A scottish man walks into a baker's shop and asks "Is that a doughnut or a meringue?" The baker replies: "Naw, yer right enough, it's a doughnut".
I had a very nice curry on Friday night, although that was mainyl to avoid cooking after a grisly day.
[ZK] Not a shockingly bad playlist, but, given that (I believe) you're a shade younger than I, shouldn't you be knocking out some more banging tunes than I did when spinning the wheels of steel plastic in 1995?
[ZK] Good playlist! Good luck with your next show. Which night do you broadcast?
[Projoy] I never understood what Tag Wrestling is all about - can you explain to me please.
And ... bye bye you lovely people ... I shan't be around for quite a long time but hope to have lots of news when I get back :-)
Should also point out that I'll be in an Manchester-Edinburgh limbo for the next week, and net access may be rather more patchy as I haven't got round even to arranging old-fashioned telephone communications technology at the new abode yet.
Let me however try to give me a feel for why Peel was a much-loved figure in music. First, he's been on the modern (Beatles onwards) pop music scene for as long as that scene existed - in fact he used his Liverpudlian connection to get himself a job in the States on the back of the Beatles' success at the start of his career. He genuinely seemed to love all music that had been created with a passion, right from Belgian nosebleed noisethrash mp3s through to jazz standards recorded on crackly 78's. His Radio 1 programme would typically showcase both of these and everything inbetweeen. His links were usually extremely witty and peppered with little anecdotes about the band whose music he'd played, or some little story about how he came about purchasing that particular bit of green vinyl from a backstreet record shop in Groningen. Even as he was starting to draw a pension, he was still producing two hour shows three times a week. The consequences are severalfold: (i) he gave people who tired of the formulaic easy-listening pap that makes up most of a radio station's playlist a refuge where something more challenging could be found (but without taking it too seriously like what more eclectic programmes on R3 do); (ii) this exposure to a wider range of music (such as, I understand the DIY ethos of the punk movement) inspired many people to start making music themselves (see the tributes passim); (iii) it also gave budding musicians something to aspire to, viz getting Peel to give them a session and help get them noticed (if they were any good); (iv) it also created the impression that he would always be there, one of the reasons why he is sorely missed.
It's impossible to know how different the pop music tapestry would be without him; but I think it's wholly appropriate that he should be saluted for having made a huge contribution to the particular way it came to be woven. I think that's what people mean when they say he's a 'great of music'.
But what I'm really listening to is the sound of my going up the wall as the local anaesthetic from my dentist's visit wears off and my gums itch and my teeth hurt. Aargh!
Back to your regularly scheduled programme.
There is the additional worry that if this broom handle pounding is performed that you will be providing a readily accessible spiked club with which one might be, how shall I put it, persuaded of the error of one's ways by an irate spouse, partner, or owner of said hardwood floor, so maybe we should just be content with the one hat after all.
Double-glazing salesperson: "I just want to ask you - if you could have any room in your house double-glazed for free, which would it be?
Self: "None of them, but thanks for calling." [Click]
Financial services salesperson: "Do you have a couple of minutes to take part in a customer survey?
Self: "No, but thanks for calling." [Click]
Door to door religious salesperson: "Can I interest you in the word of the Lord?
Self: "No, but thanks for stopping by." [Click]
I find that the little gesture of politeness catches them momentarily off their guard and enables you to put the phone down or close the door with a clear conscience and without leaving an opportunity for comeback.
Meanwhile, I wish the person calling the phone in the next office would get used to the idea there's nobody there...
However, he lacked (1) the same middle name as me, and more importantly (2) the ability to learn something such as Chopin's Polonaise in A flat in less than a week, be able to hack the second half of Rachmaninov's cello sonata in four days or - as happened today - when accompanying a baroque-music oboe class in which the student was playing on a modern instrument and the teacher on a Baroque instrument which was tuned a semitone flatter - to sight-read the same piece both in the original A minor and transposed into A flat minor, switching between them every two minutes depending on which one of the two was playing which instrument at the time.
Which is why I make a reasonably survivable living that pays the bills and mortgage working freelance at the RNCM: whereas he gave up the piano completely, went to study law, and had two houses and no mortgages within the first four years after completing his studies... *sigh*
[pen] May I assure you that my gussets are always lemon-fresh.
But what's going on here? Why was the Tag Wrestling just killed like that instead of having another round? Why are other games that should have been killed twenty years ago still limping on with festering wounds and a slightly disgusting smell? Why do I bother?
It's actually quite interesting.
Does anyone fancy revisiting Animal/Vegetable/Mineral/Abstract?
(It also helps if you kill off everyone who actively opposes the sort of thing you like.)
It became fashionable as a jazz instrument in the Berlin salons of the 1920s, because of its resolutely unmelodious nature in all but the most skilled of hands (just like, say, the double bass) but mostly because it could be eaten in extremity (very much unlike, say, the double bass).
Oh well.
There you have it a colourised experimental game. If play becomes fraught it will make way for something else. Is there a point? After watching Paul Burrel eat a kangaroo’s testicle … probably not.
[The Spirit of Winter]
Bring on your frosts of spectre-grey, your frozen leaves and skies of dun! The weakening eye of day can never chill; for friendship doth not turn cold when that warm heart that beats deep within fires the furnace of goodwill. Thus shall this community seek the warmth of its homely hearth whilst the dregs of winter's spirit is humbled ...
Bah! I enjoyed that poetic exchange and would have happily crossed further swords with the 'spirit', teetering, as we were, on the brink of yet another 'Winter versus Summer Debate'.
So the follow-up disappointed somewhat, whilst bringing to mind Wot Dan Said in MCiOS a couple of weeks back [and I paraphrase] - anonymous posting by regulars is relatively harmless fun ... however, if the post is directed at a named person, perhaps it's fairer not to hide behind the cloak of anonymity?
*throws down gauntlet in the spirit of goodwill* :-)
On the weekend we went out and bought our Christmas tree. After I had put on the lights it was for the boys to hang the decorations on the tree. Francis, likes to let Owen know the benefits of being his big brother, as frequently as possible. Putting baubles on the tree he was able to put his extra height to advantage “…and another one up here, and this one can go near the top over here…”. Being the uneven handed dad I am I helped Owen put a couple at the same height to end that bit of squabbling. Which left Tom the toddler, who with a little bit of help was able to put the fairy on top and with the highest bauble. The finished tree looks wonderful.
