Govember

Well it's the last day of the month so cue the Christmas songs and curmudgeons although it seems to have been going on for months.

Really we should embrace the original spirit of Christmas, caring for others, giving to make others happy (and hoping others return the favour) , throughout the year. I always try to but am sometimes exasperated by the concentration on money and material possessions and one upmanship you see in people.

When I can I do help others, and when you help others that makes you feel good so it's not all one sided. My help never leaves me short, so that I try to always be in a position to be there for others, sometimes in the smallest of ways. It may only be a word of encouragement, or and endorsement that someone is on the right path.

It's Still November!!

It's not about religion it's about carrying out your moral obligations and if you do then you will get an enormous lift from. There's a lot of new age stuff about wishing for good things and they'll come your way, though I see it as maintaining a positive attitude and doing things that will eventually come back on you with some form of recompense.

Anyway this is getting all philosophical, and you know I'm not that savvy to write about things like that so I need to find and picture and a video for this post which is Govinda by Kula Shaker just because it sounds a bit like Govember, although if you are in Australia it is already December so you can start to feel Christmassy!

Sort Of Normal

After finally getting up today after a good night's sleep today has been a sort of normal day. It's nine o'clock and I don't feel ready to drop. I've had a relaxing day visiting Helmsley, and my holiday has started in an excellent holiday type of way.

The weather is what you would expect in December, but I've certainly seen much worse and have plans to visit Helmsley Castle (part of English Heritage which is free with my Barclays Bank Account) and Castle Howard during the week.

The Last Glimpse Of Summer

Though being away from Newcastle has extracted me from the situation of choosing between four excellent gigs tonight so I can relax, listen to good music , drink , and just feel good. Though this is a remarkably short post it has taken me a remarkably long time to write, for something with so few words in it.

Maybe I am getting tired and maybe I should go to bed. Well my weekend has got off to a great start, I hope yours is the same and I hope all my friends who are enjoying gigs and socialising tonight have an absolutely brilliant time. I have to include a picture of Rebecca Cothers beautiful latest work one here because it is a lovely evocation of the last of summer.

I chose David Bowie's take on Jacques Brel's Amsterdam because my daughter Juliet is doing a presentation on the place this week. And that's another coincidence I've had reason to mention both of my daughters in consecutive blog posts , and that is another reason to put a smile on my face.

2 x 12 x Magna Carta

Quite amazingly this week I have had two twelve hour plus sleeps, one managing to sleep through the alarm the day after finishing work. I obviously needed so rest and recuperation. A good friend remarked that I always forget something when I go on holiday, and this time I did again, although it was just various cooking things, olive oil and the like.

This week I've noticed some odd coincidences , I was reading a book about space and the fact you could buy an acre of land on the moon for about $20 then logged on to Facebook to find my daughter Kirsty had bought an acre of Moon for £10!

Now That's What I Call A Document

After a drive down in thick fog and tea at The White Horse it was bed for me last night, but I'm up now with options of a "Christmas Fayre" in the local Church Hall and visits to local centres. I still can't believe after years of coming to Ampleforth that Helmsley doesn't have a Chemist! The White Horse is a fantastic welcoming pub, all the staff and regulars are friendly and the food is excellent, and at the the moment it's very festively decorated although there will be no Christmas songs til December. Quite right too.

Just noticed it's 800 years since the Magna Carta was signed, though think this needs reinforcing given the state of current governments. Here are Helmsley's details on the Magna Carta page.

Although this post was more about me sleeping a lot, it has morphed into stuff about history and The Magna Carta and the most contemporary music that came to mind is the Jay Zed album so I've included Crown from that album, which is quite good if a bit sweary.Have a brilliant day everyone, I'm enjoying my holiday.

No Black Friday Here

Well it's Friday and I'm waiting for my hire car to be delivered so I can drive down to Ampleforth to the holiday cottage for a week of quite after two hellishly intensive weeks. In that time I managed to see an amazing gig and a great talk about robots and what fun they can be and how great libraries are. And that reminds me that last week the BBC were celebrating libraries and Scroobius Pip wrote a poem for them to celebrate all that was good about libraries.

I'm still raving about Jordan Reyne and am going to have to order the rest of her albums, as she has been my going to sleep music all this week. I really wish I'd have bought all her albums at the gig. But anyway , the weather is still grey (and it was yesterday too) , but that's the only thing that is not great today. I'm feeling excellent and happy and looking forward to next weekk/

Did you realise that a week on Sunday it's the anniversary of  the bombing Pearl Harbour? I wonder what put that into my head.

