Banks etc.

When I was a small child banks were all dull, dusty, dark wood and as uncomfortable as libraries. People whispered, money was passed across the polished counter high above my head and then secreted away like a strange drug or a bad and unspeakable family member to the sound of scratching pens and safe doors thumping shut. Going to the bank was an event in itself and, as far as I could understand something to be slightly fearful of, don't go there without good reason or you'll be in trouble was the unsaid message. Accounts were managed using leathery passbooks in blue and gold full of handwritten figures describing Pounds, Shillings and Pence and only the rich and business men or lawyers used cheques instead of real money.

Then it changed and it turned out that these banks are suddenly run by traders and salesmen thinly disguised as cartoon best friends to manage your life, insurances, money and investments. They look at products and market shares and shifting lumps of cash and credit as if they were airliners lost on a Pushing Tin radar screen or burgers sizzling on a hot plate and about to burn. They produce ugly, noisy and expensive advertisements and try to convince you that their meagre percentages and supposedly low charges are good lifestyle choices that will improve your lot and allow you to sleep soundly at night. You will be safe and happy in their greasy hands. Now the bottom has fallen out, the greed and the unsustainable hard sell have caught up and a black hole has opened up in front to end their progress. It's hard to feel sorry for the die-hard bankers, in my view they've squandered a privileged position and in a few short years turned something respectable and solid into a cheap poker game with no winners.

Tank Girl thanks you for looking in and hopes for a return to fame following a bad film and long spell in undeserved comic strip obscurity, such is the fate of one with a fickle public following and fan base.

Things the cats killed today and brought to the back door: Two mice, one finch and a rather large white egg (now presumed dead) from an unknown source.

Doctor Doctor

I am not a Fascist but I like the design.

I had a doctors appointment this morning, I was supposed to tell him about three different ailments (none life threatening). Out of the three I managed to forget two (well skip over one by forgetting a feline connection) and only talk about one properly. It wasn't that I didn't want to discuss them, it was that I simply went blank, had a chat and he wrote me a note and I bumbled out and into the early morning rain. I'll be back once I've mastered the fine and lost (to me) art of multi tasking.

For diversion at lunch time I did a piece of web research on Italian aircraft of the Second World War. They all had great names and numbers and all looked like they've inspired modern Japanese cartoons with their great cowls, fat under carriage set ups and fins and silly paint. None of them were any good either, each one or model a catalogue of aviation disaster, crash landings and losses in battle. All too slow, heavy or under developed for a task still being defined and led by British and American engineers who were too far ahead to be caught. A sad and brave time for the pilots and crew who flew to defend Fascist ideals that were as doomed as their aeroplane designs.

The Glen Campbell (no not Glenn Lampshade) version of this Green Day opus is rather good in a strange and modern way.

RIP Rick Wright who died on Monday aged 65. The quietest man of the quieter men that were the quiet monster Pink Floyd. I liked his plink plonk keyboard and soap sud synth additions to their material. I liked his nonchalant approach to the music amid the carry on, back-stabbing and fluff that passes for rock and roll and entertainment.

Thought for the day

The real reason for the lack of personal progress in so many of our undertakings and projects is a lack of the drive that leads to proper obsession. Obsession is the mad spark that turns an ordinary act around on itself and pushes it to a new limit where it becomes special and unique. Without that colourful burst of energy to propel and idea somehow beyond itself it will amount to nothing. If you believe in something then get obsessed with it. That is unless it's religion, terrorism, mass murder, collecting aeroplane sick bags, hand washing, stalking fellow humans, biting your nails, being the member of some political party, jumping red lights, speed, drinking beer or eating fast food. None of these things will ever have a happy ending.

So was Della Street obsessive with the secretarial and office skills she provided for Perry Mason or did she just suffer from an unrealised, unrequited love for the detective bloke who was, in real life the son of Hedda Hopper who also may have been a relation of Dennis Hopper but no relation to the cartoon grasshopper "Hopper" in the film "Bugs Life"? The answer to this and many other questions is of course out there somewhere.

