A little bit of a musical self indulgence shall follow. Chad’s not around to criticise my posts, so I feel like I can write about anything I want. Not that it ever stopped me before. This time I’m going to blog about a song I could have possibly missed out on.

I was out for a walk last Monday, before I went and got my hair butchered, to the Headland. It’s a walk I take with startling regularity.

On Monday, I was listening to music on my phone, as I always do, and, happened to be walking up Thorpe Street, as the junction of Marine Drive approached. The name suggests that it would give you a lovely view to the sea, and indeed it does. I stopped paying attention to the music I was listening to, and instead grabbed the camera out of my pocket in order to take some shots, escpecially as the weather was as gloroius as this…

The song which I had previously paid no attention faded out, yet I still continued to walk along the sea front. My mind, still wandering, partially ignored the slow violin introduction of the song that was playing, until I saw a bench, looking out to sea, with a decaying bunch of flowers tied to it. This sad sight caused me to pay attention to my surroundings, and the music I was listening to, which happened to be the slow, solo violin intro to “Vagabonds” by New Model Army. (Youtube link, will probably die). It’s a song I’ve probably skipped over many times, and never noticed its full spendour.

Talking about violinny-type music, I’m not sure if I’ve blogged about this recently, but seeing as I’m here, and talking about musical shit, I might as well post this…

I now have the original, 1982 version of Darryl Way’s “Little Plum”.

“Little Plum” was a little instrumental tune released by Curved Air member Darryl Way. It has had two releases that I know of, and neither of them charted. It was made famous in the North East of England, however, by Metro FM Talk Show host Alan Robson, who for many years has used the second release of the record as the theme to the “North East Night Owls”.

Neither version of Little Plum have ever been released on CD or LP, meaning that the only way to get hold of the tune is to track down a copy of the 7″ single, which really isn’t easy!

Well, this’ll be my last posting on the subject of as I now have all three versions that I know about. The last one to enter the collection was the 1982 version…

It’s a much simpler arrangement than the later version, and after hearing it, I can see why this earlier recording was “abandoned” in favour of the later release. It’s… different, let’s just put it that way.

Some of the violin stuff from the 1982 version was used in the 1984 version. A certain section near the end of the 1982 recording matches up exactly with the 1984 intro. There’s a lot of processing on the later version, but it’s definitely the same bit.

Mere weeks after I got the first version, I did a search on ebay and found the 1982 French pressing…

Not only did it sound cleaner (less scratched) than my 1982 version, it had an infinitely more interesting sleeve.

I’m a bit upset that Darryl Way has completely disowned this song… as I mentioned before, none of the recordings have ever been released on CD, and Wikipedia doesn’t have an entry for it, though it is mentioned in his discography. Maybe it’s time I changed all that…

*UPDATE (the following afternoon)* Jesus, this was a terrible post. Don’t drink and blog.

Well, I have been summonsed by Glen Adrian of Obscureinternet (change your avatar, ffs!) to write a detailed review of my 30th birthday. I’ll start from the day, because it was a much better and more exciting day, for you see, I went bowling!

The first part of the day was spent watching stuff that had been collected on the Sky+. this involved several episodes of Countdown. Unfortunately, there wasn’t going to be a lot happening in the early part of this particular day, as the car was in the garage after it snapped a spring or something, thanks to the state of one of the local roads.

Onto the night, then. Plans had been made with most of the people from work to attend the bowling alley on Brenda Road. It was the first time I’d been bowling since November 2005

I arrived at approximately 7:30, to find that the place was absolutely packed, but I was the only one there out of the proposed group. Oh, great. Things start going through my mind, like “Am I on my own? Is anyone else turning up?” I decided to wait outside, just in case anyone was going to ring my mobile. It was noisy inside.

Thankfully, the cars did indeed start pulling up, and before long, we had a group of about 16 of us. Unfortunately, Tuesday is apparently semi-pro night, so we had to wait until about 9 before we got a game. The price was £3 for the hour. It closed at 10, so we’d just got in. It was at this point, I began to fling my camera around in the hope to catch some epic shots. Unfortunately, this failed miserably, though I did think Matt got a good strike here:-

Unfortunately after I got home and checked the video, he hit the rail first. So technically, it didn’t count.

