Tuesday, April 09, 2013

Searching for the stone


I stumbled upon the second marker stone which is in fact, as you see by the inscription the first stone. Almost in it's rightful place,  down there by the high water mark. I'm now thinking that despite my on/off eccentric love affair with maps I can't actually read them. A bit of a wake up call I suppose but it's near to  the truth. What I see and what I interpret from the map does not reflect the contents of the map or so it would appear. Now there are only two more stones to find and we can then defeat the evil Calif, free the children from their servitude, redeem the holy scriptures  and restore the water supply to the people of the village. It's all coming together nicely. I now need to apply some fresh Cherry Blossom to my bull whip.

Monday, April 08, 2013

Origami Condom


Good band name? So there I was just finding out that there is indeed such a thing as an origami condom when along came this unrelated Vine clip of an origami pig uploaded by JB Junior.

Sunday, April 07, 2013

Temporal Displacement


“Not for me the comfort of knowing that I'll meet my parents and other loved ones in the afterlife. I'm a non-believer. I think that things just stop, but if I did believe I'd go to dyslexic heaven, which is Devon.” Eddie Izzard.

Recent deaths and temporal displacements: Some days I check the Recent Deaths in Wikipedia. An ever growing list of Pakistani politicians, Canadian screen writers, Naval officers, Israeli businessmen, oligarchs, sports coaches, churchmen and the occasional celebrity animal. They've all made a mark, they're all linked into the web of knowledge and there's either a brief entry or a long list of connected articles about the things they did, said or maybe thought. Some die of natural causes, some in accidents, some from cancer or heart attacks, most are pretty old, 70 onwards. In some ways it's like the world's testimonial bowel movement, churning the great and good through the final sphincter of non-eternal life and into the bottomless inventory of the Wiki-of-Dead where you never die because your entry (and departure) live on in the links and italics. So this is what life truly is because you'll be there, stuck immobilized and electronically chipped in that unremembered archive for much longer than you live. (If you really are a somebody it's the Daily Telegraph obituaries but I think they, assuming the right angle of decent and re-entry is properly calculated do at some point merge with the Wiki stuff, it just takes a little longer). So there we are, it's all just a digitised Monty Python bowel movement that has to run it's necessary course subject to a balanced diet, tight plumbing and a robust constitution framed in the illusion that is time passing.

How do you know it's your time? I don't know. There's no great trumpet call from a gruff but loving Hebrew God either (done in a late 50's free jazz style of course because that would surely be the kind of thing that any self respecting God would prefer rather than some Middle Eastern ram's horn that just produces an annoying farty tone which only scares sparrows and children) because he's not outside of this universe controlling it all and somehow making sense of it all. No, he's passed that point, he's there in the deep sewage space himself, consigned to the corporate memory of Wiki-land in some virtual pigeon hole from which you can never return no matter how divine you considered your existence to have been. For further information see world religions, disappointed spectral spirits, books written by people but considered to be holy (?) and delusional deities. Having said that some of his best works will continue to be broadcast on U-Tube, iTunes or on some Kindle based media either for free or at a very reasonable price. Be warned there may well be loops of country or accordion music playing in the background as peasant girls perform an awkward folk-dance involving baskets, cudgels and waving black scarves.

P.S. After writing this badly written piece I ate an apple and considered how disrespectful it might seem towards those with firm beliefs either in religion, the after life or the Internet. Then I thought about reality TV shows, modern economics, social justice, people who write to newspapers, wild animals being squeezed out of their natural environments and those mysterious foods that lurk in the back of the middle drawer of the freezer. I thought about my mental health and my daily unscripted and undisciplined meditations, mostly spent looking across a body of water. Then I finished the apple, looked at the slowly discolouring fleshy core and threw it into the nearby bin. In that brief but profound moment the cycle of life was described and completed. That's it.

“The true test of imagination is being able to name a kitten.” Samuel Butler.

