Tuesday 5 August 2008

A Short Rant - Mainly against the old and the young

There's a couple of sure signs that you're getting old:
  • You tell people age doesn't matter (it shouldn't)
  • You go into HMV or wherever and you already have evreything you want
  • And lot's of others...

But one thing I never understood is that you can never get past the tiniest old man or lady on a footpath no matter how big the footpath. I finally worked this out. Normal people squeeze to make room to let let you past, while certain members of the older geneation just refuse to give an inch... The other day an old guy gets on the bus and gripped the handrails at the front of the bus and refused to let anyone pass as "he was only going one stop" !!!

Worse than the students who congregate ant the front of busses despte the rest of the bus being empty , for fear they may miss their stop.

And then the people on trains who insist on blocking doorways and aisles while they adjust , pack and unpack their luggage and laptops, totally mental.

..and the people who block doorways while they have a conversion or tab regardless of who wants to get in or out.

I suppose you can include the drivers who hog the middle lane of the motorway driving at forty miles an hour when the road is virtually empty. There's a reason for the inside lane.

Oh and then there's the charvers with puchchairs who seem to think that it's OK to block the suprmarket aisles while they decide on whether to go for the Lambrini or the Concorde , or block the footbath while trying to juggle their Gregg's pastie and light a tab at the same time spilling ash all over the unfortunate kid being pushed around!!!

Grrr.

Friday 1 August 2008

New Bath and Carpet!!

We finally had the carpet delivered after much trauma , and people have asked to see the bathroom , so thought the easiest thing would be a short video , which is here:



It's the first day of August and the weather is mad as a fish going from monsoon to tropical sunshine in a matter of hours , still it could be much worse.

Most of the stuff in the bathroom was supplied by Newcastle Bath & Plumbing Centre in Fenham who are both reasonably priced and provide great service.

After the first video , people want to see the garden and front room, so that's here now. Apologies for shakiness , but still bgetting used to video camera thing , and should give you an idea of how things are going!!

Tuesday 29 July 2008

Spiders , Bees and a dog called Keegan!!

The garden is coming on well , though we're getting a bit of wildlife in the form of frogs, bees and spiders. Fiona insists that the spider webs should be cleared though I point out that the kill the real nasties such as bluebottles and the like. This guy seemed to be quite happy sitting on the water feature!!
We've also had lots of bees visiting but they are very reluctant to be photographed or filmed. We may get a picture at some point.





While drinking Cava during the afternoon , we noticed the family at the back had aquired a new yappy , black and white puppy ......they called it Keegan!!!

Sunday 20 July 2008

Mouth of Tyne Festival 2008

No rain this year but not much sun either. That didnt stop the bands or people enjoying themseleves . We started the day in South Shields watching the Excellent Bessie and the Zinc Buckets run through a great rockin' set including Stray Cat Strut , Ubangi Stomp and Jolene, much to the delight of numerous small schildren running around the circular paved area th the front of the stage .Took some video with the new camera but the sound was distorted so I added a Gene Vincent soundtrack!!



Then we went into Tynemouth to the Priory to see various Salsa bands who were perfect for the occasion , not only that but the bar was incredibly efficient despite running out of various ciders towards the end.


The Priory looked great bedecked with weird looking flags and stuff.

Here's the main stage:

On leaving the Priory we went past the jazz stage and encountered this rather excellent sounding band:
I'll leave this post with a phone photo of a double rainbow over Tynemouth last night:

Sunday 6 July 2008

Worrying Times At The Local Record Shop

A short one this but verry worrying . Went in to the local Zavvi shop in Newcastle this Saturday just gone and the main floor has been cleared of CDs , bar a couple of cardboard boxes in their so called sale.

In the basement , half the floor is taken up by books and magazines , and staff seem to get less knowledgeable by the visit.

HMV , while not as bad , seem to be pursuing a similar route with DVDs, games and books encroaching on the music bits.

While downloading and the internet can be partially blamed for this with likes of Amazon and itunes , it still is worrying to think that in the foreseeable future you wont be able to buy music in your main shopping street unless the Baghdaddies are busking and hawking copies of their latest release.

Even worse the models that HMV and Zavvi are pursuing may lead towards WH Smiths and Woolworths which are looking more like pound shops every time you go in with their DVD For A Pound and Buy One Get One Free sales.

Don't know what the answer is but you have been warned!!!

Addendum: 24th December , Woolworths have gone bust , Zavvi , who are supplied Woolworths are running low on stock , and WH Smiths are looking unsteady.

Thursday 3 July 2008

Good Technology

Named after a track by the rather excellent Red Guitars.

Not posted for a month and the house is still short of a carpet but there have been a few developments.

Firstly my old PC started acting very dodgily so I replaced it with a new Vista based PC . That has been a nightmare. Vista is atrocious , but can be made slightly more palatable by applying a few changes as detailed here. This was at the same time as adding a Wi-Fi router this now functions fairly well. I was amazed ot the number of insecured routers in the area which prompted me to buy another piece of technology...

The rather excellent ASUS Eee. It's small enough to go in a handbag , comes in a variety of colours (we went for the pink one) , and WORKS!!! It's great for internet surfing and basic office functions , runs on Linux but you can install XP , contains a web cam and is generally brilliant. Well worth the £220 I paid for it. I got mine onlne from Currys within 3 days.



Then came the replacement of the Home Cinema amp , back to Richer Sounds, so we now have decent sound in the front room and are now considering a new television, folling the new TV Unit and stuff that were eventually delivered by the Cotswold Company!!

Sunday 1 June 2008

Newcastle Observation - Clayton Street Redevelopment

Was surprised the other morning to be on the way to work through Newcastle centre's very own skid row to see this new Delicatessen. Well they've shout down one pub that wasn't conducive to the image of the incoming tenants across the road (Debenham's et al) and it looks like the classier establishments are trying to gain a foothold:

"Fine artisan cheeses and charcuterie"
Charcuterie? That's cooked meats to me and thee.
Makes a change from the Cheap Tab Shops, Pound A Pint Pubs, Out of Date food places and Two For One Shoe Emporia!!!


Anyway a couple of doors down the Black Garter looks like it's trying to stave off the inevitable with this quickly knocked together sign , after all if the powers that be have the slightest excuse to get them out , they undoubtedly will.

They'll just have to hope that the regulars and are able to read and understand the sign, though I reckon in a couple of years this and the other less salubrious watering holes in the area will have been moved on and replaced by Starbucks
, Wine Bars , Tesco Metro's and the like.

You have to wonder whether that's necessarily a good thing