tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25945380859690130082024-02-20T08:18:03.483+00:00Whisky and the GiroA crazy maverick kid from the wrong side of the tracks (the West Midlands) Unable to hack the hidebound world of University libraries, he struck out for the bright lights of Edinburgh with legions of jealous husbands and angry creditors hot on his heels.
Stay tuned to see if our hero manages to make a new life for himself on the mean streets of the Athens of the North, copes with the winters or manages to watch Rab C. Nesbit without ceefax on...
All his has to do now is find a job.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-42395495627144019162010-12-13T02:02:00.003+00:002010-12-13T17:14:49.152+00:00It's been a long time coming....To quote the good Reverend I.M. Jolly, ""Ah've had a helluva year" Masters Degree completed and all. I had fully expected to enjoy the academic work, but hadn't realised that I would meet so many wonderful and lovely people, some of whom were even North American. Which shows me that I shouldn't be so quick to retort to lazy stereotypes. In fact if I've learned two things this years its that i utterly detest xenophobia... and the Dutch.<br /><br />If anyone is nonplussed by the reference to the good Reverend, here is, as played by the late Rikki Fulton: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Cpb8rqYFd8">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Cpb8rqYFd8</a> It amazes me that I'd never heard of him or his work before I'd moved to Scotland, 'Scotch and Wry' the show from which it was taken, was only shown once South of the border and it tanked. I can't see why, it's really well scripted and the subject matter is sufficiently universal to raise a laugh, comic clergymen being a staple of sitcoms from 'All Gas and Gaiters' to 'Father Ted. '<br /><br />'Still Game' was buried deep in the English TV schedules and never really made any impact . I'm not sure it can wholly be explained by the use of regional dialect, sitcoms with a strong sense of regional identity and reference points like 'Phoenix Nights' have been hugely popular. Indeed the one Scottish comedy show of recent years to have any real success was Rab C Nesbitt, which was hardly cut-glass Received Pronunciation (contrary to popular myth, it wasn't shown in England with subtitles.) I'd argue that the real difference is the tone of sitcoms, rather than the language barrier.<br /><br />When I moved up here I found the majority of Scottish sitcoms, with the exception of Rab C. Nesbitt, hard to watch, they seemed very 'knockabout.' Things like Still Game, the 'Dear Green Place' or 'Gary Tank Commander,' tend to eschew attempts at realism and go for a broader comedy with the laughs coming from one-liners or overtly 'comic' characters or scenes. You don't tend to get the flawed, failed characters that form the backbone of English comedy or the element of bleakness, tragedy and isolation you get in the likes of 'the Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin, ' and 'Steptoe and Son,' or the naturalistic feel of the Royale family. Its not a complaint. It is not a criticism, (apart from Gary: Tank Commander, which is actually appalling) only an observation and a curiosity why this should be the case.<br /><br />Anyway on that sweeping generalisation I shall go to bed! Good night and it is very nice to be back!rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-42074780759576207962010-01-25T13:30:00.002+00:002010-01-25T13:39:21.001+00:00Its only wordsListening to: the banal conversation of self important undergraduates<br /><br />Dialect word of the day: Swatch - to look at.<br /><br />I have been absent for a long time I know, but this postgraduate gig is a tough one and I've been saving my best words for the essays.<br /><br />There will be something more substantial(o'er missus) to sink your teeth into fairly soonish!rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-90312300421420585892009-09-05T15:32:00.005+01:002009-09-05T15:43:06.146+01:00Into each life some rain much fall.Listening to: The Avalanches - <span style="font-style: italic;">Since I left you </span><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <span style="font-style: italic;">Baltic</span> - Very Cold<br /><br />It has just stopped raining after nearly 40 hours. I never realised that Leith had its' own monsoon season. Today is blustry, but dry. I should really drag my sorry carcass outside at some stage. <br /><br />Further to my previous posts, I received a visit from the Jehovah's witnesses this morning. Normally the visiting party consists of an elderly woman with a set in concrete perm and a small boy with a permanently snotty nose. The couple to whom I answered the door was most unexpected. Imagine if you can, a Morningside Terry-Thomas accompanied by a perky, well groomed woman in her 20s. Mr Suave and the glamour-puss looked more like they should have been presenting 'The Wheel of Fortune' rather than indulging in door to door evangelism. Sadly it is all change on the Watchtower front too, it has had a bit of a re-vamp, gone are the bad line drawings of men walking with dinosaurs and predictions of imminent Armageddon, it is also accompanied by a new lifestyle magazine called 'Awake!' which in some way compensated for the changes made to its' sister publication. 'Awake!' This provides handy hints for day to day living for the Jehovah about town. This issue gives helpful hint for the driver, including 'Drive slowly' and 'check your headlights are working' and the clinically depressed 'cheer up and read the bible more.' There are also some quite nice pictures of sloths mind you, I like sloths and their lovely smiley faces. <br /><br /><br />Whilst we're on the subject of older men with younger women, I spent most of yesterday playing my favourite game in the art gallery. It is entitled: 'Daughter/trophy wife/bit on the side.' The rules are simple: upon spying a middle aged man with a much younger and much more attractive woman (and believe me they are plenty of these couples about) one observes their body language and general behaviour and speculates idly on whether the woman in question is the man's daughter, far younger wife or is engaged in an adulterous relationship with him.<br /><br />More often than not, I plump for 'trophy wife.' Whilst I have no way of knowing whether my guesses are correct, I suspect that one is unlikely to take someone you are in a clandestine relationship to such a public place or willingly spend time looking at 18th century art. I would imagine that such couples spend their few snatched hours engaging in frenzied bouts of guilt tinged intimacy, probably in a Travel lodge somewhere off a ring road . This is pure conjecture on my part, I am not by any stretch of the imagination, a crumpeteer and have struggled to get one woman to go to bed with me, the chances of getting two women to do so simultaneously, is not so much slim as positively anorexic.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-40149252520761344672009-08-26T22:49:00.010+01:002009-08-27T16:28:08.987+01:00Sleep the clock aroundListening to The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Duckworth</span> Lewis method - <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Duckworth</span> Lewis Method<br /><br /><br /><span style="FONT-STYLE: italic"></span></span>Dialect phrase of the day: <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">Face like a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">skelped</span> arse - </span>ruddy or rosy cheeks<br /><br /><br />Two consecutive days off! What a marvel! I have just spent about 15 hours asleep and I'm busily checking myself for evidence of bedsores. How do I feel after this epic bout of deep dreamless sleep? Curiously, absolutely bloody awful. Today I've gone into the National Library of Scotland to try and find some <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">solace</span> amongst the books.<br /><br />There's not even a Test Match to listen to, nothing can put me into an almost comatose state of absolute bliss like a day spent listening to Test Match Special, it's like aural heroin. The <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">mellifluous</span> tones of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">TMS</span> and cricket in general are inextricably linked to my childhood and my late Grandfather. It was with my Grandfather that I played my first games of cricket and who drilled me in the art of batting. Although a very lovely man and a wonderful Grandfather, he was extremely <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">competitive</span> when it came to cricket, having played the game to a high level in his 20s . He had been a wicket keeper and and remained pretty nimble behind the stumps well into old age. Aged eight I would stand to face tame underarm deliveries from whichever indulgent relative had agreed to play along, with my granddad taking the whole affair very seriously, crouched behind the stumps in our back garden he would ooh, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">ahh</span> and tut at any delivery that was roughly on a line and a length. He was also not averse to whipping the bails off with a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">triumphant</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">owazt</span> if he deemed I had stepped too far out of the imaginary crease. There can be very few people who can claim to have been sledged by their own grandfather, especially when they were still a small boy, but then there can be very few people who have been drop kicked by their own grandmother (that however is a story for another day)<br /><br />For the uninitiated sledging is the art of breaking a batsman's concentration by <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">intimidating</span> them verbally, in effect talking them out. Here is an excellent example by <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Sri</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Lankan</span> wicket keeper <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Kumar</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Sangkkara</span>.