Luckily the pleasant summer weather continues, which meant that we had a nice Bank Holiday weekend. Football on Saturday was great, a really young City team put on a grand display to beat Wycombe 3-0. Hopes were high, only for then to come back to earth, following a 2-0 defeat at Plymouth on Monday. Which means that after 5 games, we have won all our home matches without conceding a goal, conversely we have lost all our away games without scoring a goal. It looks as though mid table obscurity awaits us.

On Sunday we caught up with John, Jane and Mark Stumbles for lunch at the Hope and Anchor, before Orynthia and I took a walk down Jacobs Wells Road to look at the outrageously expensive new flats that have sprung up along the harbourside, including Bristol’s 1st £1,000,000 flat. We decided that they weren’t quite right for our bank balance or us!

On Monday, we went to our local cinema, The Orpheus to see The Guru. Did not think too much of the film itself. However we did like the fact that it was only £5 for the pair of us, it was a bit of a bargain night out, We do really The Orpheus , it’s a pretty ugly building but it has a really pleasant atmosphere. I often think of the time when they had some problems with the heating in the cinema, strangely it seem to synchronise with the films that were showing, so during Apocalypse Now the heat resulted in the Audience feeling as though they too were trapped in the steamy jungle heat of Vietnam. Then again, I recall another film set in the depth of winter (although frustratingly, the name of the film escapes me) when we sat in heavy overcoats, as our teeth chattered along with the soundtrack.

Well, I finished reading "The Chosen" on the train journey home last night. It really is a magnificent book. Although story is set the seemingly, narrow confines of the conflicts in the world of the orthodox Jews in a couple of New York blocks. It is a book that touches on many universal themes, families, conflict, support and the ability to be your own person whilst trying to comply with the expectations that others have of you.

As I sit in front of this computer once again, the glorious summer sunshine is streaming in through the windows. I’m off to see City play Wycombe this afternoon. Our plans for the rest of the Bank Holiday weekend are pretty fluid. Hoping to catch up some friends and there is bound to be food involved!

The imminent arrival of September means that at last we will have some bands to go and see. We have tickets for our old favourite Elvis Costello and Mcalmont & Butler (new LP is great). We are also looking forward to seeing a local band with the splendid name of Munter, which features a couple of our friends. It’s over a year since we have had the chance to them in action and we and a lot of our friends are really looking forward to seeing them again.

Long time, no write. This is mainly due to the mammoth "24" watching that we undertook. Managed to watch 17 and 1/4 hours of the series between last Tuesday night and Saturday evening. Then on Sunday the final 45 minutes wrapped the series up. I have to say that I really enjoyed both the show and the madly intense way of watching it. We did manage to sneak in a bit of socialising in between shows, notably at a surprise 70th birthday party for Steve Vowles mum on Saturday evening.

I am really enjoying "The Chosen", although it covers some pretty heavy Jewish themes in is written in a way that really pulls you in.

We went round to see Ed last night, he is off to Winchester for 6 months, whilst working on a new contract. To celebrate his employment Orynthia made one her trademark cheesecakes. We managed to eat about 1/2 of it and left the rest for Ed to finish off for breakfast!

I had a pretty tiring day today, due to a meeting that I had to attend in Bedford. The journey back was pretty frustrating as I think I must have stuck behind every Hay truck in the south of England, Still another glorious sunny day, it’s been quite strange to see so much of central Europe disappearing under massive amounts of water.

Well, with only a week to go before the series ends, we have got ourselves hooked on the TV show 24. BBC choice are showing all the previous programmes over the course of this week. So last night we found ourselves watching the 1st 6 shows and I am well and truly hooked. It is going to pretty intense viewing for the rest of the week but I quite like watching it all in a huge rush. Quite a few of our friends have been going through the agonies for the few months and now we are starting to understand what they have been talking about.

When not watching TV, I managed to complete The Sandcastle and I did really enjoy it, in a sort of "old black and white movie on a rainy Sunday afternoon" sort of way. Following from that I have started reading The Chosen by Chaim Potok. Just before we went to Cornwall Mr Potok died and I read a couple of obituaries, which made him, and his books sound very interesting. For some reason I have always been interested in the Jewish New York experience and the articles made great claims for The Chosen, so imagine my delight when I found a 2nd copy for just £2 in a magnificently overstocked 2nd hand bookshop in a small town called Wadebridge in Cornwall. The book is interesting because it looks at the tensions between different strands of Jewish communities, whilst placing those in the context of New York towards the end of World War 2. When seen through the eyes of a teenage boy coming to terms with his place in this society, it makes for a fascinating story.

Our friend Felipe went back to Madrid on Tuesday. It was really good to catch up with him again during his latest visit to Bristol. Lets hope that its not too long before we see him again.

Well the football season got of to a hilarious start, City winning 2-0 against a comically brainless Blackpool who managed to get two players sent off in a couple of minutes and then concede a goal by sending their keeper into our penalty area for a free kick, we get the ball break away and score from about 45 yards into an open goal. Generally low quality football buts lots of laughs.

Went to Ceri and Alan’s lovely house for a party on Saturday evening. Lot’s of BT people and strangely lots of young men in blue shirts.

This morning we went to a great exhibition at Bristol museum based on the Dan Dare comic strips. Loads of great ‘50’s futuristic graphics and it was quite a shock to see the amount of merchandising that was associated with the Dan Dare image. I tend to think of mass market product tie-in’s being something that was created on the back of things like Star Wars. However it’s clear that those crafty business folk knew what they were doing way back in the late ‘50’s – early ‘60’s, Everything from replica rockets to kites and jigsaw puzzles, it was all there. We met up with our friend Simon and his son Thomas in the museum. After seeing the stuffed animals and birds, Thomas announced that he would like Simon to stuffed when he dies. We thought it was quite a good idea, imagine inviting people back to your place and being able to show them your dead parents and maybe grand parents!

After the museum we went round to Heather and Spiders place for a nice get together with 9 other people. Some nice food, drink and conversation on a very relaxed Sunday afternoon.

Back to work tomorrow.

Well, we are home from our little trip to Cornwall and very nice it was too. We had a really lazy time of it. On our way down we stopped at the Bakelite museum a splendid little place, absolutely overflowing with a marvellous collection of vintage household bits and bobs. We were in retro heaven. They also sell the most amazing small caravans. Although they are newly built they look like little Art Deco masterpieces, Very cute indeed. On the Monday of our trip we went to the much-talked about Eden Project, which was only about 15 miles from our hotel. The place itself looks absolutely amazing, it’s the perfect 1960’s vision of the future, I was slightly disappointed that we weren’t made to change into sci-fi style unisex clothing before we started our journey around the domes. We stayed for about 5 hours before out feet gave out on us. Whilst at the hotel I spent most of my time reading. I took an ancient Iris Murdoch novel called The Sandcastle with me. The book is set in a fairly posh but austere English private school and follows the tormented life of one of the housemasters. The pleasantly old fashioned ambience of the hotel made it very easy for me to take the mental journey back to this England that has vanished for ever. The setting for the hotel was absolutely stunning, built atop a rocky headland with it’s own beach, when the tide was out. A series of magnificent sandy bays and coves each with huge cliff’s behind them made for some spectacular walking as the weather lurched between glorious sunshine and the equally glorious misty and moody conditions that Cornwall can through up in an instant.

Back in Bristol in time for the start of the new football season. City take on Blackpool tomorrow afternoon. No new faces to look out for on the playing side but I’m really looking forward to the start of the season.

Our new sofa came today and it’s fab. Our journey back in time to 1950’s continues with this amazingly simple piece of furniture designed by the god like Robin Day.

Well it looks as though summer has really arrived; yesterday the thermometer hit 100 degrees (F) in our back garden. Now for Bristol that’s pretty warm. Playing football tonight could be hard work. I guess I might spend a bit more time in goal than average if it is too warm. As I sit here typing this, the windows are thrown open and the music of Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelly swings through the air. The album is "Swing ’35 – ’39" one of my Dad’s old LP’s which made it’s way to me after he decided that CD’s were the only thing for him. I love the wonderfully relaxed jaunty tone that this music provides, it is amazing that it still sounds so fresh nearly 70 years after it was recorded.

On Friday evening we went to see the excellent French film "Read my lips". The film features some very interesting use of sound, the female lead in the film is partially deaf and we get to hear things in different ways as she plays around with her hearing aids. The film was riddled with the influence of Alfred Hitchcock – never a bad thing in my book.

After the film we met up with a few friends for a quick drink outside The Ostrich. Thought that we would sit outside and had the strange spectacle of watching a young lad running down the road pursued by a large dog. Then a few seconds later a policeman in bullet-proof vest came running along shouting at the youth "Police dog handler with dog. Stop now" Now logic dictates that no matter how fit you are, you can’t outrun a police dog, but having started to run it must be really difficult to actually stop and wait for the dog to leap towards you. We have all seen those police display teams in action, when they set a dog on a man with a hugely padded arm (I often thought that the dogs must think it’s strange when they get to chance someone with two arms of the same size for the first time), and the dog wrestles the man to the ground. So if you are the one being chased it must be well neigh impossible to stand still and wait for the dog to treat you as tonight’s helping of Pedigree Chum. Anyway stop he did, although we could not see the immediate outcome of that but we did see him being driven away by one of the three or was it four police cars that eventually arrived on the scene.

On Saturday we eventually got round to ordering a new sofa, it is a design by the great Robin Day that was first available in 1957, It is a classic, simple design that would be right at home in your local’s beatnik pad. We are very excited and to make it even more exciting Habitat were having a sale this weekend so it was 15% cheaper than we expected. It arrives next Friday, the day after we return from Cornwall.

