Place on a wire rack to cool.

The frosting
This was a bit hit and miss and I kind of made it up as I went along. I wanted American style butter frosting and I got there in the end. All the quantities are approximate. Just make it up as you go along.

Beat softened butter with a wooden spoon till it's really soft and creamy.
Add cocoa powder and vanilla essence.
Add half the icing sugar and mix well till it's all combined.
Add the rest of the icing sugar and mix well.
If mixture is too thick, add a very small splash of milk to loosen it up to spreadable consistency.
If mixture is too runny, add more icing sugar.
Spread a thick layer on each cupcake and make a cute swirl on top. (If you're clever you could pipe the frosting on, all posh like - I'm not that clever.)
I finished off with an indulgent sprinkle of maple sugar, just in case they weren't sickly ENOUGH.

Voila!

Lemon cupcakes

2009-10-25T18:08:00.000Z

Continuing with my OBSESSION with cupcakes that started with a visit to Cupcake Royale in Seattle, I've been dying to find and try out some recipes. Today I had my first attempt and made lemon cupcakes. I found this super-simple recipe on t'internet. It's so easy even I can manage it! The icing is not a creamy soft frosting, it's very, very nice though.

To make 12 cupcakes

For the cupcakes

125g self-raising flour

125g butter, very soft

125g caster sugar

2 eggs, at room temperature

1/2 teaspoon lemon extract

1-2 tablespoons milk to bind

For the icing

250g icing sugar

Juice of half a lemon, freshly squeezed is best

2 drops of yellow food colouring, optional

Preheat oven to 200 degrees C.

Line a muffin tin with 12 cake cases.

Blitz all the cupcake ingredients together (except the milk) in a food processor till fully combined. Take the lid off and scrape down the sides a couple of times to make sure everything gets mixed together.

Add 1 tablespoon of the miilk and process again. Add another tablespoon of milk if needed, enough to make a batter with a smooth, flowing texture.

Divide the mixture between 12 cakes cases and bake for around 20 minutes, until golden brown and springy in the middle.

Put the cakes on a wire rack to cool.

The icing

Whisk together the icing sugar, yellow colouring and lemon juice to make a stiff mixture that won't run off your cakes. Dollop it on top of the cooled cakes.

Mmmmmm..... Try not to eat them all at once.

Vertigo

2009-10-24T21:33:00.000+01:00

No not the movie... unfortunately.

In late August I was struck down with a mystery illness that knocked me for six, for days and days on end. The most extreme dizziness I'd ever experienced made simple daily life almost impossible for nearly a week. Every time I moved the room would spin uncontrollably. It was so bad that my eyes would flick rapidly from side to side, trying to keep up with the rate of spin that my brain perceived. This of course led to severe nausea. On the worst day, I was sick 8 times, despite having an empty stomach. In fact I think that made it worse, as there was nothing to come out, so it felt like I was just going to turn inside out.
I couldn't lay down as that made the dizziness considerably worse. I sat totally still for 48 hours, even sleeping upright in a chair. It was the only way the fight the urge to throw up.
The whole experience freaked the shit out of me.

Yesterday morning (we're in late October now) I awoke at 5am, completely drenched in sweat and the room was spinning again. Oh crap....
Yep - it came back. The room was spinning, I could barely walk, falling against the wall, feeling sick etc.
This morning it happened again and I was sick too.

As this is the second time it's happened I'm getting a little concerned, so I called NHS Direct. They got a nurse to call me back, then she got a doctor to call me as well.
The conclusion was that I most likely have vertigo, also known as benign paroxysmal positional vertigo (BPPV). The blurb says:

BPPV occurs when a person turns their head suddenly, or rolls over in bed. It is often accompanied by nausea and vomiting.

BPPV is thought to be caused by small fragments of debris which, for unknown reasons, break off from the lining of the labyrinth. The fragments, known as otoconia, are made of calcium carbonate crystals, and do not usually cause a problem unless they get into one of the ear’s fluid-filled canals.
When your head is still, the otoconia sit at the bottom of the canal. However, certain head movements cause the fragments to be swept along the fluid-filled canal, where they brush against the sensitive hairs that line the canal. This sends extra, confusing, messages to the brain, which responds by causing vertigo.
BPPV usually affects older people. Most cases occurr in people over 40. However, it can affect younger people, and may develop after an ear infection, or after a head injury that causes damage or inflammation to the inner ear.
Attacks of BPPV usually clear up within a few days. The condition usually clears up within a few weeks or months but it can sometimes reoccur at a later date.

Great....
I found some info on t'internet. I might try The Epley Manoeuvre, which is a set of specific head movements which are designed to move the fragments to a position outside of the labyrinth and hopefully stop the symptoms. Apparently it's successful in something like 80% of cases, so it's worth a try I guess.
I'm just a bit scared to do it, in case in makes me feel worse.

Gutted that we've missed seeing Jock, Mark and the Bushart guys tonight at Islington Academy. I was really looking forward to this gig. I can't risk driving till I'm sure I won't have another attack.

Sky TV and their sucky attitude to existing customers

2009-10-22T07:55:00.000+01:00

At some point yesterday, while we were at work, there was a power cut at our house. The surge killed our Sky TV box - bummer...
So I went onto the Sky website to find out about getting a replacement box.

I was appalled to discover that existing customers have to pay three times as much for a new box as new customers do. New customers get it for £49, we, as loyal customers of over 10 years have to pay £149 PLUS they want another £60 for some bloke in a van to come and plug the bugger in!

Cue snotty consumer email asking them to explain why they feel this is ok and asking what exactly I get for my £60 installation fee. Their response was the worst type of impersonal bullshit I've ever had the displeasure to read.

"Thank you for contacting Sky Help Centre enquiring about the service we provide our existing customers.

I sorry to read your comments regarding this matter and welcome this opportunity to clarify our position.
Our agreement with you is to provide viewing services of your chosen viewing option and this we have done. Sky does make available promotional offers to new and past customers. However, long-standing active customers are also invited to upgrade their viewing option from time to time in response to promotional marketing mailings, which are issued.
I do not consider our policy to be unusual in comparison to many major service providers. Our aim is not only to provide excellent viewing services to our customers, but also to ensure that new business continues to be improved.
Due to our promotional offers changing so frequently and being more tailored to what packages and products you select, the best way for you to get the most up to date information would be to check out our website at the following link....."

Honestly - they may as well have simply sent me an email saying "Dear customer - fuck off."
This is the end of my relationship with Sky TV. I'll be looking to switch to another provider asap.

Doves at The Forum, University of Hertfordshire, Hatfield

2009-10-10T12:02:00.002+01:00

The Forum is a brand-spanking new purpose built venue, just off the A1 at Hatfield that has some serious potential. If it's managed well and promoted well, I'm hoping it'll soon be very much a part of the UK curcuit of mid-sized venues. It's similar in size to The Junction in Cambridge - I'm guessing around 800-1000 capacity.
It's so easy to get to, it only took half an hour from our house in Bedfordshire. There's a brand new, well lit multi-story car park right next door, that's free in the evening.
The staff were all friendly and polite. The toilets are spotlessly clean and there's about 20 of them in the ladies (no queue!). There was even loo roll....

