Just checking

A good way to check pyrography is to take some photos and stand well back. Bear in mind this guitar still needs cleaned up, sanded and the wood has to be treated with oils.

Who needs friends?

With influential friends like these: Trust Uncle Frank to get it right. Trouble is that he's dead and all these other people are mostly alive or at least appear to be. Oh and his house is now up for sale for about $6m Dollars or thereabouts. 

Sad to see that Keith Emerson took his life. ELP were always a love/hate outfit and over time I failed miserably to stay with them; too much keyboards and not enough guitar (and expensive rugs and daft ideas), pretty obvious for somebody like me but I retained a soft spot for their first album. A must have for most kids in my year at secondary school... one of these days I'll rediscover it along with my hearing.

Cat roll

Above: The cat from down the street rolling about on top of our cupboard without a care in the world. He's been there most of the day, dozing and watching. He really doesn't give a flying fig. Eventually we persuaded him to leave and head back home to where he belongs (something he's not clear about). This was not easy requiring a number of special tools and devices, patience and cunning on our part. I'm glad to say that no animals were injured in the creation of this blog post.

Third eye

Many years ago I was invited to a religious meeting in St Hellier Jersey where I was told "my third eye could be opened". I felt a bit queasy at the thought but went along to the meeting, of course nothing really happened apart from an Asian gentleman playing a harmonium and chanting. It was a bit like a Nico gig in some ways. I saw this photo on Fuzzbook the other day and the memories came flooding back...well slowly returned and they were all rather blurry.

Have a break

By some clever calculation and devious deduction I've realised that I may only have somewhere between 14.5 and 11.5 working days left in my current employment. I'm suffering a kind of "ground rush". Something I'd heard of but was unlikely to experience as I've managed  to spend all of my life quite successfully avoiding parachute jumping. Alas there are other more subtle forms of ground rush it appears. Things appearing larger in the mirror than they seem to be and so on. No need to panic or be morbid or desperate about it, once this current state of employment is over I'll simply find another. Maybe better, maybe self employment or just open for general business. That is how I believe it works and so the world turns every day and twice a year the clocks change for no good reason.

Saint George

 

Sad to hear of the death of George Martin though at 90 after a full and incredibly creative life; sad isn't really the correct term nor a useful word. So time to reflect. I should probably sit down and listen to Abbey Road or Sergeant Pepper or anything else on a long list of production credits, Flanders and Swan even. I wont though, I have memories and of course as the week progresses the songs and voices and anecdotes and tributes will tumble out of every spare TV and radio moment until we move onto the next big death. These defining sounds, tunes and effects we grew up with, puzzled expressions, puzzled parents as the loose cannons fired volley after volley across the lives of a spoiled generation. Stereo was a wonderful, magical black vinyl thing and headphones were the ultimate trip and somebody could make Ringo's drums sound really cool. We just didn't realise what was really going on at the time but we did read the credits over and over again.

Scared Twitless

Just reflecting on my recent lack of tweeting anything, either rubbish, funny or meaningfully profound. Possibly seasonal, possibly mental. Sometimes there's just nothing formed up and ready to say at the time you could and should be saying something. So eventually I picked up two other tweet worthy things; CBQ's latest eclectic selection and the worthy world women's day of international things in general. Both occurrences are pretty much unrelated and on different scales but significant. If only I'd had my intelligent head on earlier in the day when it all seemed to mean much more. In life timing is pretty much everything.

No Northern Light Photos

A latte with smart water served down south.

So at the moment I'm definitely not here (there) enjoying coffee, I'm home alone missing the Northern Lights because I keep looking south and existing, like a penguin, mostly on fish. Downstairs a camera now monitors the cat flap because of the stray can refugee stand off we find ourselves in. Borders and boundaries make life complicated everywhere, even at this micro level. So right now I can't type anything else as another non-stray cat is insisting on lying across my keyboard.

This morning

Ben Lomond tries very hard but somehow fails to touch the early morning sky. Some other time perhaps.

Unsettled

Despite the fact that we have 999 TV channels and a smart TV that provides connections with all sorts or weird, wonderful and mediocre providers sometimes there's nothing much on TV. Strange but true. That tends to disturb the cats a bit, they like us there on the couch, staring like zombies into the great, humming silver screen and not moving too much. This tends to provide them with a feeling of calm and well being that's unavailable elsewhere (unless we're fully asleep).  Better recheck the schedules and the unwatched box-sets.

Golden Slumbers

OK I know that the sun sets everywhere, that's a common thing. We see it most days assuming there's no fog or low cloud or grey and murky weather. Here when that everyday thing happens the trees facing west into the fading light are bathed for a short time in a warm, ethereal glow that lasts only a few moments. Is there a name for it? I've no idea. These photos don't really do justice to the effect either.

Snowdrops

No snow but some real hail and a biting cold wind. Not a great afternoon for venturing out too far. I did however decide to refill the bird feeders and thought I'd better catch a shot of the scattered and fragile clumps of snowdrops before they disappear. 