Oh dear our intellectual credentials are in tatters! Last night Orynthia and I joined forces with our friends, Jon Collins and James Thomas to enter what is apparently the longest running pub quiz in Bristol. We met for a pre quiz meal at splendidly cheap and cheerful "Indian Fast Food", where the heat of my Chicken Jalfrarzi certainly should have woken up my brain cells. Although the turn out for the quiz was not exactly huge, our lack of ability to memorise the innermost details of a Monopoly board combined with an almost total lack of knowledge of the animal kingdom, meant that we finished the competition battling for the booby prize for finishing 2nd last!

Good news for the quirky side of Bristolian nightlife. At long last The Cube is on the verge of reopening. For those that don’t know of The Cube it is a small independently run cinema (and much more) on the site of the old Arts Centre Cinema in Kings Square. It was the home for an amazingly eclectic mixture of the wilder side of the film and music world. The place has been closed for a year due to fire in the Chinese restaurant which The Cube shared an entrance with. We have had some great nights at this fantastically down at heel cinema. It is due to reopen at the end of August and I am really looking forward to it. Often you took the walk along the long corridor into the building without really knowing what you were about to let yourself in for; always interesting, often chaotic it was a shinning star in the Bristolian entertainment scene.

I’ve been reading an excellent article in the New Yorker magazine, which talks about the problem of over qualified, over ambitious people being pushed too far, too quickly by companies who think that the way to succeed in this wonderful corporate world is to get lots of lovely newly qualified MBA’s, pay them huge sums of money and keep promoting them before they get a chance to understand what they or the company are doing. The article went on to point out that many of America’s top performing companies are those that actually have people at the top who have worked their way gradually through an organisation, rather than people who have stormed through like a whirling dervish, having no true grasp of what they are doing because they are incapable of seeing the true impact of the decisions they make. Now I am not an ambitious sort of chap but I do know that the bits of BT that I have been involved have only worked when we have had people in charge who aren’t just concerned with the next big promotion and added share options. Mind you, one aspect of the current stock market crash that I have enjoyed is the crumbling values of these share options which we were told were a gilt edged "can’t lose" bonus. My My, don’t I sound bitter and twisted today!

During the weekend I read charming piece on P G Wodehouse in The Guardian. It reminded me, what a joy it is to read the sparkling prose of the great man. Since the start of the World Cup my reading habits have fallen back to magazines and newspapers rather than books. Time to rectify that and Wodehouse is the man to kick start the reading campaign.

Well the end of busy weekend is here. Once again Ashton Court was the normal mix of average bands and lovely people. We had a very social time amongst tens of thousands that turned up. No major musical treats, my highlight of the weekend was watching people career down the hill, in front of the Academy stage thanks to a track made from bits of cardboard on Saturday evening. A wonderfully haphazard collection of individuals speed towards a metal fence at high speed. Most of them managed to loose their balance and crash to the floor before eating the metal! The sun shone for most of the weekend and we even managed to eat some food which we had not tried before, It was a French sort of stew thing made from Potatoes, Bacon and Cheese which was cooked in an huge pan, very tasty and filling. No Jerk Chicken for us this year but a new West Indian restaurant has just opened on Whiteladies Road, which is excellent news.

Said goodbye to our new friends from Korea today, We spent sometime with them on Friday evening and it was amazing to see the kids playing hangman in English. They have only been in England for a year and the youngest of them is only 7 years old. They were a really nice family the husband is a producer and director of TV programmes in Korea (he works for MBC). Maybe one day we will some of his work on English TV.

Anyway, we are both exhausted, must be all that fresh air, so I think it’s time for bed.

Well the summer looks as though it has arrived and with the 2 day Ashton Court Festival approaching this weekend the timing couldn’t be better. Last Sunday we had the unusual experience of a Thomas visit to the country! On Sunday we visited Slimbridge, home to many thousands of birds who live in close proximity to water, so we saw masses of different types of Ducks, Geese, Swans and Flamingos. Although the birds are free to leave the whole did have the feel of a zoo, so consequentially the initial excitement of seeing so many birds soon gave way to a sort of pleasant "Oh look, there’s another rare South American Duck" type experience. Much more exciting was a trip around the outlying parts of the reserve. We clambered into a trailer attached to a Land Rover were driven out towards the Severn Estuary. For the next 90 mins or so we were able to see a smaller but much more interesting array of wild creatures. The highlights of which was a magnificent swooping aerial display by a Buzzard and later watching a wonderfully bored, fully-grown Hare siting quietly in front of a gate which we were waiting to drive through, eventually it bounced away into the next field. Whilst on this trip our group of about 15 people were guided by a couple of rangers, both of them lovely guys who’s obvious love of their job shown through, as they excitedly pointed out features of the landscape to us. Fantastically knowledgeable and yet completely free of ego, if only all strands of work could produce people who are at the top of their profession and yet have no desire to flaunt it.

During the World Cup we struck up a friendship with a Korean family living just around the corner from us. Now if you watched any of the Korean games you will know that during the tournament it looked as though everyone in Korea was wearing a red T-shirt with the rather strange slogan "Be The Reds" written on it. On Saturday morning the whole family (Mr Choi wearing his recently acquired red T-shirt) came round to present me with a splendid Bandanna with the slogan emblazoned on it underneath the Korean flag. This was passed to me in an amazing box made out of paper in a sort of Origami style by Mrs Choi. A really lovely gift, sadly they are heading back to Korea this Sunday, so we won’t really get a chance to know them.

I love this What time/date is it?. Boy that guy works hard! best viewed in IE I think - but what do I know?

It’s a strange thing but I have found a couple of new TV programmes, which have become "must watch" slots in our week. The 1st of these by a couple of weeks is the splendid Six Feet Under, which always starts with a wonderfully haphazard death (man killed in giant food mixer, former porn star electrocuted in the bath by her pet cat etc) and then goes onto show the attempts to provide the sort of funeral that the family and friends of the deceased want to see for their dearly departed. We also get to watch the painful process of the family who run the funeral parlour business trying to co-exist, when they should not really live in the same state let alone the same house. It’s made by the same people who made American Beauty and it shows. The other show is The Job, yet another show about New York cops. Pleased to say that the emphasis is drawing out as much humour as possible from gleefully acknowledged stereotypical cops, You know the sort of thing, the elderly overweight Irishman, the wisecracking lead man who is not quite as sharp as he thinks he is, the two innocent newly recruited Latino cops (one of whom has not said a word in the 1st four shows, as far as I can remember). This has all combined to produce quite a few laugh out loud moments, which comes as quite a shock after years of drab TV.

Well the Lambchop gig was just fantastic. The Fleece turned out to be a perfect venue for a band on top of their form. On this occasion, Lambchop were a 6-piece band rather than the 12 (I think) who came to town last time. We were treated to a much more varied show this time around; we even had the unexpected spectacle of watching Lambchop "rock-out!" on a couple of occasions. The intimacy of the venue seamed to suit the band much more and the joyfully exuberant response from the crowd appeared to really delight the band.

Just got back from visiting my Dad in Devon, Orynthia was driving, so I managed to relax with my eyes closed whilst listening to Storytelling the latest Belle & Sebastian CD. Now I must have heard this album at least 60 times in the past 5 weeks or so, and still I love it. I really think that it contains much of the band’s best work. Songs like "Big John Shaft" are just glorious. Also blessed with some beautiful instrumental tracks, it is that rarest of all beasts, a CD that I find myself humming and whistling along. I am not normally known for vocal outbursts whilst listening to music. So something pretty special must be going on here.

When we were coming back into Bristol, I decided that if I was a writer, I would try to write something where all the characters have the names of Bristol suburbs. You can guess the sort of thing; Bradley Stoke and Lawrence Hill go into town to meet up with that well-known communist Red Cliff. Later they spend some time with a couple of girls, Hen Grove and a couple of foreign students; Cot Ham from Ireland and Be D’minster from France. Then they go back to Lawrence’s place where he has a blazing row with his dad Bart(on) Hill. Phil Ton calms everyone down etc.

Following a recent attack on a small child by a Fox, The Guardian did a nice
piece on inner city wildlife today. I think it's great that the very rare
and strangely named Black Redstarts can be found on some industrial
wasteland within walking distance of Canary Wharf. Now these birds are rarer
in the UK than the Golden Eagle or The Osprey. Less than 100 nesting pairs
in the country and wisely they have decided that they would rather live in
the heart of the city than waste its time moping around in the dull old
countryside. I was talking to Orynthia about this the other day and I think
that I have worked out why I don't like the countryside. We are sold the
idea, that the countryside is a wonderful place where we can relax and do
anything we want to do, in this glorious open space. Now when I was younger,
I would see a nice green field and would immediately think, wow - what a
great place to go and play football, Upon rushing into the field, I would
discover that the grass was knee high, the ground was full of lumps and
bumps and most likely covered in cow dung as well. In other words useless!
Nowadays the ideal use for a nice green space today, is of course, a
sumptuous picnic. If you can succeed in finding a piece of land where the
aroma of the dung does not knock you senseless, you can bet that you will
need an industrial strength roller in order to get the grass down below knee
height. Now compare this to city, where the parks and public spaces are full
of neatly trimmed grass which just demand to used by human beings. Maybe the
wildlife of the UK has finally worked out that it's time to move into the
city!

Looks as though we may be off to Cornwall on a free holiday for 4 nights at the start of August. Sometime ago we sat through a timeshare presentation in an effort to obtain some free flights to Australia! We are still waiting for news on that but included in the offer was a mini break in the UK. It will be quite a change for us to go on holiday in a place which is not a large city and we are both quite excited about the idea of 4 days with nothing to do. Lets hope that it happens.