It's a cracking venue. They've really thought it through and included all the essentials. I guess that's the advantage of a building that's designed for purpose, rather than converted, as most venues are. There's 3 large bars, one on a raised level behind the sound desk, with some seating and one either side of the main floor. There's also another bar on the upstairs balcony area. There's a purpose-built covered smoking area, right outside the main auditorium, so smokers can go for a quick fag without having to go very far or get wet.

This place was only completed in late August and it turned out that the Doves gig was the very first show to be put on here. Kudos to them for getting such a great band for the first night. The sound was spot on, well mixed and at just the right volume. Loud enough to take you away with it, but not so loud that it's oppressive or harmful. Nice lighting too - and a HUGE mirror ball in the centre of the room. I'm guessing that it's probably all LED lights, which don't give out the unbearable heat of the old-style ones. Proper ventilation too. The list just goes on and on.... So - onto THE MUSIC.

Doves came on at 9pm (after we'd endured a truly awful and totally forgettable support band). It took them a couple of songs to get into their groove. The drummer seemed to be having some problems for the first couple of songs. Maybe he couldn't hear properly or something, but he seemed to be struggling to stay in time and seemed to get lost a little here and there. It wasn't bad by any stretch of the imagination. The first two songs just seemed slightly disjointed and 'not quite right'. Anyhoo, by the third track all was well and Doves set about doing what they do best.

It was a great set. They played a whole bunch of awesome tunes. An extra long version of The Cedar Room was a highlight. I had a really good boogie to some great tracks: Pounding, Winter Hill, Snowden, There Goes The Fear, Words, Here It Comes, Kingdom of Rust, Ambition, Almost Forgot Myself, Black & White Town, The Greatest Denier, The Last Broadcast and Caught By The River.
One of my favourite tunes of the night though was Jetstream. I was listening to that track as we took off from Los Angeles, fighting back tears, so it now has a strong emotional connection for me.

By the end of the encore I was hoarse from singing and whooping and ached from dancing. It was a great crowd, a really good atmosphere and everyone was totally into it. I'd found myself dancing with the strangers around me with a big grin on my face. I was buzzzzzzing!

I really hope this venue takes off and continues to get lots of great bands playing there. It could easily become my favourite venue.

Crappy phone pics...

Tuesday 15th September

2009-10-08T22:22:00.000+01:00

Sad, sad day. Our holiday has come to an end, our flight home is today and we're really NOT ready to leave. It feels like we just got here. We didn't have enough time in Seattle, or enough time in San Diego. Sigh...

We spent the morning cramming everything into suitcases and getting ready for the drive Los Angeles. We left in plenty of time, and the journey ended up only taking 2 hours. Lots of interesting stuff on the journey.

The stole all our town names!

Lovely...

The pacific ocean from the I-5, somewhere south of LA.

A big bird in the sky, or a reflection of Vinny? Both are cool.

I totally lost it and cried like a big girl’s blouse when Vinny dropped us off and drove away at the airport. :-(

The flight home was nice. Did I mention somewhere before that business class rocks? We boarded first and they came around with champagne, while we were waiting for the peasants to board. ;-)

Despite the fact that you're "supposed" to stow everything and sit still during take-off, I took a few pictures of us leaving Los Angeles.

Goodbye Los Angeles.

Goodbye California.

10 hours goes quite quickly when you're being constantly fed. We had a 3 course dinner, watched a couple of movies (the new Terminator film and Angels & Demons). Then I had a bit of a sleep. Suddenly it was time for breakfast. Not just any old breakfast - a 3 course breakfast! Totally stuffed.

Before we had time to go completely stir crazy, we were back, landing at Heathrow. Went to the passport control desk at the UK border and OH BOY! what a culture shock. After spending 2 weeks being treated in a civil and polite way, it really took me back to be confronted by the grumpy fucker at passport control. We'd been in the country for 10 minutes, and Mark was looking at me and saying "Why the hell did we come back here?" My sentiments exactly. If I didn't have to work, I'd move to the USA in a heart-beat. However, until I win the lottery, it ain't going to happen. Not enough holiday. I couldn't give up my 25 days, no way.

The rest of the journey home was boring and miserable. We spent an hour on the tube, an hour on the train, then a 10 minute walk with 4 suitcases to Mark’s parents' house. It was nice to get our first 'proper' cup of tea in 2 weeks though.

I was then faced with trying to remember how to drive. It felt weird being on the left hand side of the road.

Thankfully I only had 2 days worth of dirty clothes to contend with when we got home, as I’d got 2 lots of washing done while we were away. That was a weight off. There's nothing more depressing than the post-holiday washing pile.

Tried to beat the jetlag by staying awake till 10pm, then slept for 9 hours. Back to work the next day.
Urgh.....
It worked for a couple of days, but the jetlag REALLY kicked in, along with the post-holiday blues at the weekend. I spent a week looking at emmigration and job sites, before I was finally able to let it go.

We had the BEST time. Thank you to all of our amazing friends who made it so much fun and so memorable. Love you all. Here's hoping it isn't too long before we can do it again. We're already saving!
3 weeks next time - and it'll include Boston too.

Monday 14th September

2009-10-08T21:31:00.001+01:00

Sadly, our last full day in San Diego and the last full day of our holiday.
:-(

We made the most of it though, with a visit to Mission Trails with Vinny.
Mission Trails is a huge area of mostly rocky desert with a beautiful lake and wooded area too.

It was HOT, so we didn't go for a particularly long walk. More of an amble, slow enough to stop and take everything in. It's great to go for a walk with people who are really into nature and know that you have to just stop and wait quietly if you want to see stuff. It's amazing just how much wildlife is all around you, if you stop and look.

At the car park and were immediately greeted with this sign.

Yikes! Though apparently, it's the baby rattlers you have to watch out for, as they aren't mature enough to know how to control their venom. If they bite you, they just keep on injecting. OK......
Luckily we didn't come across any rattle snakes, though it would have been cool to see one in the wild.

We saw lots of birds and very cool lizards.

There's a lizard on the fence post - honest.

There was talk of the possibility of mountain lions in the area - YIKES again - and how our mobile phones wouldn't work out there, and there's no-one around and so on.....
Vinny made us feel much better when he told us there's no point in running away from a mountain lion, because he's going to decide whether he's going to eat you, and running away isn't going to change his decision. If anything, running makes you look more like prey. Worth remembering.

Grooviest and scariest thing we saw was a tarantula hawk wasp. It's a HUGE red and black wasp, about 3-4 inches long. That's one scary looking wasp. Thankfully, unless you happen to be a tarantula, they'll leave you alone. They lay eggs in a live tarantula and the grubs eat it from the inside out. NICE!
Here's a picture I found on t'internet. Scary huh? My quite beautiful too.

After a nice walk around, we were all hungry and thirsty, so we headed into San Diego Old Town for lunch. As it was our last lunch together, we went to a nice restaurant and splashed out. We all had the veggie combo which was HUGE and delicious.

I treated myself to a margarita too. It was sooooo tasty.

We trawled around a few shops in search of some "Ass-Kicking Chili Fixins", but couldn't find any. Mark bought a groovy t-shirt, which must have been made just for him. It says "You can never have too many guitars!" Hahaha.....
I bought some trashy tourist stuff, some margarita flavour taffy to take back to the peeps at work and some really cool rainbow drinking glasses. MORE stuff to fit into the suitcases!
Jodi came home late afternoon, and while the boys chilled out I went to Costco with her. It gave us a chance for a little girly time together too. What a HUGE place! You have to buy everything in bulk. Crazy. I guess it makes sense when you're shopping for a family though.

