Green Card Blues

I've been working on this specially commissioned portrait for about 10 minutes, it's called "Green Card Holder with Roubles from Putin". I've no idea what it's about. 

Rishi Sunak is a British politician who says he is serving as Chancellor of the Exchequer, sometimes he works from home but I hear he's moved on now. He's been in the job since 2020, having previously served as Chief Secretary to the Treasury from 2019 to 2020. A member of the Conservative Party, he has been Member of Parliament for Richmond since 2015. That's a short career for such a high office.

He likes to dabble in hedge funds, soapy excuses and he is married to a very rich lady who lives nearby but who has also been found out to be a cheeky little trickster. He's not known for the common touch and is unable to understand contactless payments, petrol pumps and the ethics and principles of International Law. It would appear he has no real concept of poverty or experience of hardship either. I imagine that he's having a good day none the less.

There will be a "proper" inquiry you know. Plus they (?) went to parties.

You may well consider that this (my opinion and the image) is just more vacuous ranting and that reality is only some kind of complex construct. To try to prove this you may say, "have you ever actually seen your neighbour bringing in their groceries?" To which I might well respond with, "you know I have not, perhaps you have a point there."

Pink Floyd (Andriy Khlyvnyuk of Boombox)

Pink Floyd - Hey Hey Rise Up (feat. Andriy Khlyvnyuk of Boombox). All self explanatory and a quite moving musical piece coupled up with war footage and that of Andriy singing. Already it's had millions of views in the last few days but I'm always late to the party so it's still worth sharing. All the background's there on YouTube. Cynics might say that the old rich guys of Dad Rock should stay in the background and die quietly in the shadows. Nope. If there's one thing (the good part) of my generation has learned, it's that silence is seldom golden. Every little note, word, image and whispered truth helps. Don't let the bastards grind you down.

Reserved for Media

 

A match day out at Kelty Hearts FC. The day's opposition was Stirling Albion. Nice that they kept a seat allocation for each of us. The game however was a dull 1 - 1 draw. The pie score was about 8 out of 10, fair selection, good quality and serving temperature. Ease of access and overall impressions 7 - 10. Partick Thistle Factor (PCF = crowd sophistication and conversation content) a surprising 8 - 10. Cultural references and relevance (sightings of ex-Dockyard workers and Dire Straights on the Tannoy plus playing the Kelty Clippie at full time) a time warped 8 -10. Not bad scores after all. Recommended.

I could have deducted marks for their drum but I'm not so petty minded. 

Nothing

Found Item

 

I found this in my trouser pocket.

I'm considering drafting up a few artwork ideas based around the concept of "the lack of persistence of memory", an answer to a question that Dali may never have asked. Memory fade or memory creep maybe, we can all suffer from this. It seems to me an appropriate subject to try to interpret and to explore in some sort of classic or maybe romantic style. As soon as I have a few decent examples worked up I'll be sharing them here. Of course I'm assuming that I'll remember to go on and actually execute some work based on this theme. Bearing that in mind you may or may not have to wait a while to view any of the results. Thanking you in advance for your patience.

Still Life with Boots

Found hear the high water mark in South Queensferry: A pair of boots abandoned for no obvious reason. Forgotten by the owner, perhaps a tourist, high and dizzy by being so close to the Forth Railway Bridge presumably. An engineering icon from before the dawn of time and even before the invention of Steampunk, all made of girders from Motherwell etc.

Many visitors are affected and moved when seeing it's red glow and magnificence up close for the first time, but few leave their footwear behind. So the boots remain a local mystery, like some fictional based criminal mindset with it's blundering modus operandi, we'll never understand those twisted depths and we'll never quite know the real truth.

Pars Up For It

The scene after the second goal went in. Pyro on the pitch of course.

A good night at East End Park saw Dunfermline beat Raith Rovers 2 - 0 in a rare win. The scramble for survival continues, for the next few weeks anyway, the outcome being hard to predict. I suppose it's looking better but not certain by any means. Anyway it was a spirited performance last night and the fans were behind the team 100%, for a change. The North West Stand, where we were was truly bouncing in a way I've not seen in a while. Great fun and entertainment despite the torrential rain and heavy police turnout. Not so good for the Kirkcaldy fans but at least they've got a trophy this season.

Great photo. Whoever took it and doctored it.