We are going to see the quietest band in the world "Lambchop" on Friday. This gig was meant to take place the fairly large surroundings of the Colston Hall, however when they played there last time many people that we spoke to after the gig complained that they could not really hear the band. Considering that there where about 12 people on stage, it is quite an achievement to be that quiet. However it looks as though many people were put off by the lack noise and ticket sales have been very poor. There was talk of the gig being cancelled, luckily that is not the case, it has just been moved to the Fleece. A smaller stand-up venue, which should suit the band quite well.

I've resisted this long but here are my thoughts on the world cup:
Well, as usual the English dream did not come true. How strange though to go out with such a whimper. The normal anguish of the last few minutes of the last game or worse still a penalty shoot out was replaced by the dawning realisation over about the last 40 minutes against Brazil that we weren't able to trouble a Brazil side which played with more tactical nouse and defensive organisation that we gave them credit for. No-one here got angry or upset, for once we all knew that we just weren't good enough.

Although the quarter final games were poor I have to say that I have really enjoyed the competition. The spirited performances of South Korea (or is that Corea now?) Japan, Turkey, Ireland, USA and Senegal at different times were a joy to behold. I must say that I loved Seeing the over pampered poodles of Argentina, France, Portugal and Italy sent packing. I know that Italy had some grounds for complaint but sometimes that happens. You lose games that you should have won, that is what makes football the head spinning crazy, addictive game that it is.

Brazil must beat Germay or do we have one more shock left in this crazy competition!

Where does the time go? Nearly a week since I managed to update this site! I guess it is a hangover from the world cup, must admit that the constant run of early mornings was really taking it’s toll at the end of last week. Anyway away from the world cup, I enjoyed The Bees gig in Cardiff last week. They were by some distance the scruffiest looking band I have seen for some time, but they do make some wonderful music. The later stages of the gig did turn into a bit of a scratchy guitar funk workout, but enough killer blows had been landed in the early stages to make it a worthwhile trip. The next night we went to The Fleece to see McDowell and they were great. It was the first time that we have seen them playing with the whole band and what a splendid treat it was. Nicely understated vocals and acoustic guitar from Mark Hymas matched with some beautiful, melodic guitar lines from the rather fearsome looking lead guitarist. They have an album out called Rooks Wedding, I don’t think that it really reflects the band as they are now but it is still a nice piece of music.

In between world cup games on Saturday we nipped out to Bedminster Library. The Library was holding a CD sale to get rid of excess stock amazingly all CD’s were only £1.50! We ended up buying 15CD’S!!! Lot’s of great old soul from the like of Aretha Franklin, Staples Singers and a couple by the Isley Brothers, plus assorted Jazz and indie selections. Then we have been lucky enough to be given from different sources new CD’s by The Reindeer Section, Tom Waites and Baxter Dury. We also recorded a 4 hour Northern Soul special from the radio on Saturday evening. You could say that we have a bit of listening to catch up on! Luckily for us, the weather on Sunday was gorgeous so we managed to spend and hour or so in the garden reading and playing tunes. The perfect Sunday afternoon.

No football for a couple of days, so a chance to draw breath and look
forward to the remaining game of this extraordinary competition. On my way
to watch the South Korea - Italy match yesterday I noticed that a house just
around the corner from us had a small hand made Korean flag on display in
their front garden. I think the family have only recently moved to England,
so it must be amazing for them to watching the scenes coming from their home
land. After the amazing victory against Italy, I felt that I had to drop a
small card into them to congratulate them the efforts of the team and indeed
the fantastic supporters. Can they beat Spain in the next round? I think so.


Yesterday Orynthia bought one of the new digital TV converter box's. This means that
we now have digital viewing and can watch the free digital services, such
BBC4, BBC choice and about 7 others. It also gives us access to the BBC
interactive services. So now we will be able to find out what is going on
when they "viewers with digital services, press the red button now". At the
moment it just appears to be showing lots of World Cup related stuff, in
fact when I left for work this morning it was showing the full Korea - Italy
match again.

Tonight we are off to Cardiff to see The Bees, I am really enjoying their
splendid CD, although I did read a rather uncomplimentary live review in The
Guardian for them today.

I have to say that the 7:30 AM starts for watching world cup games, is starting to make me quite tired. The main problem is the lack of catch up sleep on a weekend. Still it has been a fantastic competition so far and we only have to wait until 19/6 for the treat of an extra hour or so in bed.

Still managed to keep some vestige of a normal social life going. We went to see the film "About A Boy" last night. I must admit that when I read the book, it was one of those "OK" reads, I think that on this occasion the film is actually better than the book. It has to be said that the young male lead, had the most bizarre eyebrows I have seen for some time. The poor chap looked as though he must have a relative of good old Dr Spock from Star Trek. I hope for his sake that it was part of the make-up teams attempt make him look kookier, rather than a lifetime affliction.

Tonight we are meeting up with a few friends for a meal. At the start of the tournament I weighed myself to see how much the snacking whilst watching games would affect me. Strangely after the 1st week I actually managed to lose weight, so tonight is a chance to put a few pounds back on.

Well, as mentioned previously, I won’t go on about the world cup on this site. Will just say that this afternoon, I was a very happy man.

Went to one of the smallest pubs in Bristol last night, The King Charles to see our friends Ian Green and Steve Dew playing a short improvised set as part of a trio with a guy called Bill. They had never played or even practised together before as a trio, so everyone was unsure about the outcome. I really enjoyed the short set that they played and as someone who has never played anything, I just get more and more impressed at the creative abilities of our friends. I am also delighted to live in a city where people try to do interesting and unusual things.

I nipped into town after the football to pick up some CD’s. So we now have a proper copy of the lovely new Belle & Sebastian soundtrack CD. Also got the new Edwyn Collins CD as well as an album by a group called The Bee’s called Sunshine Hit Me. Heard this whilst at Mark and Bab’s over the weekend. It reminds me of a more structured version of The Beta Band deceptively simple on first hearing, it is a real grower.

Should be catching up with old friends Kevin and Julie over the weekend, along with yet more football.

Not too much point in me writing about the world cup here. Those of you that like it, will be watching it, those of you that don’t won’t be interested anyway. We had a lovely extended weekend break with Mark and Babs, managed to watch all the matches and had great fun doing it. The good thing was the matches are all over by early afternoon, so it leaves plenty of time for other stuff. On Tuesday afternoon we walked through the village for to Banwell castle for a cream tea. It is an amazing 18th century folly with a wonderfully low-key feel about it. A great relaxed way to end our little holiday. Also managed to catch up with lots of music thanks to Mark’s enormous record collection. Filled a few gaps in our knowledge.

Whilst reading the New Yorker I was amazed to find a review of Maroons a restaurant that we ate in on our last night in New York at Christmas. They liked it, and so did we. Even our friend Kelvin (on the left in this picture), who has an appetite that is best, described as gargantuan struggled with the enormous portions. We were ready to pop.

Back to work today, but only for a two day week, as I have Friday off due to World Cup commitments.

We went to see the Experimental Pop Band on Wednesday after having another nice meal at Tico Express. The gig was good if not a little dangerous. Orynthia and I were standing behind the world’s most enthusiastic dancer. That’s enthusiastic but not gifted, allied to the fact that his build was somewhat on the heavy side and that his arms were moving like a threshing machine a full tilt, it meant that we had to keep our wits about us in order to stay in one piece.

World cup started today in the best of ways. A great victory for the huge underdogs Senegal in their match against France. Tomorrow morning will be my first early start as we have 3 games to watch, starting at 7:30am. Then we are off to spend the weekend with our friends Mark and Bab’s for a long weekend of football and to avoid the Jubilee street party that will be taking place outside our house.

I finished reading the wonderful Number 9 Dream a couple of days ago. As I mentioned previously, I feel that David Mitchell’s writing really does echo that of Murakami. Obviously a straight copy of another writers style could leave you with that nasty hollow feeling, that all those note perfect "tribute" bands induce. I do think that Mitchell injects enough of his own style into the ever more complex plot, to lift it above mere pastiche.

As ever, I have moved onto the next book and this is a considerable change of style.Human Punk by John King is a rough and ready tale which starts with a young mans introduction to adulthood as the onrushing tidal wave of Punk sweeps out of London to challenge the traditional norms of society. The main protagonist in the story is the same age as I was at the time, which makes it very easy to make comparisons. It is fair to say that in the summer of 1977 I was still held under the spell of the likes of Genesis, ELP and the rest of the prog rock massive and it was not until the end of 1978 that the penny finally dropped. Obviously, I wish that I had wised up earlier but hey, I was young! The main thing that does strike about the book, is just how lucky I was, to avoid the casual violence that appeared to be part of the average teenage boys life according to most writers that document this period. I was doing all the right things, going to football matches and gigs and I was aware of unpleasant things that happened, yet they never seemed to happen to me. I suppose this is due to the rather obvious fact that I always preferred to hang about with people I liked rather than mindless psychopaths. I guess my dad was always going to lead me away from the onrushing Chelsea or Arsenal hooligans rather than starting a ruck. Likewise the people that I went to gigs with always went for the music rather than the chance to punch someone. Certainly fights at gigs were just part of a night out at the time of Punk and the early Two Tone gigs. Pleased to say that it just went on around me, rather than in my face.

On the current music front I have recently picked up the Alice CD by Tom Waits. One of two new recordings that he has put out. As with most of his stuff it is still growing on me but worth buying for the title track alone. In a different style altogether, I have really been enjoying Blazing Arrow the new CD by Blackalicious, a really funky hip-hop CD, which I just can’t stop playing. Talking about not been able to stop playing things, the current listening on tape is the new Bell & Sebastian CD. It is the soundtrack to the film Storytelling. It does seem to be a proper soundtrack, lots of instrumentals, some snatches of dialogue most of all some really beautiful melodies. The album comes out in a week or two but we managed to borrow an advance copy from a friend of ours and tape overnight before returning it. It is a real Joy.