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlFF98dM8sA">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PlFF98dM8sA</a><br /><br />I have now ceased my employment with the street punks. I found myself curiously emotional as I said my final farewells and it feels rather strange to think I won't be going back on Monday. A side effect of this is that I'll be getting rid of the Eliminator. That's my car rather than a nickname for any appendage. I thought I'd better clarify that as I once caused a former work <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">colleague</span> considerable disgust and alarm by failing to make this clear. This is probably a good thing, Edinburgh is eminently walkable, I have my bike and the bus service is much better than most British cities. Then of course there's the Tram system, something which most <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Edinburghers</span> have militant views. Contrary sod that I am, I couldn't give a fig either way, although I am curious why the tram will run from <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Leith</span> to the airport; none of us in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Leith</span> can afford a holiday.<br /><br />There also appears to be a seemingly limitless supply of Taxis buzzing around the city, driven by the most erudite taxi drivers you could ever hope to meet. This a pleasing contrast to their London counterparts, who by and large, are ranting Essex Freemasons. Taxis have always held a particular fascination to me. When I was kid I saw travelling in a taxi as an unimaginable luxury and decadence and I used to imagine the joy of travelling in such a conveyance. Where I lived, the only time you ever saw anyone get out of one was when a woman come back from having a Hysterectomy. Imagine my disappointment when I first stepped into one as an adult, rather than looking like the interior of a better class of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">gentleman's</span> club, it was Spartan, draughty and smelt of sick poorly masked by magic tree air <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">freshener</span>.<br /><br />I began using taxis in Leeds, principally because using the the number 4 or 16 bus late at night without a stab vest could be <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">classified</span> as an extreme sport. These two buses ran between two of the roughest council estates in the city and were heavily patronised by drunks, heroin users, nutcases and some of the most <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">foul</span> mouthed pensioners one could ever meet, even in daylight hours it could be a bowel loosening experience.<br /><br />One Saturday afternoon I met an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">acquittance</span> who had travelled out of the city centre on a slightly earlier bus. What had <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">occurred</span> was surprising even for the number 4. Two drunks had got into an argument over the ownership of some booze and one had knocked the other one out. This in itself was not an unusual <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">event</span>, however the victorious drunk made the foolhardy error of yelling to the packed bus "now who else wants some?" Unfortunately for him the answer was, "nearly every single <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">passenger</span> on the bus." Within seconds, the whole bus had <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">erupted</span> into an orgy of indiscriminate violence, with women in their late 50s wading in. The driver, seeing the blood and snot flying, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">leapt</span> from the bus locked the doors and let the waring parties get on with it. From the outside it must have looked like something out of a wild west saloon.<br /><br />In future I shall stick to my trusty bicycle, although I imagine such <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">occurrences</span> on the number 5 bus to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">Stockbridge</span> are unheard of. That way on they're probably knocking the shit out of each other over ownership of some <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">sunblush</span> tomatoes and organic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">humus</span>.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-21158872231267382232009-08-18T04:24:00.000+01:002009-08-18T04:25:05.432+01:00This maudlin career has come to an end.<h3 class="post-title entry-title"> <a href="http://rhinestonecatboy.blogspot.com/2009/08/this-maudlin-career-has-come-to-end.html"><br /></a> </h3> <div class="post-body entry-content"> Listening to - Brian Eno - <span style="font-style: italic;">Here Come the Warm jets<br /><br /></span>Dialect word of the day: <span style="font-style: italic;">Jakey - </span>a hardened street drinker<br /><br /><br />I have now been living in Edinburgh a year today and in the words of the Reverend I.M. Jolly "It's been a helluva a year." What with the recession, banking crisis, recession or whatever you want to call it. All this carry on makes precious little difference to me; I was an abject failure in the boom years too. In fact if one accepts that poverty and wealth are relative, I am probably richer than I've ever been. This state of affairs won't last though as I have four -count 'em - days left and my work with social services is done, for good, hurrah! I am getting very demob happy and I'm doing rather less than the bare minimum. I will miss the riches it provided though.<br /><br />Edinburgh in August is a funny time of year, with the University closed for the summer holidays, the city is appreciably quieter in June and July and then suddenly burst into life as the Military tattoo and the Fringe Festival start at roughly the same time. In the interests of anthropology and the fact I was given a free ticket, I went along to the Tattoo with Jess and some of her workmates. I have to say that it was amongst the most excruciating two hours of my life. As I may have mentioned in previous posts, the wail of the Bagpipes sounds to me like a live cat being thrown into a threshing machine and never fails to set my teeth on edge. So being trapped in an arena where 80 of the sodding things were being played in unison nearly tipped me over the edge, at one stage I was tempted to feign a fit just to escape the noise. The bagpipes were broken up with a lot of marching up and down in frankly daft uniforms, which seem to my uneducated eye quite impractical for doing killing in.<br /><br />The festival is once again in full swing and the city has been taken over by floppy haired Oxbridge types, braying about their godawful shows and forcing leaflets into one's hands. I've been to see a few bits and pieces, mostly free or cheap stuff and it's been generally very enjoyable. Whilst in principle it is an amazing thing to see the city this busy and vibrant, it is also a colossal pain in the arse if you have the misfortune to want to get anywhere in a hurry. A walk up the Royal Mile with Sam and Dave (my old school friend and her boyfriend, rather than the Soul group from the 60s in case you thought I was name dropping) yielded about 35 flyers between us, by then end of it I was begining to hope for a Jehovah's Witness to thrust a copy of the Watchtower into my hands just for a bit of variety.<br /><br />The Watchtower is a cracking read, I love the poorly rendered pictures of humans walking with dinosaurs and other assorted beasts in some Eden- like paradise. There's also usually a heart warming tale of how the agency of the Jehovah's witnesses have saved young people from a life of sin and depravity. I am certain these stories are largely fictitious, made up to gee up the faithful, as the Watchtower's vision of deviant youth also seems to be rooted in the 1950s and the errant young people are called things like Colin or Sandra, the sort of names young people haven't had since the sweets were still on the ration. Colin and Sandra's transgressions usually consist of smoking marijuana, drinking alcohol, getting into the fictional knickers of the opposite sex. Having been 'saved' them from these frankly rather pleasurable activities poor fictional Sandra and poor fictional Colin will get to spend the rest of their natural lives being told to fuck off by hung over and crabby fictional householders who they've summonsed from their beds at some appallingly early hour on a fictional Saturday morning.<br /><br />So it seems I've been wasting my time these past few years, attempting to undertake offence focused work, sorting out employment/education opportunities, encouraging positive leisure activities, counselling fraught and feckless parents and generally running around like a blue arsed fly after the street punks has been a waste of time. All I needed to do was give them a few Watchtowers to punt door to door and instil an abhorrence of blood transfusions and they'd have been as right as rain.<br /><br />Just as well I'm leaving really.</div>rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-34982765322122733582009-07-26T02:41:00.007+01:002009-07-26T05:40:28.390+01:00These sleepless nights will break my heart in twoListening to: Charlotte Gainsbourg - 5:55<br /><br />Dialect Word of the Day: Plukey - Spotty<br /><br />Does it ever go dark in summer in Scotland? This nigh on continuous day light plays havoc with a young man's sleeping patterns. Hence I'm writing this at ten to three in the morning.<br /><br />I now have a mere four weeks left of employment with Social Services. Whilst I actually don't mind the job, the end is in sight and I am struggling to stay motivated for this last run in. If I were a footballer and this was a tabloid newspaper (which I'm not and this isn't) I would be described as 'Wantaway.' It's strange how football journalism has adopted a vocabulary which one never hears in everyday speech, players are always getting 'Slammed' 'Shammed' or 'Branded' by their managers or <span style="font-style: italic;">Supremo </span>in tabloidese. It assume this is to make utterly mundane stories seem dramatic, but imagine if people actually talked like that in real life.<br /><br />"<span style="font-style: italic;">My shoddy timekeeping was slammed today by the Social Services supremo. I hit back, branding their obsession with punctuality as a pain in the arse. I then rocked the East Lothian based outfit by handing in my resignation, throwing their tea making rota into chaos. "</span><br /><br />Anyway I appear to have gone off on a tangent, much like Ryan Giggs on a bad day. It seems odd that after a few weeks I may never work in the field of Youth Justice again, I won't pretend this isn't a relief, but after nearly 6 years all told, it's provided its' highs as well as its' inevitable lows and provided a huge treasury of anecdotes. Mind you I said 'never again' when I left Leeds, but got sucked back into it. I'm beginning to think Youth Justice is a bit like the Freemasons or the Dennis the Menace fanclub, once you're in you're in for life.