I met up with DaddyPig the other night, supposedly for me to treat him to a night out for his birthday, but as per everything-DsD at the moment, it didn’t work out as planned. What were we doing? I’d gotten myself an invite to a gig organised by SOFAR, or Songs From A Room to give them their full title. Has anybody else here heard of it? If you have, how was your experience? If you haven’t, read on after the pagebreak …
First of all, my apologies to all of you – and particularly amylee - for being a pain in the proverbial about which week I would finally get to host. Let me make it up to you: the [virtual] drinks are on me! House rules? Help yourself to as much as you like from the following dozen boozers. Pick one to add to your list of future presents when someone asks what to get you, and one to pour straight down the sink before it makes you sick.
I finally got an email from WeGotTickets that made me sit up and pay attention. Southern Gothic murder balladeers The Handsome Family are coming over for a short UK tour in May, and three – yes, THREE – of the dates are easy commutes for me. Can I have a quick shout if you’re interested, please, and with a preference for which venue and date?
Manchester @ The Ruby Lounge – Friday 17th May
Leeds Brudenell Social Club – Wednesday 22nd May
Hebden Bridge Trades Club – Saturday 25th May
Tickets are in the ten to fifteen quid price range, and if we choose either of the weekend dates, I’m considering combining it with hosting a daytime Social on the Saturday.
I don’t know The Ruby Lounge, but HB Trades Club isn’t a big venue, and the guy at The Brud told me he expects this to sell out quite quickly there, so if you can feed your pigeon some go-go juice before you send back your replies attached to its leg pouch, I’d appreciate it.
No no, not THAT type of jersey!
I’m not after a jumper, I’m after some Spillers’ tips. We don’t have a holiday booked yet during the school summer break. Lifelong Gerald Durrell fan DsMam has always wanted to go back to Jersey with the kids, as the last time we went was before DsSis was born. (Technically, Jess has been there: Julie was six-or-seven months pregnant with her at the time!) The trouble is, an awful lot of things have changed over the last dozen years, and therefore we’re starting our search again from scratch. We don’t know anybody out there; we don’t know anyone who goes there for holidays; and even my wife’s old school friend the travel agent has long-since sold her business. That means we’re randomly throwing ourselves at the mercy of the mainstream tourist-fleecing holiday companies, and so far it’s looking prohibitively expensive. Tentative forays into independent internet searches are producing some very dodgy results …
… so that’s where you lot come in. Does anyone know of any independent / private cottage or caravan rentals on the island which are clean, green (don’t really want to be crammed into the fourth-floor attic of a St.Helier B&B) and not too dear? Discussions of any vaguely relevant experiences in the last five years or so welcome. Tips of any hidden gems-to-seek-out or pitfalls-to-avoid will be gratefully received.
If you don’t want to discuss them openly on this thread, you’ve all got my email and/or telephone details.
Ah, it’s great to see a band put some effort in. After years of trying, I finally got to a Thunder Christmas Party gig. After this evening, and with pretty much all of my customers having finished work for the holidays at Friday lunchtime, I think I can safely say the holiday season has started.
2012 has been a strange old year, and in some respects I won’t be sad to see the back of it, but on the other hand, there was the Olympics, LFC collecting silverware again, DsSis at the Royal Albert Hall, the West Country RR Social, the truth about Hillsborough, etc., etc.
But as we get to the end of another year (or even a 5,125 year cycle, if you’re Mayan), let’s start the “out with the old, and in with the new” chit-chat, shall we? I wish you all a Merry Christmas, and a better 2013 than you had a 2012.
Hi all,
Well what a lovely birthday treat it was being the RR TempGuru! I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it’s all I can do to resist immediately bugging Adam for a chance to do it again.
You WILL like what DsD has posted, or we’ll send da boys round, capiche?