Hey that was 541 words without mentioning the World Cup. Only 3 days to go!!!! I’ve got most of my leave sorted out and feel ready for those early morning starts. Bring it on.

We went to see "Bend it like Beckham" last night and really enjoyed it. Some top footie skills on display from Parminder Nagra as Jess Bhamra. I read somewhere that she went to a Brazilian soccer school, where they were taught dribbling skills and tricks in the same way people are taught dance steps. It must be quite strange to see people lined up going through their step overs and drag backs as though they were in a line dancing class. Maybe some of the Bristol City lads could attend before the start of next season, then again I suspect that most of our players already spend as much time in the clubs as they do on the training ground.

I spent Wednesday in London for annual BT Sector conference. We had to sit through hours of toe curling bad sketches hammering home the various messages that management want us to take forward over the next year. One of the problems was that all the "actors" were BT people. It really made you realise why real actors get paid to read words aloud. Don’t get me started on the scripts!
The afternoon team building fun events were mercifully brief and painless. My main cause for concern was that went I got back to my fantastic hotel room, I was more than a bit worried that my luggage had not turned up. As we were having a black tie evening meal, this was a little disconcerting. The bag eventually turned up and the night passed without any further drama’s I finally wondered off to bed at about 3am and managed to wake up in time for breakfast at 8am without any real discomfort.

This time next week the world cup will have started. Can’t wait for it to begin. Most of us are still unsure of our viewing habits. The only thing we know is that for the next month the days of the laying around in bed will disappear, as we struggle out of bed for those early morning kick off’s.

Went to see the Bosnian film No Man’s Land at the Watershed last night. A very touching film set in the main, in the trenches between rival sides during the civil war between Bosnia and Herzegovina. 3 men are trapped in the trench, we watch with equal measures of amusement and despair as they and the UN peacekeeping forces try to get them out alive. Tonight I’m off to see DJ Shadow. Not to sure how he will play it, will it just be one man on a stage playing records?
At long last we have used the bread maker that we were given for Christmas and guess what it makes stuff that tastes like …..Bread. We have done a bit of sorting out of Christmas related stuff. Finally got round to buying some picture frames on Friday night. This meant that as well framing Anna’s recent gift, we could also frame up some great Russian photomontage prints that we picked up in New York at Christmas. This was a strange shopping experience as we bought them in a huge shop called Canal jeans, on Broadway that sold, ah you guessed already! Well hidden away at the back of the shop they had loads of great prints $20 for 2, it took us about 10 minutes to work which 2 we were going to buy. Anyway they are up on the wall now and they look mighty fine.

Well we watched Ring 2 and shock horror, as expected it was nowhere near as good as the original film.

We are having a bit of a stay at home take it easy type weekend, although Orynthia got very excited when she found out that The June Brides were playing in London tonight. For those of you that may not know, The Junes Brides were one of those classic early 80’s indie bands – Jangly guitars, Baa Baa Baa chorus lines, wobbly weedy vocals and the obligatory trumpet player. This was back in the days when indie bands sold 1000 copies of a single, never appeared on TV and either wore second hand suits or black 501’s with two roll turn up’s. They made a couple of great pop singles and a nice LP before being lost to the world of proper jobs as indie somehow became Oasis, Blur and any guitar band in the country, no matter which multi-national label they signed to. I never got to see them play live, although they did play once with local indie kings The Brilliant Corners. The gig was in The Hope centre, a converted church in the middle of densely packed flats, because of the location, the venue had very tight noise restrictions placed upon it. This meant that all gigs had to be over very early, consequently my friends and I were drinking in The Adam & Eve next door as The June Brides played. Shame. Anyway we shan’t be driving to London tonight, maybe they will play a bit nearer to home and we will get the chance to pretend to be 20 again.

Did not make it to the cricket yesterday afterall. Gloucestershire managed to play rather too well. By the time we would have got to the ground, the game would have only had about an hour left to play. We did not fancy paying £9 for that.

Still have not got round to putting any of the digital photo's on this site or on another webpage. Just down to time really, we have taken lots of snaps and had some great fun playing around with the images on photoshop. It the past week we have been to the theatre a couple of times. Saw A chorus of Disapproval by Alan Ayckbourn and Endgame by Samual Beckett. Contrasting approaches to the our frail concept of control over our destiny.

If the weather holds, I'm off to the cricket this afternoon. Gloucestershire Versus Nottinghamshire at the County Ground in Bristol. it is the 3rd day of a 4 day match, Gloucestershire are in an excellent position to win the game. What could be better than an afternoon in the company of OAP's and skivers?

Last night we had a bit of a test run for the impending World Cup. 10 of us watched the European cup final in our house. As the competing teams came from Spain and Germany, we tried to link most of the food and drink with those two countries. This is something that we have done for past couple of major football tournaments, you find yourself eating and drinking some very odd combinations at it can become a real test of the Bristol gastronomic shopping scene. Last night was fairly straightforward. Wine, cheese and beer coming from both countries along with olives, salami and bread covered the basics. Steve cooked a fine Tortilla to round things off. The multi-national crowd were well behaved and a fine night was had by all. We could be having some very odd breakfast meals over the next month.

Found a nice piece on the writer Murakami today.
It echoes many of the things that attract me to his books. I love the detached way he deals with often fantastical situations. I find myself leaping on every new release from him. My introduction to him was through "The Wind-up Bird Chronicle" in many way the toughest of his books, however I was hooked. All the books have merits, although on occasions the endings can drift away. My current reading matter, Number 9 Dream by David Mitchell, does have strong echoes of Murakami’s work. It features a split narrative, with the story switching between a 20 year olds search for his estranged father and a period in early childhood. To make matters slightly confusing the 20 year old undertakes regular Walter Mitty like flights of fantasy. I’m about 1/4 of the way through the book and it is starting to really grip.

On Monday evening we watched one of the most frightening film that I have seen in a long time. It was a Japanese film called "Ring", a very understated chiller that gradually built the tension. No gory special effects or over the top "here comes a scary moment" music. It was great very uncomfortable viewing. The follow-up "Ring 2" is being shown on TV next Monday. Can it be as good?

I still seam to be obsessed with all things Japanese. I could go on about the music of Cornelius as well but I better leave it for now.

Another exhausting but enjoyable weekend. The Spike Island show was a great start to the weekend. A real mixture of work, from the Human scale Hamster wheel to flowers that had been planted in shoes. Anna gave Orynthia a print, which was related to a tale of us getting lost in Australia. Then Saturday and Monday afternoons / evenings were spent at the Essential Festival, where we saw James Brown, Culture, and some of the Full Cycle crew plus others. The real standout part though, was the walk back across the suspension bridge towards Clifton late on Monday evening. The sheer number of people walking over the bridge, set off an unsettling swaying motion, that made us all very relieved to reach the other side. Then again the bridge has been standing for 150 years, so I guess we weren’t in too much danger.

I finished reading The Unexpected Salami a couple of days ago. It is good fun, a splendidly improbable plot is just about kept under control, as the ever more convoluted story charges along.. Although it is a funny book, very funny on occasions. I liked the way that the parents proved to be real stars and proved that often the people who you think will be most critical of your actions, can also be the most supportive. I have now started to read Number 9 Dream by David Mitchell, mainly because it is set in Tokyo and has been compared to the work of my current “must read” author Haruki Murakami. Most of the fiction that I have read over the past year or so, has been set in either New York or Tokyo. I like the little buzz of recognition that I get when an author talks about a certain building or part of town, it starts to trigger memories of time spent in those amazing places. At the moment Bristol does not feature extensively in the world of fiction, unlike TV, where Orynthia spend an increasing amount of time playing the “who can recognise that part of town first” game. Anyway, whilst reading this lunchtime, lots of memories of February 1999 came back to me. We stayed in the Shinjuku area of Tokyo, where some of the opening sequences of Number 9 Dream are set. Strangely the first thing that comes to mind is the fact that all the opticians had little stands set up outside their shops, with solutions and cloths so that you could clean your glasses! I also think of the amazing record shops, it really appeared that you could buy any record that had ever been released no matter how obscure. The fantastic noodle soups that we ate for breakfast whilst standing on a very chilly pavement at about 7 am in the morning after visiting the amazing Tsukiji fish market and then realising that nowhere else was open at that time of the morning, so we had to spend about an hour over a cup of coffee in McDonalds.

Talking of local sights being on TV, this week I bought the DVD of Portishead playing at Roseland, New York. One of the extra features is a copy of the film that used to be shown at the start of Portishead gigs. It is a video of the journey from Redland in Bristol to the town of Portishead. The start of the journey features Chandos Road, in Redland, at the time the film was made we were living on Chandos Road, it brings back lots of good memories, although it is very strange to see the big red van that belonged to John our former Greengrocer featured in a screen filling close up. I’m sure he would be thrilled – if he had any idea who Portishead were. By the way if anyone reads this who is not based in Bristol, you may be interested to know that Portishead are recording again. No idea when the next record will come out, but I’m delighted to know that we have another one to look forward to.

This evening we are off to the opening night of the Spike Island show. Spike Island is a centre for 100 local artists, and this weekend we get the chance to take a look at the work they have been doing. As you can imagine with so many people involved, the material on show covers all the options. It promises to be a fascinating, amusing and curious evening.