Thursday, April 04, 2013

When North Korea attacks

The end of everything according to the Ancients (for today).
Modern Sci-Fi: With all the dignity and serenity of Ian Duncan Smith or David Cameron on a non-patronising visit to Scotland the sun sinks slowly into Longannet Power Station thereby simulating the effect of an unprovoked North Korean missile attack on Fife and the resultant "Black Start" chaos that would follow. It seems I may have stumbled upon the beginnings of a science friction novel plot of some sort here. I'll probably add in a Zombies from Culross and sex starved refugees from Blairhall storyline also.  We'll all need to be equipped with bigger ray-guns and bicycles for that to work out as credible narrative. Now if only I could muster up the right levels of concentration, stop stirring the soup and find the correct size of paint brush.

Class - still top after two days: The class calculator on the BBC website is getting the beaver hammered out of it by anxious folks hoping to understand themselves better and so know for sure the niche into which their lives fit in order that they can then go out and behave accordingly. I suppose that everybody who wants to use this blunt instrument to compartmentalise themselves into modern British life is just like me, all you need to do is tell a few lies to yourself and tick the best boxes. It's as easy as voting for the Tories I suppose.

    Wednesday, April 03, 2013

    Reposted this pic


    Daenerys Targaryen: Ok she's a pretty girl, she's royal, she's on a mission to get her rightful inheritance, she's buying a slave army (so there are some ethical issues there) and at the moment she has three of the coolest dragons ever (she also happens to be their mum), so WTF is happening with her eyebrows? They badly need a fix...c'mon HBO make-up department, earn your cash with some action.

    Tuesday, April 02, 2013

    Recently added photos

    When flying solo I usually park my ailing Spitfire here for a mug of trucker's  tea and some kind of hot meat served on a bread roll. File under "authentic but rough and ready".
    Here's an upside down but right way up view  of a massive stone monument erected in memory of someone now sadly forgotten. File under "don't try too hard to become immortal". 
    In celebration of the annual forwards changing of the clocks ceremony I cooked up a fistful of streaky bacon and served it to the assembled masses. File under "breakfast but not at Tiffany's".
    The view from the extreme north of the back garden looking out over the Straights of Alaska into the former Soviet Union and Republic of West Lothianshire. File under "a day when the temperature almost got to 3 Degrees".

    Guide to the Throne(s)


    If you're like me and blessed/cursed with intermittent memory loss and suffering from a self inflicted chocolate headache then this simple guide to Game of Thrones may help you in the coming weeks.

    Monday, April 01, 2013

    What am I doing here?

    Claudia and a Welsh bloke.
    Drove up and back to Aberdeen today and I forgot to stock up on car CDs :-(. That made the choices for the driving soundtrack either Radios 4 or 2; so 4 started strongly but then became tedious at about 1030,  I then tried Radio 2. It was an infuriating themed day of  lists and plays of listeners favourite 100 albums. As you might expect there were loads of tedious and supportive texts and various sycophantic explanations offered by the unfortunate DJs. In the end it's clear that when it comes to music that  the public might think that they know what they like but actually they know very little. Come the revolution a few things will change around here and not just the housing benefit. Click here if you want to make yourself angry (just for the hell of it and so you can remind yourself you're alive) - Coldplay were top apparently.

    Sunday, March 31, 2013

    Feline Alerts


    I don't really understand much about inter-cat relationships but they appear to be complex and full of pointless territorial moves. It's all a daft puzzle to the innocent human. Our two now seem to have been accepted into the local cat society but there still is feline friction of sorts, on most days. This boils down to:

    a) Standing off - keeping a safe distance and scowling at the other cat like a cross OAP.
    b) Being oblivious - that is until some space invader tipping point is reached.
    c) Howling - usually a low, plaintive moan where the cat sounds genuinely disturbed.
    d) Snarling - not a proper snarl really, more of an angry meow.
    e) Spitting - again pretty feeble with not much spit ever coming out.
    f) Sitting in the place where the other cat just peed or pooped, no idea what this is about.
    g) Running madly for the home cat flap - when items a - f have run their course.

    Lastly there is showing off. The cat next door jumped up into a tree to attack two Wood Pigeons innocently procreating.  Our two looked fairly puzzled by this and were I suppose pretty much intimidated by the show of speed and aggression. The pigeons didn't mind much and resumed their activity on a higher branch on another tree. No animals were injured etc. etc.