The last couple of weeks’ selections from Abahachi and AngryIrishPunk gave me a dilemma: do I continue with their policy of driving us down a narrow track, as a way of trying to make you all listen to a dozen (i) classic rock cuts; (ii) Americana adventures; or (iii) minimalist mood-pieces? My long-lists for this thread included enough options for me to do any of those things. Or was it time to give you all a bit of relief; play safe, pick a load of Spill faves, and see how they ended up being ranked? It might have been fun to watch you agonize on how to split one vote four-or-five ways each!
Oh the joy, the relief, the sheer “Thank-F**K-for-that”-edness! (Sorry yet again for the swearies, TFD; I really AM trying to cut down on my bad language.) Computer back, seemingly fixed, installed, online, and all elements so far talking to each other without any problem. Better than that, the PC is now sat on my new one-piece desk which feels so much bigger than the old one I almost feel like inviting you all over to come and have a picnic on it!
So excuse me a little noisy indulgence, whilst I sit back at my workspace and enjoy a few stress-free minutes, before the reality of just how much admin work I’ll now have to catch up on dawns on me.
I’m buyin’! (Only virtually, of course.)
Jess (DsSis) is 11. Time to find that all-important high school.
Dunno if this will link you all directly back to the map, but when AliM said she couldn’t find it, I felt I ought to, as an apology for dissing her “Keep One, Kick One” list.
Cauliflower owns the list, but Tinny is a ‘Collaborator’ with editing privileges, apparently.
… Leeds Brudenell Social Club, that is, the venue of last night’s sets from Damien Jurado and Megafaun.
“Unsocial, DsD?” I hear you ask. Well, yes, in a couple of ways actually.
First of all, I was on me own. No crocodile tears required folks, this gig was never gonna be gordonimmel or DaddyPig‘s bag, though with hindsight, AliM may well have enjoyed it: sorry, Ali.
Secondly, I was of course driving myself to and from the gig, so sobriety was the order of the day. But as I was feeling a beer thirst (it’d been v.hot’n'sticky most of the day, despite the bursts of torrential rain), I had a pint of lager shandy. Gawd only knows why, but it gave me massive, constant expulsions of gas all evening. If I knew who the poor sods behind me were before they made a rapid exit at the end, I’d've been obliged to apologise!
My third gripe is a bit mean of me: I had every intention of getting a T-shirt this evening, but Damien doesn’t do ‘em, and Megafaun only had XS to M left: not a lot of good for the, um, ever-more-generously-proportioned DsD!
Next was the non-appearance of the promised support band. 7pm arrival doors, 8.35 still playing Yahtzee on my phone whilst hiding my new-found gas-propelled levitation skills. OK, the gig was dirt cheap (only a tenner), but if there ain’t gonna be a support band, either don’t put it on the tickets, or at least tell us on arrival.
So anyway, at 8.45, Megafaun climb unannounced and unassuming onto the Brud stage, and for the next 3/4 of an hour give us a happy-go-lucky, slightly shambolic selection of their songs, concentrating very much more on the Grateful Dead / Beach Boys hybrid end of their sound, rather than their “headily absorbing, occasionally unsettling, full-bore concrète music, harsh noise salvos, and wild free-jazz interventions * “ thankfully for me. DsD-fave Get Right (from last year’s eponymous album) was slightly underwhelming – I can lose myself in the 8m30s studio version – but I put that down to it being played early, before we’d all got into a groove. However, they more than made up for that with an extended runthrough of Kaufman’s Ballad, which rocked out much more than the folky album version. They ended the set with Real Slow, which they turned into a lovely noodling jam, and meant they’d left the stage before I realised they hadn’t played Hope You Know, probably their best-known song, and one which is an early contender for the DsD 2012 Festive ‘Spill selections.
I was going to insert a show video of Alberta (the blues number made famous twice by Bob Dylan) here, but my iPhone and YouTube seem to have had a fallout, and aren’t now speaking to each other.