Katy Lied? ... Katy Did

Today I know lots of idiots are getting into fights , being conned by the big stores into buying stuff they don't want. There's fights and police involvement , very seasonal indeed, but that's not for me , I don't do queuing unless there is absolutely no other option. Most of my friends are the same.



The only Black Friday I have time for is the Steely Dan song from Katy Lied and with that I will leave you for today. Hope you have a very enjoyable day.

Remember - Be Positive

Very often I deal with advertising campaigns which say "Don't Forget" (or else something bad will happen or you will miss out). I always say use positive words. Instead of "Don't Forget" use "Remember" , instead of "Don't Fail" say "Succeed". Anyway last night I forgot to take make drugs , except I'd also forgot whether I'd taken them or not so it was a case of potential overdose or feeling a bit rubbish going to bed. I opted for the latter. This morning I have taken drugs and feel fine.

The sky is still grey and it's quiet out, neither hot nor cold.

Would You Touch This Man's Tash?

My friend Glen has had problems with people touching his Tash in Tynemouth (hows that for alliteration?), I think he's grown it for Movember,  so I suggested he goes for the look on the right!

I'm still being amazed by the Australian singer Jordan Reyne,  so it's an excuse to include one of her videos in my post , the amazing Shadow Line.

So be positive and have a great Sunday everybody, always look for the good and good things will come to you , oh and make sure you smile , that's always a good thing.

Not Burning Out ... Burning Bright

This week has been mental and could be deemed as stressful. Planning always helps but when things go wrong it can be disconcerting. It is great to have back up options in place as well as having the ability to deal with things as they occur. Luckily I'm not in that situation that often and have always come out stronger and more confident. I was thinking of a TED talk I watched a while back about stress being your friend, and while it's not good to be permanently stressed , it is good to be under controlled pressure every so often. I , like everyone else, don't like losing control, so wherever possible have safety nets in place, which , ideally I don't have to use.

Things aren't finished , but I am looking forward to having a week and a half's holiday in a very quiet cottage in Ampleforth.

The think is this week I've had a lot of good things happen, not leaste finding out that I have enough loyalty points from Enterprise Car Rental to pay for two weeks hire , which is like finding £200 in your wallet you didn't know you had. I also watched another TED talk about the benefits of smiling which I now try to do as often as possible.. I used the talk a couple of posts back here.

#mikeydredsplaypile

Then last night I was at an amazing concert, saw two incredible acts , Jordan Reyne and The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing , both of which I will be seeing again. Sometimes at a gig I'll buy a CD if I like the act. I ended up buying 4 and am listening to the Crone EP as I write this post, by the incredibly talented Australian Jordan Reyne.

So this week has so far turned out to be very rewarding despite the tribulations and the icing on the cake was Preston beating Bristol City after a bad run and Newcastle continuing their winning streak.


Anyway we're halfway through the weekend, and I still have work to do, but am fully confident that i can tackle whatever happens, sometimes you need to change the way you look at things , sometimes you meet things head on. I have done a bit of both this weekend but am looking forward to next weekend when I will be well into my holiday. You enjoy the rest of your weekend, I will enjoy mine.

Backsliding Fearlessly

Mott The Hoople

Don't know what brought that to mind, I think it's the name of a Mott The Hoople song, which will be somewhere in my collection because I do have quite a large one. It's actually on their first album, the one with the MC Escher sleeve featuring the paper crocodiles.

One of the things I like about writing a blog post is the way you can just ignore the rules and flit from one thing to another as your mind sees fit ... or unfit as the case may be.




As I say I don't what inspired me on this post but now as a video for this post I want an Escher animation , you would think that someones bound to have done one on Youtube, and when you look there are quite few on there but this one is very inventive and a joy to watch. The guy looks like a cross between Gru and one of his minions in Despicable Me!

So it's quite a leap from a seventise rock band to a kids animated film , although The Beatles did do Yellow Submarine , so maybe it's not that far fetched , and they have an actual Yellow Submarine in the Matthew Street complex in Liverpool.

Anyway this post has told you little although it may have joined some dots that didn't actually need joining, but I hope it stimulated you or made you smile a little. It's time for bed for me, so I hope you are having a great week and tomorrow it's Friday. Have a good one!!