Sore feet and tired legs are the order of the day, after 2 nights of dancing. Friday night was Four Corners night at The Croft. Biggest crowd so far, and some of the strangest dancing yet seen, thanks to a strange Mr Been meets Max Wall chap, who had Orynthia and I chuckling, when we weren’t swiftly moving our toes out the firing line. Then last night it was off to Blowpop, to see Scott Hendy and Andy Smith in action, along with the Blowpop regulars. It was a treat to see Pete Smithson, briefly recreating the glory of his nights on the dance floor.

Prior to Blowpop, we joined Crescentia and some of her friends for a birthday meal at La Quentos. Strangely the conditions in the restaurant matched the rain swept streets outside, as an air conditioning unit leaked water on Orynthia for most of the evening. I suppose it helped to give us the authentic high humidity experience of a Mexican night out. The staff were mortified and the delicious complementary cocktail that came Orynthia’s way made up for the strange experience of eating in the middle of fine drizzle.

On the subject of food Teresa has pointed out that I forgot to mention the lovely brunch that we enjoyed last Sunday with her and Steve Dew. We went to Café Maitreya on St Marks road. It is a fairly new vegetarian place, where Teresa appears to eat at least twice a week. Really nice food, fantastic Cheesecake although as we were one of the last groups of people eating they did not have enough for all of us to have a portion. Run by really nice people, I expect that we shall be returning, although it may not be easy, as it’s reputation is spreading quickly leading to problems in getting a table.

Yesterday. We bought one of the super small digital camera’s for £40. It is an amazing thing. The qualty of the pictures is not fantastic, but for quick, fun photo’s it great. Took a few shots round town today after we failed to get into the animation festival at The Watershed. Hope to put some of these on the site. Also went to a new outdoor market in St Pauls. Of course it rained and blew a gale! Needs to have a few more stalls but could be an interesting addition to Sundays in Bristol.

Orynthia has started a new job in the last week or so. She is now back in the world of the web, which is really good news and better still her new office is across the road from mine, which means that we can meet up for lunch or after work. So as well as an interesting job, she gets the chance to travel in wonderful old fashioned style of the train journey from Redland to Temple Meads.

The train journey is a really nice way to start and end the day. Redland station is 15 minute walk from our house, a lovely walk it is too. Through Redland Green, watching the Squirrels rushing around whilst the birds swish noisily too and fro, It is my idea of perfect countryside – because it is in the middle of the town!

Been buying a few CD’s of late. Picked up new releases by Elvis Costello and Craig Armstrong yesterday as well as an EP by the raucous Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Then last night we caught up with our good friend Steve Vowles, who has been working in Madrid for the last 6 months. As a thank you for looking after his city ticket whilst he was away, Steve gave us a lovely CD by a Spanish group called La Buena Viola, although it is sung in Spanish and I don’t understand a word of it, I love it. It matches the mood of the glorious sunny weather that we are experiencing at present, subtle melodies, understated vocals with occasional lush but not overbearing string arrangements. It is a fine piece of work. Imagine that Belle and Sebastian had grown in San Sebastian rather than Glasgow and you won’t be far wrong.

Just started reading another book that has been recommended by our friend Bill from New York. It’s called The unexpected Salami and was written by Laurie Gwen Shapiro. It gets a mention in the Australian section of the epic travelogue that is on the website that Bill and Doreen put together after their world trip. The site is really interesting with some great photos and I’m not even a twitcher so I’m sure that a lot of the really exciting stuff goes over my head. I’ll let you know what I think of the book.

Today was the last day of Bristol City’s season. We drew 1-1 at home to Stoke City. We finish in 7 position in the league, 2 places better than last season but not good enough for the promotion playoffs. I’m not upset about the prospect of another year in division 2. As I get older, I start to value the social side of going to the match almost as much as the quality of football itself. I’ve been going o a regular basis since 1970 and have accepted the fact that City will never become a Manchester United or even a Southampton. We have bad games and good games. Obviously I love the really great performances by the team or indeed the really exciting games such as the recent game with Reading. However on many occasions I have the most fun on days when the football is not too good. I have been lucky enough to watch the matches with the same group of people for the last 6 or 7 years (indeed in some cases for nearer 20 years!), I also meet up with lots of people in the Nova Scotia pub for a quick drink before the game. Some of the people are amongst my closet friends, many more of them are only linked to me through football. Now the popular conception of the English football fan is of a racist, beer monster storming around the country abusing anyone who is not one of them. This people do exist, however my experience of going to football is an ever expanding collection of interesting, funny, loyal people. It is great to spend time with people that have searched out life in so many different places all over the world. It is also great to be in a place where no class system exists. The view of the 17 year old person with an underpaid agency job is just as valid as the millionaire popstar, the accountant or the unemployed 55 year old. We all moan and groan as the season progresses but it is lovely thing to say to so many people today, "Have a good summer, see you next August" and know that you will be able to pick just were we left off this afternoon.

Orynthia and I went to 24 hour party people earlier this week. It is the film that tell the tale of the rise and fall of Factory Records. Steve Coogan who plays Tony Wilson the figurehead for the company narrates it. The film concentrates on Joy Division, The Hacienda, and Happy Mondays. I was one of gloomy young men that took Joy Division to their hearts, and remember being devastated when John Peel announced that Ian Curtis was dead. I saw them play once at Trinity Hall, and they were fantastic. Watching them in a semi-derelict church, seemed like the perfect way experience them. I went to Hacienda, I think only once (maybe twice) and it was an eye opening evening for me. In Bristol at the time, clubs small, dark, edgy places. So to step into this warehouse of a building was quite a culture shock. As was the music. At the time dancing was not something that any one liked to admit to doing. The culture in Manchester was very different, not yet in its full ecstasy driven madness, it was still a sight to behold. The film caught the wonderful contradictions of the period really well.

Orynthia has had an amazing week of job related issues. Nothing is fully resolved yet so I won't go into any more detail. Fingers crossed it should all be resolved in the next week.

At last, I have managed (with a lot of help from Webmaster Orynthia) to put up some pictures of our trip to Guadalupe for the wedding of Felipe and Mercedes. If you want to read what I had to say about it at the time, you can, by looking at my entry from March 7th.If you want to look at the pictures go to the link to Felipes & Mercedes Wedding.

At least City have managed to put us out of our misery today. 4-0 down after only 34 minutes, we ended up losing 5-1 at Blackpool. Huddersfield won, so we stay in division 2 for another season.

I have just finished reading The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho. It was leant to me by Ian Wallen (literally my oldest friend, as I have known him since I was less than 4 years old). It came highly recommended but I have to say that it did not really do much for me. The writing style, such as it is, is very simple. I felt as though I was back in school reading something in a bible studies class. The blurb on the back advises that Paulo Coelho has sold over 20 million books worldwide. Then again a lot of people like Sting!

Well the period of national mourning is almost over. I suppose we all knew that it was going to happen, it’s just that the timing is so unfortunate. Only a couple of weeks after the last warning that even he is mortal, it happened – David Beckham is injured! What fantastic irony that in the midst of the 20th anniversary of the Falklands war and with less than a couple of months before the next titanic meeting between England and Argentina, that the major star of English football, should be felled by an Argentinean pre-emptive strike. The initial despair of last night has started to lift, everyone that I spoke to today suddenly knows the innermost detail of recovery times for broken bones in the foot, and they all confidently pronounce "6 weeks, he’ll be ready. No Problem". We will have to wait and see, at the moment it is Argentina 1 England 0.

Last night we went to The Old Vic to see the fantastic Peter Postlethwaite in Scaramouche Jones. It is an epic one-man show as a man looks back on his extraordinary life and the century that he has spent it in. I was a little dubious, as I saw a brief clip of the play on TV, which showed "PP" in full clown get-up over acting to not very comic effect. I have never been a fan of clowns, indeed the older one gets the less funny they become. However, within the opening couple of minutes of curtain up, the snippet I had scene emerged and it was clear that it meant to be a cheesy aside, in stark contrast to the rest of the performance. A gripping and moving piece of writing from Justin Butcher.

Orynthia has had a mad week with work related stuff. She has a short-term contract with an excellent local web company, starting next Monday. It is a really exciting opening. We wait to see what it could lead to.

Shock horror, the football on Monday night went well. I could still walk on Tuesday, well with the aid of a stick anyway – only joking.

Back to work today. Not too bad considering that I had been off since 29/3.
Just heard that we have been awarded a huge 2% pay rise!! Still, lots of our
friends have been losing jobs lately, so I can't complain.
The weekend went well, had a good time at both Four Corners and Espionage,
hooked up with lots of people and danced our way into the small hours at
both nights. Local noise merchants The Heads played at Espionage and
although I quite enjoyed the sonic rush for a short while, I must admit that
Orynthia and I had to take cover at the back of the boat after about 20
minutes. Lightweights!!

Whilst we were at Four Corners I received an unexpected and slightly belated
birthday gift from John Stapleton and Jane Tily. Sometime in the late
1950's or early 60's a series of record were released which featured actors
reading lines from a script (which was included with the record) then
leaving a pause for you to reply. A bit like a language tape, but with a two
way dialogue rather than repetition. I have had one of these records
featuring a wildly over the top Vincent Price for a number of years. John
managed to find one with the marvellous "Slapsy" Maxie Rosenbloom. Now, you
may not be aware (I wasn't) that Slapsy was world champion boxer in the
1930's before turning to the silver screen, playing mainly, and no surprise
here, punch drunk old boxers for comedy effect. The record features lots of
sketches written with Slapsy in mind. It is a fine thing. I'll be looking to
pick-up more of these if I can.