In the evening we watched a crazy Japanese anime movie called "Paprika". It's an insane story about a dream machine that’s stolen and used to infiltrate people’s minds. Loved it. It made me want to see more movies like that.
Here's a synopsis I found on t'internet.

In this Japanese anime epic, humanity's last bastion of privacy has finally been infiltrated by technology, the world of our dreams. The story centers on a new invention called the DC-Mini. With this revolutionary device, psychiatrists are now able to enter a patient's dreams in a therapeutic setting. But when an unknown assailant steals all of the devices, using them to enter peoples minds enacting mind control, chaos ensues as dreams begin to bleed into reality, and the thin line between the conscious and the unconscious begins to blur. Enter a young female researcher named Chiba, who takes it upon herself to delve into the newly anarchic dream world in order to set things straight. In this surreal realm her name is Paprika, and she's out to save the world. Bursting with fantastic imagery and breathtakingly innovative animation.

Sunday 13th Sept - San Diego cont.

2009-10-05T19:14:00.000+01:00

Sunday was probably THE most memorable day of the whole holiday for me. I mean, every day was GREAT, and I hate to pick a favourite, but as far as really memorable days goes, Sunday wins.

During the day we went into El Cajon to a cool hippy shop.

Mark bought me a pretty polished stone heart pendant. Knowing that (because he's a bloke) he doesn't 'do' subtle hints, I picked the pendant up, handed it to him and said, "I like this and you're going to buy it for me.! :-)
Hey - it worked.....

We then had a HUGE lunch at Hilberto’s mexican restaurant. Burittos, quesadillas, nachos etc. Bloody lovely!

At 6pm we headed down to the harbour for a boat trip around San Diego bay. Vinny and Jodi had really pulled out all the stops to make this event so fantastic. They hired a big fishing boat for a private cruise.

There were 20 or so of their friends and family there. What a great bunch of people! Each and every one of them was so friendly and nice. They made us feel like we really belonged. It was pretty special.

I finally got to meet Vinny's sister Rose-Anne (RoRo) which was awesome. She's lovely, but somehow we managed to NOT get a picture of her. Dammit.

Vinny and Vern - aaaawwwwww.

The three hour trip took us to see loads of seals and sea birds. There were huge pelicans swooping over our heads, it was so amazing.

As it got gradually darker, we cruised towards the city and watched the downtown lights come on and the city light up. Amazing.

It's difficult to get a decent picture in the dark on a moving boat.

We passed under the HUGE Coronado bridge, which looked amazing at night. We saw a massive aircraft carrier (the Midway) and sailed right underneath the end of the flight deck. There was a beautiful sailing ship (The Star of India), and the ¾ scale galleon that was used to make the film Master & Commander.

There was a picnic onboard and everyone just had a really great time. I'll never forget that day. And I didn't feel even vaguely sea sick!

Off the back of a lorry...

2009-10-05T18:12:00.000+01:00

It's amazing what you can get off the back of a lorry......

On Saturday, we headed up to Market Harborough to see the awesome Burning Codes play at an Oxjam event. If you're not familiar, these are events set up to raise money for Oxfam, usually with local bands playing. In a typical outside event kind if way, no-one really seemed to know quite what was going on, or who was playing when. So we got there at 12pm, thinking they'd be on pretty much straight away.

Unfortunately we had to endure two crappy bands in the force nine gale before we got our B.C. fix. The first band were just bad - nuff said. The second band were a group of teenagers with flying v guitars, playing knob-rock. Yawn.....

So finally Burning Codes took to the 'stage'. I say stage, but it was a curtain-side lorry trailer, balanced precariously in a lumpy field outside the local yoof cente. Access to said stage was up an equally precariously balanced step-ladder. Rock 'n' roll baby.

There weren't many people there to be honest. The people that were there were mostly dressed in fancy dress costumes, which leant a slightly surreal mood to the whole thing. Superman and wonder woman are not people you see at gigs that often.

Thankfully the rain that was threatening from the mean looking clouds skittering across the sky didn't fall on us. In fact the sun did come out here and there.

Burning Codes played a bloody excellent set. They didn't seem to mind the high winds or the lack of audience. They still pulled out all the stops and played like they mean it. Honestly, if you ever get a chance, go and see this band live. They blow my frikkin mind. The songs build and build from barely a whisper, till they eventually crash over you in a wave of beautiful harmonies and addictive grooves. Bloody lovely.

After the Codes set we continued our journey up to Ashton under Lyne and paid a long over-due visit to our lovely friends. A hilarious 2 hour long karaoke session with Andy C left me hoarse and aching from laughing. (You should hear my Thom Yorke!)
We then took Mr Kizilok out for a belated birthday dinner, which was fabulous. We ate at The King William in Wilmslow, Cheshire. The food was absolutely delicious (the best stuffed jalapenos I've ever had), generous portions and not expensive. A fun evening of live music, catching up and lots of laughs. I needed that....

Saturday

2009-09-28T23:15:00.000+01:00

Saturday was a fairly eventful day.

On Friday night the pesky cat had got up on the roof of the house, and he was still there on Saturday. He was looking a bit freaked out and scared to come down, meowing and pacing up and down a lot.
Viv and I decided to go out into the front garden, in hopes of coaxing him back down the treee he used to get up there in the first place. I'm standing on the drive when Viv decides to go to the bottom of the tree to try and talk him down.
She walks into the grassy area in flip flops and suddenly ALL HELL BREAKS LOOSE!
Poor Viv - she stepped on a bee and got stung right on the sole of her foot. She freaked out!

Bless her, I remember how much it hurts when you get stung, though thankfully I haven't experienced it for a long time. I also remember how frightening it is when you're a kid. So she's screaming and crying and I'm feeling slightly panicky. So I scooped her up and carried her back to the house. Vinny came to the rescue and pulled the sting out of her foot. She was so brave. We ran her foot under cold water for a few minutes, then I liberally applied lots of After Bite. I was so glad I thought to take that with me. It works so well. Pretty soon she had regained her composure and we managed to get a little smile out of her. Brave kid.

Another, much more relaxed and fun part of Saturday was watching hummingbirds drink nectar from the feeder right outside the window. It was absolutely awe-inspiring. They are so beautiful and tiny. I felt really privileged to be able to stand not 3 feet away from them and watch them hover and stick those long tongues into the feeder to get nectar. Fantastic.
Here's a link to my hummingbird (and other California wildlife) video I made. So cool.

The main event on Saturday was something I have waited YEARS to experience. We went to watch Vinny play ice hockey with the San Diego Bruins team. It was as much fun as I guessed it'd be and WAY MORE.

Go Vinny, Go Vinny!!!!

I made video too.

They got thrashed by the other team, but who cares? It was great fun and it was nice and cool in there by the ice. Everyone else thought it was f-f-f-freezing. We thought it was just nice....

It's a very fast moving sport and I'll admit I had no idea what was going on for most of the game, but it was very enjoyable. In fact, it's inspired Mark and I to maybe start going to check out some of the games of our local ice hockey team, the MK Lightnings.

At least the Bruins had a few supporters there. Me, Mark, Jodi, Viv, Vern and Cassidy were rooting for them. The other team only had one supporter. She was sitting a few feet away from us and kept quiet until we started making a little noise. Then she got quite vocal in her support. Good for her I say.