Lookin' in the wrong place

Lyrics:

You say you want a love that's pure

You'll find her, heart right, you're sure

But not so much when you're face to face

Maybe you're just lookin' in the wrong place.

You're searching for a cause to believe in

Feel strong about, kick their teeth in,

See the solidarity trapped in a wider space

Maybe you're just lookin' in the wrong place

"Here comes the sun" done as modern jazz

John Coltrane's shadow on a piece of glass

You fall in love then you fall from grace

Maybe you're just lookin' in the wrong place.

Lookin' in the wrong place, twenty twenty vision sees the easy mistakes

When everybody moves in their happy ways but you're still lookin' in the wrong place.

Lookin' in the wrong place.

Still hibernating

As I walked out one March morning: well I forgot my phone and the weather was a bit iffy and there were dogs and birds and other walkers and things and then the weather turned so I turned and returned and eventually ate a late and very welcome lunch. Turns out that despite the date, media speculation, bulbs sprouting and the great portents in the night sky, Spring is still busy hibernating (as above) and who can blame her.

The breaking of the day

Today's extra and quite pretty dawn, captured from the bus to work by the wonderful Ms AG.

You have to wonder why the mystics, timekeepers and clever people from the past chose to add an extra day in February of all months. Why not July or August when we could all enjoy an extra day out hopefully in fine(r) weather. but it was not to be  for sound reasons of propaganda, stupidity and control. Any political party worth it's salt should shove that one in their manifesto, do away with the occasional 29th and add in the 32nd of July. Vote winner surely. Also an extra day to blog when my head's full of soup and cold chicken and there's a cat lying across the laptop.

Bad design

Note: no grizzly away fans, just a blaze of winter sun on row upon row of empty seats.

When they (?) orientated East End Park man years ago they failed to take into account the position of the sun in the sky relative to the assembled multitudes watching the game. As a result the home support spends eleven months of the year sat on the dark side of the moon, devoid of heat and light, freezing, chittering and buying hot, poisoned Bovril that's murky and grim enough to stun a beaver. Meanwhile the away fans, no matter how badly behaved, bask in the radiant warmth of the best of the Fife climate should any of them bother to turn up. Groan. Anyway and observations aside, we won the game in fine style, 6 goals to 1. If only every match was like that (apart from the searing cold).

Cameras roll

This film (LIFE) is about the photographer Dennis Stock's early work featuring James Dean. Slow and unsteady, introspective and disturbing. Dean is enigmatic, volatile and vulnerable, Stock is driven and self centred. Neither man knows his life and what to make of it. They stumble in the dark while the cameras roll and casualties pile up around them. 1950s USA looks grim and cold and the film industry is a great, careless, chewing, spitting juggernaut. Having said that it's a watchable film in a bleak, car crash kind of way and the photographs that came from the sessions live on in the strange, black and white afterlife of remembered popular culture.

A short period of artificial serenity

The Superwoman of Rock? This is complete nonsense and what's more everybody knows that Dr Strange and Captain America were always Fender guys. Not sure about the drummer either.

For some reason preparing and cooking up a pot of vegetable soup gives me a peaceful, easy feeling. I can't explain it. and it's nothing to do with the Eagles. I don't actually get much of a peaceful feeling serving it up or when eating it either. It just happens. Then there's the eternal quest to get down to the bottom of the dirty laundry basket and get everything clean again. No real peace here I'm afraid just a sense of perpetual churn. What about mixing up the smooth, decaf and regular coffees into different jars and not letting on? Hmm, just breeds and uncomfortable guilt and mischievous self doubt. Extracting a trapped mustard seed from the dark void of a worn molar without drawing blood? First remorse over eating that kind of mustard and then some low level of satisfaction once the errant seed is removed and spat out into the sink. Ugh. Winning an item on eBay. That's OK but there's usually a catch, a delay or a quality issue of some sort. Feeding the birds? A short spell of serenity then rampant anxiety as the cats eye them up. Frying three eggs and not breaking any of the yolks; nice.

Instant protien

Keeping up my strength, fortifying my resistance to ebola and stimulating my vigour with a regular can of cheap, slimy, oily fish. It's almost working and I'm feeling younger every day. The main bodily joints work more easily, times passes more quickly and I suffer fewer corner of the eye flashbacks than before. My ideas are less politically bankrupt and my beliefs are less stressful and more believable (but less achievable). My sense of humour is darker and deeper and my feet less itchy. My trousers fit and my shirts need less ironing. Comfortable shoes remain a problem however. You are what you eat it seems. In other news I'm turning my back on bananas, you can't get a decent one anywhere these days.

Detrimental

Large artistic beanbag has detrimental impact on pony.

#Fiscal Framework. What appears to be a good result for La Bella Scotia somewhat marred by the lovely Nicola's overuse of the words detriment and detrimental. Clearly help  is required in the speech writing office in the SNP. HQ The offending words appeared in various awkward forms 87 times during her regaling of the "Toon Cooncil" this afternoon. So we've a few bawbees for the next five years and "nothing detrimental" to report apart from the Tories being in charge of the Treasury and the collapse of the oil industry.

"Move along, move along, nothing detrimental to see here."