Thursday, March 31, 2005
Conception
No, not that sort. But the possible birth of a new blog..
Bruv's comment to yesterday's post got me to thinking about setting him up with one of his own. At least it might stop him stalking me. Joke, Bruv, joke.
I thought I might call it Rugsarus, so he'd sound like some exotic and intriguing ex Soviet bloc refugee.
Or with the second "r" comically capitalised and reversed, to promote his new rug trade.
No, not r
ag, r
ug.
And we're not talking syrups or two pays here. The genuine floor jobbies.
I might have more luck
this time?
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:28 AM
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Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Bitch weather
The underseat heaters on today’s dirty, decrepit slam-door were belching out so much noxious heat that even with thrown-open windows sucking in the grey, misty air, muffled commuters were quickly shedding scarves, gloves, coats, whatever. It must have been 90 degrees when we were stationary. Nice.
The latest natural tragedy to hit Indonesia now probably means that we won’t be meeting up with Number One Son in Sri Lanka later this year. Which is, of course, only a personal disappointment for us, but a horrendous disaster for the innocent and indefensible people in that region.
So where do we go?
Here? (where my Mum was born – the daughter of an Army man, stationed there. I never met him.)
Or
here? Have had good reports from other tourists.
Or
here? Actually had a really good day there once, watching the birdmen (and women) vying for that elusive prize..
Answers on a postcard, please.
Holiday-me-up!
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:29 AM
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Tuesday, March 29, 2005
Old Stoconian
The start of the bank holiday was tinged with some very sad news.
Keith was the husband of a former work-colleague of Mrs.D’s and became a very good friend of ours.
His bluff, gruff persona inevitably hid a very warm-hearted character, who was happiest when making things good for other people. He was also the only person who ever managed to drag me to a football match (his firm sponsored the team, so we had a box). And the floodlights failed.
I had to laugh.
He ‘phoned me at work one morning to ask if I could insure an advertising balloon. When he gave me the dimensions, I said it’d be a hazard to air traffic, but I’d see what I could do. When did he need cover from? “About ten minutes ago – the ruddy thing’s broken free from its hawser and is floating somewhere over Kent.”
I had to laugh.
Way back – B.C. (Before Children) the four of us drove down to the South of France in his beloved ‘silver bullet’ (an old Merc). For the last day, he promised we’d max out on his company credit card, but then got sunstroke and collapsed, so failed to live up to his promise.
I had to laugh.
He came from Stockport, so he was an Old Stoconian, which was the name of his home.
I had to laugh.
Then, last Thursday, one day after his sixtieth birthday, he died.
I had to cry.
# posted by Mr.D. @ 9:19 AM
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Thursday, March 24, 2005
Timely
The book I've just finished reading (over there, on the left and down a bit, under the clock) is written in four parts, each told by a different narrator, about the interraction between several lives. And, spookily enough, given this week's news from the U.S., starting with a school massacre and how the impact spreads out for decades.
Not a novel (sic) technique, but it was skilfully done. And enough tomake me want to read other works by the author.
One narrator, Heather, finally finds her soulmate, only for him to disappear without trace.
In her despair and desolation, she declaims: "I'm alive, but who cares?"
What a terrible thought?
And with the impending Bank Holiday, when you'd like to be outside in daylight, it looks like indoor d.i.y (again) - hence Costello's somewhat gloomy lyric, today.
I need cheering up.
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:48 AM
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Tuesday, March 22, 2005
Dream
Floyd have always been part of our musical history. I lost the tickets for our first gig and we had to wait until everyone else was seated, to find out where we were sitting. The prayers I offered up that no-one else had picked them up somewhere...
And when Mrs.D. first heard the Scissors' cover version of "Comfortably numb", she confessed she wanted to smash the car radio. But then, like me, she reasoned that it's
so different, it's almost
not a cover at all, but a good, poppy tune in its own right. And I'm enjoying the album.
Totally separately from all that, for some reason this morning, on the walk in, it occurred to me that I've never had a lifelong dream. Well, maybe as a lad, when I vowed I'd never spend my life behind a desk, get married and have kids etc. etc. No, I was joining the Royal Navy, me.
By nineteen, I was married and working for a building society and, although procreation was still several years away, had no real aim in life. Events fashioned me, not vice versa.
How 'bout you?
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:31 AM
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Monday, March 21, 2005
Letter to The Times
Sir,
"I believe that yesterday, I smelt the first barbecue of the year."
Guilty as charged. It was a record, even for us.
And there was some left over for lunch today. Mmmm.
There's always a brief moment of solitude, when the coals are quietening down and before the art of scheduling everything to be ready simultaneously begins, when I look to the sky, glass of red in hand, and thank the powers that be that I'm still alive.
Such a great feeling..