I finished last, as you can probably gather, though I did manage a strike. I might have to start going there, if I can find someone to go along with. there’s no point playing on your own.

After the bowling, we made our way to Lloyds, in Church Square. And yes, I really did wear this shirt…

Some random barfly stated that I looked like Timmy Mallet. Out of all the times I’ve worn that shirt, it’s the closest I’ve ever gotten to a compliment. Unfortunatelty, there’s a button fallen off it, so that’ll give me an excuse to never, ever wear it in public again. Awww.

After sharing a jug of some odd drink bought by Matt (possibly to celebrate his non-strike), it was time for everyone to begin departing. Some people had work in the morning, and some people wanted to attend the Indian. Guess which category I fell into.

So, the initial group of 16 had dwindled down to 4, and we headed off to the Dilshad for a load of grub.

As usual, the meal was delicious, and just as we were finishing, the clock struck midnight. Yup, I was now 30 years old. Daddykins sent me a text.

The second person to wish me happy birthday was Wayne, at an impressive 2 minutes past midnight, though obviously I didn’t get it until I got home. His email made me quickly realise how much of my life had disappeared…

“You are now twice as old as you were when we had our first talk on CB”.

He was right. The CB days were now half my life ago!

The 4 of us finished our meals, and headed off home in our respective taxis, and a good night was had by all. Well, certainly by me, at least, and I made my way up the long, winding gravel driveway of Mercuryvapour Towers at 1:13.

And now, onto the day itself. It started off early, around 5AM. This was mainly because I could feel the vindaloo on the move, and it was only a matter of time before it was indaloo (actually, alloverdaloo would be a better description). So, I was wide awake after only 4 hours sleep, and with an arse like the flag of Japan. I logged onto Facebook, and watched the happy birthday messages scroll past. Thanks to all of you who left a message, and for those who tried to talk to me, Facebook Chat is being a tart at the moment, and although I can see who sent me a message, I can’t actually see it. I’ve gone back to an earlier release of Firefox. That might help it.

Anyway, the morning consisted of my usual “Woo! I’m off work!” ritual – lie on the sofa and watch “Homes Under The Hammer”, followed by “to Buy or Not To Buy”, then “Cash In The Attic” (as long as Jenny Sodding Bond isn’t presenting it), followed by “Bargain Hunt”. Andy The Iridium Fan popped round during the preceedings, and dropped off my birthday card. He stayed for a few hours, and was amazed to find that he also liked amplifying the ends of songs just to get every last note out of them. An “interest” of mine which I thought nobody else shared. A bit like streetlights. He also helped me dispose of the large boxes that Beastbits2 had came in.

ATIF stayed for 3 hours, 22 minutes and 45 seconds, and after that I began watching some more stuff that had accumulated on the Sky+. I was absolutely knackered, as I’d only managed a couple of hours sleep, and decided to go to bed “for an hour”. This was at 4PM. Next thing I know, it’s 10PM. I must have been more knackered than I thought. The day was finished off with the obligatory “few cans”, and I headed off to bed some time around 4ish.

So, that was the story of my first full day of being into my 4th decade. Not bad going considering I wasn’t actually going to blog about it. And now, I’m off to take photos of a pothole, or I might wait until the chippy is open, and kill two birds with one stone. Pothole photography and chips. Being 30 is AWESOME.

This time of year seems to come around too quickly. It is mere hours until this blog enters its ninth year, and as you’ve probably realised over these years, it’s also the time of year when I post the least. This is a combination of being insanely busy at Employment Palace, and the fact that nothing ever seems to happen in October. Ever.