* from Pitchfork reviews … oh, and whilst I’m at it, here’s another quote on the subject of “unsocial” – from the BrightestYoungThings website Megafaun gig review of a show in Washington DC – which after tonight I heartily agree with:
A brief note to the latter half of the audience at the Megafaun show this past Thursday night at the Black Cat’s Backstage: do kindly shut the fuck up next time around. You can go to any random bar on a Thursday night in DC and have a loud, inane conversation while music plays. Why buy a ticket just to ruin a great show for people?
Despite my post title and all the moaning I’ve done so far, I have to say that Megafaun themselves were as social and courteous as it is possible to be. I’ll take this opportunity to thank multi-instrumentalist Phil Cook, for taking the time to write down some links for live sessions I can find on t’interweb, after I’d gushed about that live version of Kaufman’s Ballad. I however, was a little unsocial, or at least ungracious, to Phil in return, as Damien Jurado came on stage as we were talking, and I kinda hurried him up and snuck back to my seat.
Damien Jurado is a very intense performer. With the exception of the idiot couple sat on the floor next to me giggling about Canada, pretty much everyone in the room was absolutely rapt. I swear the old line about hearing a pin drop whist Damien sang is true. But again, you could easily describe his stage prescence as unsocial; the amateur psychologist in me would even have guessed at Asperger’s / borderline autistic had I not been pre-warned (by Shoey amongst others) about his lack of audience interaction. But the performances – WOW! You didn’t need to see his eyes behind those dark glasses to feel the blackness and pain; the lyrics, and that voice brought it right to your spine. Abilene and The Ghost Of David in particular were given extra chills by the power of the live performance from the man sat twenty feet in front of me. OK, so I didn’t get to hear either of my two all-time Jurado fave songs (Big Decision and Bad Dreams, if you’re interested), but we did get an ace rendition of Rachel & Cali, amongst several highlights.
When Damien did finally speak to us, it was to tell us that Megafaun would be joining him to play some songs at the end of the set. “At last”, I thought, as I’d been sold this gig on the basis it would be a three-set show, the two artistes on their own, plus one where Megafaun would back Jurado on a selection of his louder songs. Sadly however, we only got two, and no encore. Not very social of you, Mr. J. But here’s one of the two: Nothing Is The News, the opening song from DJ’s new album Maraqopa
EDIT – HMMM, IT WOULD SEEM GONEFOREIGN IS RIGHT: I DON’T SEEM TO BE ABLE TO INSERT ANY PICS OR YOUTUBE VIDS. NOT GOING TO TRY TO SORT THAT NOW (MY ALARM GOES OFF FOR WORK IN UNDER 90 MINS – I THINK THAT’S A NEW RECORD, SHOEY!!)
His final twist of the knife – though I’m being churlish now – was that he used his longest spoken word speech of the night to tell us he won’t be back “probably for a few years”. Gee thanks, Damien, rub it in why dontcha? US tour, huh? Check. Other commitments, too, is it? Check. Oh. Wait. What was that? “And I’ve got a baby on the way, so I’m gonna stay home and be a dad.” Aw, damn! Now I feel guilty.
Good luck on that adventure, sir, and oh yeah, parenthood, and committing to it that fully: that DEFINITELY makes you seem unsocial to the rest of us, but you know what? Go for it, with my best wishes, and see you round . . . . maybe.
|
YOU MUST BE EFFIN’ JOKING!
It’s not pretty watching a grown man cry, but I’m fairly close to tears right now.
So … CALLING ALL iPHONE USERS:
I’ve managed to lock myself out of my iPhone. I changed the password after the girls figured out yet ANOTHER one, but the very next time I tried to get into the phone, it told me I’ve got the password wrong.
I can’t believe I messed up the change, but nonetheless I’ve tried Capitalising it, mis-spelling it, typing the old one again in case the change hadn’t processed, etc., etc.