Queensferry Daily Photo

There has to be an interesting back story as to how this crusty old LHD 4x4 V8 Jeep Grand Wagoneer still on it's Arizona plates ended up parked faraway from home at the Tesco in South Queensferry. Answers on a postcard please.

Here's the trippy, through the looking glass version:

Machine Heads

 

Swapping out machine heads: So I took the (old) Grovers from my Washburn 335 and put them onto my Yamaha acoustic and fitted a new set of Wilkinsons on the Washburn. Half an hour of fiddling and some kind of double tuning stability has been achieved. Quite satisfying in the end. I'm not bothered about the screw holes in the Yamaha, it's an old campaigner now and they're hardly noticeable. Please ignore the poorly attempted but nearly reasonable luthier knots, I'm slowly getting better at them. I also filed down the Yamaha's bridge piece as part of the exercise and bingo, better action and no unexpected buzz.

Evolutionary Progress

Whilst Darwin style evolution is the default choice for explaining how things came to be, and I get that, sometimes I wonder why some obvious directions of evolution have not been taken. I'm puzzled that we have so few flying mammals. How, with all their voracious hunting skills, appetite for birds and energy did cats never manage to fly? Had they done so small birds would pretty much be extinct and battles between cats and raptors might be commonplace in our skies. 

I'm not saying that this would be a good thing but cats with wings has to be a logical step in their own progress as predators. You could argue that because cats have not developed wings (and flight) there may some inherent cap on evolution that prevents a creature becoming too dominant in it's field. This doesn't apply to humans though (that's a bit of a stretch) as we collide with everything in our path. Blah blah ... getting back to cats; we have interfered with feline evolution by domesticating them to the point that there's now no need for them to fly, so they don't.

Bigger cats, cougars, pumas etc. maybe could've gone this way but as most of their prey is ground dwelling there would be no need so it only seems a worthwhile extra attribute for smaller cats. If there was/is a god who controls evolution in some limited way or within creative boundaries then that god may have decided that wings would be a strength too far for cats versus the rest, so it never happened. Otherwise it's another random act of unintelligent nature limiting the success of one strand of creation.

I've really no idea or scientific insight into the whole theory of evolution (as is obvious), I'm just checking out one animal at a time and then, as the full weight of history and biology crash down on me, giving up and rambling. Of course this entire train of thought was inspired by me dreaming of one of our cats was up a tree attacking and subduing an owl in a very violent and unpleasant manner. "Don't fear the Reaper" by Blue Oyster Cult was playing along as the soundtrack to these slow motion Spaghetti Western style events. I awoke somewhat disturbed. I can't quite see cats the same way anymore, despite the fact that the cat in the dream was not equipped with wings of any kind.

Marveled Comix

A recently completed panel mock-up.

A silent world without word balloons but full of CGI explosions: I'm steadily getting more and more bored with the ever expanding Marvel Universe. It used to be an artistic if disturbing place, not any more. Now re-imagined as the centre of disasters and diversity so extreme it is as boundless and silly as any real universe. The melted faces of the reviewers, the disbelief of the audiences, the drunken staggering of the producers, the hum of the devices processing the payments, the capitulation of the sponsors, the reduction of the alcoholic mind-soup back to steam and heavy vapour. All in a bolder than bold script.

Cardboard cut outs, inky blocks of pain, fakes and dramas and half formed things we can't ever care about. At this point comics become a pointless distraction, then rendering them into the playground reality of action films making them even more ridiculous with each release. There was a time when fine, multi-coloured roses bloomed there, now I'm not so sure. Dead artists slowly spin in their finely inked, detailed and cross hatched graves, stricken by the exploding spaghetti of exploitation.

Cija Li Je Livada

Branko Mataja

Nice little tune from an obscure but talented musician, (that puts him in with the majority I guess). Sadly long gone but his music, very much home grown and inspired by his heritage lives on via the curious thing that is YouTube. A place where we all might gain eternal life.

Unexpected Life Form in the Bragging Area

The promise of a steady drizzle or a bout of hail may be enough to entice me out once in a while. The magnetism of the fresh air on flesh. The glory of lungs filled with celebratory low cloud. The joy of avoiding unexpected and unplanned roadworks by means of stealth. Eyes still on the prize of non-political correctness but set at an acceptable level. 

