overlap

So, fixtures have been out for weeks, the speedway GP has come and gone like a Scott Nicholls punch on the chin of a full-face helmet, my garden's been subject to a bit of hack and slash, and we're nearly back to normal.

My diary shows I might possibly have two free weekends between here and October, and the brief pre-season burst of enthusiasm will soon be swept away. Just once I'd like to see us win our first two or three games and top the table, but it'll be a relief just to start the season on zero points.

Meanwhile I'm still chasing airline staff to get a definitive view on who is going to own up to losing my luggage so I can get my insurance to do something about paying out for the urgent and ongoing replacement of things I already own but have had lost for me. It would be foolish at best to name any names at this point, but there's one airline whose customer service has been highly impressive even if they can't really help, and one whose efforts I'm rather less impressed by. So for now what should have been a highly memorable, one-off trip is book-ended by bereavement and the inordinate hassle of chasing what ought to be a fairly straightforward process to claim for my lost luggage, and a definite disinclination towards using a certain airline in the future.

We'll see what happens, but it's hardly the ideal background to the ongoing redundancy shenanigans, which have already seen my departure delayed for one extension, and further developments of that sort are not out of the question.

Not really what you'd called settled conditions!


* Out Of Season is a song by REO Speedwagon, and an entirely different one by The Icicle Works - take your pick depending on taste and credibility concerns!

Going to see the same band dozens of times invites questions about why keep on going, and in many cases it's the different songs, different inter-song anecdotes, different venues and different support bands that keep things from becoming routine.

In this case it's a trip to the Midlands back to a venue I've been to a few times now, and including a trip to a nearby out of town shopping centre that allows me to make a start on replacing all the stuff lost in an airport somewhere in Asia. It's not just not having the stuff, it's the research it takes to find out what is currently available and what my realistic options are that makes life difficult. Bearing in mind that some of this stuff absolutely has to be replaced before I'm out of the country again inside the the next month, I don't have too much time to spare and getting on with buying replacement items feels rather more like taking some control of the situation than just waiting for an airline and an insurance company to do something. I manage only to buy more or less what I'd planned, and leave without yet another new handbag, so that's progress on two fronts!

Unusually there are few people at this gig that I know, and the ones I do know are working, either selling t-shirts and CDs, or on the stage. Which means I'm free to take in the support band with all my attention. The first track is a nice enough piece of brass-flavoured pop, and if that makes you think of the Zutons you are somewhere along the right lines. This is no preparation for the second track, when the seven musicians and singers are joined on stage by a vision in red and grey gloves. Check out the picture!



For anyone who, like me, is not aware that there is a significant visual element to Misty's Big Adventure, this is something of a surprise! Not an unwelcome one, but one that threatens to distract from the music, though happily the band are obviously used to this and it rapidly becomes just their kind of normal. There's a risk of accusations of novelty act, of stuntmanship and of cheap attention-seeking but for me it's pretty straightforward that Erotic Volvo (made-up name!) is both an integral part of the MBA performance and something that elevates MBA from being just another band. Their laid-back, jazz-tinged and laconic pop is a welcome tonic in the bland age, and I'm happy to appreciate them for what they are rather than what they're not, and what they are is great fun.

It's a refreshing change for The Wonder Stuff set to switch closer to a greatest hits set rather than performing the entire Eight Legged Groove Machine album as we've seen recently, and Radio Ass Kiss and Piece Of Sky dedicated to Swells both hit the spot. I'm hardly in any position to pass unbiased comment, but I had a great time.

* Great Adventure is a song by classic Midlands hard rock band Magnum, who have recently released another new album. Misty's Big Adventure are also from the Midlands, and great!

Labels: gigs, Misty's Big Adventure, The Wonder Stuff

I've learned a few things on my recent travels, and there's now two
different flickr streams showing stuff from the two parts of the trip.
One flickr account you may already know, and one I've just set up in
the last few days - ask if you need directions.

One thing I learned was that a better class of accommodation or
transport does not necessarily guarantee a better class of punter -
I'm thinking of the guy flying business class who went a long way out
of his way to complain about his crackers not coming with a postage
stamp sized piece of cheese. To the point of telling the poor air
steward guy he was 'really not happy about this' on his third go.
Blimey but life's too short, and I bet the guy working on the plane
doesn't get paid enough to put up with much of that sort of nonsense
either.