<br /><br />Today, apparently was the Clan Gathering, which explained why I saw so many be-kilted Americans wandering about the place. When I first heard the term Clan Gathering I was utterly unaware of what it was, it all sounded rather sinister to me; I was thinking more Klu Klux than Highland. Thankfully it was all part of the Homecoming celebrations and was an exercise in kitsch and an excuse to extract money from gullible tourists with dubious claims to Scottish ancestry.<br /><br />I confess it sent me a bit Gok Wan and I was inwardly cringing at some of the Highland dress on display, a full Bonnie Prince Charlie outfit teamed with white trainers was the worst, but by no means sole offender. I also noted that a number of the more portly gentlemen were sporting kilts that were so short they could only described as buttock skimming.<br /><br />I have profound problems with the whole Homecoming celebrations, firstly it panders to the whole shortbread tin cliche of Scotland; Whisky, Tartan, Highland Games and Golf courses. Needless to say this isn't the Scotland I have experienced and isn't the reason I fell in love with Edinburgh. My love affair is in no small part due due to the array of Scottish writers, starting with Alaisdair Gray in the 70s who have attempted to capture the rhythms of everyday speech have portray modern Scotland as it is.<br /><br />Alongside promoting Scotland as a backward looking nation, stuck in some imaginary past, I have profound problems linking Scottishness and belonging so closely to blood ties. To my mind belonging is rooted in the present and comes from citizenry and participation rather than being based on ancestry. Basing the whole notion of Homecoming on this reductive notion of Scottishness seems very divisive and to a hand-wringing bleeding heart lefty, such as myself exclusionary. The unspoken and probably unintended message of Homecoming is: "you're Scottish if you're a wealthy American who can find some claim, however tenuous, to Scottish ancestors who left centuries ago and are prepared to spend plenty of money to spend on Whisky, golf courses and tartan tat, but if you belong to a minority community who have lived in Scotland for generations , sorry pal you're not Scottish, it's not in your blood." A retired Scottish academic of African-Caribbean heritage pointed out in superb article in the Evening News -(can't find the link!) that there are plenty of people in the Caribbean who have Scottish heritage and blood (there are more Campbells in the Bridgetown phone book than the Edinburgh one) and their links with Scotland were forged not by choice, but by the unspeakable brutalities of the Slave trade. He, quite rightly in my opinion, called for this experience to be chronicled as part of the Homecoming.<br /><br />But hey... such uncomfortable truths, amongst this orgy of tweeness, might make the tourists put their wallets away.<br /><br /><br />Anyway, lefty rant over, my spleen is well and truly vented. I would hate to leave you on such a cynical note. I will leave you with my favourite joke, first told to me by my mother on the day of my grandfather's funeral, minutes before we were due to head to the service. It popped into my head earlier today and had me smirking to myself all afternoon.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Three great Danes were sitting in the Vets' waiting room. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The first great Dane turned to the second and says "What you here for mate?" </span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">"Well" replied the second Great Dane, "I live with very house proud couple and as I've got older I've lost control of my bowels and I keep on making a mess of the carpet, so my number's up, I'm here to be put down."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The first Great Dane sighed "If it's any consolation to you mate, I'm here for the needle as well. I live with a family with small children and as I've got older I've got a bit crochety and the kids were pulling my ears and tormenting me something awful and I snapped at one of them."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">"Bad luck" said the second Great Dane. He then turned to the third Great Dane and asked "what about you?"</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">"I live alone with an attractive young woman and one day she was getting ready to go out. She had just come out of the shower, and by gum did she look and smell lovely. It was then that she took off her dressing gown and bent over to pick something up from on the floor. Well it was all too much for me and I couldn't help myself and... you two can guess the rest."</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">"Blimey" said the first Great Dane, "After that, I suppose you're here to be put down too."</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">"Not at all" replied the third Great Dane with a grin "I'm here to have my front claws clipped."</span><br /><br /><br />Thank you and goodnight.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-85589904213091034152009-07-18T03:56:00.007+01:002009-07-18T05:37:08.571+01:00Raining in my heartListening to: Booker t and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">MGs</span> - Melting Pot<br /><br />Dialect world of the day: <span style="font-style: italic;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Chib</span></span> noun: a knife verb: to stab<br /><br />What has happened to the wildlife of Edinburgh and East <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Lothian</span>? Have they taken collective leave of their senses and decided to throw themselves en <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">masse</span> under the wheels of passing cars? Every day there seems to be more and more roadkill and my drive to work seems to resemble a half an hour tour of an ever more grizzly animal mausoleum. Mind you it's been a cracking year for Swifts (I can never tell the difference) and watching them fly in and out of the swift hole on the building, opposite my office window which is a rare treat. <br /><br />I have been enjoying the Ashes tremendously and tend to spend most of my working day listening to Test match special, scheduling appointments around meal breaks I find 20Twenty and One day cricket a bit naff, but I really relish the ebbs, flows and the ongoing narrative of the five day game. I am largely <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">ambivalently</span> about Scottish politics, Scottish independence and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">SNP</span>. However Sandra White annoyed me with her ignorance, carping on about 'Saturation' coverage of the Ashes in the broadcast media, which is remarkably petty and small minded given that the only way to follow the cricket without a Sky subscription (and I for one refuse to line Rupert Murdoch's pockets, unless it is to buy one of his quality news papers such as the Sun or the Daily Star) is via, radio 4 long wave or an obscure digital radio channel, hardly constitutes saturation coverage. Admittedly there is an hour long highlights show on channel 5, depriving Scots of the chance to watch the documentaries on the Nazis, 50 stone teenagers or the Conspiracy theories about the death of Princess Diana, that usually constitute Channel 5's evening schedule. She also went on to compare the "over the top" Cricket coverage to the lack of coverage of the Curling World Championship , Curling!!!! For <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">chrissakes</span>! , a combination of overgrown marbles and housework, played by three people in the Highlands. I was surprised how popular Cricket was when I moved up here, there's numerous flourishing leagues and Cricket constitutes an important part of the culture of many Scots of Asian heritage, something Ms White overlooks when she tries to cast it as a piece of English cultural imperialism forced on an unwilling Scottish public.<br /><br />Jolly glad to see normal service has been resumed on the weather front, I certainly did NOT move to Scotland for weeks of unbroken sunshine., my <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">cadaverously</span> wan complexion won't stand for it. I take the Victorian view that tanned skin is the surefire sign of a working class oik forced to labour in the out of doors, this view is at least partially attributable to the fact that I blister and turn lobster red at the merest hint of the sun. Today I luxuriated in the thin drizzle of the morning and rejoiced in the afternoon downpour. Somehow Edinburgh didn't look right in the sunshine, its' natural state is one of overcast, grey and foreboding. A sunny Edinburgh reminds me of PE teachers on parents' evenings when they are forced to put a suit on, it looks plain wrong. Having said that there have been no unsubstantiated yet, persistent rumours about the City of Edinburgh interfering with kids in the showers after cross-country, so my simile probably isn't that apt.<br /><br />More and more pieces of Scottish slang and dialect words are creeping subconsciously into my speech, I think i went too far when I caught myself using the word <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">heid</span> (that's head <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">sasanachs</span>) at work the other day. It must have sounded absurd to Scottish ears. There's a woman at work who sits at the opposite desk to me who seems to take this to Nth degree. Thankfully she's not in the same team as me, but she is very posh and very English , yet whilst talking to clients and their parents peppers her conversation with Scottish vernacular, yet delivers in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">flutey</span> BBC English. On one hand I find it hilarious yet on the other desperately patronising as she doesn't do it with colleagues or other professionals, which speaks volumes about what she thinks of the people we work with. I am waiting for the day when she says something along the lines of "Square go, then, ya <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">crappin</span> doss <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">basturd</span>" in her cut glass nasal RP tones. <br /><br />Anyway, that's all, I shall crawl back to bed for another few hours of sleep. Good night all.