Recording sagas: The word "ambient" springs to mind as both a description and a damning criticism for my latest efforts. Why are structures so hard to find? Why are song constructions either so forced that they jar and irritate or so loose that they drone on in no particular direction? Creation comes from obsession and my obsession sessions are not running on long enough with enough sustained effort to get them over the critical hump. As somebody famous and in the recording know might have said, "a lot of "B" sides in there son". It's a start.

Parking paranoia

Following on from the little shunt a few weeks ago that resulted in Mr Cougar getting a new front wing and five night's B&B a kind of silent parking paranoia has crept over our lives like a crawling weed or virus. The main cause are those we refer to as the "Churchy people". These itinerant visitors come to the local "Churchy" events next door and quite naturally park their cars in the area around our house. It can get busy and as it's not well lit, not really surfaced and many of them are old (in a good way), so there is it seems a high chance of further unplanned events taking place. It's not of course surprising that the good people of the congregation when coming back from another riveting and inspiring service might have their thoughts placed elsewhere and not on driving or reversing out of parking spaces. They are thinking about the glorious path that their church is on, their missionary lives in a hostile and sinful world and what they need to get at Tesco on the way home. Accidents are inevitable in this heady mix of inspiration, kilted and Sunday best chatter, impeccable behaviour and niceness and driving home in the family bus, but we are watching from the window...
After a month of not drinking I had a few glasses of wine over the weekend, watched a predictable (as ever) X Factor and steamed some vegetables and other assorted goodies for a late tea with various children and grandchildren - the drink produced no adverse effects. I slept well, breakfasted well and have just done a (sweaty) spot of gardening and will be asleep again in about five minutes.

Toad count: Last night two at the back door, one behind the cooker and a rather large one that I locked in the downstairs toilet, it's a seasonal thing.
Mouse count: Three dead in the garden and one dead under the back door mat (ugh!).
Bird Count: One dead under the garden table.

Which one's Pink?

Funny how you can use words, hear them, speak them and still not have their (obvious) meaning register with you, well me anyway. I've been aware of Pink Floyd since 1967's See Emily Play and the Piper etc. but never really though of Pink being pink the colour, I never, ever thought that pink was actually pink. Furthermore I didn't think that Floyd was the christian name Floyd. Pink Floyd have always been and meant the sum of their total parts and not the parts themselves. I'm sure there are many other examples of not taking the literal meaning of things or connecting with the obvious particularly with band names. Mind you I did think a bit more about the name when Tommy Mackay was first performing his rather clever "Pink Floyd are shit" song, a worthy piece written from the perspective of Mr Syd Barrett.
I've always wanted to do a similar thing to the (above) Ummagumma picture for Impossible Songs (Dr Drum would take up most of the foreground) with a couple of older sports cars bringing up the rear in place of the Commer van. There's not really enough flat land around here though and the hike to Cambridge is just not do-able.

Nice comment below (ta) from the one and only Glenn (two ns) Lampshade, alas I knew him not very well.

Glen Lampshade

Tonight I heard a gentleman on the radio describe himself as a "Chippie from Wolverhampton going under the pseudonym of Glen Lampshade". It seems all his pals on the building sites where he's employed adopt odd names for themselves to alleviate the boredom generated by hanging out on such sites, their associated trade activities and the inclement weather that goes with the task. It's good but not great. He was also struggling with the dogs that lived next door and their constant barking, he was on the edge. Every so often I listen to Radio 2 in the evening, so far it's led me to Elbow, the Fleet Foxes, the Felice Brothers, Josh Ritter and Percy Plant, now I've landed up with Glen Lampshade at the dawn of his career. It's not been a bad year really.
Songs about stuff: "Runnin' up that hill" by Kate Bush is about problems achieving a female sexual climax, "Four seasons in one day" by Crowded House is about PMS, "Rattlesnake shake" by Fleetwood Mac is about masturbation - I can't think of anymore.

The pros and cons of ready meals. Pro - they're ready in minutes, cons - they taste crap, pro - they're cheap or on BOGOF, con - they are full of crap, pro - you can fill your fridge with them and not cook for weeks, con - you can fill your fridge with them and not cook for weeks, pro - there are no dirty dishes, con - we have a dishwasher anyway, pro - there is no waste, con - you'll end up with a huge waist. There must be an answer hidden in the fine balances and tuning between convenience, diet and necessity.

