The great F1 swindle... self-delusion by drivers? Never...

OK, ok, it's not music related. But it is a big "I told you so", and we've all got to feel smug sometimes.

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?PO_ID=40795&PO=40795

So Felipe Massa thinks Ferrari deserve their F1 constructors title, does he? Come on mate, you should have kept your mouth shut. At least then if Ferrari had kept saying "no comment" we could limp to the end of the season and let the 2007 championship whimper to a close and lick its' wounds in time for 2008.

But no, the idiot had to open his big, fat, stupid mouth. And now everybody will be thinking that Ferrari are paranoid that nobody thinks they deserve the title. So now, in everybody's eyes, they won't!

Well done, there's a hole in your foot guys.

I don't like to extend political intrigue in sports (it diverts from everything that's good about sport) but in this case I had to say something. F1 sucks, it really really does. It's like Heathrow, it can't grow any more without pissing people off (the technology has become too big a factor) but if it doesn't grow people will think it has failed.

Let's hope F1 can find a new direction, or it'll implode in more messy ways next year. Meantime, don't watch grand prix... it's pretty boring.

small gigs, small rigs...

Tomorrow night we're at the Bricklayer's in Marston, Steve's local, tiny pub for the big noise that is Janeiro: they love it tho. I have to remember to bring mic cables so I can get sone singing in!

I'll take just the combo and 2x10 I reckon. The crating up of the two big speakers is pretty much complete, now I have to weigh them and work out how much it'll cost to ship them! On the plus side it's original boxes, so they're up to the task. Was a pain getting the boxes down from the loft.

Our pond is drying up: don't know why, but the ducks are looking worried. Think we'll have to work this one out for ourselves. Could get messy.

Btw, if you've got a wii, there are actually websites out there where you can register you wii number so connecting yourself to local gamers!

In an effort to look more well-rounded...

OK, I admit it, it's been a while since my last gig(!) - I do think about other stuff though, hate you to think I'm a one-trick pony.

So stuff I've noticed - F1

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?PO_ID=40767&PO=40767 - so Juan Pablo Montoya, the world's greatest has-been in F1 (let's face it, he's a better driver than I'll ever be, but that's not the point of being a sports fan, is it?) slags off the way F1 works. Well mate, now you're really playing with the big boys at NASCAR, driving around and around in circles on unchallenging tracks and able to bang your steed off anyone who gets in your way (never did work with F1 cars did it you lead footed hot headed tit?) after quitting halfway through the 2006 season you're obviously hugely qualified to comment on the state of F1...

Honestly, what a cack-headed dimwit.

The Dilbert Blog -

http://dilbertblog.typepad.com/the_dilbert_blog/2007/09/900-pound-man.html (latest story)

I don't believe it, the man who writes Dilbert has time to write an acidic blog... and he's got plenty to say on a lot of stuff. Gets a lot of good comment traffic too. Well worth the odd peruse.

And if my post last night from the Globe during the intermission (complete, I might add, with elizabethan musicians on the stage!) wasn't enough to persuade you to go see a show there - I'll reiterate - the complete lack of technological stuff in there (aside from the standard white lights so everybody can see) means you just have the play, the words, the fun, the actors voices: I've never found a Shakespeare comedy quite so funny! Who thought ol' Will did fart gags? And bloody long ones too, Family Guy have a real lineage behind them (no pun intended).

Tonight I'll be packing up huge speaker cabinets in prep for selling the buggers on eBay. You heard it first here folks, I'm cutting at least 20Kgs off the 900W warwick stack by buying new cabs. Woohoo!

surprise theatre!

Alas alack-no!

I'm watching shakespear at the globe!

This place is fantastic-and the guys playing are really funny. One of the leads is on crutches (accident, not character!) and he's been using them to great effect.

Northern Rock, etc... and that McCann thing...

Right, non-contentious as ever.

So northern rock shares have rallied, hmmm? Well well well... do you think people might have bought some when they thought it had bottomed out? Oh wow, that could never happen... this doesn't mean a thing! And the government saying they'll guarantee every penny? Well, it seems to have worked in Leeds and Manchester... but surprise surprise, you get further south (north london) and they were queueing at 1am again this morning.

"I don't trust my life savings on the govt's promise" seems to be something the nearly-deads queueing outside the branch are saying. And we still don't know what the postal and electronic transfers are going to do yet... watch his space.

