A big thank you to the equine hero
Comply or Die and jockey Timmy Murphy - a spread £10 bet that I could barely afford nicely netted me a smidgen over a ton. It has made my weekend - cheers guys!
What the chuff is going on with the weather? 18 degrees on Friday, zero degrees and 3 inches of snow on Sunday! I'm not complaining mind - it's always an amazing feeling to wake up and be hit by the white light of a freshly laid snowy landscape. We drove to
Mickleham in Surrey on Saturday to stay with friends Heather, Kent and their little man
Noah. This morning was the first time he had ever played in snow properly and it was amazing to watch his reaction. He wasn't sure at first, so I made a huge snowball and dropped it on my head...much to his amusement, and it triggered an association that will last for a lifetime...Snow is fun! Great to watch him pottering around, fascinated by his footprints, the coldness and texture of the snow, the silence of it falling and the near blinding whiteness. A great night on Saturday - drinks, chats, nosh (good old
Dominos - ah the memories...check this
link out for related madness) and that shaky hand late night
fav.
Jenga. Kent has bought a
StormTrooper helmet which Noah has developed a
penchase to as well. A generally chill weekend all in all though - needed a 'doing very little' one to recharge. During the week I have to be dragged out of bed, but I always wake up really early at weekends, keen not to waste my free days and go do stuff, but was happy to splat for this one. Did achieve quite a bit though - very nearly finished my promo website, span the turning wheels a bit more etc. Went for a great Sunday lunch and few pints at
The Nightingale with C, Darby and Duncan today - could well become our regular boozer. A real local's traditional sort pub, with good nosh and bitter.
Work...well it's Schmerk to be quite honest. Won't waste much more finger energy on it than that this time but...Going to put my noodle in turbo this week and try to keep my head above water. Some good projects on the go at the moment, but there are some important parts of my job I am not even scratching the surface of due to other commitments. It's rapidly dawning on me that in times of strife in 'this company' you just have to think of yourself, because when you play the helpful considerate team player you just get used and taken advantage of. Selfishness isn't a natural way of thinking for me, though self preservation is and because no one else is going to look out for me at the moment maybe that's card I have to play. A sorry state of affairs so it is. Schmerk aside there's lots to look forward to - a meeting about a photography gig, starting an illustration commission/present, drinks and meets with some old muckers.
The festival ticket sales have started - it's like a gold rush these days. When I started going to festies in 1989 (those halcyon days) it was all so simple...pop down to Jumbo Records in Leeds a few weeks before the event and hand over your hard saved £45 for a guaranteed 4 days of good tunes, scrumpy, pot noodles and laughs. These days you have to play a lottery with your ISP to see if you even get on to an already crashing website and then there's no guarantee you'll even get an (overpriced) ticket. Anyway, we managed to get tickets for
Latitude in Southwold, Suffolk - heard great things about it. We went to
Electric Picnic in Ireland a few years ago (the best festy I've ever been to by a long shot), and Latitude is said to be a similar sort of do and has the same vibe - can't wait. On a slight bummer - The tickets I ordered for
My Bloody Valentine at The Roundhouse in June have gone astray, as have my confirmation and any record of the order (but I know I booked them). Slightly upsetting as I REALLY want to see them again. A lifeline is in the pipeline apparently.
A big thanks to
PaintMonkey for his generous offer this week - looking forward to seeing your amazing work dude.
Plodding through Mind Eye still - it's all getting a bit samey and tedious, but will persevere.
Tunes of the week: Never loose that feeling by Club AC30: A load of old school shoegaze covers by NuGazers. Not as bad as it sounds!
Nye for bow.
YouTube has been banned at work by the IT bods. I'm still not sure of the reason, but am trying to find out. The thing is YouTube is a fantastic communication and networking tool (as is FaceBook...also banned). Granted there's a load of rubbish on there, but you don't have to look at it. I guess there were too many incidents where people were searching for the Mighty Boosh instead of doing their work (or maybe they were looking for things altogether darker)!