But now it’s locking me out for increasing amounts of time after each failed attempt, and I’ve been warned by one ex-user “For God’s sake don’t get to ten failed attempts or the phone will wipe itself”. Um, *ULP*, I can’t be far off that point.
Anybody know what I do now? I can’t find free online advice, and I can’t find it in the hundreds of pages of online service manual.
I need the phone tomorrow.
HELP, PLEEEEEEEEEASSSSSSSEE!!!!
UPDATE ********* UPDATE
Ee, could you all feel that Beaufort Force 8 sigh of relief just then?
Given that you have to put in a new password twice accurately in order to change it, I asked myself the question “What could I possibly have mis-typed twice in a row?”
I changed the last letter “r” in my intended new password for the adjacent “t” on the qwerty, gritted my teeth and hit OK . . . SUCCESS!!!
I’m back in, and I promise to concentrate on one thing at once in future.
OK, so I finally succumbed and took a bite from the Apple: got myself an iPhone4S. But it’s taken me less than a week to realise I haven’t got a scooby how to do anything on it, apart from play Yahtzee on a free download app that’s now annoying the shit out of me by causing the phone to beep incoming messages that turn out to be unwanted ads at all hours of the night.
My friendly-neighbourhood T-Mobile store bloke took pity on me and got my 1200+ Contacts transferred, and I have somewhat decluttered the homescreen, but that’s about as far as I’ve got.
It turns out I need two new email addresses, three new accounts, and Gawd knows what else. What the hell’s the difference between an iCloud account, an Apple ID and an iTunes Sign-in anyway??
I can’t get the Snooze right on the alarm; I can’t import my own wallpaper; I can’t pick a ringtone from my own music … I haven’t even dare TRY the camera yet!
The iPhone won’t talk to my [temporary] Bluetooth carphone thingy, or to the Parrot kit in Julie’s car at all.
A 7-year-old had to show me how to put it on silent when we were at the Beeb last weekend, FFS! I have gratefully received the tip that applications never close, but merely hide and continue to run unseen unless you expose and close them, and I’ve committed how to do that to memory, but I’d never have found that on my own in a million years!
The User Guide is now paperless, i.e. I have to access it on the phone, which by definition means I’m not in the function I want to learn how to use, and by the time I’ve stumbled back to the right place, I’ve invariably forgotten how to do what I wanted in the first place.
It would therefore appear I don’t have any Apple-logic grey matter in my hurting head. So gimme some tips here, iPhone users. I’ll take and try whatever you’ve got that you think I’ll find useful.
In particular, I want my ringtone back. How do I get UFO’s Only You Can Rock Me to play as calls come in without having to buy again a song I already own about a dozen times?
They’re playing Halifax Minster, where I saw shows by I Am Kloot and Dan Michaelson last year, but missed ones from John Grant and The Unthanks the year before. Well I ain’t missing this one.
Tickets for me AND DarceysMam already bought. I’m prepared to pay for one more … for Shoegazer, to return the favour he did for me on the only other occasion I’ve seen Low, [at The Social, in Orlando, FL in Feb 2009]. All you have to do, Shoey, is get here!
Anyone interested? Friday 13th July is the date for your calendars, folks, (if you think you can afford two Northern Socials in three months – I’m still gutted I’m missing DaddyPig‘s 50th with RockingMitch.)
It would be nice if we could make it a bit of a multi-day Social event, but I know I’m working for London2012 on uniform distribution that weekend, and fear I said yes to both Sat & Sun.
Anyhoo, ticket info here:
http://www.doghouseuk.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=51&Itemid=110
And deliberately-misinterpreted-to-make-it-look-appropriately-titled Low song here:
I CAN’T WAIT.
Please feel free to ignore me here, folks, as I do realise I’m committing one of those ultra-awkward, blog etiquette faux-pas, but …
Full info & sponsor page here:
http://my.sportrelief.com/sponsor/claytonsycamores
Those of you who’ve met me will realize that if I try to break out into a jog, earthquake early warning centres all over the northern hemisphere will panic!