Cassidy came back with us to the house after the game and I made portobello mushroom risotto for everyone for dinner. They seemed to really enjoy it. It's a very simple, but very tasty recipe.

For 6-ish people

Brown rice (about 1/2 cup per person)
2 packs of Portobello mushrooms quite finely chopped (it's worth using the real McCoy as they taste great)
1/2 an onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic
1 vegetable stock cube
Mustard seeds (just a few sprinkled in)
Assorted herbs - whatever takes your fancy really. Just go easy so you don't over-power the taste of the mushrooms. I think I used rosemary, coriander, thyme - stuff like that.

Fry the onion, garlic and mushrooms for a few minutes.
Crumble in the stock cube and add the rice and herbs and stir it all together.
Add enough water to cover the rice.
Bring to the boil and simmer until the rice is cooked, adding more water as needed.

Simple!

Friday - San Diego

2009-09-28T22:35:00.001+01:00

Well - El Cajon to be precise....

Friday was a very chilled out day. It was dang hot and we spent a lot of the day just hanging in the garden with Vinny, Casey the super affectionate dog and the crazy cat. Jodi had to go to work, during the day.

Vinny and Mark practice their loafing skills. Experts at work...

Casey

Bonkers cat! Affectionate one minute, biting your ankles the next.

We were just enjoying the weather and watching birds and butterflies buzzing around the garden.

Swallowtail?

We did leave the house, to go grocery shopping with Vinny. I actually really enjoy going to supermarkets in the US. It's a very different experience to here, so it has novelty value (much like the cucumber lady in Sainsburys - in joke...) Everything is BIG in America. Supermarkets, the shopping carts, portion sizes, THE BILL! It's surpising really. Eating out is so cheap over there in comparison to here, but actually buying food is pretty expensive. We went to a couple of places and tried to resist the temptation to buy LOADS of stuff.

Then we went with Vinny to pick Viv up from school and she hung out with us in the afternoon too.

Viv

Lunch was American style sandwiches (which I am now obsessed with since we came home). They KNOW how to make a sandwich! It has to have AT LEAST 6 ingredients.

None of your boring cheese & pickle - oh no..... For example, my sandwich today was mayonnaise, quorn ham, grated cheese, cucumber, lettuce and home-made salsa - and it was bloody lovely.

But I digress (again).

Vern stayed over at her friend Cassidy’s house on Friday night, so we didn't see her much. She's a Varsity cheerleader and they had a game. She looked awesome in her outfit.

It was still so hot on Friday evening that we decided to not go to the Brendan Benson gig in San Diego. Besides - we wanted to spend as much time as possible with our friends, and a gig isn't the best place to make conversation.

Vinny made his world famous tacos for dinner, which were YUMMERS, then I settled down to watch a film with Jodi, while the boys watched a baseball game. Jodi and I watched 300, which is a fantastic film about the Spartan army. It was cool.

Sleep. ZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

Thursday

2009-09-25T18:19:00.000+01:00

Woke up in agony! My calf muscles were like lumps of rock and I could hardly walk. Yikes!
I popped some pain killers and lay face down in the middle of the living room with Mark using a rolling pin to massage my legs.

Thursday was also Alex’s first day at kindergarten. Everyone was excited and upset in equeal amounts. He seemed to enjoy himself anyway.

We didn't really do anything on Thursday, apart from pack and enjoy what was left of our time with Andy and Gabi. We'd already aquired quite a lot of extra stuff, so Andy kindly gave us a spare suitcase he had lying around. All too soon it was time for Andy to take us to the airport and officially handed us off to Vinny on the phone. We said our goodbyes, many hugs were exchanged and I managed not to cry - just.

When I put my carry-on bag through the x-ray machine, the lady called me over.
"Is this your bag ma'am?"
"Ummm, yes..."
"I'm just going to take a look inside here."
"OK" (even though I knew I'd done nothing wrong and had nothing I shouldn't, it still made me nervous.

She pulls out the large bag of corn bread mix powder, that Michelle had given me, from my bag, shows it to the x-ray operator and they both smile. Phew.... I guess it hadn't occured to me just how much that looked like a kilo of cocaine on the x-ray!

The flight to San Diego takes just over 2 hours and passes some pretty amazing scenery. As you leave Seattle you get a spectacular view of Mount Ranier. It towers over everything else in the landscape, an incredible sight. I looked out of the window over Portland and waved to Jacob and Sarah. I wonder if they had a strange feeling around 4pm that someone was watching them?
I also waved hello to Oregon for my boss Devra.

Next up was Mount St Helens, with its massive chunk missing from the top and one side, from the eruption in 1980 (?), then Mount Hood and the Three Sisters. It’s a beautiful mountain range.
The pilot was great and pointed out anything of interest as we flew over it.

We saw Lake Tahoe, which is HUGE. It took several minutes to fly over it. Then the landscape started to gradually change from green to brown as we headed South and into California. There were massive tracts of land laid out in perfect squares and loads of circles of green, where you can see the shape the rotating irrigation sprinklers make. It’s frightening to think of the amount of water that’s being used to grow these crops out in what is basically a desert. And it all has to be pumped in. Best not to think about it really, I guess.

Arrived in San Diego and it was HOT. It was SO good to see Vinny's smiling face waiting for us at the airport.
We got yummy Round Table pizza for dinner on the way back to chez Votel. Jodi, Veronica and Vivienne were all there, waiting at the door to meet us. There was lots of running around, hugging, saying "Look at you!" to the kids (we haven't seen them for 2 1/2 years) etc etc.
Thursday night involved much chilling out, catching up and relaxing into the Californian pace of life. Aaaaaahhhhhh.

People are strange

2009-09-25T17:37:00.000+01:00

A slight aside from my holiday blog, which I am still working on and will add more here later.
Our next door neighbours are having a bit fight right now. I can hear them shouting and slamming things around through the wall. Their baby is also being exposed to this aggressive behaviour, which can't be good.

I've never understood why people who love each other scream and shout, and say such horrible things to each other. I'm of the opinion that the rest of the world out there sucks so much and is so selfish and unkind, that the ONE place you should be at peace is at home with the one you love.

It's each person's responsibility to not make the world a worse place for those they care about.
You should be the smile, the hug, the kind word at the end of a crappy day.
You should be the haven of love to come home to. That counts for both people in a relationship.
Agree to disagree.
Don't try to change each other, because you may just find that you lose the person you fell in love with if you do.
Don't get annoyed at each other's little faults, find them amusing.
Embrace the phrase "But when I do it, it's cute!"

There's enough shit out there. Don't make your home life just part of the daily shit.

Wednesday

2009-09-24T20:04:00.000+01:00

On Wednesday we went for our first ever bona fide HIKE. We've been for walks before, but when in the USA, you call it a hike - so ner.
We drove out to Twin Falls State Park, which is close to North Bend and Snoqualmie. Twin Peaks country.

It's an absolutely stunning area, especially to us East Anglians. We're just not used to hills, never mind mountains. Bear in mind that I'm still impressed every time we go to Manchester via the Woodhead Pass. Our part of the country is as flat as a flat thing that's feeling a bit let down. So - I digress.....

The Twin Falls hike is a beautiful lush green forest walk that takes you along the side of the river for the first 1/2 mile or so. The river itself reminded me a little of parts of Wales. Crystal clear water bubbling over boulders and stones.