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-43827871135182958072009-06-11T21:15:00.007+01:002009-06-11T23:20:00.605+01:00"Did you miss me (yeah) ? While I was away"Listening to: Jarvis <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Cocker</span> 'Further Complications'<br /><br /><br />Dialect Word of the Day: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Boak</span> (to heave or vomit)<br /><br /><br /><br />Hello there me chums in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">interweb</span> world. I have been frightfully neglectful of my blogging duties, so apologies. Alas life or more accurately work has got in the way. This whole two jobs lark is really <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">beginning</span> to take its' toll, somehow I managed to get my contract working with the bad-ass street punks extended by another four months. It would seem that my <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">sojourn</span> in Edinburgh has transformed me from a work-shy wastrel into a model of dour <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Presbyterian</span> industry. <br /><br />I did manage to make my first visit back to England since I moved up here. Very lovely to see all the folks in West Yorkshire and all, many old tales were told, much booze was drunk and I was reminded of a very happy period of my life. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Armley</span> seems to have lost none of it's slightly shabby charm. It has two architectural masterpieces; St Bart's church with its' magnificent organ (<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">oe'r</span> missus) and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Armley</span> Goal a wonderfully <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">foreboding</span> mid 19<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">th</span> century construction. It has numerous wonderful examples of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">neo</span>-<span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Gothic</span> architecture sadly most of it going to wrack and ruin, either <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">abandoned</span> or <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">hideously</span> ill used (Mike's Carpets warehouse) the credit crunch appears to have put a halt to the gentrification that was cautiously starting when I lived there. Although both the pole dancing club and the local knocking shop are victims of the credit crunch, (forgive me the crudity but describing it as brothel or bordello which would be misleading, I'd imagine there isn't much velvet and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Rocco</span> decor or 18<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">th</span> century Fanny Hill- <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">esque</span> lovelies.) <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Armley's</span> house of ill repute was located above a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">discount</span> frozen foods outlet and crucially next to the chip shop. It always used to amuse me watching shifty looking middle aged men visit the chip shop before heading upstairs haddock and chips in hand. I can only presume it was to keep their strength up. <br /><br />Jess has seem fit to high tail it off to Australia for three weeks and leave me in the flat on my own, in order to attend a family wedding.<br /><br />The fact that she has gone on her own has attracted considerable comment, usually along the lines of "ooh I bet you wish you out there too." To which I patiently explain that firstly, Australia is not somewhere I have any great yearning to visit and secondly I find the whole process of going on holiday a deeply over-rated and it wouldn't concern me if i never went on holiday again. The consternation this causes , is a source of bafflement to me, I also dislike eggs, the smell of petrol, golf, Jim Davidson and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Coldplay</span>, none of which <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">excites</span> much agitation in others, it's accepted as a matter of personal taste but mention you don't like going on holidays and for some reason you're viewed as a joyless <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">skinflint</span> worthy of pity. I dislike holidays for the same reason I dislike Christmas, it smacks of rationing enjoyment and channeling it into a specific place or time. I've always feel holidays act as an escape valve for pent up feelings of frustration, holding at bay the need to make meaningful changes.<br /><br />In fact my lack of desire to 'get away from it all' is probably a sign of relative contentment with my lot in life. In fact I quite like 'It all'. I'll spend my fortnight's leave exploring Edinburgh, watching it reveal itself to me slowly, finding small nooks and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">crannies</span> I've overlooked and reminding myself how lucky I am to live here.<br /><br />I shall draw this to a close, before it gets a bit smug and self <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">satisfied</span>!!rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-76140592776576808652009-01-18T20:04:00.006+00:002009-01-18T22:47:42.174+00:00Just one more thing...Listening to: Pavement - <em>'Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain' </em><br /><em></em><br />Dialect word of the day: Coupon (Face)<br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Much <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">excitement</span> in this little corner of the world (by which I mean the tenement block in the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Leith</span></span>/Edinburgh hinterland in which I reside) A brave member of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Lothian</span></span> and Borders Dibble turned up at 9am to be greeted by Jess on the very cusp of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">drunkenness</span> and a stinking hangover. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"> One</span> of our neighbours has been subject to a sustained spate of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">graffiti</span> on his front door and had called the Feds in to investigate. Quite why this gentleman who seems an inoffensive sort, should be prolonged to a such a sustained campaign puzzles me. Given that the communal door is on a dead lock, it's a fair bet that the culprit also lives in one of the other seven flats.<br /><br /><br /><br />The <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">graffiti</span> is fairly <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">amateurish</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">daubing</span> of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">genitalia</span>, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">and</span> if the representation of the male organs is an anatomically accurate, I would suggest that the perpetrator should <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">arrange</span> a consultation with a urologist <em>tout suite</em>, although credit where credit's due, his depiction of a woman's most private of places displays a certain <em>elan</em> and given the chosen medium (marker pen) a remarkable attention to detail.<br /><br /><br /><br />Given that there are a limited number of people who could have done this, any unusual bangs or noises has me rushing to the door or window to investigate. I am tempted to launch my own inquiry in the style of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">TV's</span></span> <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">Columbo</span></span></em>. I'd be perfect for it; I already have the trench coat, shambolic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">appearance</span> and battered French car, with the twist that I deal with low-level <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">nuisance</span> crime rather than <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">homicides</span> and whereas <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Columbo's</span></span> bumbling absent mindedness is a device to lull suspects into a false sense of security, my <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">incompetence</span> is utterly <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">genuine</span>.<br /><br /><br />Although I had the novel experience of being praised for an aspect of my work today. My knowledge of two rooms on the tourist route was described as "awesome." I apologise for this burst of brazen <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">immodesty</span> and I realize that in the overall scheme of things, my ability to retain, snippets of historical trivia and regurgitating them at will, is nothing to shout about. However as the majority of my working life up to this point has been characterised by low level uselessness, punctuated with occasional bouts of mind boggling <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">buffoonery</span>, so any <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">praise</span> coming my way I am almost pathetically <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">grateful for</span>. <br /><br />Hopefully such kind words will sustain me as I spend the week at my other job, bungling my way about the Scottish Youth justice system, where, rest assured, it will be very much business as usual.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><p><br /> </p>rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-54094409354747485302009-01-12T19:35:00.005+00:002009-01-13T20:12:47.000+00:00Darts of PleasureListening to: Young Marble Giants - <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Collosal</span> Youth</em><br /><em></em><br />Dialect word of the day - <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Vennel</span> (an alleyway)<br /><br /><br />I find myself restless and distracted, unable to settle to anything, even the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">voyeuristic</span> pleasures of <em>50 stone son</em> on Channel 4 cannot hold my attention. One might attribute this to tiredness, post Christmas torpor or the fiscal woes January inevitably brings, but not a bit of it.