    Saturday, March 30, 2013

    Easter Impressions

    11:05 Good Friday, on the Fife Coastal Path. 
    23:05 Good Friday, about 10' away from the Fife Coastal Path. (Still life with chocolate)

    Thursday, March 28, 2013

    Torx keys


    “Like most of the others, I was a seeker, a mover, a malcontent, and at times a stupid hell-raiser. I was never idle long enough to do much thinking, but I felt somehow that my instincts were right. I shared a vagrant optimism that some of us were making real progress, that we had taken an honest road, and that the best of us would inevitably make it over the top. At the same time, I shared a dark suspicion that the life we were leading was a lost cause, that we were all actors, kidding ourselves along on a senseless odyssey. It was the tension between these two poles – a restless idealism on one hand and a sense of impending doom on the other – that kept me going.” 

    Now that I've got my Torx keys none of that shit really matters.

    P.S. Anything worth having is worth stealing...

    Winter Easter


    The new Winter that is Easter is upon us. Time once again to stock up with those religious icons, chocolate eggs and badly designed bunnies. All highly appropriate items with which to commemorate another misunderstood Christian festival and the ongoing extended ice-age. Children rejoice as the schools break up and the first big public holiday traffic jams begin to form. I'll head out into them shortly for a family bucket of miscellaneous eggs and their supporting cardboard constructions.

    Later, as usual at this point in my life,  I'll spend a long time reading clever comments and views expressed and rehashed on the Guardian and Independent web sites, a pale representation of an actual ink and snot newspaper. Writers and journalists are regularly outraged and upset, it's their job to be. They question all sorts of things and offer alternatives and vent their angry spleens in order that we can understand the "issues". Each well written contribution buried by the next link, or blog post or photo montage. There is an avalanche of opinion out there collapsing on the poor average, bemused middle aged mind that cant quite take it all in. Which one should I support, care for and then worry about? Their noble arguments and musings build, turn and inform, then as quickly as they were posted they are swept away and lost forever by more words and more cyber-snow. There's always another, better, newer story to come.

    Tuesday, March 26, 2013

    Home truths



    It takes an unknown number of wild birds 2.5 days to consume 1 litre of seed from an Orangina bottle.

    The kind of snow we are current getting would not be considered snow at all beyond the Arctic Circle.

    The last quarter of fuel in the tank goes down quicker than the first quarter.

    The current Coalition Government would probably get their just reward in Hell if there was such a place.

    There is no point in trying to postpone the inevitable.

    The clocks may change this weekend but people won't.

    Log fires require a lot of attention if they are  to stay burning.

    The proper tool is at the bottom of the tool box. (If it's not it's somewhere in the garage.)

    The dishwasher misses bits.

    Potholes are almost always avoidable but you may stray across the white line while trying to avoid them.

    Nobody notices your odd socks (unless you brag about them).

    A cup of tea is appreciated and savoured more than a cup of coffee.

    Recycling Coke cans can quickly get your fingertips lacerated.

    A hours sleep before midnight is about the same as an hour's sleep afterwards.

    The Channel 4 news on Channel 4+1 is just the same as the original. Does nothing ever happen in that hour?

    Monday, March 25, 2013

    When art attacks



    An unexpected attack of mirror themed artworks has taken place in our humble home. I am looking into the matter and (with the appropriate amount of fake gravitas and wistful signing) reflecting on this phenomenon. More examples to follow as soon as the mirror paint is cured and fully dry.

    Sunday, March 24, 2013

    Cars & cats

    World's greenest and shortest driveway. 
    Note abandoned and suspicious fuel can. What's been going on?
    A day of multiple jumps starts and high engine revving incidents as we scooted across the country lanes and nearby cabbage fields. At times up to four cars were moved around in sequence by a team of expert volunteers (and then there were numerous bicycles threaded across an unforgiving area of tidal dog turds). When the catering team finally got into gear it was all change and I for one had more than my fair share of wine, olive bread and anchovies. Everything else is a bit of a blur except for the super cheesecake and fresh fruit salad.







    Saturday, March 23, 2013

    40 years on

    So it's 40 years tomorrow since Dark Side of the Moon hit the record shops? I do remember the day. My own favourite was this one, mainly the two sides that were recorded live, but that's all much more than 40 years old now. Share your memories, if you will,  here. Or at least on where ever the link may take you.