We had a great meal on Saturday evening at a newish restaurant called Tico
Express. It features interesting tapas style (in portion size and cost but
not always in the type of food) dishes, which wiz around the room on the
sort of conveyor belt that you see in those swanky London sushi bars. Plus a
small selection of hot dishes. We really enjoyed the food, and it is good to
see a non stop procession of dishes heading towards you.

Bristol City managed a win on the weekend to just about keep our promotion
hopes alive. We have to rely on Huddersfield dropping points, it could
happen and we may yet find ourselves embroiled in the dreaded playoffs.
Could all come down to our final game of the season, when we are at home to
Stoke. Get those calculators ready!!

Finally, The Guardian had an interesting piece,talking
about old Jazz musician's that have fallen on hard times. It features Abdul
Zahir Batin, who we met whilst we were in New York. In fact we bought one of
his tapes and enjoyed it.

I playing football tonight for the first time since the middle of December,
My legs are starting to wobble already at the thought of it!

Here we are back in Bristol, after a couple of nice days in London. Thanks to the wonder of the APEX ticket, managed to travel on the train for only £18 pounds each. Also managed to find a nice little hotel just between Edgeware Road an Marble Arc for only £40 including breakfast!! Bargins all round. To continue on the theme of bargins, once we had dumped our bags in the hotel, we set off, in the warm spring sunshine, to West Norwood, in deepest south London. For a journey that took about 80 minutes, we were only charged £1 each! By Bristol standards - amazing. We spent a few hours with Orynthia's splendidly named Aunty Tiny, before heading back towards Brixton for the Belle & Sebastian gig at Brixton Academy. We had a quick walk round the fantastic food shops in Brixton before sitting down for a drink in a bar just down the road from the venue. The clientle at the bar was a glorious mix of boisterous elderly West Indians and geeky indie types. Then off to Academy, my first visit to this huge old cinema. The first band to play were a Glasgow 4 piece call "Life Without Buildings", not huge on conventional song stucture, but I did quite enjoy the bass driven melodic lines that lurked beneath the surfice. Reminded me of The Au-Pairs being fronted by Bijork. Around 09:15 B&S ambled onto the stage. A similar set to last years tour but this time instead of being joined by a Dixieland jazz band, this time a local Steel band provided a bizzare but entertaining interlude. Afraid to say that the "sound" was not as good as it could have been, we were about 4 songs in before the string section could really be heard. An enjoyable gig but not a great one.

Thursday was Orynthia's birthday. So as a treat for her we went to see an exhibition of photo's taken by Kevin Cummins featuring The Smiths (Orynthia has always been rather smitten with Johnny Marr). Lots of memories came flooding back, enjoyed seeing the pictures of the fans as much as the band. What splendid hair we all had in those days!! Then it was off to the Conran shop for a nose around at all the things we can't afford, before heading to Soho for lunch. A really nice little Italian in Frith Street set us out in the afternoon, with tastebuds suitably tickled. Saw Lenny Henry in a book shop on Charing Cross Road, before heading off to Hyde Park to watch the Belle & Sebastian invitation football match. I did have thoughts of playing, however it was about 20 a side, on a very bumpy pitch, so I thought I would just enjoy the food whilst watching the indie boys (and a couple of girls) indulge in a fairly robust match. Orynthia also spotted her 2nd Nissan Figaro of the day, to round off her birthday in style. The train home was almost on time, quite rare for a train out of Paddington!

The birthday celebrations continue this evening at The Croft, where we aim to dance the night away with John Stapleton, Ian Green and Phil Darby in control of the decks.

Well, the long Easter weekend is over.
Football first: For Bristol City it was a weekend that may have ended our promotion hopes. On Saturday, we watched the best game of the season at Ashton Gate. Top of the league Reading stormed into a two goal lead with only 4 minutes gone and we all feared the worst. Against all odd's we were back on level terms within a further 8 minutes, thanks to a fine strike by Lee Peacock and a very dubious penalty, converted by Bell. However in the 14th minute we conceded another goal! 2-3 down and only 14 minutes played. Reading shaded the rest of the first half. The second half belonged, in the main, to City. We got back on level terms with about 20 minutes to go but we were not able to force a fourth goal. So, it was off to second placed Brighton on Easter Monday. After conceding a soft goal just before half time, we fought back to equalise with 35 minutes to go. Despite creating chance after chance, we failed to score again. In fact in injury time, Tony Thorpe had a header cleared on the line before Brighton went straight onto the attack to clinch the game 2-1. We now need to win our last 3 games and hope that Cardiff slip up. Can't see it happening. Oh Well.

Sunday was spent with Orynthia's family. Huge amounts of food were consumed. Two Peking Ducks, multiple curry dishes, noodles and Chicken Satay. Before, rounding it all off with fantastic Tiramisu and Banoffi Pie, both made by Orynthia. Then off to see my sister and her boys for lots of music chat before meeting up with Jane and John for a quiet drink. Went to bed still feeling very, very full.

Tomorrow, we are off to London for the Bell & Sebastian gig and to celebrate Orynthia's birthday. Looks like a busy weekend as we are aiming to go out dancing on both Friday and Saturday night. Will our old bodies be able to take it?

Today is the first day of a week away from work, as well as the easter bank holidays of today and Monday, we are both taking Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday off as well. This is mainly because we are going to London on Wednesday to see Belle & Sebastian.

Spent most of the day hacking away at things in the garden, whilst Orynthia did the more creative things. Managed to clear a path through to old Air Raid shelter. One day we will finally empty it of all the old junk that has left to rot over the years. Not sure what we will do with it then, it's been on our things to do list for about 5 years now!! You can't rush these things.

We are off for a bit of 80's nostalgia tonight. Pete Wylie is in town. Wah, in most of their guises were one of fav bands back then. Although Pete has troubled the charts on a few occasions, I think that he has troubled his bank manager rather more! We saw him play in Cardiff about 6 months ago and he was great. Started the gig with the old Johnny Thunders classic "You can't put your arms round a memory" and went on to play all the hits that should have been as well as telling tales of the confused and strange life that he has lived . Also playing tonight is a certain Glen Matlock once of the Sex Pistols. 25 years on from "God save the Queen" will the middle aged people of Bristol be pogoing through the night?

Big weekend for Bristol City, home to top of the table Reading tomorrow, then away to 2nd placed Brighton on Monday. I think we need 4 points from these games to stay in the hunt for a play off place. I'm not confident that we will get them. our record against the top teams of the past couple of seasons has not been good.

Just finished reading "When we were orphans" by Kazuo Ishiguro . Like all his novels, his languid style, which initially is frustrating. does really draw me in. His books seem to feature the most pompous people doing the most mundane things. Somehow Ishiguro makes this compelling. I wish he would turn his attention to something more contemporary. I would love to see what he has to say about todays issues.

Just in from seeing The Royal Tenenbaums at last. Really enjoyed the film, lots of great scenes, my favourite being the discussion between Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson about the suicide note. I won't say any more in case you have not seen it. Also enjoyed the music, nice to hear Nick Drake and The Velvet Underground amongst others.

Being thinking quite a lot about Margaret Thatcher over the past few days. Not nice I know but it all started when it was announced that her medical people had told her to give up public speaking as she could have another stroke at any time. At last I thought, no more of her bitter ramblings. Then on Saturday evenings Critical List show on Radio 2, Stuart Maconie played both Margaret on the guillotine by Morrissey and Tramp the dirt down by Elvis Costello. Both of which look forward to the day that she dies with vitriolic glee. Now, I don't like to think of myself as a nasty person but I must say that the when the day comes, it will bring many memories of those awful spiteful days, when the only thing that mattered was individual wealth and selfishness. It was also strange to see Ian Duncan Smith trying to claim that the Tory party, could be the party to help the people at risk in our society. We will have to wait to see what happens, when the day does come. I won't shed any tears for her but I may just do so at the thought of the foul, self obsessed, small minded England that she helped to create in those dark days.

Well, I just put a webcounter on this site. Will it get into double figures before the end of the year?

Shocking news - City manage to win! A 3-1 victory at Bournmouth keeps us in the top 6 and may just be the spur that the team need in the quest for promotion. Huge game for us next weekend, when we are at home to top of the league Reading.

Had a long sleep-in this morning following a late night on Friday. I went out straight from work , to wish good luck to a couple of work colleagues that were leaving the company. Then I met up with Orynthia at The Croft for the latest Four Corners night out. Loads of friends were out and we had a fine dance (well, we danced a lot, i guess other people should judge the actual quality of the performance!)

Today we (along we lots of other people) helped Heather and Spider shift some stuff into their splendid new house. Managed to catch up with Babs who has just returned from a great trip to the States. Babs and Mark went to Vegas before heading down to Austin, Texas for the South By Southwest music festival. It sound's as though Austin is really good place to visit. Maybe one day, we will manage to get to the states and move beyond New York.

Picked up a few second hand LP's in the afternoon. A great Isley Brothers one from 1967, a strange LP of Jewish comedy sketches called "You don't have to be Jewish.." recorded in New York in 1964, and a fairly generic blues album by a guy who's name I have forgotten already. Set us back the grand total of £4 for the lot, so I can't complain. Earlier in the week I also picked up the soundtrack to the glorious Mulholland Dr. and a CD of amazing early work from Steve Reich. Not easy to listen to, the sort of thing that I find really compelling but sends Orynthia rushing out of the room as fast as she can make it.

Off for a Dim Sum lunch with the family members that went to the Prince Buster gig at 12;30 tomorrow, so I guess I should head off to bed now. Then tomorrow evening John Stapleton has invited us down to little session that he is doing at il Bordelo (a fairly new club on a boat. So it's a mixture of food and music tomorrow - what could be better?