<br /><br />The cause is the end of the darts at the Lakeside, which had me glued to the box for nearly all of last week and has left a yawning void in my life. I love darts and have done from the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">moment</span> my father, in a state of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">despair</span> at my mathematical ineptitude, casually suggested I watch it in order to improve my mental <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">arithmetic</span> ahead of my <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">GCSEs</span>. Whilst it was of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">negligible</span> value in improving my maths; amazingly the Midland Examining Group's <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">GCSE</span> syllabus didn't feature any questions on how to hit a 138 checkout (Treble top, treble 18, double 12, if you're interested) or Steve <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Beaton's</span> three dart averages, I was hooked.<br /><br />I love darts in a simple uncomplicated wholehearted manner and it has rewarded me with some wonderful <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">moments</span> of unalloyed joy and nerve jangling tension. I can't abide that awful, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">sniggering</span> ironic tone the broadsheets adopt when covering it - ' oh look, at the plebs at play, they're all fat, drink booze (despite the fact alcohol at the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">oche</span> has been banned for about 15 years) and wear too much cheap jewellery' It all smacks of thinly <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">veiled</span> class prejudice to me.<br /><br />It's a pity because as a sport it has everything; <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">immense</span> skill, it involves repeatedly hitting a target not much wider that your little fingernail with metronomic regularity, startling mental agility and most tellingly, punishing <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">psychological</span> pressures which lead to missed doubles, and players wracked with self doubt wilting in front of your very eyes; like watching <em>Hamlet</em> in polyester shirts.<br /><br />The players themselves are, by and large, free from ego, entertaining utterly gracious in defeat and there is a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">genuine</span> warmth between them. This was encapsulated when Tony O' Shea beat his best friend Daryl <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Fitton</span> in the semi-final, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Fitton</span> had six darts to hit a double twenty, yet inexplicably fluffed every single one. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">O'Shea</span> eventually took the match with an outstanding checkout, yet seemingly heartbroken that in the process he'd crushed his best friend's hopes of a world title in the process. It was one of the most compelling pieces of drama and raw human emotion, you'll see on TV.<br /><br /><a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/darts/7822472.stm">http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/other_sports/darts/7822472.stm</a><br /><br /><br />If you've made it this far without losing the will to live well done, thus <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">endeth</span> today's bout of darts <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">evangelism</span>. I will <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">endeavour</span> not to mention the subject this side of the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">Winmau</span> World Masters, where my <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">sermon</span> will be 'Why darts should be an Olympic Sport'rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-53843908891390742762009-01-07T20:39:00.012+00:002009-01-08T22:09:56.413+00:00Perverted by languageListening to: <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">This Gift</span> by Sons & Daughters<br /><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Jings</span></span></span></span> (an expression of surprise)<br /><br /><br />Happy New Ears to you all!<br /><br />Well goodbye to 2008, a year roughly divided between the mundane and the horrible, although things picked up a bit towards the end. In my teens/early 20s I would religiously compile lists of my favourite records, books and films. However inertia, limited money and general haziness on when stuff was released has made me less likely to do this, although I would say I've enjoyed <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">This Gift</span> by Sons & Daughters very much, so by default is my album of the year. I would have also mentioned <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">Fleet Foxes</span> but all and sundry seem to be raving about that, so it would hardly be an original pick. Biggest disappointment was the re-issue of Dennis Wilson's <em>Pacific Ocean Blue, </em>which is soft rock <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">stoner</span> nonsense, not the lost classic it's <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">purported</span> to be.<br /><br /><br />2009 has been exhausting so far, I have eventually started my job with the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">badass</span></span> street punks at the council, whilst still donning my lovely cape at the weekend. I am <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">permanently</span> tired and bewildered by the effort of maintaining one job and getting my head around the complexities of a new one. The basic problem is that my ability in interviews far exceeds my actual ability to perform the job in question, perhaps I should give them fair warning and tell them that I am basically a buffoon with a talent for flanneling my way through interviews, get the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">disappointment</span> out of the way early. Nevertheless it is very odd being back in a social services office again, I'd forgotten how as a species, social workers are extremely foul mouthed. In every social services office the f-word has been the building block of most sentences, perhaps Social Workers <span style="FONT-STYLE: italic">en <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">masse</span></span></span> are attempting to play down their image as sandal wearing, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">yogurt</span> knitting do-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">gooders, by using the kind of language that would make a sailor blush.</span></span><br /><br />Give it a few weeks and I'll probably be effing and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">jeffing</span></span> with the best of them. Well I say that, but I am actually a rubbish swearer, it always sounds slightly forced and if I'm trying too hard to shock, impress or be 'one of the lads.' I blame my parents for bringing me up too well, despite years of illicit practice I still can't swear <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">convincingly</span> or spit properly - no one knows how the children of the aspirant lower middle class suffer.rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-85600884049250973102008-12-20T01:56:00.010+00:002008-12-22T03:58:36.929+00:00There is a boy who never goes outListening to: Jenny Lewis - <em>Rabbit Fur Coat</em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Foosty</span> (Damp, dank)<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />The eagle eyed amongst you will have noticed that my blogging has been far more frequent in recent days. Rest <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">assured</span> my life has not suddenly become radically more vivid and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">interesting</span>, it is solely due to Jess being away and in order to stave off the boredom, I will probably spend the next few days recording my humdrum existence and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">passing</span> thoughts in <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">excruciating</span> detail, so apologies in advance. For the next week think of me as a low rent Charles <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Pooter</span> for the dot.com generation.<br /><br />I actually ventured outside the flat for the first time in three days today and sauntered into town, it struck me how very attached I have become to <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">Leith</span> and the east end of Edinburgh (I still haven't worked out where one starts and the other stops) and what a wonderful place it is to live, the fact I can see the Salisbury Crags looming over my street never fails to take my breath away. I love the way the street thrums with life when <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Hibs</span> are at home, I love the tenements and their air of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">benign</span> neglect, I love the fact you're surrounded by a rich cultural history, but a history that doesn't appear in guidebooks, but reveals itself to you gradually.<br /><br />I recently learned that as a young man beset with <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">philosophical</span> doubts and unsure how to make his way in the world, the essayist Thomas Carlyle underwent an epiphany, on <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Leith</span> Walk, (of all places!) Such experiences are <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">unverifiable</span> and I am deeply sceptical about such 'conversions' but whatever happened profoundly shaped Carlyle's entire life and worldview. Whilst I lack the intellect to fully <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">understand</span>, let alone articulate what <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">occurred</span> to him, I find it fascinating that something so powerful and significant happened so close to where I live and in such an unlikely location.