But, it’s November now, and exactly a month before the conclusion of the “Before I’m 30″ section of the site. Ugh. Something did happen a couple of weeks ago, which I personally couldn’t believe, and it happened in Asda… I started blogging about it, but didn’t finish it, because I was so filled with rage, that if I’d have gone any further with it, I’d have smashed something…

I’ve truly had it with Asda. Today was the last straw, and I shall never step foot through the doors of their sorry organisation as long as I draw breath.

“Well, I’m not going to serve him either because I know he’s going to give them to you”…

That’s where I stopped typing! Needless to say, I walked out without the beer, and . Quite unbelievably, for anyone who knows me, I have stayed out of Asda since that incident, and now, I can’t see any reason to ever go back.

There WAS one reason. It was the only place I knew which stocked “Tymbark”. Now, I’ll not be surprised if you’ve never heard of it, as it’s Polish. That’s Polish, as in, it originates from Poland, and not the cleaning product. My dietary habits, no matter how bad they are, have yet to see me consuming Mr. Sheen. It is a fantastic blend of cherry and apple juice, which was stocked in Asda’s “Ethnic” aisle.

Whilst in Tesco the other day, I was delighted to find that they also stocked the very same product! Therefore, I officially have no reason to ever stagger through the doors of Asda again!

Right. Erm, that’s the first thing. I’ve actually forgotten the reason why I was going to write this post.

Well, there’s three days off work, which have disappeared quicker than the analogy I originally thought of when I started typing this sentence. It’s actually been a good few days off.

Firstly, it’s not been wasted, which is a good thing. Unfortunately, the bad things include being incinerated to a crisp. You’d have thought that I’d have built up some immunity to the sun as a child, seeing as I was only ever allowed to “play out” until 6PM, before my mother appeared at the door, screaming my name at the top of her lungs, ordering me to come in. Hence Chad’s recent comment-posing name of “6-O Clock Curfew”.

Don’t worry, it took me a while to work it out too!

Er, anyway. Back to what has been going on recently.

Monday, unfortunately was a day that can just be scrubbed off the calendar altogether. After finishing a nightshift, I decided to just stay in bed until about 8PM. I don’t like doing that, but sometimes it’s necessary to get a few good hours of sleep inside of me. Therefore, the day was entirely wasted. Unless you count sleep, in that case, it was pretty much perfect.

So, Tuesday was the day when I began to get things done. The weather was ideal. Daddykins left Mercuryvapour Towers at approximately 11, in order to get the car MOT’d. I was kicking things around the house, when I decided that the grass out of the front needs mowing. It had been a couple of weeks since I’d done it. In fact, I blogged about it in here, thanks to the fact the mower shedded two blades.

Surely, the same thing couldn’t happen again.

After completing the majority of the garden, I ran over a piece of innocent looking grass…

“BANG! BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

Sigh. Another blade gone. I can only apologise for this piece of deja-vu, but… I replaced the blade, and once again began to cut the grass.

“BANG! BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

Christ almighty. Two blades, shattered in less than 15 seconds. Only this time, this came from a different piece of grass. Four blades in 2 mowings. I’m beginning to think our mower is fucked.

During my time shredding turf, I took a look at the front piece of the garden. There is a small portion at the top of the garden which normally “houses” daffodils in the spring, but the rest of the year, it’s a weed trap. Now, I’ve been paying more attention to this bit of the garden than what I’ve let on, and had recently de-weeded it, meaning it actually looked just like a bare piece of land.

Daddykins was home by this point, and helped remove some freshly sprouted weeds. Mostly dandelions, thanks to the state it was in last year. At this point, I said something in jest, about going to Focus and getting some plants. I also wanted to get my hair cut. The two things weren’t connected, but what was left of my hair, was a mess.

Daddykins drove me to the barbers. Turns out the temperature on the long gravel driveway of Mercuryvapour Towers was 29 degrees. It wasn’t until I sat in the barbers chair that I realised just how much sun I’d caught. As the lovely lady combed my hair, it felt like 10,000 white-hot needles were beng scraped across my scalp. Oh yes, I was sunburned, and sunburned good. Bugger.

I left the barbers, devoid of hair, and returned back to the car.