It looked so inviting, we were all tempted to dip our toes in, but we moved on. The air is so clean there. The trees are dripping with mosses and ferns. I've never seen so many different types of slugs either!

The path gradually moves away from the riverside and starts to head uphill and becomes more uneven in places as you go. A quite gruelling mile of uphill hiking (stumbling) that got steeper and steeper as we went, was a killer for my poor legs, which started to feel a bit wobbly by the time we reached the waterfalls. But oh my, was it worth it! Stepping out onto the bridge across the small gorge was exhilirating. Mark was very brave, seeing as he's not keen on heights. Beautiful views and the sound of the falls - it was magical. You can feel the extra oxygen in the air around fast moving water.

Thinking the path was a circular route, and we'd end up back where we started, we kept on. Onwards and UPWARDS. It got steeper and steeper, the path cutting switch-backs into the mountain side. It was a real struggle. We kept going and going. I ran out of water and started to wish I'd brought more than a small 1/2 litre bottle with me. We came to a particularly steep bit after about another 1/2 mile and I just stopped dead. I couldn't go any further. I was so thirsty and my legs were like jelly.

We saw some people coming back down the path, who had passed us earlier. They told us it wasn't a circular path. When you get to the top, which was another 1/2 mile UP, you had to go back the way you came. Disappointingly, they also said there's no pay-off when you reach the top. No spectacular view, no hidden gem - it just fizzles out and there's a railway track. Apparently the walk up as far as the falls is the intended as the main pretty hike. The rest is for serious exercise and veteran hikers. Ha! Neither of those apply to me....

Andy and Gabi were determined to not be beaten by the hill. They wanted to get to the top. So they convinced me to go on. It felt like a LONG way, and I tried my best. I got to probably within 1/4 mile of the end, but I just couldn't physically go ANY FURTHER. I thought I was going to puke or cry or collapse. I was right on the edge of what I could take - physically. So I let them go on ahead and rested while we waited for them to come back down. I would have liked to get to the top, but I just couldn't do it. The views from as far as we got were still pretty amazing, to these eyes.

We still had the long walk back down to contend with. Down hill hurts in a whole new set of places!
Of course, while I was huffing and puffing and complaining about how much it hurt and where, Andy and Gabi's 5 year old son, Alex just ran up the mountain and back down again, like it was nothing. And he STILL had energy to spare. Oh for just a percentage of his energy.....

It sounds like I'm complaining and didn't enjoy this hike at all doesn't it? That's just not the case. Yes - there were moments when I longed for a cold drink, a hot shower and a comfy bed, BUT it was all totally worth it. The beautiful forest, the stunning waterfall, the lovely friends all made it an experience I'll never forget.

Funnily enough, I don't really remember much more about Wednesday. I remember stopping at a 'gas station' to buy junk food and huge drinks, which we all got down our necks as fast as possible. After that I think we just collapsed in a heap and a deep sleep. The sleep of the over-exercised.

Tuesday

2009-09-21T20:58:00.000+01:00

On Tuesday we went to the Seattle aquarium with Andy, Gabi and Alex, which was fantastic. So many really cool fish (and not a chip in sight). We saw river otters, sea otters, sea lions, seals, puffins, loads of starfish, jellyfish, seahorses etc etc. It was fascinating and great fun. I took a bunch of pictures which are all on my Flickr page.

After the aquarium we chilled out on the pier for a while, enjoying the sunshine and the gorgeous views of the bay.

Next up was a little shopping at North Bend. I bought some snazzy Converse and Mark bought 2 pairs of Skechers. I love going to North Bend - it's where Twin Peaks was filmed and it's absolutely stunning there.
On the way there we got some great views of Mount Ranier, which towers over all the other mountains in the area.

A delicious dinner at a Mexican restaurant rounded off the day nicely. I ate far too much and actually made myself feel a bit sick. Had to go outside for some fresh air.

A nice relaxed evening of chatting finished us off for the night.

Monday

2009-09-21T20:23:00.000+01:00

Monday was just like being at home. It was pissing down with rain. We checked out of the hotel and Andy very kindly came up picked up our luggage and took it to his house. This worked out well, as we could go off and enjoy our day without worrying about all the suitcases. We were staying with Andy and Gabi from Monday night for the rest of our stay.

So we hopped on the monorail, which is great fun and headed down to the Seattle Center, right next to the Space Needle to meet up with Jon, Michelle and Darian for the Bumbershoot Festival. Bumbershoot has been happening for years, but this was the first time we’d had an opportunity to check it out. It’s a 3 day festival that takes place right in the middle of the city. They fence off a large area and use all the buildings inside as venues.

We caught about 10 minutes of The Minus Five, then went over and saw a bit of a band called Say Hi. They were really good. There was another band that we snuck in to see, but I can’t remember their name. They were playing on the stage inside the Space Needle.

The Minus Five

We spent some time playing all the silly fairground games, throwing darts, shooting ping-pong balls etc. Mark won me a purple monkey! He’s never won me anything at a fair before – ever. Jon won a blow-up alien and Michelle even managed to get a cuddly duck out of one of those grabber machines, that NO-ONE ever wins anything out of.

One of the moments when it stopped raining temporarily.

We decided to grab something to eat before Jon’s show, and so began the day of sugar overload. Fries and a massive 3 berry burst smoothie from Orange Julius, followed by some extra sickly fudge and a huge cotton candy (candy floss). I was buzzing!

Time to head over to the venue for the main event of the day The Radio 8 Ball Show. It’s an interesting concept. Everyone on the audience is given a card and a pencil. On the card you write a question that you’d like answered. It can be anything from something silly to something profound. The cards are then collected and one is picked at random. If they pick your card, you have to go up onstage and ready your question out. You then flip a coin which decides whether you pick a card or spin the wheel. There is a list of 8 songs on a board on the stage. The house band (Jon plus a bass player and drummer) play the song that corresponds to the number that you either picked out or the wheel stops on. The idea is that you listen to the song, then try to interpret how the song answers your question. With me so far?

Ask a question

Get a musical answer.

There were a couple of amusing ones, like the man who wants to kill all the mountain goats and his question was should we shoot them or trap them. Random….. The song he picked was called Blood & Roses. The chorus went “I want to live, but I don’t belong.” Pretty funny, considering his question.

The best one by far though was a woman who has a loser boyfriend who is out of work, owes her money and her mum thinks she should dump. She wanted to know what to do. So she spun the wheel and the song that came up was Jon’s track Six Feet Under. The very first line of that song is “Nothing’s going to save us now.” It’s a song about a relationship break-up. The whole place just erupted with laughter. Jon couldn’t sing, he was laughing so much. Not much interpreting needed there then. She said “I thin I know what I have to do.”

After the show, Michelle and Darian headed home and Mark, Jon and I went off to catch some of Dead Confederate’s set. We’d seen this band in the UK, supporting Dinosaur Jnr a few weeks earlier and liked them, so were looking forward to seeing them again. We eventually found the venue, but there was a HUGE queue to get in and they had already started their set, so we gave up and caught a cab back to Jon’s instead.

As if we hadn’t eaten enough sugar for one day, a quick visit to Cupcake Royale could not be missed. What an awesome place. They sell cupcakes, lots of cupcakes – and coffee. I got a fabulous classic cupcake with a massive pile of chocolate frosting on top. Mark had a carrot cupcake. They were bloody lovely.