<br /><br />Whilst I have probably gone of on a tangent a bit, the thrust of what I'm saying is that I can't imagine ever wanting to live anywhere else and I'm slowly starting to gain a sense of purpose and belonging which I have lacked for most of my adult life. Whilst I generally have a good memory for dates and places, the half decade that has passed since leaving University seems to have drifted by in one long mope, beset by indifference, rootlessness uncertainty, and brief periods of self pity. This may be a false dawn; so far my renewed sense of vigor has extended to ironing a few shirts and putting some <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Domestos</span> down the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">lavvy</span>, but to be happy with one's surrounding is probably a good sign. You never know one of these days I may even lower myself to do something as vulgar as to have a good time!rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-38166084228834662992008-12-17T22:00:00.011+00:002008-12-19T00:03:42.506+00:00Winterval wonderlandListening to: Herman Dune - <em>Giant</em><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Swedge</span></em> (a fight or brawl)<br /><br />How does one measure when Christmas period starts? The first day Advent? December 1st? or maybe the week immediately proceeding the big day? I prefer a more unconventional temporal marker, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">albeit</span> every bit as regular and reliable as the ones above. For the past decade or so, I have considered it to be Christmas from the the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">moment</span> I'm informed by a right-wing pillock, normally apalectic with rage that, this year <em>"Birmingham City Council has banned Christmas</em>." They usually cite the Daily Mail or the Sun as the source of this nugget and that it's an attempt of "loony left <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">councillors</span> going out of the way to avoid offending minorities" and/or "Political Correctness gone mad."<br /><br />Problem is, there is not a shred of truth in the claim. What annoys me most, is the sheer <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">gullibility</span> of the people who believe such arrant nonsense (although being utterly spineless I never actually say this to them) All they need to do is think about what they're saying for a second. It is not, in the council's interests or power to 'ban' Christmas. What do these staunch opponents of all things political correct imagine the council are getting up to? Are they raiding branches of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">HMV</span> looking for contraband copies of Slade <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">CDs</span>? Making road blocks on the A38 to catch those smuggling tinsel into the exclusion zone? Or sending specially trained sniffer dogs door to door to detect the smell of Mince Pies or Turkey?<br /><br />Amazingly not.... those loony lefties at the council have <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">suppressed</span> official recognition of Christmas in Birmingham to such a degree , that every year they've put up a tree, an array of Christmas decorations, including a huge illuminated sign across Corporation Street that reads 'Happy Christmas Birmingham' in 15ft high letters! This pap about Birmingham banning Christmas comes from a marketing campaign the Council employed about 10 years ago, to get more shoppers into the refurbished city centre shops for a greater period of the year, and promote a range of secular and non-secular events throughout the Winter, including Winter <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">solstice</span>, Bonfire Night, Children in Need, Ice Skating, Carol concerts, New Year, <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Diwali</span> and at the very heart of it all...Christmas itself. They hit upon the term '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Winterval</span>' to market these diverse events to shoppers, the term <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">Winterval</span> was never used to replace Christmas and all the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Winterval</span> literature makes copious reference to Christmas. Don't believe me? Well here's the long defunct <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Winterval</span> website, count up all those C-words!<br /><br /><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/19971210073015/http://birmingham.gov.uk/winterval/index.html">http://web.archive.org/web/19971210073015/http://birmingham.gov.uk/winterval/index.html</a><br /><br />This rather mundane truth hasn't stop lazy journos regularly trotting out "Birmingham bans Christmas" stories or their <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">gullible</span> readership, desperate for evidence of 'political correctness gone mad' or reverse discrimination ( however <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">fictitious</span>) lapping it up like sick puppies. What is doubly depressing is the way that the Church Of England have jumped onto the Birmingham bashing bandwagon, either out of ignorance or a cynical bid to curry favour with the baying mob.<br /><br />It is an ideal story for reinforcing a whole set of deeply ingrained prejudices about council officials, minorities and the left in general. I am deeply <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">suspicious</span> of those jourmalists, (and yes I mean you Richard Littlejohn) who revel in being 'politically incorrect.' I suspect it is often just a way of legitimating their racist, homophobic or sexist attitudes, and celebrating the 'good' old days when you could slap the secretary's arse, call Indian waiters '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Gunga</span> Din' or drive home after 10 pints "without the PC brigade jumping on your back."<br /><br /><br /><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Breathe</span> easy chums, my lefty rant is over and Christmas is now officially upon us; eat drink and be merry (and that includes folks in Birmingham)rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-74822247276354158232008-12-15T18:38:00.006+00:002008-12-16T16:51:39.483+00:00The caped crusader<div>Listening to: <em>Alasdair Roberts<span style="font-style: italic;"> -The crook of my arm</span></em> </div><br /><div> </div><br /><div>Dialect word of the day: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Broo</span> (Dole/unemployment benefit)<em></em></div><br /><div> </div><br /><div> </div>I sit writing this whilst enjoying a highly unsatisfactory <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">foot spa</span>. The bubble function appears to have bitten the dust on the journey up to Scotland. A whole fiver that foot spa cost, I've a good mind to write to Anne Robinson on <span style="font-style: italic;">Watchdog </span>or something<span style="font-style: italic;">.</span> <br /><br />The reason for my podiatry discomfort? Firstly I have always been a martyr to my feet, secondly I favour wildly impractical Chelsea boots and thirdly I have started my weekend job at <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Holyroodhouse</span> and I'm on my feet for about 7 hours a day. Despite battered and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">bruised</span> tootsies an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">slight</span> unease about whether I am <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">compromising</span> my anti-monarchist stance, I find the whole work <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">shabang</span> rather pleasant, my hunger for arcane trivia is more than sated and I get to get dressed up in the most astonishing garb. This consists of Tartan trousers, a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Glengarry</span> hat and the best of all a cape with lovely shiny buttons. I love swishing around the Palace in the cape feeling quite the dandy. I am tempted to see if I can persuade Jess to knock up a cape for casual wear, maybe in a discrete tweed. I'm sure my fellow <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Leithers</span> will be delighted to see me cutting a sartorial dash through the grey winter streets.<br /><br />The <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Glengarry</span> is another matter altogether, very few people can wear one of these with<span style="font-style: italic;"> elan </span>and I am certainly not one of them. The most straightforward and inoffensive of hats can make me look a bit gormless, but the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Glengarry</span> makes me look an utter simpleton, especially combined with my glasses and luxuriant sideburns.<br /><br />Hopefully my feet will have recovered <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">sufficiently</span> to transport me around the German Market. Jess is ludicrously excited by the amount of pork based foodstuffs she can consume in a single evening. I am actually quite excited, the first time Jess visited me in Leeds, we went to the German market and it seemed a magical experience, both of us drunk on love and a range of quality German lagers. These are now a staple of British city centres at Christmas time and the stalls all seem to be run by your actual German market traders. It makes you wonder who actually runs the stalls back in Germany, given <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">the</span> vast majority seem to be over here. Perhaps there is a market trader exchange scheme in operation. Whilst we peruse handcrafted wooden ornaments, elaborate nativity displays and specialty beers and wines, the good people of Frankfurt or Munich hurry down to the traditional yuletide 'British market' to stock up on pirate DVDs, counterfeit sportswear and condemned meat sold from the back of a lorry.<br /><br />Tonight will be slightly bittersweet, given that itll be our last evening together for quite a while, Jessis off to see her mum for a pre-Christmas visit. I shall be left in the flat alone and who knows what chaos will ensue, given my inability to cope with the most mundane pracicalities of life.