In other points, I'm seriously glad to see the Portugese police pointing out that engaging celebrities and high-ranking british officials is a pain in the arse:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/09/18/nmaddy318.xml

I suppose they might be feeling a little like their every move is being scrutinised - but just to play devil's advocate... if you'd engaged in a high-stakes high-media savvy attempt to cover up something that happened to a member of your family accidentally ( it has happened comparatively recently you know - the news conferences by the tearful boyfriend, etc and it turns out they're guilty... ) would you keep raising the stakes? I mean to say, getting Gordo to set out your case???? Holy crap, I hope Mr Brown has more sense than to get involved...

Oh - and I heard on radio 4 earlier on the classic politician-has-ears-shut response to constant calls from almost every phoned-in caller for ELECTORAL SYSTEM REFORM.

We keep shouting, they ( i.e. the two main parties ) keep shifting in their seats and nervously bleating about "minority parties having too much power"...

Look, either give us a "none of the above" or do something about that crappy one-past-the-post bullshit.

D'oh!

Wait a moment... that sounds like Rock and/or Panic...



Good fun generator, that one - http://www.signgenerator.org/church/

Northern rock... who'da thunk it?

I'm at home with a cold today, (ahhh stoppit I don't need sympathy I need more beechams) and I've seen a few more reports about what's going on with Northern Rock. Now you'll know I follow the UK mortgage market with a cynical eye so you'll find no surprise in a degree of schadenfreude on my part... but the extent to which the media-fuelled paranoia is becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy is just staggering me. Once some speed gets into a story like this now, it's amazing how people will run with it.

So people are still queueing outside branches (although if you believe GMTV there aren't any north of Kingston), trying to extract their savings. Hmmm. As long as you keep reporting this, I think it'll keep happening, chaps.

There's a number of things I've heard this morning which are new, though.

• The head of northern rock accidentally(?) revealing that they can indeed pay everybody who wants their cash - thanks to the loan from the bank of england! No distortion here, he literally said that on GMTV this morning. So, how much real liquid asset do you have, Northern Rock? Hmmmm.
• Northern rock's shares have gone into freefall again this morning (I watched "fun with dick and jane" over the weekend... that poor CEO is reminding me more and more of Jim Carrey) - the pillocks reporting this story and queueing are all going to bring about the takeover of northern rock if they're not careful: then the mortgage holders will end up owing the cash to someone else... someone not so nice? It does throw Fiona from GMTV into stark contrast - the dozy bint was trying to emulate Paxman interviewing the CEO of northern rock this morning while repeatedly mentioning she had her mortgage with them(!!!) - well done dear, there's no amount of foot-shooting you can't achieve with a microphone and your incessantly annoying nasal whine if you put your mind to it.
• Paragon (who are a huge UK mortgage company specialising in buy-to-let - no deposit accounts AT ALL) are being eyeballed as the next to die - they're staunchly saying they've got credit funding secured into mid-2008 but to that, I'd say - who from, and will they still be able to supply the cash? Where are your facility providers getting the credit from? Cash? Or the global (frozen) credit market? Buy to let - your time is nigh. Here's hoping all you property tycoons jump out of the second stories of your ludicrously extended houses and impale yourselves on B&Q conservatory glass panels!!! (me, bitter? Nah)

The ol' google trend for England (the most paranoid in this search in the world, I might add) for "house price crash, mortgage rate" is starting to pick up big time! Clicky clicky for all the good reasons to wait out the storm!

I'll be in my room, sniffing, sneezing and chuckling.

why facebook might survive...

I've heard and read a lot recently about facebook, and how it differs from other social networking sites: the third party app plugins (I'm fond of scrabulous), the status updates, and I've realised they're right, but nobody I've heard so far has summed it up: facebook is more like having some shared experience with old friends, whereas myspace is always more of a "look at me! I'm here!" sort of thing (which you could do with any copy of dreamweaver and a space on the web somewhere, myspace just made it a bit easier for spods).

Although no replacement for getting out and seeing people (which I really need to do more of) it's something more collabarative than old email lists, etc. Maybe it's got something that'll keep it alive: enough quality to keep people updating their status. I'll keep leaning over the e-fence and spying on my mates status for now...

That Flickr experiment...