Andy picked us up and we headed out to his lovely house in Lakeland Hills, near Auburn, where we were introduced to Edgar the guinea pig and settled in for the evening. A light dinner and off to sleep in their oooh-so-comfy guest bed. Aaaahhh......

Sunday

2009-09-20T18:19:00.000+01:00

We had some free time on Sunday morning, so we went for a wander around the downtown shopping area. I managed to get some USA voltage hair straighteners for a bargain $30. I needed them to help me cope with the humidity. I go seriously curly without them. Went into Macy’s, unimpressed, walked out again.

Sunday afternoon Jon picked us up and we went to Trading Musician, which is a fantastic music shop. They sell mostly 2nd hand stuff and they have a great policy where anyone is free to grab a lead, switch on any amp they fancy and have a go with any of the instruments. You don’t have to ask to try things out, you just help yourself. A lot of (most) UK music shops could learn a lot about how to treat potential customers from these guys. Mark tried out a guitar, but didn’t buy it. I fell in love with, and very nearly bought a kalimba (thumb harp). They were so beautifully made and sounded gorgeous. But I wasn’t sure if it would fit in my luggage, so I had to resist.

When they found out we were friends of Jon’s the guys in the shop very kindly gave Mark and I a free t-shirt each, which was cool, as I was thinking about buying one. Their philosophy is that it’s cool for their shop to get advertised around the world, and we were happy to oblige.

Next up was a trip to Jon’s favourite wine store. It’s a huge warehouse absolutely full of every type of wine you can imagine from all over the world. I bought a $30 bottle of local Washington red, which we had with dinner that night. And very nice it was too.

Finally, we went to Bedrock Industries, a place I’d found on the internet some time last year and had wanted to go to since I found it. It’s a really cool place. You can take your household glass there and they pay you for it. Then they crush it, melt it down and make beautiful art from it. I wanted EVERYTHING there, from the coasters to the huge garden mobiles, but I limited myself to buying an adorable hand-made recycled glass robot. They had 50 or 60 on display, but I knew as soon as I saw him that this one was for me. I love the look on his face. Slightly startled, like he’s saying “What’s going on?”

Back to Jon and Michelle’s apartment for yummy homemade 3 bean chilli and corn bread. I’d never had corn bread before. I so tasty!
Desert was strawberry shortcake Why it’s called shortcake I have no idea. It was a tower of sponge cake, covered in crushed strawberries and whipped cream. There was nothing short on that cake, flavour or height! Amazing.

After dinner we watched watched Death Proof another Tarantino movie and finished off the tasty wine.
We were sent off at the end of the night with 2 packs of cornbread mix and some chilli seasoning.

Saturday

2009-09-20T17:01:00.003+01:00

Woke up at 7am with a blinding migraine. Yikes! It felt like my head was splitting in two (don’t we know a song about that too?) I was dizzy and felt like I was going to puke. Not good. I took as many headache pills as I dared and sat very still for several hours. A yummy stack of pancakes as big as my face with warm syrup was consumed (purely for medical reasons, of course). Thankfully, it did eventually pass and by the time Andy, Gabi and Alex arrived at 1.30pm I’d had plenty of time to chill out and almost felt normal again (for me).

We had a fun couple of hours at a kids birthday party at ‘Pump It Up’. It was all quite civilised. None of the expected screaming and punching tantrums and what not (and that’s just the parents!) The kids, and some of the adults, bounced and slid around, then there was cake and ice cream and presents for the birthday boy. Not the nightmare situation I imagined. Quite fun.

Gabi, Alex, Mark and Andy on the inflatable throne.

Weeeeeeee.....

After the party they drove us back into Seattle to get us checked into our 3rd hotel in 3 days, the Crowne Plaza. Turns out we got a room on the priority club floor. 34th floor – top floor! It’s crazy high up here. You need your room key to get the lift to come up to this floor. No riff-raff allowed. We feel like imposters! Haha. It’s an ace room with fantastic views. One of the first things we saw (Mark spotted it) was two eagles having a mid-air punch-up and swooping around. Cool!
Massive thanks and kudos to Andy for getting this room for us. We REALLY do appreciate your endless generosity.

It's a LONG way down.

Stunning views.

The bed is enormous and very squishy – just how I like it.

Saturday evening Jon picked us up from the hotel and we went for a nice drive around (he used to drive us around – arf arf,). We headed up to Ballard to see the sun setting over the Olympic mountain range. It was absolutely beautiful, looking out across the water to the mountains on the horizon. Stunning.
We coveted some very nice houses, then went to Ballard Market, which is a huge supermarket crammed full of really good stuff. Lots of veggie and organic and locally grown stuff. I could have spent A LOT of money in there, but restricted myself to some chocolate bunnies and some cheese bunnies. The intention was to bring them home, but the cheese bunnies didn’t last very long at all. They’re lovely. Cheesy little biscuits in the shape of bunnies. Mmmmm.

Mark admires the stunning view.

Sunset over the Olympics.

Back to Chez Auer for a lovely home-cooked dinner of a delicious pasta bake with garlic bread, followed by yummy apple pie with loads of cinnamon and whipped cream. Oh man – soooooo good.
A great evening.

Seattle – Friday

2009-09-07T02:37:00.003+01:00

Arrived at Seattle airport earlier than expected (don’t we know a song about that?) Jon picked us up from the airport and kindly deposited us at The Red Lion Hotel in Bellevue, our digs for the night.
Nice place – we had a first floor room with a balcony. It was clean and comfortable and had free wi-fi, exactly what you need. We saw a couple of what we assumed were blue jays bobbing around in the trees outside.
I have to say that hotel beds over here are so much more comfortable than those at home. They’re always really squishy and BIG. I never fail to sleep ok in a big squishy bed.

Andy called, and I convinced him to sneak out of work for an hour to come over and see us. Sssshhh, don’t tell anyone. Man – that boy is LOOKING GOOD. So healthy, it puts me to shame.

Friday evening we went and had Mexican food for dinner at a little restaurant just a few doors away from Chez Auer. I had a lovely veggie buritto, but couldn’t eat it all, as it was HUGE.
After we ate, Mark and Jon went back to the apartment to ‘dude-out’ for a while and Michelle and Darian took me to get my nails done. What an unusual experience that was. You know that I’m not much of a girly girl don’t you. Anyone who knows me, knows that. I have never in my whole life had a manicure before. It was actually quite relaxing. The hand massage was the best bit. So now I have a French manicure (laa-dee-daa) and it’s like I have someone else’s fingers. It’s bizarre. They’re all shiny. It was a nice treat, and it’s always good to try something new isn’t it?

Then we went to the cinema to see Inglorious Basterds, which was hilarious and bonkers. Quentin Tarantino never fails to make extreme violence entertaining. I had no idea it was such a long film. It’s around 3 hours long. I’d been up since 5.30am, so I struggled a little and almost dropped off a couple of times. That’s not a criticism of the film, I was just tired. It’s a good film – maybe a little too long. There were a few sequences that could have been shorter, but then you just know they made them uncomfortably long, just to mess with your mind. You KNOW what’s coming, but they make you wait. I guess it’s part of the art.

Pooped – sleep.

