This Garden Earth

I really enjoy our garden space, we're very fortunate. Scotland at the moment has a pretty tolerable climate. The sun rises early through the trees, now all green and busy and heads across the sky lighting and warming the garden pretty much all day. Apart from a few shady corners there is no hiding place from it's rays. The dry spell has lasted longer than I expected, I've become used to at least a couple of consecutive rainy mornings but now once the early clouds clear it's bright all day. Is this really the warming process or just some weather blip? I'm on the fence here, I've seen evidence both ways in Canada and Iceland and the expert bodies (all of whom seem to be using fairly sound scientific examples) probably can't be wrong. I guess I'm guilty of having more faith in the Earth itself and the processes and weather systems that have run since the dawn of time. We do tend to over estimate our influence on things; man loves to believe he's the author of so much change be it good or bad. The thought of another, impersonal force influencing doesn't sit so well with that arrogant stance. So I'm not saying that we're not shitting up the world and making things worse, we surely are, that's all we've ever done. We're a selfish, thoughtless species in the main. It's more about to what extent we're actually doing it, how much the Earth is fighting back and how much influence other unseen factors may be having

This was the garden yesterday, looks pretty much the same today, let's hope we can follow that pattern into tomorrow and beyond.

Pet Sounds flounders

Maybe not so incredibly but this is 50 years old, about now. I don't hold to any view that the sixties were somehow the cradle and golden age of modern music, that's nonsense. Every generation has creative high points and with the benefit of looking backwards you see how what works and succeeds or  how it fails and how potential is not realised or opportunities are missed out. History teaches us that we can't learn much from history other than good things and bad things tend to happen but not always in equal measure. So I always liked the Beach Boys, even as an uncool guilty pleasure. This album is taken as being their best, Brian Wilson at the height of his creative powers and so on plus all the urban myths that surround it. I'm not so sure, it ticks many boxes (the train still beats me though) but Holland and Surf's Up are better albums. Anyway, happy birthday. The past remains a pretty strange place.

Better, Safer, Stronger Europe.

I'm always uncomfortable seeing politicians (mostly the ex variety here) sharing a platform over bigger issues. I say that despite being eager to see a more realistic, collaborative political model actually run and deliver things in this country. So I'm conflicted, maybe it's the personalities and their recent histories and general lack of credibility. Here we have all the wrong people probably saying almost all the right things. However these three standing at the gateway to Europe (?) that is a shed in Stanstead doesn't really make a good case for anything other than acting as a foil for numerous Twitter rants and blog fodder like this.  I'l get back to promoting my own little economy via Gumtree. Jeep for sale anyone?

15th May again

Snacks and Prosecco. 

Some folks like crab, others like asparagus.

Then there's whisky, coffee and there's Baileys.

Anniversary night out, some of the food and drink sampled.

Hard roads often lead to beautiful destinations

Blossom 1

Blossom 2  

Four sticks

Too nice a day to sit in and write or even to sit out and write so here are three sunny garden pictures and a wise and profound sounding post title that I stole from somewhere. The blossom and the flowers don't last long really but for today in the sunshine they look bright, unworldly and eternal.

Bus to Glasgow

Glasgow's a cheap day out when you're old enough to have the Scottish Entitlement Card in your wallet, that's free travel in any bit of central belt dialect. It's chilly place though, where brave buskers and beggars were staying out in the cold now that the heatwave has passed and the gloomy clouds have returned to remind us all where we are in the world.  After lunch in the relaxing Spitfire Cafe, soup, sandwiches and cake and a lot of tiny tea pots, (toilet c/w odd additional fittings featured above) we moved onto the Art Gallery where I took this photo of the arse of the iconic Duke of Wellington statue and his faithful horse.  The gallery was a strange mixture of the simple and the over sophisticated, too much space, a lot of style but not enough content or explanation. Edinburgh knows a thing or two when it comes to setting up an exhibition if that's not an unfair comparison (but that's how wars start). 

As a driver of 40+ years traveling by bus is always a strange experience. The simple fact that you can see things, over fences and hedges, into houses and offices and just observe familiar places and landmarks (along the motorway) from an elevated, new angles and detached position is fun. It makes me wonder how much of Scotland I've ever really seen, most of now seems to be that bit in the middle distance that is caught in the windscreen while everything at the edges just flashes past. I'm no bus junkie though, my trips will be carefully rationed...too many old, moaning wrinklies on board. 