Julie (DarceysMam), who hasn’t worn a sports kit outside of Center Parcs for over a decade, has been to the gym THREE times this week in a desperate attempt at training.
Jess (DarceysSis) is wondering if she can get out of the whole thing by sponsoring the other three of us.
Darcey, however, has decided that she wants to help those kids she’s been seeing on the telly. Bless her!
So, on Sunday morning, off we go. Sunday evening? I’ll be all jimblylegged.
Yeah, that’s two coffees and a tea you see being supped in a Manchester City Centre pub by the Tins and my rather pasty-looking self. Incongruous, you say? Um, probably not, actually … or at least, no more odd than some of the other memories I came away with from The Castle Hotel last week.
In the credit column were racking up another miniSocial and chinwagging with old friends; meeting our charming and erudite Resident Deadhead; enjoying a single rather delightful pint of porter before reverting to driver’s drinks; and getting to see a very good band I’ve been listening to A LOT recently. On the debit side, getting ripped off for on-street parking even in the evening; being oven-baked in one of the most inappropriate rooms I’ve ever had the misfortune to see a band in; and finding a dent in my car roof after the event (good job the dealer I’m trading it to next week missed that on inspection!). I really don’t like Manchester – you can tell, can’t you?
But anyhoo, The Deep Dark Woods.
Despite observations from some of the others that their music may be a little one-paced and samey, I’m really warming to this band. Ryan Boldt has a voice that commands my attention – he can do wistful or gothic, melancholy or menacing – and from even a low-rise stage, a physical prescence to go with it. The seam of Americana the band mine is one they can trade with me anytime.
When I get the chance, I’m going to listen to Tinny’s linked interview, but in the meantime, here’s just one of the highlights from the album the band are currently tour-promoting.
As the snow comes down at the end of a very quiet Saturday, I figure it’s now or never to post a thread I’ve been pondering for a while.
Amylee‘s excellent Disco thread threw up an example of something that has frustrated me for over thirty years, namely the inability of some brilliant bands to capture their magic on record.
The culprits cited this week were Cameo; my go-to band (since the 70s) to demonstrate what I mean has always been Thin Lizzy, but tonight Matthew, I’m going to be . . . trip-hop, chillout, wouldn’t-harm-a-fly merchants Morcheeba.
Now I will admit that back in my cash-rich, child-free days, I would go to gigs and buy albums on a whim, and I wasn’t always rewarded for my investment. That’s how I picked up debut Who Can You Trust. There was something about that album that got under my skin more than, say, Massive Attack, Zero7, Distant Cousins, or even Portishead did. Trouble was, I couldn’t figure out what it was, and in follow-up The Big Calm I couldn’t even hear it. Oh it was pleasant enough, but I’d have had the tassles on my leather jacket ceremoniously ripped off by the HM Society for voicing that opinion out loud.
Nevertheless, I went to see them live in Leeds, and HOLY AXEHERO, BATMAN! The band generally, and guitarist Ross Godfrey in particular, blew me away. They ROCKED, MAAAANN! Why didn’t they sound like that on record? I went back to the albums when I got home, and w-e-e-l-l-l, yes, I suppose the evidence was there, but it was almost buried under the production. I tried for quite some time to convince friends and family, (even tried on RR once), but with no-one else I knew having seen them, and audio/video evidence of their live prowess pretty much non-existent, I got nowhere. I wrote to the band’s label, their management company; got nothing in reply. Eventually, after diminishing returns (for me) from their next couple of albums, I lost interest.
Well, they’re back, reunited with their early albums’ vocalist Skye Edwards. In fact, they’ve been back for a while, but who knew? I’ve only just caught up with 2010′s Blood Like Lemonade. And GUESS WHAT?!?!?