“So, do you want to go to Focus, then?”

After realising that I’d known nothing about gardening, I suddenly wondered if this was a good idea after all. I decided against it, but seeing as Focus was on the way home anyway, we decided to call in. A lighter wallet, 6 fuschia plants and a marigold plant later, we returned home. Whilst Daddykins cooked some eggs for the “Twat Cup” taking place later that evening, I went out of the front, and planted the afore mentioned plants.

The Twat Cup itself, went off without much of an incident, except I was almost “accused” of cheating at dominoes, because I didn’t let the other player pick first after it was my “shuffle”. Tsk. I explained that it was the first time I’d literally versed anyone at dominoes that wasn’t over the internet, and wasn’t aware of the finer, physical rules of the game, but was totally aware now, should I ever verse another human being at the afore-mentioned bar game. It’s unlikely, but it may happen. Remember, kids! After you shuffle, allow the other player to pick their dominoes first! Trust me, it’ll save you earache in the future. Honestly.

Chris was missing for the Twat Cup, so when I returned home I texted him to see where he was. Unfortunately, I don’t have my phone to hand, so can’t tell you exactly how the conversation went, and thanks to winning £15 and having plenty of free whisky, I was slightly the worse for wear.

So, off went Tuesday, and onto Wednesday. I awoke, in a funny position on the sofa, early enough to consider a trip to the flea market. After it was apparent that the quality of the previous nights’ ale had resorted my anus to the role of “shite fountain”, I was hesitant. Considering the sun was, once again cracking the pavements, I deicded to head off in the general direction of the flea market. It was, unfortunately, pathetic.

Eric had replaced his 50p CDs with another load of cheap, shitty DVDs. I ended up spending one, whole British pound on a “Best of T’Pau” CD. This was a CD I’d owned back in the early 1990s, but got destroyed in what I would claim was the worst week of my life, back in summer 1995.

Either way, I have a copy of it again. And, you’ll have to thank Chad once again for my T’pau interest. If he hadn’t had sold me this cassette tape back in 1988/1989, I’d have less of a knowledge of Carol Decker and the rest of the band, and their overly distorted percussion.

So, I returned home from the flea market. I decided to go out the front and begin documenting the life of my plants, whic were only planted yesterday. This involved some pretty graphic closeups…

Whilst taking photos, I returned to the alley, to view my images. It was the only place dark enough to be able to see the camera screen. I happened to look down the gravel driveway. At the end of it was a figure, clad in a high-viz vest, bicycle and camera. It could only be one person. Yes, it was Andy The Iridium Fan. I wanved, making him aware of my presence, and he cycled up the gravel driveway, and explained his prescence. Apparently, there wasn’t an actual reason, except for getting his picture taken on the “windowcam”.

Considering both of us had the rest of the day free, there was a little discussion on where to go, or what to do. I think I mentioned Durham, before quickly putting that idea on the back burner, seeing as that the only things burning would be me, on the bus to Durham. After the trip with Chris, earlier on in the year, I decided that public transport wouldn’t be the best idea, considering I’d be cooking all of the way there.

Andrew did mention the “Then and Now” exhibition on at the art gallery in Church Square, taken by Mail photographer Tom Collins. He had visited it at the weekend, and said it was great. And, considering I love stuff like that, I decided that this was the best idea ever. And for the paltry price of 50p, you could get to the top of Christchurch’s tower too. Something that I’d seen hundreds of pictures of, but never had any to climb up and call my own…

It’s around now that the photoblog starts, so for all of you who have scrolled this far, you’ll get your first pictures.

After paying your 50p, you can escalate the stairs that takes you up to the clock tower. After many dodgy experiences with climbing monuments, such as the Arc D’ Triomphe, the Scott Monument and more recently, York Minster, I was happy to find that the staircase was perfectly acceptable. You can even stop off on the way and take photos….