<br /><br /><br />I shall keep you posted....rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-83806162193631091922008-12-01T07:02:00.003+00:002008-12-01T21:45:37.137+00:00You've been Slade<div style="WIDTH: 430px; TEXT-ALIGN: center"><embed src="http://www.mixwit.com/flash/widgets/shell.swf" width="426" height="327" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" flashvars="env=embed&widget=1f58a5504f51306679b76fdab2432b37&playlist=2c3bfb17ceec21591c86fe1f6b2aee56&vuid=embed"></embed><br /><script src="http://www.mixwit.com/m.js"></script><a href="http://www.mixwit.com/hinksj?e"><img style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px" alt="Mixwit" src="http://www.mixwit.com/p.jpg" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.mixwit.com/create?e"><img style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px" alt="Mixwit make a mixtape" src="http://www.mixwit.com/m.jpg" border="0" /></a><a href="http://www.mixwit.com/?e"><img style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px" alt="Mixwit mixtapes" src="http://www.mixwit.com/l.jpg" border="0" /></a></div><p><br /><img style="VISIBILITY: hidden; WIDTH: 0px; HEIGHT: 0px" height="0" src="http://counters.gigya.com/wildfire/IMP/CXNID=2000002.0NXC/bHQ9MTIyODExNDg4NjI5OCZwdD*xMjI4MTE*OTQ2MDA*JnA9MTg*MzMxJmQ9Jm49YmxvZ2dlciZnPTEmdD*mbz*zMDQzYWYxMmE1OWY*YWRhYmUwZDJhMGY*OTU3MDdjOA==.gif" width="0" border="0" />Christmas is nearly upon us and I'm trying to cobble together a decent Christmas compilation (If that's not an oxymoron) . I've got to 12 tracks so far, So further suggestions are most welcome. So far I've snared the obvious candidates, yer Low and yer Phil Spector efforts, so you've got your work cut out, if you decide to take up the cudgel. </p><p></p><p>You never seem to hear the Glitter Band's <em>Another Rock and Roll Christmas </em>these days. I wonder why on earth that could be?</p>rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-57323420089042333362008-11-30T15:54:00.000+00:002008-12-01T04:11:41.464+00:00The Science of SleepListening to: El <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Pero</span> Del Mar - <em>El <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Pero</span> Del Mar</em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br />Dialect Word of the day: <em>Outwith (outside of)</em><br /><em></em><br /><em></em><br />I woke this morning unable to move my limbs.<br /><br />My sleep addled mind instantly <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">lept</span> to the most logical conclusion: I'd had an <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">horrific</span> stroke and was incapable of movement below the neck. I sighed, accepted the cruel fate that had befallen me and drifted back into a blissful sleep. Given that I can spend all night worrying about the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">minutiae</span> of my humdrum life, I think it's fair to say that I displayed hitherto unknown depths of stoicism.<br /><br />When I awoke properly, some hours later I found that before leaving for work, Jess had lovingly tucked the quilt around me, but had done it with such vigor that I was swaddled like a big gormless Baby Jesus. <br /><br />Having escaped from the jaws of lifelong paralysis, I decided to make the most of the day, finish the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">application</span> for the Masters degree, clean the flat, do the recycling, cook something nice for tea and generally behave like a productive human being. Somehow my good intentions got blunted by a combination of the cold, apathy and the fact that the Archers omnibus was on the radio.<br /><em></em><br />I really should loathe the Archers with a passion and spent many years doing exactly that. I used to spend all Sunday lunchtimes praying for a mass outbreak of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">BSE</span> to hit <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Ambridge</span> or for a communist coup to collectivise <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">Brookfield</span> farm, anything that would have seen the wretched show taken off the air. The Archers seems to exist in an alternative universe, the fictional county of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Borsetshire</span> is unaltered since feudal times, with the whole village being run in the interests of the insufferably smug Archer family. The working class characters, almost all <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">forelock</span> tugging yokel types, seem to exist only for casual labour and comic relief. However when I moved out of my parents' house, teatimes seemed strangely incomplete without it and the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">tyrannical</span> silence my mother used to enforce from 7:03 to 7:14pm. I will try and keep all mention of <em>The</em> <em>Archers</em> to an absolute minimum, but they may well feature heavily in future blog entries.<br /><br /><br />After that I'm not quite sure what happened to the rest of the day. I cannot recall a single thing that <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">happened</span> until Jess came home, somewhat peeved to find me still in my dressing gown and the flat looking like a dosshouse. I tried to explain, to her that unemployment, robs the day of any purpose structure or meaning, so what she sees as hours of <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">uninterrupted</span> leisure is a sprawling mass of dead time. I know my degree in Sociology isn't worth much, but being able to trot out this sort of pseudo-academic <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">psycho</span>-babble, can come in useful. It certainly sounds a hell of a lot better than "I'm a shiftless, work shy, skiver."<br /><br /> <br /><br /><em></em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br /><em></em><br /><br /><em></em>rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-12705867381404155392008-11-21T06:47:00.000+00:002008-11-30T15:33:07.802+00:00Life, love and leavingListening to: Gram Parsons anthology<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Swally</span> (alcoholic drink)<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />A fairly pleasant day today, one that makes me wish I'd spent my time 'inflation reducing' more productively and also makes me vaguely threatened by the prospect of starting work. I met Jess and her sister in <em>Monster Mash </em>before wandering over to the Library and spending the afternoon and much of the evening reading late Victorian newspaper articles. I feel I may have been over-<span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">immersed</span> myself in Ripper research of late, upon leaving the library today I addressed a fellow reader as '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">guv'nor</span>' in a appalling Dick Van Dyke-<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">esque</span> accent. I was mildly surprised I didn't preface the remark with 'Cor Blimey' or 'Stone the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">bleedin</span> crows.'<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />This week I've also found time to visit Carlton Hill, albeit in slightly unusual circumstances. After two and a bit years together, me and Jess decided that last Sunday would be an excellent time for our first row. We achieved this with <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">consummate</span> ease and in a fit of pique I flounced out of the flat. Being a rank <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">amateur</span> at the rowing and flouncing lark I soon realised that I had made a crucial error I had nowhere to flounce off too, not knowing anyone in Edinburgh well enough to inflict a few hours of low level pseudo-angst on them. So I was left standing on Easter Road feeling a bit pathetic. I soon realised that:<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />1. In the middle of a Scottish winter it is probably not a good idea to storm outside without first donning a scarf<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />2. or a hat<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />3. or gloves.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />4. or money so you can sulk in a pub or cafe.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />So <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">despite</span> these privations, I stuck it out and wandered off to Carlton Hill for a bit of a mooch and mope. Despite my black mood, I couldn't help but be overawed by the view from the top of the hill and the bleak beauty of the monuments, especially the half completed National Monument. It was an attempt to build a replica of the Parthenon in honour of the Scottish troops who'd died in the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">Napoleonic</span> Wars even though they ran out of money after only 12 columns it's still a hugely imposing spectacle and I rather like it for being such an epic failure.<br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/20939975@N04/2616330209/in/pool-vps">http://www.flickr.com/photos/20939975@N04/2616330209/in/pool-vps</a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Having stuck it out for an hour and a half I rather pompously decided that I'd probably made my point and deigned returned to the flat, to find that Jess had fallen asleep and had no idea I'd even left the lounge ! Thankfully this took the wind out of my sales and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">We</span> both found the whole scenario utterly absurd and had a good chortle about it. Especially when she revealed that Carlton Hill was a well known dogging hotspot. <br /><br />Although can one go dogging on foot? Now there's a question to ponder!rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-37279417289025291452008-11-02T00:37:00.000+00:002008-11-02T06:41:09.246+00:00The morning after the night beforeListening to: Jens Lekman <em>Oh you're so silent Jens</em><br /><br />Dialect word of the day: <em>Jag (</em>Injection)<br /><br />The weather is starting to become wintry and given my scrooge like tendencies, I have begrudgingly switched the heating on. For once my fiscal self restraint is probably warranted, two months on the dole is really starting to bite.<br /><br />Talking of the dole, my bi-monthly appointment with the good folk at High Riggs Job Centre, was marginally more awful than usual. My regular signing man was absent, which is a pity as for a dole office clerk he possesses uncommon amounts of humanity and intelligence (Christ knows how he slipped through the net, perhaps he has been sent on an intensive DSS course to systematically purge him of every trace of civility.) His replacement was every bit the archetype of the dole office drone, brusque to the point of rudeness, utterly lacking in imagination and a slavish devotion to a seemingly endless list of arcane rules and regulations. Well only a few more weeks and I'll be able to kiss them goodbye (fingers crossed!)