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:36 AM
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Friday, March 18, 2005
YGGY (2)
On Charles Bridge in Prague, there are dozens of monuments built onto the buttresses.
There was one peculiar one, encased in a stone recess and grilled with iron bars?
This handsome chap was looking at the sculpture inside
and decided to poke the camera lens inside...
Not sure what to make of it?
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:35 AM
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Thursday, March 17, 2005
You're gonna get yours (1)
We found some of the art and artefacts in Prague to be, well, bizarre.
In the Museum, there is a painting called "
Tearful Bride*" (c.16th century, if I remember rightly).
It’s of a particularly hideous specimen of womanhood (yes, I know, I know, I’m no oil painting myself) who appears to be being escorted (frog-marched, I thought) to her doom, by two equally unsavoury characters who Mrs.D. averred resembled “the Mitchell brothers from "
Eastenders"?
I had to take her word for that.
The painting itself was of such quality, it was virtually photographic. But apart from her puffy and bloated face, caused (at least in part?) by her unconfined joy at the prospect of marital union and the ensuing nuptials, there was – and I kid you not – an inch of snot descending from one nostril.
Which begs two questions:
a) why could anyone be bothered, hundreds of years ago, to spend an enormous
amount of time reproducing the sheer terror of the impending ceremony; and
b) wtf did the groom look like?
* no pix available as photography was, of course, forbidden.
YGGY (2) tomorrow (with pix)
Now showing in Wenceslas Square Odeon - Tolkien's second opus:
# posted by Mr.D. @ 12:15 PM
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Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Bereft
Have no inspiration, today.
With the spirit of blogworld within you, can anyone help me through the plethora of offers for broadband and suggest the best, current package?
And if anyone has experience, what is the best remote internet access modem/box thingy for use with a laptop?
Answers in a Comments box somewhere near here would be much appreciated.
Oh yeah. 1
The train driver and conductor decided to have a chat over an open communication line this morning. "Is that Steve?" "Yeah". "Oh, it's Dean here, I'm just gonna do a check on..."
When they finished, I quipped "Love you..". Almost three other commuters wet themselves.
Oh yeah. 2
Congrats to
zed for her BEW Bloggie
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:35 AM
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Monday, March 14, 2005
Extreme Touring Van Championship Update
We received Number One Son's first CD of photos at the weekend.
He's met up with his best mate (fortunately, because at least he has a full licence) and they've been touring New Zealand's North and South islands in a hired camper van.
Actually, not the "rent-a-wreck" we were expecting, but quite a chipper beastie. There's an unsavoury interior shot (God help the valetters) with a bottle of gin juxtaposed next to a tomato ketchup bottle. Students' version of a Bloody Mary, perhaps?
So far, he's hunted down and caught his first coconut breakfast, got wrecked at a Maori dance (it so reminded us of the Polynesian lu'au we saw in Hawai'i), been towed back in when they got caught in a tidal rip while learning to surf, watched a pod of killer whales cruise by, kayaked back down through a forest they'd trekked up through and are probably at this moment on a glacier walk.
Oh yes, and a tandem parachute jump.
There's a great picture of the two of them in the worst-fitting wetsuits I've ever seen on a human body. But as they're both 6' and barely weigh 16 stone between them, it's hardly surprising that the "Mr Average" hire suits weren't quite the picture of sartorial elegance they expected. There must have been more water sloshing around inside than flesh!
And here I am, sat at my desk.
There's no justice...
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:31 AM
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Friday, March 11, 2005
Before and after
When we got there..
and when we left..
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:31 AM
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Wednesday, March 09, 2005
"Woo. Me too!"
Today's lyric:
"She unscrews the top of her new whisky bottle.
Shuffles around in her candlelit hovel.
Like some kind of
witch, with
blue fingers and mittens;
She smells like the cat, and the neighbours - she sickens."
Squeeze: "Labelled with love" From the album: "Greatest Hits"
for
The Bloggers Disco:Brown Sugar - by the popular beat combo, The Rolling Stones.
# posted by Mr.D. @ 12:34 PM
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Back
from Prarg. It was
damnedly cold.
Just too busy to put together a post to do the place justice, or sort out some of the better shots to illustrate.
Soon though, soon..
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:40 AM
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Wednesday, March 02, 2005
OoO
I know I've used "Today's Lyric" before, but on the eve of our 32nd anniversary, it seems appropriate?
So it's off to Prarg (careful avoidance of a 10p levy, there) for a combined celebration of that
and Mrs.D's 50th birthday, with our lifelong friends in tow.
* checks "Out of Office" message *
Back to work and blogging on Tuesday - enjoy your weekends, y'all.
# posted by Mr.D. @ 8:33 AM
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Drinking and Driving (but clearly not simultaneously)