I have been a bit slack, when it comes to updating this site. the trouble is we never seem to be at home. Had a really good weekend, the highlight of which was seeing Prince Buster on Sunday evening. That's right the ska legend came to town and what a man he is. He had the large crowd dancing like lunatics for 80 minutes. After the show Orynthia even managed to get him to sign a CD. The gig should have taken place last year but was postponed in the wake of September 11th. We had started to worry that it would never happen but the man came good.

On the advice of my friend Bill, I have just read the excellent Are You Experienced? by William Sutcliffe. A splendidly funny read about a young man "Doing" india for all the wrong reasons. Although we have never done the full backpacking thing, anyone who has done the slightest amount of self organized travel will recognize the fantastically observed portraits of the people who delight in telling you that you have just done it all wrong!! They always know a better place or cheaper deal and relish telling you all about it.

I was delighted to see an illustration by Marcellus Hall in the latest edition of the New Yorker. I really like his work. In a recent edition of the same magazine he did a great piece on the Knitting Factory in New York. We spent a couple of nights in the Knitting Factory at the end of last year (including New Years Eve) and he really caught the atmosphere of the place. I might send him an email to see if he minds me putting a link to it on this site. You take a look at some of his other work by go to his web site by clicking on his name.

I also learnt from the New Yorker that they are starting to worry about a water shortage due the lack of rain. No such problems here, another day of howling gales and drenching rain. Good old England.

Bristol City go from bad to worse, lost to lowly Notts County on the weekend, to slip to 6th place in the league. As I write this the team are in action at Chesterfield. We really have to start winning some games or we are going to miss out on the Promotion play offs, let alone outright promotion. COME ON YOU REDS!!!

Whilst watching the local news on TV last night, we were curious to see that Stapleton Road in Bristol, was named by David Blunkett MP as one of the 5 most dangerous places in the UK. Many of our friends live in the Easton area and are quite happy to do so. That's not to say that we are not aware of the problems that do exist in the area. It was very strange to see the TV debate on the state of the area taking place in The Casbah cafe on the wonderful St Marks road. The coverage made it sound as though, only a madman would venture onto these streets. The same streets and indeed cafe where we have enjoyed lots of fine nights out. Good food in a relaxed enviroment. We just hope that the bad coverage does not put people off going to this part of town. What the traders and community need is more money being spent in the area by people from other parts of Bristol, not less.

Sad news in Bristol, Vital Distribution is closing the Bristol warehouse. Now the name Vital, may not ring a bell with most people but for many years it has been part of the fabric of the music scene in Bristol.

It all started from the back room of Revolver Records back in the late 1970's. Revolver was, for me, a crucial shop. It turned into a place of Saturday morning pilgrimage, as I would venture into town, my head buzzing with the names of obscure bands that I had heard on the John Peel show during the course of the previous week. Where else could you go to get those singles by Spizz Oil, O level, Those naughty lumps, This Heat and hundreds of other bands of dubious musical pedigree. Well Virgin may well have sold them in those days (unlike now), but it just could not compare with the magic of slipping into that small doorway and the journey up the stairs and along the small corridor festooned with scrappy bits of paper, from people who were "into Slits, Wire, Gang of Four - seek Bass player - enthusiasm more important than ability". You then emerged into a small room, which was a cornucopia of delights for the enquiring musical mind. I sure that this was the first place that I heard the like of Captain Beefheart , Big Youth, Tom Waites and many more. The staff were different as well. They actual knew about and loved music. Over the years we enjoyed great if opinionated service from Mike Chadwick, Steph Thornton, Grant Marshall (yes, Grant from Massive Attack), Sean Mayo, and Bob Jones.

Then the shop started to distribute records as well as just selling them, soon it became an important cog in the whole post punk music scene. Although Orynthia and I never worked for Revolver (Which changed it's name to Vital at some point), countless numbers of friends did and although many of them moved onto other things, the "Vital" social crew are still a great bunch of people to be with.

In the 1990's the shop was sold and was never really quite the same, it limped on for may years before closing a few years ago. Vital hit a peek on the back of the Oasis explosion before dark clouds started to appear a while back.

Bristol just will not be quite the same. Then again, no place ever is.

More on the trip to Spain.
On the Saturday morning, we set out for Guadalupe in the new car that Pedro had bought with his TV winnings (He was featured on a popular Spanish quiz show, whilst we were in Madrid). Steve and Janet were taken by the lovely Jorge and Annalise. After about an hour of fairly dull motorway driving, we turned to head into the mountains. Immediately we saw some wonderful birds which were either Cranes or Storks. This was the start of an amazing twisting journey through the mountains. Poor Pedro had to wrestle with his steering wheel as we turned this way and that for about 45 mins. Eventually we arrived at this amazing small town which was completely dominated by the monastery that was to be the setting for the wedding. We have lots of pictures waiting to be scanned. I think these will do more justice to the setting and the day itself than I can. It was a great occasion and the Spanish people really went out of their way to make 2 humble speakers of the English language only, very welcome.

We finally made it to our bed at around 4 in the morning, having danced to some truly awful Euro pop. Never mind, the atmosphere remained splendidly good natured right to the end, and although everyone had more than enough to drink, no one was suddenly turned into the sort of raging English person that we see all too often.

The journey back to Madrid was even more spectacular the journey out. Overnight, snow had turned the previously rugged mountain ranges into soft and gentle cotton wool covered fantasy lands. Not the best of conditions for driving. I was pleased that Pedro was at the wheel rather than me. Upon our descent, we then ran into very thick fog for a couple of miles before this gave way to rain for the rest of trip back to Madrid.

On our return to the hotel, we were pleased to see that we had been allocated a much larger room for the last couple of days of our trip. On the Monday, Orynthia, Janet and I went on a walk through the old town to the Segovia bridge managing to catch site of a woodpecker in one of the parks along the way. We returned to our lunch by way of the grounds of the Royal Palace, where we saw some very strange green birds, as yet they remain unidentified. Our last night in Madrid was spent with Steve and 4 of his female friends, and we had a few drinks in a couple of nice bars.

Lucky me. I don't have to return to work until 11th March. Orynthia is working, so I am just mooching around for a couple of days. Nothing I like more.

Well, we are back from our trip to Spain, and a fine time we had.

On arrival in Spain, we were a little surprised to find that our room was about the same size as the double bed which filled it! However, it was very cheap and in an amazing location - Within 30 yards of the magical Plaza Mayor. Within 30 mins Steve Vowles (from Bristol), Felipé (soon to be married) and Pedro (current TV star) met us in the hotel. As is the way in Madrid we found ourselves heading out for the evening at around 11pm for Tapas and wine.

Over the next few days, we visited the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza and the Reina Sofia museum. We almost went into the huge Prado, but decided that the collections were just too old for us. In many ways we are very predictable in our choice of art, we really only like 20th century stuff. Managed to find lots to enjoy although the Warhol / Basquiat/ Clemente exhibition took about 5 mins of our time. I think that was about 4mins 50 seconds too long. Maybe I am just getting old, but I just don't get the inane scribbles that Basquiat managed to pass off as art.

Had quite a relaxed time really as we all knew that we had a big weekend in front of us with the wedding in Guadalupe. Managed to have a crazy walk around the back streets of Madrid when about 8 of us were trying to find a vegetarian that Felipé had allegedly booked us into on the Thursday evening. Poor old Pilar was walking around on a crutch following a skiing accident. Of course, when we found the place it was closed whilst building work went on. Another walk around before sitting down to eat at around midnight.
To be continued.....

Oh I forgot to say - Lamchop, that new CD is just fantastic!!!!

Well the weekend rushed past, mainly because we drove for 90 mins to sit in a room for 3 hours, whilst people attempted to sell us a Timeshare deal. We managed to resist, it was not hard really. Our prize for doing this is a free trip to Australia!!!! Not yet sure when this will take place, as we still have a few hurdles to overcome.

Spent Saturday night at my Dad's new(ish) place in Dunkerswell, Devon, before heading home on Sunday morning.
City drew 0-0 away at Colchester, so we slip to 4th. Home to Peterborough tomorrow night. Then we head off to Madrid on Wednesday.

That's about it for now.

Well it had to happen, City manage to lose 2-0 at home to Cambridge last night. No LDV glory for us this season. Strange game really, City did not play well for most of the game, but still had 7 or 8 great chances to score. A mixture of fine goal keeping and poor finishing meant that it counted for nothing. I could go on about the fact the 1st Cambridge goal was yards offside but hey.....lets concentrate on the league!

Music - Rushed into town on Monday to pick up new CD'S by Lamchop and Boards of Canada plus singles by Cornelius and Freeheat.

I must say the Lamchop disc is swoonsome in the extreme. I enjoyed "Nixon" but it sometimes sounded a little forced, "Is a woman" just sounds like a group of people working their way through thoughts and emotions at the end of a tough 6 months or so. I really think that Kurt Wagner's voice is at it's best here. Some wonderful melodies, helped I think by the increased use of piano of some tracks. We been lucky enough to see Kurt play twice in the past year, Once on his own and then with quietest large band in the world. I love the way he reaches deep into his soul to force the words out. Often, when they emerge they are barely audible but the meaning and feeling is always clear. A lovely man - This is a fine CD for quiet nights around the fire.

Only managed one play so far of "Geogaddi" by Boards of Canada. As expected on first hearing it just a collection of fairly ambient sounds. Both the "Music has the right to children" CD and the "In a beautiful place in the country" EP washed over me for the first couple of plays before becoming perfect mooching around on the sofa listening.