Cheap sunglasses

My bike has now returned from a lengthy stay with the bike doctor in the fictional village of Dunfermline, one time capital of Alba or was it Aldi? Anyway said bike has new tyres, new air in the new tyres, brakes and gears that work and it may be a little cleaner than it was before, all for £55 cash and no awkward negotiations required. I took it for a zoom along the coast just after lunch in the unseasonal warm weather (38C in the conservatory) wearing a T shirt (and other clothes) and cheap polarising sunglasses, turns out they're the best sunglasses ever. They give the world a warm and amber glow, they provide rich and soothing sun-tones that speak of new worlds and light from sources we currently can't quite perceive because of their relatively complex atomic structure compared to that of our primitive fish inspired, round and foggy peepers. One day we'll all evolve eyes good enough for meeting these sunglasses' mysterious capability, until then we can only dream. Now I'm off to cut more timber just in case any local witch burnings are required out of the blue and at short notice; be prepared.

As I walked out...

... not far from the Fife Coastal path near to Torryburn. The early afternoon sunlight plays on the trees and the stones in the local, long abandoned churchyard. The gravestones tell there own sad stories of short lives, infant deaths and families cut back by regular early deaths over quite short periods of time. Of course the people represented and (almost) remembered here are those that were well enough off to afford plots of burial land and the now smooth and weathered gravestones that might live on after, maybe for hundreds of years. The rest died poor, anonymous and forgotten.

Here's Windmill Barn Venue, a place I hardy knew existed until today and with the normally tightly closed gate wide open. It appears to be a fine (expensive?) looking wedding and meeting venue just a few fields away from our own little cabbage patch.

Day revolves around a sandwich

Well a small part of a day maybe. There's an M&S brown bread cheese and ham sandwich sitting in the fridge.  It was bought in Aberdeen yesterday and has made the long journey down here relatively unscathed, now it's just chilling, waiting. I'm also considering adding some pickle and salad to it before consumption, that's an obvious game changer. It'll be bigger, fatter, tastier as a result but not as the M&S sandwich designer intended it to be. I may miss something because of this, it's the possibility of the bad science of unintended consequences in sandwich consumption coming together in a light lunch setting and ending badly. Of course as there two sandwiches in the pack so I could modify one and not the other or add the salad etc. to one and then mayo and tomato to the other. Then there's the mustard, when do I bring that in? I have a fresh and unopened jar I bought in Aldi for 59p last Friday. The day that I accidentally visited four different supermarkets in the space of two hours in the most unplanned and uncoordinated burst of shopping I've recently experienced. It was mainly down to me not having a decent list to begin with. So back to the sandwich... more thinking time is required.

Lost photos of the sea

A lost photo.

Just dawning on me that I have not set or used the alarm on my phone for about a month (...well maybe once in Iceland), that's a significant change in my lifestyle now I'm unemployed/retired/at rest etc. Changes happen but also sneak up on you, little things, having more time but not knowing quite what to do with it, deciding to do things then doing nothing or just going with some other unexpected flow. The thing is that every day is different now, there's routine if you allow it but then there's none if you don't need it. Before April my life was carefully set up and regulated for work, long hours, travel, thoughts and worries and a sense of busyness and (artificial and self generated, looking back) purpose. Being retired now seems like some kind of long running Christmas present that you open up every day and then, as the contents unravel you run with. Somehow I didn't expect that. Suddenly time belongs to me most of the time and this morning the sun is shining and I'm headed off on a road trip and I can leave whenever I like.

Popular chords

Spent an enjoyable and  busy day recording yesterday. As it turns out Em and Cmj7 were the most popular chords. You just never know quite what direction music sessions will take you in. Other chords used included Am, Bm and a few others for good measure. Now it's all somewhere in the mix.

Completer Finisher

As I have a number of guitar projects on the go and am forever moving bits between them, stopping work to concentrate on something or just being unproductive (lazy) so it's unusual for me to have actually finished something. (Of course in a sense they're never finished because tinkering about and rehashing things is all part of the game).  So today it's the composite P Bass that's done and it has  turned out to be reasonably playable. It started up as a blank eBay body, everything else is new, imported, recycled or just different; neck, machines, bridge, electrics and Wilkinson pickups. I kept the sunburst finish, it's not in bad shape (and I'm not sure what's lurking underneath the finish) and restricted the dragon tail pyrography to the headstock. I'm still adjusting the action and intonation but it sounds ok so far. It's also very heavy...more protein needed in my diet.

After, after, before.