Questions and solitude

The repetitious addition of stolen images and re-hashed ideas, fruitless searchings, self centred lists, trivia and the trivial and opinions that don't matter to anyone. That's the way it goes with blogging and predicting the end of the world. Time wasted and diversions explored in a bid to find meaning and reason. Am I bothered?

It may not end up being called "Off the Rails" and that may in fact be a true statement of it's position but for better or worse the current attempt at a South Queensferry Arts Festival has been renamed and we've done the decent thing: started a group for it on Facebook.

Last night's episode of Smallville stretched a thin thread of plot to the limit and then allowed it to snap. Clearly the writers were having a bad day and so were the viewers. There is the germ of a great, epic sci-fi series in there somewhere but the network seems to be struggling to get it out. Perhaps this will be the last batch and the story will die on the vine naturally, starved of ideas before it teeters into something far worse.

At least we didn't all end up dead in a black hole today. Perhaps the next revolution will catch us unaware and sleeping, the best way to go I think.

It's the end

Good news for those of you who have never visited Switzerland, a free ride is headed your way. Tomorrow when they switch on the big bang particle accelerator or Cern Collider we're all headed there for a short, sharp Swiss style party. There may not be much time however to take in the fine Alpine scenery, long road tunnels, Lindt chocolates or knife shops as we're all sucked into a central European oblivion that's better than anything at Alton Towers.
From the BBC:

Three decades after it was conceived, the world's most powerful physics experiment is ready to be powered up.

On Wednesday, engineers will attempt to circulate a beam of particles around the 27km-long underground tunnel which houses the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).

The £5bn machine is designed to smash particles together with cataclysmic force, revealing signs of new physics in the wreckage.

This will re-create conditions in the Universe moments after the Big Bang.

Entering a world of pain

Sometimes a world of pain opens up before you with little or no warning.

Yesterday we were busy multi tasking on a number of projects, some time was spent on the ever present domestics, some time on the practical and even some on the creative. The first two are relatively easy as they can be done thoughtlessly and whilst on the automatic pilot of day dreaming. Creative stuff is more arduous and frustrating - if you fail to get onto a roll. I was playing with loops and synchronising various looped guitar parts with Ali's vocals, also looped. Trouble was I kept on deleting Ali's vocal and/or losing track of where I was - the alcohol drought was not helping either, that little flash you get in the corner of your eye can go a long way to oiling the creative wheels. In the end I gave up and sat on the couch in a darkened room watching the Big Lebowski, only for it's calming, mind numbing and inspiring effect you'll understand. A mug of cool White Russian would have been nice but we're not going down there so much these days.

The evening was concluded in an unusual and noisy manner by the sight and sound of a biplane buzzing our house like the Red Baron. At first I feared the worst that a) we were at war with some local landowner or b) a stray plane had escaped radar control and was about to crash into our newly vacuumed lounge. Neither proved to be the case, the plane we believe was performing stunts, complete with smoke trails, for the amusement of a wedding party at our neighbour's nearby stately home, the same one no known sat-nav can ever find. I did get a bit stressed as he dived and banked over the brick chimney pots and then disappeared behind trees, his plane's engine roaring a continual, rowdy complaint to way it was being treated. In the end he retreated to East Fortune or somewhere and we could both breathe again.

Walking with impressionists

On Friday we spent a pleasant evening avoiding the ever present Edinburgh rain and then viewing the Impressionist exhibition currently running in the National Gallery. It was an eat and greet event with the added effect of at least two trayfuls of drinks hitting the deck thanks some nervous waitering. I had to hold myself back from helping out to tidy the aftermath. I always feel sorry for the students who end up serving at these bashes, shuffling from one foot to the other whilst passing out the food and drink with no prospect of a decent tip from anyone.
This ugly little number (by Degas) was the painting that most folks wanted to see last night. Bought by a straight-laced Glasgow tailor for £180 in nineteen canteen it caused a "fair stooshie" at the time. The lady on the left may have been of easy virtue and rumour has it that she is a little down in the mouth as her pussy has just been run over by a passing trick cyclist. The poor bloke on the right appears to have been recently expelled from the Russian State Circus Clown School. Not a lot of laughs down the pub that night but at least the free flowing absinthe may have transported the couple to Timothy Leary's garden for a few quiet hours to reflect.
These Tudor guys were bonkers with power if you believe in TV history (which you might as well believe as anything else), drunk with mad passions and a self-belief that's the size of Europe because all was possible for the king and his cronies. Re-write the bible, reform the church, upset the Pope, hack a few skulls open, whack the peasants over the head and keep a harem of footballers wives on the go down in Slough. It's utter tosh but entertainingly shocking and good to unwind to after a busy working week.