A quiet weekend this time, which I guess we need as we will be away for the next two weekends. Enjoyable game on Saturday, a 3-0 win over Oldham taking City back up to 3rd in the league. Then in the evening we went over to have a meal with Bob and Karen Jones. Amused to hear that Bob is now doing some DJ work, under the fine name of DJ BJ. Even more amused to hear that he is mainly playing Karens old records rather than his. So no place for Eric Dolphy or Roland Kirk at the moment! It does reinforce the comment that Felipe made to us whilst he was in Bristol "Everyone in Bristol is a DJ" I'm starting to think that this is true. Orynthia and I are almost the only people we know that don't spend the weekends working expectant crowds into a frenzy. Or in DJ BJ's case 2 or 3 people into a state of mild interest!

Also spent some time (and it takes a lot of time to read the whole thing) reading the website that Bill and Doreen posted for the bird watching trip around the world. It's very interesting and funny, well worth checking out.

Well its official, everything in Afghanistan is now ok! Yesterday the peace keeping forces managed to arrange a football match in the national stadium in Kabul. 35,000 people managed to get in to see the match between a team made up of locals aginst a team made up of mainly British soldiers. Of cousre football being the game it is, shots had to be fired in the air, to scare away the multitudes without tickets that were storming the stadium. Pleased to see that nobody was injured but if this had happened in England football would have been castigated as the source of all the evil in the world. The local team were managed by former England number two Lawrie McMenemy, whilst the forces team were lead by our local boy made good Gary Mabbutt. One day I will bore you all with the story of the day I played against Mr Mabbutt and in my opinion played him off the pitch. Gary went onto captin Spurs and play for England, whilst I ended up with the mighty Fishponds Albion!!

Orynthia is excited at the moment having just spotted a female Blackcap in our back garden. We are very lucky, to have some interesting birds visiting us. The Blackcap was enjoying a splendid breakfast of Holly berries on this dry but nippy morning.

Things have been a bit techy on the computer front this week. Thanks to skills of Jon Collins our IMAC is now working on OS X. It looks great but we do have to learn a new way of using the computer, which for someone like me is not easy.!

Off to Ashton Gate now to see City v. Oldham. Can't imagine that the atmosphere will quite the same as the game in Kabul yesterday. Maybe it's will be time to reflect on our good fortune in being able to enjoy the simple pleasures that a game of football can bring to people.

Old age, now I know I'm 40! Settled down last night to watch Rushmore on DVD. Heard lots of good things about it from Bill and Doreen in New York and Alex in work. Alex was kind enough to lend me the DVD and I was really looking forward to watching it.

We had a glass of wine with our meal, before heading upstairs to watch the film. We have to watch DVD's on our IMAC and altough the screen is small the excitment of new technology is still with us. Settled back with another glass of wine and off we go. Enjoyed the film and then started playing around the additinal features that you get on the DVD. Had a listen to the film in Czech, which was kind of cool for about 40 seconds. Loved those Croatian subtitles!! Then thought I would have a look at the scene access bit. Whilst flicking through the chapters I noticed some stills that I did not remember. On closer inspection it looks as though I missed about 10 minutes of the film. Now this could be down to the wine or a hard day at the office (fat chance!) or just simple old age. The question now is, how often has this happend before. Was I asleep when I was offered that dream job in Tokyo, maybe I was snoozing when Tony Benn overthrew Tony Blair to take control of The Labour Party ( sorry, I can't say "New" Labour without flinching). How many times have I left Ashton Gate thinking City have lost games, when it fact a glorious victory was ours?

Since coming home from Xmas in New York , I have been reading a book called Wonderful Town its a collection of short stories taken from The New Yorker magazine, which have New York as their setting. It features many names that I know and love - Salinger, Woody Allen, Dorothy Parker, John Updike, James Thurber and like. plus many names who's work is new to me. Ashamed to say that its my first contact with John Cheever, Deborah Eisenberg,Daniel Fuchs and Jeffrey Eugenides amongst others. Many fine things although I was a bit disappointed with the William Maxwell tale.

Plant the Rice, the paddy field is ready!! Another day of spectacular rainfall Redland Green has turned into a maze of swamps and streams. Its starting to take on a bit of an end of the world feel. Rather fine it is too.

Made my first music purchases for a while today, and its back in time I go. Picked up a double CD of all John Cales work on Island from the mid 70's and Blue by Joni Mitchell. I guess the John Cale is partially because of the Warhol TV stuff. It reminded me of the fantastic "Songs for Drella" record that John Cale and Lou Reed stuck out as tribute to Warhol after his death. It is one of my all time fav records. As much for Cales contribution and Reeds.Poor old John has always been overlooked but I love his slightly skewed melodies and cutting lyrics.

Went to see Gosford Park and enjoyed it. However I did come away thinking that I had been watching a BBC2 Sunday evening drama, rather than an Altman film. Have to say that Maggie Smith was, as ever fantastic. The epitome of the irrasciable old lady.

Well, what a busy week!! Wednesday had the sort of work day that everyone should have. At 12 noon we all went out for lunch. Had a great time with the fine people at Sergios. Then stayed out for drinks and chat for the rest of the afternoon. Ended up playing pool - something I NEVER do. Even managed to win a few games, although I think this was down to my doubles partner Paul Harding , rather than any latent talent that I may have stumbled upon.
Thursday was the Union AGM. More drinking and I now find myself as part of an 18 strong committie for the South West Branch of the CWU. Not quite sure what this will entail. Should be fun finding out.
Friday went out for a drink with Jane, John and Baxter. Had a good evening, spent a lot of it talking about old clubs in Bristol, The Western Star, Top Cat, Bastille and more. By the way John has just put ot a great comp cd called "Make Music" on Harmless. It is getting great reviews all over the place, as it should because it is a fine CD.
Yesterday we sorted out our hotel in Madrid. Had a chat with Steve Vowles in the morning, we are still not sure of the final travel plans but I'm sure that we will have a splendid time. Bought a new suit for the wedding that afternoon. Well overdue as I was in danger of becoming the office tramp. Of course as soon as the purchase was made I worked out that with a bit of work 2 old suits could be knocked into shape, so now I have enough suits to take care of the wardrobe demands on the next Guy Ritchie mobster Britflick!! City managed to lose at Wycombe, so we are back to 4th place.
Jon Collins came round in an effort to fix a problem on our Mac, came back again today and although progress has been made further work is required. it's nice to have friends who's brains work the right way to these sort of things.
Just watched the last of the Warhol progs on channel 4. I must admit that the actual work which he produced does very little for me. However I do find him fascinating. England has gone Warhol mad, then again Steve said there is an exhibtion in Madrid as well. Maybe it is a world wide situation.

Hey, new web page template, new Bristol City. We are back up to 3rd in the league after a 2-0 win over QPR. Best home performance in the league for months. Credit to the mighty Tommy Doherty, for inspiring the team to play at a high tempo. Also Matt Hill, he just gets better and better.
Had a good chat with Chris Rose in the Nova Scotia before the game. He was excited about the upcoming vist a band called Faint, from Omaha who are in Bristol soon. They also get a mention in the New Yorker but I was worried to see that amongst the 5 piece, they not only have a moustache but also a full beard!!
I managed to grab a pre release tape of the new CD by Cornelius a couple of weeks ago, it is quite a change from the fantastic Fantasma. Has a few tracks which remind of 70's Jazz/Rock workouts, also has some sublime moments. I just hope we get the chance to see him perform again in Bristol.

As I was saying, had a great time in London on Sunday. We saw lots of swollen rivers and floooding whilst we trevelled up on the train. Once in london we changed our mind and went to Paris show at the RA first. Good call. It was fantastic. we were in there for several hours, loads to see and learn. Having done that we ran out of time to see the Paul Klee show, maybe someother time. We also went to see the Indian film Monsoon Wedding, which turned out to be very moving.
Talking of weddings 15 years ago yesterday, orynthia and I walked the walk. After the hectic weekend, we celebrated with some good food and Champagne and a quiet night at home.
Just found out that Belle & Sebastian are playing in London on April 3rd, the day before Orynthia's birthday. So its back to London again, which is where this entry started.

Blogger just lost the entry I had typed for today! its now 11:45 and I think I'll go to bed. Will try again tomorrow.

Not the greatest game of football the world has ever seen! Finished 1-1, with Huddersfield getting a goal in the 90th minute, to send us on way through the wind and rain in a grumpy frame of mind. No matter we will all be back for more on Tuesday, for the visit of QPR, and the return to Bristol of a certain Mr Hollaway. I don't think that he will get the same sort of reception the Joe Jordan did today!

Anyway whilst I was watching men huff and puff to no great effect, Orynthia spent her time doing rather more creative things. We have some pictures of the New York trip that can be viewed by going to http://website.lineone.net/~tomory/newyork
more will follow when we are able to spend some time at home. Going out for a meal with Richard and Alison tonight. Tomorrow we are off to London for the day. Aiming to go to the Paul Klee exhibition and if we have enough time, will go to the R.A. to see the "Paris" exhibition.

As I write this, the wind is howling around the back of the house. Garden chairs are resting in the flower beds but somehow our shakey old fence is still standing! The weather conditions should make for an interesting match this afternon, off to see City play Huddersfield. Was looking forward to catching up with Rich Ainsworth - Huddersfield's number 1 fan (even though he lives in London), but he is unable to make the trip.
Finally have all our New York pictures back. We are going to try put on this site via a link, so that our friends in far flung places can see what we got up to.

Well, after some confusion last night I have managed to change the template this morning.I quite like the cubes heading down the page.
Another wet and windy day in Bristol. Out on the town tonight for a combination of leaving parties and birthdays. I just hope the weather calms down.
Just booked our flights to go to Madrid for a few days at the end of the month. We are off to the wedding of Felipe and Mercedes. At the moment we are not quite sure how we are going to get from Madrid to the wedding but I'm sure it will be fun.
Better get on with some work now.