When you reach the top, it’s entirely different to what I thought it would be like. After seeing the few hundred pictures on sites such as flickr taken from the top of it, actually going up there and taking your own personal view of the location adds a hell of a lot to it. Since I was a kid, the Transporter Bridge is one of those things I’ve always wondered if it was visible from Hartlepool. I have never received any photographic evidence to say whether this was the case, until today….

Click the image, as you might have to zoom in a little to view it!

I’ve noticed, on flickr, that there’s normally only a couple of photos taken from Christchurch. Here’s approximately 56 of the fuckers… http://www.flickr.com/photos/mercuryvapour/archives/date-taken/2009/06/24/

Well, it appears that summer, or at least, some pleasant warm weather is here at last. It seems like only yesterday I was taking photos of the floor, and the several inches of snow laying on the sweeping lawns and gardens of Mercuryvapour Towers. Instead, I have to go out and mow the bloody things.

In fact, that’s a good a place to start as any. Yes, cutting the grass. After awaking on Saturday morning, and seeing the glorous sunshine outside, I thought I’d do the front garden. I’ve made a conscious effort to actually look after it this year. Well, by that, I mean butchering the hedge so that there’s not a leaf left on it, and cutting the grass to within a millimetre of its life.

I dragged the lawn mower out into the garden, after completing the whole rigmarole of finding somewhere to plug it in which doesn’t result in a wire trailing all of the way through the house. Eventually, a suitable outlet was found, and I plugged in the lawn mower. On it went, and after approximately six seconds.

“BANG! BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

That’s supposed to imitate the sound of one of the blades coming off, thus making the rotating thing imbalanced, then vibrate like a motherfucker, for want of a better term. Indeed, the blade has snapped. Grrr. Oddly, the repacement blades are scattered throughout the house, with absolutely no rhyme or reason. To prove this, I located a repacement blade on the telephone table near the front door. Clearly, a strange place to keep a small item of gardening equipment.

I replaced the blade, and once again began to cut the grass.

“BANG! BRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!”

Christ almighty. Two blades, shattered in less than 15 seconds of the mower actually being switched on. I have no idea if this is a record, but I once again located a blade in a strange place, this time the kitchen windowsill. I reliased that my luck of finding these blades was bound to run out sooner or later, especially if they were snapping at this rate, and I’d be left with a half-cut front garden.

Amazingly, after the 2nd replacement blade was finished, I managed to complete the garden without incident.

After I’d completed this, I slapped one of the broken blades in my pocket, as it was the only way I would know which ones we needed. We headed (Daddykins and I) off to Focus and pick up a few things. Replacement blades were, of course, on the agenda, along with a new fluorescent tube for the off-shot, which now doubles up as my darts oche.

I headed off randomly to find the lighting section. whilst Daddykins hovered around the door handles, in an attempt to replace a broken handle in an undocumented and uninteresting door handle snapping incident several months ago. I just happened to be walking around the DIY-door area (which is roughly between the door handle section and the lighting section), when I spy something which caught my interest. Something which someone had placed on the shelf after they decided they didn’t want it. A blister-pack of replacement blades for a Flymo. Hmmm. Our mower is a Flymo, and these look strangely familiar…

I examined the code on my broken blade. They were the exact type I needed, just left abandoned in a random part of the store, as if someone had just placed them there, knowing I was going to come down this way. It was one of those coincidences which I am sure I’ll be sad enough to tell everyone I meet… or maybe not.

Daddykins also attempted to buy some pea seeds, seeing as he caught the little fecker that just happened to be eating his current crop of afore-mentioned green vegetables…

Don’t worry kids, he’s only sleeping. With his eyes open, because what remains of his skull is pushing his eyes out of the sockets. And his bed is at the bottom of our wheelie bin. It seems to be the season for photographing dead stuff. This time one year ago was the time I photographed the dead hedgehog, which has since became my 5th most visited photo on flickr.

Um, moving on swiftly. I also bought a new box to store some of my records in, also from Focus. Shouldn’t have bothered. It cost me nearly 8 quid, and I didn’t realise. For the record, the fluorescent tube cost me £3.99.