In love with Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin and her favourite road kill recipe. Why not try one today?

If I could I'd vote Republican (if only) for Sarah Palin, but in order to do so I'd have to adopt a new lifestyle and nationality that are beyond me to adhere to, love and understand and frankly are just a little too extreme politically. So I'm stuck with trying to support and share the same baffled Northern European country with ugly and unpretty Scottish politicians who don't shoot deer or wolves, don't play ice hockey or drink gallons of cold beer outside while standing deep in the snow in their sealskin lined boots and don't winge. My life is now pointless and I'm bored stiff with the time, money and coverage given to dealing with the awful and awkward Wendy Alexander.

The good news is that Jimi Hendrix's burnt out Strat still plays ("I heard it on the radio" as Eric Burden said (also on the radio) a few hours after the great man died) and that some rich bastard is going to buy it for a stupid sum of money and no doubt stick it on his dining room wall in a glass case. Truly just the fate that Jimi intended for it the night he attacked it with his can of Ronson and Zippo.

The other news that I'm fairly indifferent about is that poor car dealers/makers have had their worse sales month since 1966. As I recall it was about the same time (1966) that they launched the Mark 1 Cortina and the Austin 1100, so not something you could easily blame on economic downturn then. Maybe the simple fact is that so many new cars today are complete crap in both looks and practicality and that nobody wants to buy them. The latest batch of prime time, TV car commercials, Nissan and Citroen's being the worst, certainly don't help.

A joke: The difference between a rock guitarist and a jazz guitarist? A rock guitarist plays three chords to thousands of fans...

Any old lie will do

Why are some people so much more interesting than others? You notice this particularly in politics. Some politicians have been in the business and culture of politics so long that they have ceased to share any common contact or connection with real life.They are like isotopes in a nuclear reactor, both powering and poisoning at the same time whilst shielded by the lead casing of their chosen career from the rigours and tedium of the outside world. Gordon Brown and Alister Darling both come across as prime examples. Wee Alex Salmond is smug and self righteous and eager to snipe at all and sundry and has to win every argument to regularly refuel his stunted self esteem. David Cameron rides a bike not because he has to but because he thinks it makes him look normal, how could that ever be? Sadly none of them pump over priced petrol or scrape through McDonald's drive throughs to collect their tea, or buy a pint of £2.95 lager with the last of their change, pick their noses or choose some reduced chicken from the chiller cabinet in Morrison's. I guess we wouldn't want them to either but it would be good to think that they knew what it felt like to have to do these things now and again.

"Cindy McCain, washed in the rain, no longer" (The Fleet Foxes).

Aspects of life I can enjoy:

The joy of cold ham on warm toast.
Waking up warm and snug in the morning.
Getting my car back from the repairers.
Losing track of time.
An almost complete pedal board in working order.
Practicing on a regular basis.
Drinking fruit juice.
Thinking a bit more about personal fitness.
Happy cats purring in the dark distance.
The freshness of the morning.
Searching for the right laptop but never buying one.
Wikipedia powering the imagination.
Coming home.

Last of the NYC photos

Today's poor weather allowed some photo catching up to be done, these are a few of Ali's NYC shots, she manages to take the photos that I would have liked to have taken. This pigeon is looking at a procession of dumb tourists looking at it at the top of the Rockefeller Centre.