Didn't work, actually. I ended up trying to send the email three times, but the flickr pic email address seems to be a bit shafted: no worry though, if you include pictures with a post to the blogger email post address it includes the pics in the post, as you can see from the previous post.

And it ends up as a link in the Facebook RSS feed note trawl, which'll do. I'm lay-zee.

Still going to make an app which can post to Facebook, Blogger and Myspace though - once I get some content MP3 wise onto my myspace page I'll be making sure my blog on there gets posted at the same time. Email me if you're interested in the app, or have any suggestions for other sites it should post to: my aim is a tick-box list of sites the prog will post to via web page control, which I'm thinking will happen similtaneously in the background (i.e. it'll post to all of them at the same time, with progress bars for all of them too as it goes).

Cats can be a pain in the arse - our three are predictably great at catching things, but their habit of bringing live stuff in for practise means the poor small furry beasts often die hiding in corners, where they then start to stink after a few days. Not nice. We've aired the house all day and here's still a lingering trace of decompsing mouse.... grr!

We've been harvesting nature's local wonders again. Within 30 feet of the back door are enough brambles and an apple tree with masses of fruit on for the 5 gallons of bramble wine we've got brewing upstairs, two frozen apple and bramble crumbles and now many many pots of apple and bramble jam.

And flying off in another direction... touchscreen Ipods! No need!

Fwd: mega blog picture tastic

Ok, this is a picture of green park in reading where i work. The lakes are actually really nicely done, did get rather full during the floods, but the ducks, fish, swans, geese, and million other living things you can stroll about looking at from bridges after lunch were not bothered.

Why is this a test? Well, flickr gets this from email from my phone, which took the pic, it then posts a new blog on blogger, and facebook then gets the rss feed and it's all dead clever. But as simple as sending one email.

Btw, good time on the 6 string last night, totally funked up on some beats on the pandora. Nice.

Oh dear, well, it had to happen... I'm on Facebook.

And this post is echoed to it as well. That's possibly a good example of why I'm thinking I'll probably keep an account there - I've been thinking recently that E-Mingling is nothing compared to real mingling (which is definitely true) but then again, how much mingling do I get to do these days? Best days of your life, student days. You socialise in a random way which is stimulating, life-affirming and definitely exciting. Adult life just kills all that really!

So in the absence of real mingling, we'll declare that E-mingling will do for now.

BTW, anyone need a bass player to play some danceable stuff?


----- Today's Practise Diary -----This evening Andy will mostly be clearing a space and setting up his studio!

Friday night gig...!?!

Well well well. No sooner am I predicting my own spiritual demise when an O'Neills gig comes along and saves me :) Great night, I was knackered before I started but soon got into it, and the familiar berserker instinct kicked in. Must remember to always bring my own mic cables though. However, the exertions of the night definitely proved to me I could use some more gigs - just lifting the cabs was an effort where normally I wouldn't have a problem.

This should change soon when I get the neodymium (sp? who cares!) cabs for the warwick stack. I'm selling the combo (fully up to speed after the tiny fix to the relay- ran close to flat out all night at O'Neills no worries!), the trace elliot 2x10 cab, the warwick 1x15 and 4x10 and purchasing the 4x10 and 1x15 lightweight cabs Warwick currently have. Smaller, lighter, they should go into car a lot easier and be generally better! Plus, I'll take the stack places more as it won't nearly kill me (and Jamie, and Steve, and Richie.... :) to get them into and out of the venue.

Oxford on friday night seemed a little more out of control than usual - although there's usually a fair number of visible police about (and one night recently a car full of plainclothes?) last friday seemed a little less like people having fun and more of an undercurrent. Maybe my most hated topic, the media, is actually getting to me at last... still, the vespa with alarm shrieking into the 1am night sky with graffiti painted all over it seemed like a valid soundtrack to the closing of the night.

I've signed over the Myspace site to Jamie now, so if you leave messages etc he'll get the emails! I'll still sign on and do stuff (friend adding, etc) but Jamie is doing the admin.

Cheersh punters

A much revitalised Andy.

P.S. did anybody reading this get back to me with stories about why you had kids? Tell me some of you haven't done it by accident... what is it with the UK and not liking children? It's like some new form of the victorian premise of "seen, but not heard" only now we don't even want to see them... I blame the newspapers.