Something else that seems to be inescapable fact is that some people
will never be happy wherever they are. And as with the guy on the
plane, some fabulous surroundings are wasted on some people who are
determined that everything is a problem that requires being
extraordinarily pissy with people.

Another thing I learned is not to be too trusting of people who say
they are going to do something if you can't stand there and watch them
do it. There are gradual signs of progress from my insurer and the
airline on looking for and I hope eventually paying up for the
contents of my lost luggage, but it's certainly not going to get
sorted out overnight, and it's a bit of an inconvenience in the
meantime.

Despite the aggravation, I met some great people too and took a couple
of thousand photos of all sorts of things and places, so on balance I
had a pretty good time. And I'd never seen a tarantula before either!

* Hey Jack Kerouac is a 10,000 Maniacs song. I have just been to Sarawak.

After some time out in the wilderness of no network access, it's good to have been able to have the first bath in maybe a month and slap on a little make up to even out the sun damage on my skin. Still four flights and a few thousand miles between here and home, but I'm already up to date on my email, and making a start on knocking together a few pictures from my trip. By the time I get home and unpacked and so forth, it'll be the middle of the week though, I reckon.

In the meantime, here's what sunset over the South China Sea looked like this evening.

I guess it's no stranger than going for a Chinese or an Indian in
western europe, but coming this far round the globe to end up in a
restaurant called "Italianni's" still feels a little questionable.
Especially to the sound of "buona sera, I'm your waiter and my name is
Ken..."

Then again, I only ended up there on my way back from the local M&S to
see if they had any food, so who is the joke on now? It amused me
greatly to see the minimal amount of stock in M&S includes more than
one pair of pretty shoes that I have back home, and I think they were
made in Vietnam so they have travelled rather less far to get here
than me.

* a line from Mick Thomas' song The Cap Me Granda Wore, a song about
faux "Irish" pubs, and the paraphernalia of Irishry.

One week in, and nearly done with the work stuff, I've had a fairly
productive day. After minimal sleep, I was up through all the early
morning hours, had some laundry done, crucially bought some of the
food items I have really been missing, had a couple of hours sleep and
went on a three hour guided trip to see a whole load of stuff I would
not have seen by myself, nor understood. Here's hoping I can get a
whole night's sleep, because I damn well need it!

I know this is a long way from home, but the focus on security arrangements is also something else. You can't go inside anywhere - shops, office building, the hotel - without having your bag searched, which I guess is fair enough. Round every corner is another armed security guard, some with what look like shotguns hanging round their necks but I'm not planning on getting close enough to ask.

There's some sort of incongruity with that against the opulence of the hotel, where there's hot and cold running 'good morning, sir', 'have a great day sir', 'how are you today, sir?' everywhere you go. Just when you think you've run the gauntlet of the lobby staff, it's 'good morning sir' from the security guard in the car park, and then again from the security guard with the very serious dog. And then I end up in the lift with one of our transatlantic cousins who joins in and
wishes them 'have a great day' back. This may be a certain kind of normal if you come to this sort of place anywhere, I don't know, but when I'm rather more used to the 'what-choo-lookin'-at' style of address, well it's a very noticeable difference.

Maybe it's a contrast, or maybe they actually belong together and I've just never considered it that way, but among all the security paranoia I can also see signs for Vuitton, Prada, Gucci and Vulgari [sic!] from my hotel window. In any case it doesn't feel like a natural combination to me.

The mix of utterly banjaxed body clock and the incentive to get the work done so I can get off to somewhere rather more interesting instead means I have so far seen very little beyond the hotel and the office, and the ten or thirty minute between the two - the variance is based on prevailing levels of heat and\or rain. I need to try to get a little further away, as time is short.

At the same time as my investment in this netbook is proving a great means of staying in touch, I've been wondering whether the easy online access to familiar places and people means I'm much less likely to be in touch with whatever's going on locally. By this time next week, I'll be in a different country again, with substantially reduced levels of luxury, and that may no longer be an issue as I am not going all the way out into tropical jungle to spend as many hours a day online as I normally do, and I'm not expecting that to be such a ready option there anyway.