A few months ago the shed roof blew off. I've been holding myself back from doing the repair and watching the always unpredictable weather. Well the weather moved on a bit into sunny and slightly calm and so I replaced the damaged sections and laid on some new roofing felt (obviously as above). There's still a bit of finishing off to do but the worst is over and I didn't hurt myself too much during the repair programme, something of a first. This spot of DIY was swiftly followed by the ritual hacking into shape of two virgin guitar headstocks. Sadly I missed out on a proper before picture so it's a semi complete along with a nearly finished. Posted for (future) reference only.

Saw this inside my brain and I thought of the relative mediocrity ingrained in Scottish politics and songwriting:

I woke up this morning, the election was done,

A rainbow result, they all think they've won,

Seems like everyone did well or at least as expected,

Got a steady job for 5 years now that they're elected.

Yesterday's efforts

That awkward, fiddly bit where you mate guitar necks to bodies and hope for the best, almost done for these two. There was a fair bit of frantic measuring and searching for the usual sources of dimensional help across the web. Trouble is that there are so many experts and internet slackers out there all peddling advice and ideas. Beware. It seems like I've been footering with the same batch of guitars for ages, that's true. I enjoy the staged procrastination, building and then taking them apart and then longer periods of time when nothing really happens until there is some spurt of activity, like yesterday.

Burn the Witch

As ever it takes me a while to get round to looking into the latest cool thing that's floating around, so much so that I'm no even sure that the latest cool thing is even cool. Are Radiohead cool at all or are they living in that 90's twilight zone where they are famous enough to coast along and command an audience and rich enough to not bother. They can also delete their internet presence (how's that work) and then relaunch themselves and so on. In all this meandering and coming and going I'd like to think that they can still throw a decent tune together or at least come up with a challenging set of lyrics that..."makes a person think". Maybe making people think is a bit risky these days, let's just keep them comatosed nicely. So the brave new Radiohead video has been launched and everybody is excited. I'd be a bit more excited if I understood a few more of the references and keys but I can't help my age and general lack of education. Anyway I like it and I suspect that that the audience they are targeting (30s or so) will get it all right away.

Guitar repairs etc.

Photos from top to bottom: repair to the nut of an Epiphone Flying V, nice banana headstock, new nut due in from AxesRUs any day. Then on the "Lone Wolf" Strat body I'm using veneer shims glued together to ensure the neck and body are a tight fit. Because I'm modifying fairly well used guitar bodies the neck pockets (as per photo three) are often worn or damaged. Thin strips of veneer can at least pack the joint and once compressed and oiled up like the rest of the body the repair shouldn't be too noticeable. That's the theory. The guitar has a single JB Seymour Duncan H with coil tap; simple and hopefully effective.

Get through the slump

(From Saturday's canal boat outing).The serene and effortless swimming of a swan...except for the cliched notion that under the water a lot of unsightly and ungainly paddling action is going ahead. So the three day hangover has lifted and the steady rains of a grey public holiday discourage the thought of venturing out and fixing the shed roof...I'm fixing guitars instead, planning projects and drinking coffee. It was also no surprise to read the usual Monday morning spoilers regards the resurrection of Jon Snow in GoT. Now that this plot device has been taken up no character is safe or even unsafe albeit the word out there is that Jon will be a changed man following from his soul's temporary vacation into Ghost the wolf/dog and the fact that some of his soul will have been distorted in the process. It all sounds like a bit of a holiday treat that we can properly savour at 2100 tonight.

Falkirk Tunnel

There is a light that shines, there in the distance as you travel under Falkirk by canal boat. I didn't know that this 600m tunnel existed but it does and it is fully navigable from end to end. A strange mixture of carved out walls, hewn stone and brick work supports a high and dripping roof as we sailed serenely through, twice. So I quite enjoyed this piece of underground exploration from light to dark and back again. Canal boats, canals and tunnels are all pretty good.

Alternative cheeseboard

Whilst I've nothing against the fine cheeses of Iceland, I'm less than convinced about their cheeseboard awareness over there. Maybe not a regular Viking pastime. I think I mentioned that in a previous post. Above is a rather nice Scottish version from the fabled and often overlooked village of North Queensferry where we ate a hearty (?) supper last night. I don't believe all the cheeses included are from Scotland mind you, but it's a fine wee example of the cheese-boarder's ancient skills and craft and it looked fancy.

Seasonal Variations

There's a mighty cold wind blowing down upon us from the Arctic. Soon it will be Christmas and Games for May have well been postponed this year as the stubborn seasons refuse to cycle on in their own confused despair. I believe that it happens this way every year around these parts. I'm not troubled by this, any bad weather that comes my way gets quickly recycled into poor quality photographic artwork thereby rendering it a wee bit more interesting but ultimately forgettable.