So, after the excitement of Focus, we went to Netto. I didn’t buy much, though one of the things I did place in the trolley was a 24x pack of Carlsberg. This turned out to be a mistake. Not because of the beer content, but because at least one of the cans was damaged.

Between lifting the beers out of the car and through the door, I noticed a wet patch on my chest. This wasn’t the time of the month where I usually lactate, so I thought this was a bit odd. Indeed, the pathetic amount of packaging around the cans had claimed a victim, and one of the cans was punctured. Grrr. Before I had time to get mad, however, the phone rang. Chris said he was on his way up, so I arranged to meet him half way, as I had something else to do, and we might as well both walk along.

After returning home, I showed him the new dartboard setup, and almost made him marvel at the wonderment of my new, shiny, fluorescent tube. OK, I’m not that bad, but I’m sure I mentioned it at least once. After a quick game of darts, I decided that it was just too nice a night to sit in and watch telly/play darts/listen to my shite music, etc. He agreed, and we headed off in the general direction of Hart Village. It’s a perfectly acceptable walk. It’s all uphill, nice scenery, and yes, there’s a couple of pubs there too.

After having a quick walk around, we entered one of the afore-mentioned watering holes, namely the Raby Arms. It’s a nice place, but not something you would call a “local”, as the only people that were in there looked to be attending some type of function. Not that I particularly minded. The weather was warm, the beer garden was cool, and the alcohol was refreshingly cheap. For a place such as this, it was a nice surprise to receive change from a fiver for 2 pints.

After a few minutes, we headed inside the pub itself, as Chris claimed it was too cold. David Icke has said a lot of things in his time, but for *anyone* to find it too cold, on the hottest day of the year by far, they clearly must be some type of cold-blooded reptile. Or I’m exceedingly warm-blooded. One of the two. Considering everyone else in the town appeared to be showing vast amounts of bare flesh, I can’t have been in the minority.

The holiday was discussed, and unfortunately, Jonathan has pulled out of this years’ trip, after finding the lure of another trip down under too good to resist. I’m not sure, as of yet, if this will put a hold on this year’s holiday plans. We certainly seem to be leaving it late to book stuff.

In other news, I have once again removed my beard. Aftyer the trip to Raby Arms, I found it physically impossible to drink from a glass without it all dribbling down my chin. I must have been a sight. Now, for exactly 2 minutes, I removed the beard, but left the moustache. Now, there was no real reason for this, I just wanted to see what it looked like. The answer? Ned Flanders. No photographic evidence exists of me with just a moustache, but all of the signs are there if you think about it. Sigh, again.

Hart was once again the destination on Sunday, when Andy the Iridium fan called round. Once again, I was too warm to sit in the house, so off we went in the general direction of Hart. This time, Andy took his camera, while mine remained at home. I’ll explain why in a minute. Either way, I was happy with the shot I took here…

It’s the cropped version, but still looks awesome. I’d love a macro lens for my camera, especially if I can get results like that with just the stock lens. You can view all of the photos taken on that day here. It’s the first time I’ve posted a link to a flickr set for some time.

As for the reason why I didn’t take my camera, well, it’s pretty ill at the moment. I went to take a picture the other day. I switched it on, only to get the message “NO CARD”. Bugger. I couldn’t remember taking the card out of the camera, so I searched high and low for it, in all of the normal places, with no sign. I never thought to have a look in the camera itself…

The card was RIGHT THERE. Inside the camera. Joy. I removed the card, and inserted it again…

“NO CARD”.

Thinking my 16Gb card was fucked, I nipped upstairs, and got my other one. Inserted it, and “NO CARD” again. Sigh, once again. My 2Gb card produced the same results. Arrrrgh. So, I inserted/removed the card a number of times. Clearly this was enough to restore the contacts, as the camera recognised the card after that, but I am a bit annoyed. My experience with electronic devices points me in the direction of this happening again, and frequently, until the camera is useless. Whilst the camera is under warranty, do I send it back now, or wait until it dies completely? This is clearly an intermittent problem.