Er, no. Still the same problem. Hints of their ability to cut loose, but to start with, no more than that. Take Crimson from BLL: lyrically, a deliciously dark tale of love, jealousy and revenge, but musically, same old same old. Good, but … Have a listen though, please, because this is the set-up for my point.
OI! You still awake out there? See what I mean?
But the difference between my frustrations of a decade ago and now is that marriage made in copyright hell - cameraphones and YouTube. The audio quality still isn’t great, but get a load of this live version of the same song:
[Cut to the three minute mark if your patience is running thin here]
Now there’s a sound I’d kill to own a whole album of – Cave-black lyrics, soulful vocals, trip-hop sensibilities, but played in a blues-rock stylee. WHY DON’T THEIR RECORDS SOUND LIKE THAT?
GAH, THE FRUSTRATION’S DOING MY HEAD IN!
HEY ALL.
DO NOT – REPEAT – DO NOT OPEN AN EMAIL FROM ME DATED TODAY. I’VE BEEN SNAGGED BY A FINANCIAL DETAILS PHISHING WORM.
APART FROM BLIMPY, WHO LEGITIMATELY HAS AN EMAIL ABOUT ONE OF OUR MUTUAL FAVOURITE ARTISTS, ANYTHING ELSE FROM ME HAS BEEN AUTOGENERATED BY A BLOODY HORRORSHOW OF A CYBER-ATTACK. NOT ONLY IS IT PHISHING, BUT IT’S ALSO EMAILING EVERYONE IN MY ACCOUNT’S ADDRESS BOOK. WATCH YOUR SENT FOLDERS . . .
APOLOGIES PEOPLE, MY SECURITY SOFTWARE DID WARN ME, AND I DID HEED THE WARNING AND DELETE THE LITTLE BUGGER, BUT IT APPEARS THE DAMAGE HAS BEEN DONE.
For no other reason than the fact I caught my wife in a (for her) rare moment of alcoholic abandon less than an hour ago. I figure we can trade well-meant-if-ultimately-inconsequential best wishes for the New Year here:
Fire away, you lot. Me? I’m off to bed! May your 2012 be better than 2011 was.
‘Night all *hic*
(Gratuitous use of a song recorded by a briefly enthusiastic, and most interesting RRer. – ‘Spill points on offer for anyone who guesses the identity. Double ‘Spill points on offer for anyone who already owns the album it comes from.)
EDIT -
Now that Julie has seen the pic and post, the sentiment of this next song has passed unsaid between us:
I was going to call this thread ‘Listen Without Prejudice’ but some bugger swine’s nicked that idea before.
There are guilty pleasures (“mmm, yummy!”) and there are guilty pleasures (*blush*). But when you’re a heavy rocker of a certain age, there are also GUILTY pleasures as in ‘disbelieving-looks-of-scorn-and-immediate-ostracism’ from your peers: guess which category this one falls into?!
But I’m posting it for a reason, and with a question for you all ["All"? Er, DsD, I think you'll find there's no-one here: they've all gone down the pub to get away. - Ed] to consider.
I have taken some simple steps to hide the artist’s name from the player. This is NOT to hide my embarrassment, though you may not believe me about that! It’s because the question is about the influence our prejudice has on our view of a song. In other words, I’m covering a lot of the same intellectual ground Bish did with his Paris Hilton selection a few weeks ago.
Now some of you will recognize the song (& thus the artist) immediately: there’s not a lot I can do about you people. I suppose that makes you the benchmark for the experiment. All I want from you people is to not give the game away … yet. Just post a reply saying you’re in, say, “Group A”. Some of you – I’m hoping – won’t have a scoob who it is: you’re the control group, as you’re unaffected by the element I’m investigating. So tell me you’re in “Group C” (for Control) and then tell me what you think of the song. The reactions I’m really looking at are from those who hear the opening, can’t think/remember who the artist is, listen …, but then remember who it is. You’re “Group B” (for Bloody Hell!), and I want to know if your perceptions of the song changed as a result of that realization.