Los Angeles

2009-09-07T02:26:00.003+01:00

Not all that much to report on Los Angeles really, apart from the temperature. We arrived around 8.30pm and it was warm and very humid. No hassle with immigration or customs. Breezed through quite quickly really. By the time we got to our hotel for the night, The Hilton, we were pretty tired. We got a lovely room on the 9th floor with two double beds and air con. It was very comfortable and very well sound-proofed. We both slept well. Up at 5.30am (urgh) to get ourselves back to the airport for our 8.30 flight to Seattle. Saw the sun rise, which isn’t something I see that often.

Isn't this exactly the type of roof you expect to see Jack Bauer running across at any minute?

Hazy sunrise over LA.

The 2 hour flight to Seattle was comfortable, just like I remember. If you’re doing any internal flights around the USA try Alaska Airlines out. I’ve been impressed each time I’ve used them.
We didn’t see any evidence of the fires we’ve all been hearing about around LA.

The flight

2009-09-07T02:23:00.002+01:00

Did I mention that business class rules? Heehee. Reclining chairs with adjustable lumbar support. AND they transform into fully flat beds! It makes a whole world of difference when you can lie down and relax properly.
Makes me wonder if we’ll ever be able to travel economy again. It’s kind of like air conditioning in a car or getting a dishwasher. Once you’ve experienced these things, you can never go back.

The flight was very smooth, just a little turbulence here and there. Watched 2 films on the way over, the latest Star Trek and Knowing (Nicolas Cage). Both pretty good. Looking forward to seeing the new Terminator film on the way back.

The one and only glitch on the whole flight, was with the food. They had no record of us ordering a vegetarian meal, so there were none on board. Apparently, it’s not something they get a lot of requests for. It was pretty annoying, as I had my flight confirmation right there (which I waved at them) which stated our food choice.
Luckily, we’d filled up in the airport lounge, stuffing our faces with the novelty of FREE FOOD! The flight crew were great though. They were very apologetic and did everything they could to make sure we were looked after. They even shared the crew food with us, so we did finally get something to eat. We just had to wait until till 2 hours after the passengers ate, when the crew got their dinner. So they gave us a baked potato with cheese, some salad and couscous, houmous and falafel. It was REALLY nice and more than made up for the cock-up. It was tasty proper food, not some poncey blue cheese and walnut tart bullshit that you usually get. People seem to think that vegetarians need to be impressed with fancy food, laced with fat. NOT TRUE. Give me something basic and tasty, that’s all I want.

The crew over-compensated for the rest of the flight, bringing us every type of food they could find. We were given fresh fruit, salad, chocolates, copious cups of tea and glasses of wine. Basically as much as we could eat and drink.

I tried to get a picture of Las Vegas as we flew over it, as it looked very cool. But you just can't hold the camera still enough for a long exposure on a moving plane, so this is all I got.

On our way to the USofA

2009-09-03T16:35:00.001+01:00

Business Class rules!
Politely and quickly checked in, fast tracked through security, welcomed by name to the business class lounge with comfy chairs, free food and drink. And we’re not even on the plane yet!
I could get used to this.
Normally a delayed flight means stress and getting annoyed. Funnily enough, the fact that our 4.15pm flight has just been delayed till 6pm isn’t bothering me. Maybe it’s the Diazepam tablet I took half an hour ago? Maybe it’s the glass of J.D and coke I have in my hand? Either way – BOVERED?
The only disappointment is the lack of public wi-fi. There’s a network here, but the signal strength is pants and I can’t get connected. Ho hum, could be worse eh? We could be sitting it out in the cattle class plastic chairs being charged extortionate prices for a bottle of water. Captive audiences – the capitalists best friend!
Sadly, there’s only so long (about 15 mins) that my crappy laptop will last on battery power, so I couldn’t take advantage of the wi-fi even if it was working.

MOOOOO

2009-08-27T18:22:00.003+01:00

I'm such a kid.
I've been saving points from Anchor butter packs. So far I have 20 cows in my herd. They are all named after people I know. Today's new cows were named Whitaker, Perry and Kim. I already have Jon, Michelle, Vinny, Jodi, Mark, Suzy, Izzy, Jock, Millsey, Cleggy, Andy, Ian, Auer, Kizilok etc etc.

When I get to 25 cows I'll be able to send off for my FREE cow kite.
I'm tempted to cash in 15 right now and get a fuzzy felt cow farm, but I kind of want the kite more.
Maybe I'll get the fuzzy felt next time. I loved fuzzy felt when I was a kid. Must have had a dozen of them.

If you use Anchor butter and don't have a herd - why not? It's fun. If not, send the code printed on the pack to ME and I'll adopt a cow for you.

Cook-tastic mate

2009-08-23T15:14:00.004+01:00

I optimistically over-stocked on fruit this week and rather just eat the stuff (that's boring - right?) I'm currently making apple & blueberry crunch AND a banana & blueberry cake. I still think that cake mixture, off the spoon is one of the best pleasures in life. If you fancy giving either a go, here's the recipes.

Apple Crunch
I got this recipe from my friend Jodi in San Diego. It ROCKS! This recipe is really flexible. You can play around with the quantities of syrup and sugar and add other ingedients too if you like. Hence my apple & blueberry crunch. You can also double up the quantities of the crunchy topping if you like lots of it.

For the apple filling
4 large cooking apples or 8 medium eating apples (Cooking apples work best, as you get that tart edge to counteract the sugar.)
1/2 cup of maple syrup, golden syrup or honey (I usually do a mixture of all three.)
1/2 pack of blueberries (optional)

For the crunchy topping
1/4 - 1/2 tsp nutmeg (to taste)
1/4 - 1/2 tsp cinnamon (to taste)
1/2 cup plain flour
3/4 cup brown sugar (or less if preferred)
1/4 cup cold butter

Peel the apples and cut into smallish chunks. Put them in an ovenproof dish, (along with the blueberries if you're using them) and drizzle with the syrup.
Mix the dry ingredients together in a bowl, then add the cold butter and cut it with a knife until it reaches a crumbly texture. Spread over the apples.
Bake uncovered at 190c (375f) for 30 - 40 minutes.

Banana cake
I found this on the internet when I was looking for a recipe that didn't need eggs. I rarely have eggs in the house. I've adapted it a little here and there. This is my version.

5 or 6 ripe bananas
1/2 pack of blueberries
1 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp whisky
1 tbsp maple syrup
2 cups plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda

Mash the bananas and sugar together.
Add the vanilla, whisky and maple syrup and stir in.
Sift the flour, baking powder and baking soda together.
Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.
Add the blueberries and stir in.
Line a loaf tin with baking paper (or grease well) and pour the mixture in and level off.
Bake for 1 hour at 175c (350f).

Mac-o-rama

2009-08-22T19:21:00.003+01:00

We recently bought an iMac for the studio. It's VERY cool and just 'works'. You know, you plug it in and it does stuff, without crashing, getting viruses and freaking out on you just when you least expect it.

It's quite a steep learning curve for both of us. I used to work on Macs a long time ago. The last time I touched one was a beige G3 with OS9 on it. Mark has never used one before. So to be confronted with OSX Leopard and a whole new way of doing stuff is a little daunting, but we're getting there.

The Mac is predominantly for use in the studio. We're not going to clog it up with unnecessary programmes or use it for email or anything like that. It'll run Logic Studio and that's what it'll do.

