Sunday, February 26, 2006
Bear Faced Cheek
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
Rock Around The Clock
Well, I feel pretty good considering. Being at my desk means I'm just about getting over the disorienting what-time-is-it-where-am-I? feeling, the sun's out (sort of) and everything's good.
Sunday night was a very late night, for frustrating technological reasons, monday was an earlier start than normal so I could drive to work and then drive away in the afternoon. I spent some of the afternoon on a train, heading off to watch a half-hour live acoustic set in a branch of a major high street music retailer.
There's always something special about the day a new album comes out, whether or not it's the first chance to hear new songs as intended rather than as scratchy live versions, and though I've already been listening to the new album for a couple of weeks it's still a pleasure to see it finally turn up on the shelves of what old-fashioned stick-in-the-muds like me can't help calling 'record shops'.
So, a 5pm performance saw us queued up outside HMV like we were waiting for the Beatles, and after some time catching up* with mates of mine who I rarely see from one tour to the next, I was on a train out of New Street station by 7pm and home for 9.30 - not the sort of time I would normally get home from gigs in the Midlands!
* and arranging who's going where on the forthcoming tour, natch!
Labels: gigs, The Wonder Stuff
Friday, February 17, 2006
The Numbers Game
I've rather given up on marking anniversaries, not least because once you've been around the calendar there's little value in an exercise of 'guess what, it's the same anniversary as last year!' posting. That said, there's the odd thing that crops up that does seem worth noting, and at some point in either the last couple of days or the next couple, one such occurs.
Post graduation there were a number of years I spent alternating between a variety of temporary agency jobs - chambermaid, gardener, hospital porter, tent assembler, kitchen staff, paint sprayer, surveyor's assistant, I've done it all - and being unemployed. Ironically it took moving away to a slightly less economically blessed region where support for (and availability of) learning skills of some practical benefit actually existed to set me on the way to where I am today.
Someone else takes some credit for helping support me while I did the only job-relevant training course I have a certificate for, though the information I learned then has long since become obsolete. There was a long time where my present situation of being several years into a job I mostly enjoy and where I have almost everything my way, never mind the possibility of buying a house of my own and all that sort of stuff looked no more plausible a prospect than an elephant flying to the moon with me on its back.
I don't live in the past, but I do like to remember where I've come from sometimes, and how lucky I am. And it's with that in mind I'm pleased to realise that some time right now is the tenth anniversary of the last time I signed on.
Wednesday, February 15, 2006
Food For Thought
Sunday, February 12, 2006
The Key's The Timing
Friday, February 10, 2006
Here Comes The Sun
What a beautiful day, riding towards work into the sun as the frost cleared, and enjoying sunlight streaming through the office windows once I got here. Tomorrow I get to see a bit more of the great outdoors than I'd planned for this weekend (calendar malfunction, see!) and it seems like this flaming cold is finally shifting, so this feels like seeing the first tiny signs of distant spring.
Hope the sun is shining on you too!
Wednesday, February 08, 2006
I Predict a Diet
Or something vaguely like that - let's not get carried away!
Over a couple of days last week when I wasn't at work and was more or less confined to the house, I found myself on the scales and slightly surprised by how much of me there was. It's easy to put it down to not leaving the house for 36 hours, and eating out of boredom, but I had also been feeling not like eating much.
In the meantime, I think I've worked out roughly where the problem is; I don't really enjoy what I eat, I mean, sure I love eating and my capacity is huge, but it's rare that I take much time or care over eating. It's a function rather than a pleasure.
This isn't helped by spending so much time driving around, going to see bands or watch football matches - it can be difficult to make the time to prepare an organic butternut squash quiche served on a bed of four kinds of lettuce with a macrobiotic radish and onion dressing, and even more difficult to eat off the passenger seat of my car while I'm driving. The convenience of ready bagged crisps and chocolate confectionary items is hard to beat, I'm just lucky the same applies to fruit or I'd otherwise eat nothing but over-processed rubbish.
So, the salad and veg drawer in my fridge is now a bit fuller, and making the effort to make cheese and salad rolls for lunch instead of buying so many pasties and replacing doughnuts and muffins with bagels and trying to up my water intake is a good place to start...