I'll also visit a supermarket of some sort to buy chicken pieces for the cats. In a parallel universe I know I'm also buying pieces of cat for the chickens. In a third kind of universe the cats are buying pieces of me for even more chickens. I'm glad not to be living there. Unexpected human sacrifice in the blogging area.

Upon Us All

According to Robert Plant "upon us all a little rain must fall". Weather maps and forecasts usually show patterns of rainfall from quite a distance, maybe a mile high or thereabouts. I'm not sure, at a personal level, that's the best way to display such information. Here's what you get when you map the rainfall pattern from where it lands / hits the ground when you roll out a grid to capture it. You also get wet graph paper. After a while it's pretty much useless too, perhaps an alternative to feeble paper is required for the data recording to remain meaningful. I suppose nobody is ever 100% happy with the weather forecast whichever way it is presented.

Backwards of Downtime

Art is either everywhere or nowhere.

Try to address it if you will.

A categorical eating of pickles.

Less fuss and furor than your average Oscars ceremony.

A nasty bite from the Metropolitan Police's toothless squad

All hands on deck for BBC Scotland's  journalistic standards.

When you're low you're low.

The Royal Family: it's own dysfunctional cash machine.

A guitar shaped like a fish does not need a bicycle.

You are in way too deep for yourself.

Alternative LED bulbs from Latvia.

Computers are easy to take apart with a claw hammer.

Unexpected load in the washing machine.

What the world needs now is love sweet love.

That's the only thing there's just too little of.

Too Late for the Humans

 

In the morning I usually eat muesli.

IKEA on a Monday morning, store just open, piano music on the Tannoy, a few shoppers in masks looking and pointing. There's a synchronized shuffle in the way we move, all maintaining a safe distance. It's a peculiar place to be. Walking idly around, not really planning a purchase, just following the arrows and staring into simulated rooms on the left and right. Like a strange voyeuristic out of body trip, empty spaces, plastic fruit, wine bottles and pretend notes on pin boards. My mind is now filming it all, as if in an abandoned house or hospital for some shaky, hand held YouTube Channel.

I continue my retailing shuffle as if I'm sneaking through that vacant care home, or a mental health ward just after a false fire alarm had sounded and the evacuation exercise was complete, though nobody bothered to switch off the piped music piano track. Somewhere up above, beyond the golden clouds, perhaps God's great judgement is finally underway. All the beds are made, objects are placed here and there but nobody touches them, too late for the humans now, we've run out of sleep time. It's an immersive experience being here at the edge of the rapture but still without the full picture.

After a twenty five minute wander and ponder I was done. At the robot till I handed over an electrical signal to give them £17.50 and received a bamboo tray, a soap dish, a phone holder and some sticky pads in return. Then across to the cafe for a packet of muesli and a take away coffee. Unfortunately there were no jars of roll-mop herring available from the fridge, I was somewhat disappointed to find this out. What a time to be alive (assuming that we are indeed alive).

Beginnings of Wisdom

Cat you spot the hidden cartoon cat? 

The famous optical illusion has been circulating for many years in the veterinary sector where it is used to try solve what is commonly known as the "canine syndrome". Dogs being dogs basically. There is also the "feline syndrome" which is tackled by quite different means, using Liki-Lix mostly.

Sunday

 

Happy Sunday.

Sign Language

Are you a corpse or are you feeling wet down low?

Perhaps you're taking part in a Highland Dancing Show.

Just some other sorts of things, I'll never really know.

You can tell that this is a short poem because the text is positioned centrally on the page. A sure fire sign of poetic intent. Positioning is important. So some say. There are lots of things that some say, for example:

"Can three not very entertaining lines of forced humour actually make a poem? Maybe more space between the lines would help. Oh and a fourth line with additional detail might make it more interesting. Just a thought. You need to try harder."

Now Playing

1. Now playing on YouTube. Well it was playing there. A strange album and unpopular at the time of it's release with many people but not me. I think it's fair to say that this incarnation of the band were better without (contributions from) Jeremy Spencer. Nothing against him but that's how it is. 

2. "What do you want?"

     "To be found out ... the same as everybody else."

       From Nightmare Alley.

3. Sounds to me like your average, run of the mill ostrich. Nothing special.

4. Meanwhile let's consider the earth's atmosphere, protecting the unworthy from the great vacuum that exists beyond the firmament. As is now traditional I must credit this photograph as having been taken from a Canberra. 

5. I promise you that it's forever, it's cast iron.