Me? I unashamedly love this. I know it’s simple, false, trite, horribly uncool, bombastic, and lyrically, a deeply cynical pull on the heartstrings, but I like it despite all that. So I don’t want or need sneering dismissals of its shallowness; all I want to know is – did you change your opinion of it because of who the artist is?
Too much choice, people, I need some help.
Last Christmas, DsMam & I committed the sin most present-givers hate most: we asked for money in lieu of anything our friends and family would otherwise have given us. It could have backfired horribly, but our explanation ahead of the game – namely that we wanted to treat ourselves to a decent telly before the old one packed up on us, and didn’t have the disposable income to do it ourselves – seemed to head off any grumbles, and we ended up with a nice fund with which to attack the January sales.
Well, guess what? We’re pushing our luck and trying to pull off the same trick twice. For various reasons we simply don’t have a music system of any sort on the ‘ground’ floor of our home, and we intend to remedy that. But there are some limiting factors and parameters:
(i) Space. Whatever we buy is going to have to be SERIOUSLY compact, both for the player and speakers.
(ii) Finance. Whilst we can’t be certain, it is highly unlikely the budget will break the £500 barrier.
(iii) Accessibility. The unit is going in the dining room, and must be controllable without leaving the table.
(iv) Capacity. There is no storage space for piles of CDs in that room, so digital storage is vital.
(v) Functionality. Our music is in just about every format you can think of, and I want DAB radio for my sports commentaries.
(vi) Quality. Old-fashioned CD ghetto blasters don’t cut it; too indistinct at low volume, too rough at high volume.
(vii) Programmability. The ability to create child- or visitor-friendly playlists is essential, as is the ability to find any given song on demand.
My research to-date has narrowed the likely candidates to the following shortlist -
Cocktail Audio X10 (1TB HDD);
Sony GigaJuke;
Brennan JB7;
Roberts MP53 Sound 53;
or, the wildcard,
iPod 160GB Classic and Bose Sounddock speaker.
Things like PURE’s Avanti Flow, which stream wirelessly from the audio files on the house PC, are NOT being considered. The computer would have to be on to make those work, and isn’t on the same floor as the dining room. Besides, there are WAY too many songs in my iTunes that would not be suitable for the family teatable.
Normally, I’m an open-minded but eventually decisive consumer, but I have to admit that the reviews of all the above are making my head spin. There is no clear leader, pros and cons to all of the options, and no-one we know has any of these systems themselves from which to glean dependable feedback. So, my friends, help us out here. Any views, pointers, opinions or even further things to consider we may have missed, will be gratefully received.
Over to you … I’m off to bed, but will check in as much as possible over the next couple of days.
Last week, at SpottedRichard‘s behest, we ran amok in the ‘Spill Library of rules: shouting, giggling, repeating ourselves, grabbing double portions, blowing ink pellets through biro peashooters *, and so on. So this week, I thought I ought to bring back a little order, by returning the Challenge to its original 10pm Tues slot. [Er, nothing to do with the fact you were too tired last night, and have only just got in from work today, then, DsD? - Deadline-nervous Ed.]
++ahem++ Er, moving swiftly on …
But don’t think I’m being all goody-goody for Teacher: oh no! Let’s own up, we all enjoyed trashing the place just a little last week, didn’t we? And that got me thinking. So here’s this week’s homework:
Find me a song about a wicked, Wicked Person (that’s a Rank Bajin for those north of the border) whom actually, you just can’t bring yourself to condemn.
Despite the obvious criminality, possibly evil intentions, and definitely unreconstructed BADness of their behaviour, you secretly just want to be their friend, to get a little vicarious tingle. Or maybe they’ve got enough cheek to get away with it, or such charisma that you can’t help but forgive them.
Whatever it is, I wanna hear about them. In fact, let’s put together the baddest gang of mean muthaf……. ever to walk through the valley of the shadow of death unafraid.
