Lucky thirteen begins

I hope you enjoyed whatever you were doing to see in the New Year, I couldn’t have any alcohol, hence no hangover, and saw it in alone but I was not lonely, for a change. I had thought the neighbours from hell would mark the arrival with a bang and a huge wheelie bin fire, especially as they’ve been quiet for the past 2 weeks, but they went out by car early on.

I watched the New Year in with Jools Holland (as always) before turning over to watch Fletch, I just love Chevy Chase because he remains deadpan to deliver the one liners which makes them even funnier somehow. After Fletch I turned the box off and the lights on to wish my friends a Happy New Year, at least those I knew would still be up. I don’t have many friends which some might find strange, I go for quality not quantity and always have.

Anyway, I just want to say that I have every intention of putting some content on here more regularly in 2013 than I did in 2012, I hope you enjoy my rants, raves and laughs this year and everyone should enjoy life, living and not have any fears, whatever you do enjoy this year, and remember today is the first day of the rest of your life!

Happy New Year one and all.

Sorry I missed you

I was going to write this entry yesterday but went shopping instead, what can you do, I mean we all have to eat drink and make merry. Especially at this time of year, although in my case, this time of year makes me think of different ways to end it all. I suffer from manic depression (I think they call it bi-polar disorder now) and seasonally affected disorder (more commonly referred to as SAD). That means if I don’t see a whole lot of sunshine (and who has this year?) it brings me down, not just the blues, I get full on depression which I hide as well as I can until I get home. Probably explains why I go through women like liver salts through a body.

Anyway, I got to thinking what I’ve done with my life thus far, what I would’ve changed and how different things could’ve turned out. If I could’ve done one thing that would’ve kept my attention for more than 5 minutes it would’ve been something to do with music. Either playing it, making it or introducing it to an audience. Throughout my life music has been the only constant feature since I was 3 years old. My teenage cousin was into American rock n roll, Buddy Holly, Paul Anka, Little Richard, and Fats Domino, as well as the British contingent of the time, Marty Wilde, Adam Faith, Billy Fury, Joe Brown and Cliff Richard and the Shadows. I soaked all this up like a sponge so that when I heard music on the radio I put it into only 2 categories: music I liked, and music I didn’t like.

In the mid 70’s I was in London and, along with 4 friends from work, started rehearsing in a garage hoping to perform at one of the numerous pubs which featured live music at that time. The vocalist was another Dave and he also played guitar, I played drums, there was a John on bass, another John on keyboards and the rhythm guitar was played by Jon King (not Jonathan King) but we called him 3. We started rehearsing one Friday with a load of booze and only stopped when the police told us to keep the noise down, I think it was about 1:30 then. Anyway, the vocalist never thought we sounded tight enough to get paid and after 3 years Dave, 3 and I called it a day. My marriage was on the rocks and I decided to go home and lick my wounds with my then girlfriend. The other 2 were getting another group together but with nowhere to stay I decided to sell the drum kit and head North.

I went to college while I took stock of what to do next, one of the classes was drama and one of the assignments was to go off in pairs and create an imaginary radio show. As I was absent the day the assignment was given out (and the class had an odd number of students) I was given permission to do something “by myself”. When the tapes had been graded I was awarded an A+ as the only student to start with a theme tune, have “guests” chatting about music and a competition. I had also filled up 1 entire 30 minutes of tape which no pair had come close to. The tape was played to the entire class and I was asked who I’d had in to do the guest spots, I said it was all just me, a bottle of Jack and an ounce of herb which no-one believed. The teacher held onto my cassette while everyone else was given theirs back. Needless to say I passed that subject at the end of the year but I never did hear back from the lecturer so don’t know what happened to the tape, whether she used it as an example to other classes of what can be achieved I’ll never know.

That’s all for now so I hope you have a Happy and prosperous lucky ’13 I hope to catch you again soon.

Wow isn’t Mother Nature angry

Yesterday, 28 June 2012, will remain in my memory for a long time. I went out in the morning and, although it was raining it was very warm, on my way home the sun was shining which lifted my spirits. After dinner, I decided to take 5 before deciding whether to go back out or not. 20 minutes later I was pleased with that decision as the sky darkened I could hear rumbles of thunder so I moved position so I could watch the sky. I didn’t have to wait very long for the rain and flashes of lightning to start. Within an extremely short space of time the rain became torrential and the lightning, while not being continuous, must have been very close as the thunder followed within a second.
The beauty of the storm, natures very own firework display, soon changed as the street outside became a fast flowing river. While watching the local news last night I heard that Newcastle’s city centre Metro stations, all of which are underground, had all been flooded. Lots of roads in and around Newcastle were impassible which led to buses being cancelled and cars abandoned.
Yes, I thought, this is heading towards the end of the beginning. Ok I don’t subscribe to the belief the planet will end on 21 December 2012, however, I do believe that we are building towards a climax of epic proportions on that date as Mother Nature tries to fix the ecological imbalance which we have created.
My friends, fellow bloggers, and readers of this blog, I would be interested to find out your thoughts on this. Nature is concerned with survival of the planet and not survival of any species living here, do you think mankind can survive for another few millennia or are we destined to die out after a few hundred years more?