I can't quite remember seeing this view from our flight but I must have, I don't recall us being so high up either.
I first became aware of this building, the Chrysler Building that is, when it appeared on the cover of Electric Ladyland Part 1 many years ago. At the time (I was about 14) I thought it was a piece of artwork from Dan Dare or something and they'd just added it in for fun.
Not a sight you'll see in many places but these evangelical atheists were parked outside of the Warner Centre and in a good humour despite the heat, their basic message being the need to separate the state and the church in the US. Well good luck with that folks, I can't see either McCain or Obama buying into it this time around.

As wet as last August

Buy any of the above at the Club Shop if you will.

This weekend has been heavily football orientated, a visit to the hallowed turf of East End Park yesterday started it all. The crew cut home team struggled with an energetic Livingstone side and despite a late fight back went down 2 - 1. I also missed out the 50/50 draw by at least a thousand numbers and I wasn't even hungry enough for pie at half time. No doubt we'll return for more torture and pain later in the season. Perhaps I should've worn my lucky DAFC training top instead of a Sponge Bob T shirt.

Today was spent watching Joe's team cuff a Leven side 6 -1, the best part being Joe's fine, first ever (in a league game) hat trick, a playing event and milestone he really enjoyed passing. The rain however was unrelenting and of course my golf brolly was in the boot of the wrong car and I hadn't brought a jacket. Having said that putting up and taking down the goal posts and watching the game in the wet was actually quite exhilarating and I did sweat as per the doctor's orders.

When I got home I was so happy I put up a shelf all by myself, as it was in typical August style, far too wet to even contemplate gardening. The shelf has been on the list for about four months so I look on that as decent Karmic progress. The afternoon may well now be whistled away, sitting around hoping for inspiration and world peace and avoiding the media chatter about whatever happened at today's Old Firm encounter.

An iconic image that has nothing much to do with anything I wrote today.

Hong Kong landings

Is it real or is it a simulator and does it really matter anyway? It's how you approach Hong Kong by all accounts.

List of splintered bits:

Dennis Wilson - "Only with you" from Holland and Pacific Blue, best lost love song of all time perhaps.
Aberdeen Angus sausages for breakfast.
Dinosaur eggs for a grandchild - to learn patience and the concept of time.
Driving a diesel Fiesta while the Cougar gets unbashed.
Fleet Foxes growing on me after a faltering start.
Bits of the TV series the Tudors are worth watching.
Relaxing.
A steady stream of football related laundry.
Plans for extensive drum and guitar loops.

New small car (repeat)

Today I have new small car to play with and cherish, that is until my real car is returned to me from the vets. In many ways life is a steady cycle of repetition, car needs fixed, car gets fixed, car needs fixed, car gets replaced, car needs fixed and I am content to drive around in a bubble and a day dream (at some level) whilst focusing on the road, other users and fiddling with the radio.

In a mad fit of not worrying about the technical challenges I removed my new loop pedal from it's box today and tried it out. To my surprise it worked despite my skating over the 52 page instructions and focusing in only on the shortcuts menu. Soon the whole house was resonating to hammered on D chords and fiddly twiddles heavy with reverb. The illusion of being creative came and went and returned as I drifted through the hypnotic sounds. It is noodling of the most self indulgent type but I can deal with that - another steady cycle of repetition.

A fleet of foxes

I'm not bothered about always being months (or even years ) behind the rest of the world in discovering "new" music. There is so much stuff out there that I long ago gave up even bothering trying to stay in step, read the music press or bottom feed on whatever is currently cool at the moment. Every so often I just like to dabble with some thing I've not listened to and try to make sure it's not quite in the same rut as the last one, or at the very least it's a fresh rut on the same road.

The Fleet Foxes have now come to my crinkly attention, I heard Pat Nevin talk about them on some radio show and read a few snippets, then I picked up a sampler in an airport and the first track on it was "Mykonos" and it sounded great. I eventually bought the CD and got round to listening to it today. Does it disappoint? Well it's a yes, a no and a don't know. It's a classic in derivative planning and execution brought about by stealing elements of greatness from Love, CNSY and the Beach Boys, does that make it bad? Probably not, just disturbing in the way that sometimes everything seems set on repeat but repeat with a twist, I've heard it before but maybe not quite that way.