I'll also be using it for video work, as the Windows Movie Maker on my laptop just refuses to work any more. It crashes as soon as I add a file to a project. I never get as far as saving anything. I've spent too many hours getting frustrated and getting nowhere.

So for the past couple of days I've been playing around with iMovie and the result is something I've been wanting to do for months, which is a video for the Kizilok track, Torben Byl. I was hit with a sudden flash of inspiration one day, ages ago. I rushed out and bought a clockwork robot, just like I'd seen in my mind's-eye, took a bunch of video clips of it, and then couldn't do anything with them. Very frustrating.

But now I;ve finally been able to make my Torben Byl video, and I'm pleased with it. It makes me smile. Here it is.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-kgWwNBLE6U

Ramadan a ding dong

2009-08-21T23:30:00.005+01:00

Did you know that Ramadan starts tomorrow?

Nor did I, till I spoke to our friendly local purveyor of damn-fine curry this evening.
Couldn't do it myself. No eating during daylight hours. I wouldn't last a day.

Apparently they have a huge selection of great Asian food on offer in Tesco in Cardington Road, Bedford this week. They even have Islamic 'advent' calendars with chocolates inside!

If Indian people are doing their own festival shopping there, that's a pretty good recommendation.

Gotta go and check that out.

Cashback and old Mrs Cynical

2009-08-21T22:44:00.002+01:00

You know me, quite cynical in general and not willing to trust things/people I don't know....

Well, a few months ago a went on a training course on affiliate marketing. For the uninitiated, affiliate marketing is the advertising banners that you see on websites, enticing you to click through and buy stuff.
Basically the way it works is, you click on the banner and end up buying something, the host website gets a commission for displaying the advert and generating the click through, the shop gets a sale, but takes a hit on the commission cost off their profit. Simple really. Everybody does it.

But did you know it can also work for you as a customer?

The guy running the training course highly recommended a site called Quidco.com to me. All you have to do is sign up, then remember to use Quidco, rather than going direct to the sites you're going to buy stuff from. I ain't bull-shitting you, this actually works. It's all done with cookies. Let's face it, if you were going to buy the stuff anyway, you're onto a winner if you can get a little something back.
Every time you click through from the site and buy something YOU get money back. I'm smitten.

Oh man, this really sounds like one of those get rich quick scams, doesn't it?
Just send me your bank account details and I'll do a runner. Haha....

So I've been using it for a few months now. Every Ebay purchase I make goes through there, and I get 40% of Ebay's cut. No shit! I got £20 for buying my car insurance through it. The list goes on. I only wish I'd been using it when I booked the flights for our USA trip. Dammit.
I'm trying to train Mark to remember to use it too, seeing as he's the Ebay FIEND in the house.
It takes a little while before you remember to automatically check to see if the shop you're going to buy from is on there. I was gutted that I forgot to use it to go through to the Apple Store when I bought the iMac. Coud have got £30 for my trouble, but got lost in the excitement and forgot. What a numpty.

All you have to do to use this site is pay an annual fee of £5, which they take out of your earnings, so you don't even have to pay that upfront. It takes a little while for the payments to come through. Ebay is pretty fast, some take a couple of months.

I going to shut up now. I sound like a total loon. Even I don't trust me.

Sometimes the past is just the past...

2009-08-21T17:59:00.000+01:00

Last night we went to a really disappointing Dinosaur Jnr. gig. I'll admit that I've never been a BIG fan, but we thought it'd be a fun 'blast from the past' night.
So I squeezed myself into my vintage original Posies t-shirt and off we went to The Junction in Cambridge.
There were a LOT of flannel shirts and beards on display. Fleet Foxes have a lot to answer for.

I wasn't feeling all that enthusiastic about being somewhere hot and crowded, seeing as I'd only just got over a serious stomach bug illness. I even tried to give my ticket away to a friend during the afternoon, but he couldn't make it, so I was determined to get back on the horse and make the most of it.

We arrived in time to catch most of the support band's set. They are called Dead Confederate. You can find them on Myspace if you're interested.
They're pretty good! Nice voice, nice tunes. They wooshed between power pop and indie rock quite nicely, with some great wig-outs and swirly guitars thrown in. It was like being transported back to 1993 (in a good way).
They're playing at Bumbershoot in Seattle while we're there, and we both said we'd go and see them again if we get the opportunity.

Good start....

So - Dinosaur Jnr.
Ummm, I initially thought it was me, just not being into being there because I still wasn't feeling well, but sadly that was not the case.
They sidled onto the stage in a half-hearted fashion, picked up their instruments without saying a word and proceeded to UNLEASH on the audience the most ridiculous volume level I've experienced since My Bloody Valentine!

There are certain things that have to happen for me to enjoy live music.

The band have to look like they actually want to be there, rather than look like they'd rather be anywhere else.
They have to play like they mean it, not like they're just going through the motions.
Communicate with the audience. Look at them once in a while. Say something, anything between songs.
Play loud by all means. (There's nothing worse than the volume being so low that you can hear all the inconsiderate tossers in the audience who refuse to keep quiet during gigs.) BUT don't play so stupidly loud that even earplugs jammed in as far as they'll go aren't enough to stem the sonic barrage. There were people who didn't have earplugs LEAVING! That is officially TOO LOUD.

The sound was loud (did I mention that?) and very, very harsh. The mix was crap - you could barely hear the vocals over the wall of sound coming from the 3 (count em) enormous Marshall stacks. Probably not entirely the sound guy's fault, as there's only so much you can do when competing with that kind of level on stage.

After about 4 songs I'd had enough, so I went to get some fresh air and a drink.
Mark only lasted 2 more songs than me before he'd had enough too.
We left early, avoided the queue to get out of the car park and got some chips on the way home.

Not a 'bad' night, but not the best by a long shot.

Give me The Posies over Dinosaur Jnr. ANY DAY. Gorgeous voices, sweet, sweet harmonies, intricate guitars, songs that grab you by the heart and squeeze, songs that grab you by the throat and squeeze, songs that make you want to jump around, songs that make you cry, songs that make you smile - plus some of the nicest people you'll meet. One of the most criminally over-looked bands EVER.

Ebay gomper

2009-08-21T10:26:00.001+01:00

We sold a couple of things on Ebay recently. One of the items went smoothly, the other - not so much.
When the auction ended I sent an invoice to the buyer - no response, no payment.
After a couple of days I sent them a reminder email via Ebay - no response, no payment.
After a couple more days I did the same again - no joy.

Today, I sent a snotty text to the buyer, telling them if they didn't contact me within 24 hours I'd have to report them to Ebay.
Finally I got a call from the guy, who is a complete TIT. He was bidding from his iphone, using his wife's account. It didn't occur to either him or his wife to actually log into Ebay and check to see if they'd won the item. Duuuurrrrr.
What a gomper.

So he says he's going to pay us tomorrow. I'll believe it when I see it.
I won't be in too much of a hurry to post the thing.

Blogging again

2009-08-21T09:54:00.000+01:00

I used to blog religiously about anything and everything. Then I got side-tracked by Myspace, Facebook, Twitter etc etc and stopped.
I kind of miss having an online diary in a central place. I blog to remind myself of stuff I've done more than for anyone elses entertainment. Of course, if other people enjoy reading it, that's great too.
So I'm going to try to make an effort and write stuff on here about what I've been up to and where my head is at.