<br /><br />The rest of the afternoon was spent more pleasantly in the library, doing a bit of reading on the ol' Ripper murders. I'm beginning to get some more focused ideas for a dissertation topic, looking at the hoax letters received by the press and how by writing these, the public became actors actively shaping the course of events. I begin to worry that my reading matter on such occasions makes the library assistants think I'm some sort of weirdo, borrowing book after book on Jack the Ripper; I am increasingly convinced they have me down as a Fred West waiting to happen. This worries me to such a degree that I have been trying (and largely failing) to engage them in light hearted banter, in a futile attempt them I am actually a well adjusted human being and I won't be waiting for them outside wearing a leather mask and weilding a chainsaw.<br /><br />The Halloween party at Leith ex-servicemen's club was pretty cool, the building is located in a surprisingly spiffy street of Georgian Terraces although the interior was pure 70s and fabulously cheap. I had been somewhat nervous walking down Leith Walk in my Rod Stewart costume, but with my leopardskin leggings and bleach blond feather cut wig I was an absolute dead ringer for a Leith Prostitute and escaped unmolested. I think the locals appreciated my efforts to pay homage to one of their heroes and I managed to win one of the awards for best costume, which pleased and embarrassed me in equal measure. I felt a bit sorry for Jess as she had gone to a great deal more effort with her Dusty costume. Whilst the drink flowed relatively freely, there wasn't much action on the dancefloor., I did have a a half hearted go at dancing at the end, but my leggings were chaffing a bit, who knew Rod suffered so much for his art?<br /><br />In amongst the booze and general merriment was the world's longest raffle which, I kid you not, lasted for nearly 45 minutes. There was such a wide selection of prizes that literally everyone in the room won at least once. I managed to scoop a set of bath soaps (which will do as a Christmas present for my Gran and a meal for two at a hotel in the Grassmarket, which should see Valentine's day taken care of.<br /><br />Tightfisted? Moi?rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-59793719022785763752008-10-27T14:47:00.000+00:002008-10-27T16:57:17.785+00:00That was the week that wasListening to: <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Bandwagonesque</span></em> Teenage <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Fanclub</span><br />Dialect word: Weejie (someone from Glasgow)<br /><br />Finally! Work!<br /><br />Well at least the prospect of it, an end to my enforced idleness is nigh! An interview with Social Services on Wednesday and I got offered a job in their Youth Justice team. This was something of a surprise to me as I didn't think I'd done particularly well in the interview, and came across as a bit of a know-all. However they looked fairly impressed when they found out I could complete an ASSET and I guess that probably swung it. The post is only for six months and they needed someone who at least knew their way around.<br /><br />After the phone call on Thursday, which I fully anticipated to be of the 'thanks but no thanks' variety, I was <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">pretty</span> euphoric and took Jess out for a meal at <em>Tex Mex</em> and very good it was too. To cap a very decent day, John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Betjeman's</span> <em>Metro-Land</em> <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">documentary</span>, was on BBC Four and given that it contained <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">Architecture</span>, Underground trains, Social <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">commentary</span> and John <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">Betjaman</span> himself being all charming, it couldn't fail to delight me.<br /><br />My views on the suburbs have scarcely changed since I was a teenager; their mediocrity and <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">characterlessness</span> bore me to tears a <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">juvenile</span> and patronising attitude I have been unable to shift. <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Betjamen</span> is more nuanced and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">ambivalent</span> than me , whilst he pithily comments on the gnomes and car washing denizens of <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Neasden</span>, and the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Croxley</span> revels that "date back to 1952" <em>Metro-land </em>also looks at the idealism and <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">aspirations</span> of those who after the carnage of the First World War <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">desired</span> a rural idyll within easy commuting distance from London and how that informed the deeply conservative, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">faux</span> rustic <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">Tudorbethan</span> style semis that sprung up in a ribbon pattern along the line. The sheer popularity of this vision combined with <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">comparatively</span> low interest rates, during the 30s effectively killed the vision and led to the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">anonymous</span>, identikit suburbs that litter outer London.<br /><br />However if you take a trip on the Metropolitan Line, what is utterly striking is how brave and futuristic the tube buildings are. Eastcote is a cracking exapmple. Designed by Charles Holden, at roughly the same time, they look clean, simple and bright, whilst the suburban semis around them look fussy and chintzy.<br /><br /><br />Jess was off work this weekend and we went shopping for fancy dress costumes for the <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">Hallow e'en</span> party in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Leith</span>, sadly no Robin Hood outfits to be had at short notice and we had to innovate. She opted for Dusty Springfield and got a super maxi dress in the <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">Grassmarket</span> and I've gone for Rod Stewart circa <em>'Do ya think I'm sexy' </em>I believe that Rod is the patron saint of Scotland and I hope the locals will appreciate my homage to the great man. I was also pleasantly <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">surprised</span> by the ease with which I obtained a pair of l leopardskin leggings for the occasion. My delight at <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">securing</span> the said items almost outweighed the humiliation of standing in the queue in <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">BHS</span> grasping a pair of<span style="color:#ffff00;"> </span>leopardskin trousers intended for a 15 year old girl.<br /><br />Almost but not quite......rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2594538085969013008.post-63057943022575302462008-10-21T14:42:00.000+01:002008-10-21T15:48:13.051+01:00Opening salvo<em></em><br /><em><span style="font-family:arial;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Willkommen</span>, <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">bienvenue</span>, welcome!</span></em><br /><em><span style="font-family:Arial;"></span></em><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"><em>Listening to: </em>Vampire Weekend</span><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"><em>Dialect word of the day: Piece (Sandwich) </em></span><br /><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;">I moved to Edinburgh from a tedious London suburb (or <em><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">Orbitaland</span> </em>as I pretentiously labelled it) with my girlfriend and am attempting to establish a life in Edinburgh. This is pretty daunting thing to do, especially as you get older and tend to establish social ties in a particular place. Much as I disliked London, there were a number of friends a tube ride away. </span><br /><span style="font-family:Arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">That said, Edinburgh is quite lovely and the flat is in a quite nice Victorian tenement block. (Well it was until someone set fire to it ) I stumbled across David Hume's tomb at the top of our road and managed to walk unscathed through a <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">Leith</span> housing scheme wearing a cravat.<br /><br />I think that I will quite like living in Scotland, any country that celebrates its' national poet with such vigor is alright by me. I still haven't got over the novelty of Scottish notes and Tartans. However such talk does tend to get me in trouble with my girlfriend, who <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">understandably</span> gets <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">narked</span> when I act like the tourist I probably still am. </span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;"></span><br /><span style="font-family:arial;">However certain things still puzzle me, notably the Scottish <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">cuisine</span>. Everything and I mean everything appears to be deep fried! The chip shop across the street appears to exist as a v-sign to the health minister, it sells booze, fags, sweets and fizzy pop as well as deep frying their Pizzas. The orange Cheddar is also taking some getting used to; cheese plays a big role in my life.<br /><br />The diet hasn't done me in yet, although a car had a bloody good go back in September. I bounced off the windscreen at about 30 mph, although I had the good sense to get myself run over outside a Doctor's surgery and was still wearing my bike helmet. Even so, I got carted off to hospital and they were amazed I hadn't broken anything. I put this down to my languid, limp <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">wristed</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">demeanour</span> .<br /><br />Anyway that's enough for starters, more later!<br /><br /><br /><em></em></span><br /><br /><br /><br /><em></em>rhinestonecatboyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16689486208675217816noreply@blogger.com0