Put simply it defines the dilemma of getting older and not really wiser, "heard it all before" versus the sheer joy and exuberance experienced when you hear something so fresh and original like you have never heard before. I hoped that such a moment would have come along with this CD and it didn't, maybe next time.
Just to add that the next thing on my list is Dennis Wilson's "Pacific Ocean Blue", a project that began in 1977 and is now just realising full cult status. At 33 tracks and booklet it's the best value ever on Amazon at £7.99, I'm quite looking forward to the journey - when I finally get a spare afternoon. I may save it up for the end of my alcohol holiday and crack a bottle of red from the couch and just zone out.

Jungle

Today we took advantage of a break in the weather and spent some time converting the jungle that has sprouted during the monsoon season back into the more civilised parkland that was formerly there. Taking the doctor's advice to "exercise until you sweat" and applying it to gardening was relatively easy, I only had to look at the garden to start sweating. The three person team of Ali, Joe and me, though focused on different tasks gradually cleared great swathes of land, moved a few indigenous tribes and disturbed a variety of wild life, all in the name of Queen Victoria and the We Three Church of Scotland (Olivia was taking an extended shower). Now we can relax for at least 24 hours by which time it will all have grown back and returned to nature.
The morning was spent taking the cats to the vets for a jab and a weigh in, this involved catching them and depositing them in their baskets and heading into the centre of Edinburgh. It wasn't helped by us sleeping in and a general kind of weekend bewilderment falling on us, something that creeps up on you (me I mean) gradually and only seems to affect me at key moments - when there is something to be done that is.

In the evening, by chance we found the secret method for making the best chips in the world. In one sweet and simple move Ali overheated the oven (as usual), added a pre-cooked chicken (bought in Sainsbury's on the way back from Dr Cats) and then placed in said fiery furnace a tray of frozen oven chips. The results stunned us all, perfect hot chicken and the crunchiest, moistest, tastiest chips I've had in ages, all in about twenty minutes. The pain, stings and aches of gardening vanished in a blue haze of finger lickin' goodness.

L.A. Breakfast

Perhaps I am obsessed with breakfast, perhaps that is because it is a meal I rarely bother with, so any breakfast consisting of more than lukewarm coffee is special. Perhaps I'm a bit sad and not so good at adhering to the breakfast taking advice that the wise eaters of the world expound. Start the day right etc etc. Anyway today I invented the L.A. Breakfast. A cunning plan to get the kids to eat some odds and ends left over in the fridge, also allowing me to avoid going out in the rain for fresh supplies. It was also served at about 1300 hrs so not really a breakfast at all but because I declared it's name with a fanfare and set it out on the table rather attractively they gobbled it up. In case you ever wish to create a similar masterpiece you'll need: Three Cumberland sausages (spicy), scrambled eggs, Heinz beans and toasted rolls (straight from the freezer), a touch of orange juice and a few garlic olives to complete the effect. The photo is of course nothing to do with today's express meal.

Alcohol holiday

From today I'm on an alcohol holiday for at least a month. No wine, no beer, no lager or whisky, I'm dry. The suggestion was made by my doctor, not because I have a problem but because he thought it may be a good way to restore my energy levels and give my system a little break. He also gave me, at this routine check a clean bill of health so that was rather nice to hear, the only downside was the advice to "exercise until you sweat". This maybe means doing a bit more than stuffing a duvet into a cover whilst the heating is on so I'll be pumping up the bike tyres and getting out the garden shovel, as soon as the rain stops.

Mr Cougar has suffered a nasty little bump thanks to a rather disrespectful Citroen C2 that sneaked up and landed a cheeky punch on his front wing while he was innocently parked outside our house. It's new wing and a bit of spraying next week in the local cat's hospital. I was too traumatized by the whole thing to discuss it much at the time, such are the tiny joys and large shocks of budget motoring.

Tomorrow the schools, the libraries, the community centres and various other things are closed whilst those employed there, in support roles, have a nice day out on strike. Naturally they want more than a 2.5% pay rise and who wouldn't when inflation sits at over 4 and six Muller Fruit Corners are £2.95 (or two 6 packs for a fiver). Bring the government down I say, I'm bored with these dull Labour twats and their stiff necks and sense of humour failures, let's have a return to Tory sleaze and Nationalist bullying and little more gay banter from the LibDems.