    Friday, March 22, 2013

    Alternative photo

    Disappointing alternative photo.
    Today's photo extravaganza should really feature a cat perched precariously on a branch at the top of a spindly tree whilst another (possibly hostile) cat circles the bottom of the same tree looking up occasionally. This is happening in a light snow storm at 7AM on a grey Friday morning in our back garden. Of course the moment I tried to sneak out in order to capture this daft natural occurrence on camera both cats bolted across the garden and away into the distance to pursue their other secret adventures. You will  just have to use your imagination I guess.

    Thursday, March 21, 2013

    Take me back to the Stone Age


    Useful things not properly used: So who says what it and what isn't their proper use? Who defines useful and rewards it and sentences that not so useful to be useless? Who measures the boundaries between those two nebulous points? That is if such a boundary exists in the first place. Meanwhile small groups of people develop more and more useful things. A larger group of people then make and build those useful things and ship them out all across the world. A huge group of people are told that they should want these useful things. At first they are a little puzzled but intrigued, then they take the bright shiny bait and suddenly want those useful things. They purchase the useful things thanks to the wages they earn making other useful things.   Once they have the useful things and use the useful things  they quickly get bored with them. It seldom occurs to them that they don't really use up much of the capability or power within the useful things.  Then, one day the useful thing is superseded by another more useful thing. The people decide they want that thing, then they think think that they must have that thing. The old useful things are discarded, thrown away, scrapped or lost somewhere. They are in a big pile nobody ever sees. The people have bought into the idea of the next more useful thing by now anyway and go and get it. Meanwhile a very very small group of people are making a very large amount of money from the design, manufacture and sale of the useful things. They recognise that these things are useful but they know that the larger process and cycle that they operate is much more useful than the useful things ever could be. And so it goes.

    Wednesday, March 20, 2013

    Everything between

    Sorted and plagiarised potential album cover.
    Despite having various hi-tech tools at my disposal and reasonable brain I tend to fill my pockets with crumpled little yellow stickies upon which are scribbled various instructions, reminders, shopping lists, lyrics, PINs and passwords, all for my attention. Today's pocketed batch read like some random nonsense poem from an alien place and of course which one is which? Not much makes sense to me, here they are:

    Torx screwdriver or allan keys
    Link Calum Storrie F1 website
    Picture Frames?
    Put them on Gumtree tonight
    Sitting on the stair
    Staring into space
    Thinking on your words
    Picturing your face
    bananas
    yogurt
    Coffee for work
    X3478
    Picking
    Card or voucher?
    Porsche archive 986 FAQ
    Do the Gelaskins thing
    Stratocaster1
    Birdseed for the juice bottle

    Tuesday, March 19, 2013

    Boxster S


    A busy night of ironing and bird feeder filling led me eventually to watch the latest Wheeler Dealers' Boxster S episode. It's already generating comment and gathering shit on various petrolhead forums and as I've got a keen interest in this affordable but problematical Porsche (?) it had to be worth a gander. The first deal, buying it for £1000 took some believing even with a dodgy Tiptronic gearbox; what was the owner thinking? Presumably nothing more than "I'll be on be telly looking a complete dickhead selling my Porsche for a grand". The car hadn't run properly for four years but took off like a rocket on a single key turn and sounded sweet as a nut except from the clunky gear change and some worn brakes. Never. Of course the faulty gearbox only needed a £200 oil and filter change and lo and behold it ran again like a Swiss watch straight from the German factory. Next the seats got  recovered and the brake discs skimmed (while on the car) using a five grand special tool (don't try this at home). The biggest job was honking off the two cats and cementing on a stainless steel exhaust. Meanwhile nobody, well perhaps Ed China off camera, seemed to look at the engine at all. A tough omission to believe and that was the one bit I really wanted to see opened up. Unbelievable. Then some shifty bald bloke (looking a bit like me) handed over £5400 cash and drove away with the most strangely restored high miler motor I've seen yet. The worn out seats suggested 100k anyway. View more photos here if you're a tyre kicker of any kind. TV format? Getting tired I'm afraid.