You won’t be surprised to hear mine, but I’ll reveal that later – bonus ‘Spill points to anyone who guesses it up front.
UPDATE EDIT – AMYLEE SHOOTS, SHE SCORES. PIC ADDED JUST UP PAGE
* OK, maybe not that one.
Normally, I’d like to think I’m not one to be taken in by hype. However, in the case of next year’s Games being in my “home” country, I do think I’ve probably fallen for the argument that it’s the proverbial once-in-a-lifetime opportunity etc. As a consequence, I had decided soon after the venue was confirmed that I would just have to take my daughters to London to see at least one event.
And then they announced their cockamamy ticket sales plans . . . truly a WTF moment if ever there was one!!
Having eventually calmed down, I figured, never mind: it’s gotta be done. So, in spite of my distaste at the STUPID system they put in place to buy them, I put in for over £350-worth of tickets across four events in three locations.
As the allocation, and more importantly, the LACK of information about same didn’t emerge, I got more and more angry. I have to say, the words “piss-up” and “brewery” are increasingly lodged in my brain over this, and the level of officialdom defiance in the face of overwhelming evidence of incompetence makes Cnut look like a wimp.
Well, finally, some information is getting out. Am I happy? Am I f***! I’m sure the UK residents amongst you will have seen the stats last week: 1.9million applied for 20million tickets – only 700,000 got anything. A fair system? MY ARSE!! Just look at the profiteers who already seem to have more tickets than they can shake a stick at. The 1.2million unsuccessful applicants get a second shot at the end of this week, using a different, and EVEN MORE RIDICULOUS application process. Pound gets you a penny, the system crashes by 0605hrs Friday morning.
Well, I won’t be getting up to join that exercise in futility . . . because I’m not allowed to!!!! Why not? Because I got an email “congratulating” me on securing my tickets … to the Women’s Football Bronze Medal playoff game . . . in Coventry. Oh, and of course, they haven’t told me those are the tickets I’ve got: I had to work that out for myself from the amount of money taken from my account.
**speechless**
Now don’t get me wrong, I did put in for those tickets, but in truth, only as a kind of ‘control’ purchase: that event was never gonna sell out in a million years, so I figured I’d get a feel for what was happening in my [COMPULSORY] Visa account when I saw the money for that disappear – a full sixteen months before the event, let’s not forget. Had I known getting those would deny me a second go at getting anything else, I wouldn’t have done it. DarceysSis is at the age where going to London to see part of the Games next year was causing almost as much excitement as our Disney trip a couple of years back. If I could have got hold of Seb Coe (preferably by the throat) when I had to explain to tearful Daughter#1 that we won’t be going to London to see anything next year, I’d have throttled the git!!
Has anyone else looked at the spreadsheet of what tickets are left? It’s a joke. How many ten and six-year old girls will want to sit through Basketball preliminaries, Greco-Roman Wrestling, Synchronised Swimming or the Walking Race? And that’s now. By the time I get my next go, most of those tickets will have been snapped up by the scrambling desperate parents who got NOTHING in Rd1.
And another thing: talking of parents – the scheme for under-16s to “pay your age” for a ticket sounded good, didn’t it? Yeah, in theory. Having asked around, I cannot find even ONE successful child-price ticket purchase ANYWHERE! NOT BLOODY ONE! The next official from the BOA-or-whoever who tries to tell me that the allocation ballot was random and fair will be roundly laughed at … just before I punch their lights out. Unless of course, any of you lot tell me you’ve secured finals/medal-ceremony tickets for a fiver for your infants? No? Thought not.
So, apart from having a rant, why am I posting this? Well, I want to know: is any ‘Spiller planning on going to the Games? Did you get tickets? How are you thinking of organizing your travel and accommodation? . . . And . . . does anyone want to come to the Women’s Football Bronze Medal playoff match with me in Coventry on 9th Aug? I’ve got three spares ………………………..
