Yesterday afternoon I made my way home through that familiar alleyway that riuns along the old college site. It is something of a rubbish tip, a place for personal drug deals, and even sometimes the odd bonfire or two. The discarded clothes, rotting wood, rusty springs, smashed plastic shells of consumer electronics, incomplete graffiti, and broken bottles and stones are something I've wearily become used to. As I leaned forward to avoid the ever-increasing expanse of foliage, the troughs dug by
You might think from reading this blog that things aren't quite going my way. Correct. However, it isn't all that bad, and sometimes I end up with a few quid left my pocket to indulge my passion for takeways. This week didn't quite leave me enough for my favourite curry. So it's a bag of chips then?
Do I really want to go up the hill at the back of my house and barter for the wrong meal in that chinese fish and chip shop? As far as I can tell, they have no comprehension of customer service o
Like many others with projects to get on with, I find myself in a struggle. On the one hand, the relative quiet of the early hours is conducive to productivity in the absence of distraction, yet on the other you're tired and want to go to sleep. Eventually I succumbed to the latter, and realising I was asleep at my computer, decided it was right and proper to abandon any more effort and seek the comfort of my bed. Tired.... Eyes closing.... zzzzzzzzzz
THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD THUD
With a train magazine in hand I sat in the waiting room at the local surgery. Sooner or later I was going to be called and rather ominously the editorial of this months issue was about dead trains, locomotives lying idle, rusting away. Great. I needed that.
Actually there a certain poignancy. As a child I used to wander along a disused railway, and in the wide open plain of ash beyond the iron railings, row upon row of obselete diesels waited for the cutting torch, reduced to shells or pitia
What would you do with a lottery win? With several million pounds in your wallet? I've heard this question asked time and time again. Many people actually tell me they want to be generous and give everyone they like a huge wad of the winnings. Perhaps, but I'm a little too cynical to believe I'm that likeable.
Anyhow, Young L, the museums resident football player, was discussing that very question today with the backroom crew. His preferred course of action is to buy a Bowler Wildcat (for t
"Hello" Said the guy next to me as I waited for the library to open. Receiving a friendly greeting is an unusual experience for me and I sort of did a double take.
"You are.. Caldrail?" He enquired, looking a bit mystified as to why I was looking mystified. Erm... Yes. yes, that's me.
"Remember me?. College, OND days?"
Good grief. I remember him now! There was an Iranian chap who was part of our year back in 1982. The year before we'd worked together on an embarrasing project to buil
I got a phone call from a flustered computer technician on Friday. "Uhhh... We can't load your Windows.... Have you got a license code?"
Groan. Yes I do. Please wait. Off I went, found the necessary document, and told him the code over the phone. He was happy and informed me the computer would be ready that afternoon. I hung up and went about my daily business. That of course means guitar practice at the moment. A short while later the phone rang when I was in the middle of a hot screaming s
A quick glance through the news is always the same thing. Once again the plight of residents in Queensland, Australia, takes centrestage, but the the usual collection of political and financial wrangling makes life seem one long argument from start to finish. No wonder people turn to soap operas. What's the alternative? Learning that a female celebrity was sleeping with a different guy every night as one newspaper headline proclaimed this morning?
How much of our news is nothing more than e
All this good weather has been very seductive. It might be something people in other places around the world take for granted, but we British do enjoy our sunny weather when we can get. This weekend the clouds rolled in and as disappointing as it was, we do need the rain. I stopped for a while looking out the back window. The rainfall came in surges, no more than a light drizle one moment, a torrential downpour the next, though I didn't hear any thunder from the storms the weather people told us
Times they are a-changing again. I'm to be placed on a two year program designed to get me back into work. A part of me is a bit dismissive. It is after all just about politicians trying to cover their backsides and look as if they're doing something to reduce unemployment, and you have to wonder what this course will do that hasn't already been offered by the others I've been on.
The trouble is that this government is talking tough over things like the dole queue. I'm well aware how many c
Last week at the programme centre a chap asked me to help him with his jobsearch. His concernwas that the job centre was getting a little impatient with him. My concern was that he was asking me to do his applications for him.
You see, I don't mind helping people. it's just that I prefer to help people who try to help themselves. If he'd actually shown any willingness to pull his weight, I would have backed him to the hilt. As it happens, he had no intention of doing anything at all. Noneth
Phone hacking is the big news story right now. Frankly I've had enough of these reports. Yes, it is scandalous, and has already shut down a national newspaper, but I seriously don't believe Gordon Brown said anything remotely of interest to the general public no matter how the journalists tried to word it.
The truth of this ongoing scandal is the realisation that Rupert Murdoch owns too big a slice of british media and those who want that issue addressed are making sure it is. Even this morn
Another sunny day? Yes, it is. Another chance then to get out and about, doing stuff, meeting people, filling my day with endless blog anecdotes. So let's start as I mean to continue. First task is to extricate myself from bed.
Get out of bed? There was a time in my energetic youth when I thought nothing of leaping into clothes and bursting out into the big wide world before being crushed utterly by fate. Now I grimace and debate the relaive merits of warm comfortable beds and the bracing we
How could any sane mortal resist a weekend of sword & sorcery on television? Furry underwear and long hair. Incredibly pathetic villains and the violent comedians who thwart their evil schemes. A part of me has some masochistic enjoyment of the genre. The rest of me cringes at the sheer awfulness of the films that portray these invented worlds.
Okay, there are one or two that aren't so bad. Armie's Conan The Barbarian retains a sort of immature exuberance. I still watch Red Sonja for it'
Recently I bumped into a lady I've known distantly for a long time. To be honest, I've never really spoken to her much, but on this occaision we got talking.
She began by enquiring about my historical research, something she'd noticed me doing at the library. The reason for her interest had nothing to do with my natural charm, physical assets, or bank balance, but rather my soul. It turns out she's a keen member of one of those odd christian sects that you see from time to time. Hers is a do
Yesterday I'd arranged to meet DW for a photo-shoot in town. The weather map last night showed rain crossing the country and I had images in my mind of being immortalised as a miserable drowned rat. As it happens the weather wasn't too bad, being merely overcast.
With my business for the day seen to I had some time on my hands. Quite a lot of it So I sat down outside the library and watched the world go by. What is this life if we have no time to sit and doss?
All of a sudden I realise
What can I say about last night? Without doubt, it was the worst nights sleep I've had in ages. Usually that would be because the local gorillas are out partying, or some resident of north swindon is trying to use my half-abandoned car to get a cheap ride home, or simply that the urban foxes living in the old college site are yelping their heads off. No, it was off course the stale air. It wasn't warm enough to be sweaty, just unpleasantly heavy. This morning is one of odd days. There's some thi
What's going on out there? This is a big old planet, however small Ryanair makes it seem. Time then to switch to Auntie Beeb, Britains most watched news channel, and check out world affairs unfolding from the comfort of my comfy chair.
More huffing and puffing about the US debt crisis. Apparently politicians are under pressure to find a solution, which is pretty much what ours do for a living, so obviously crises aren't as common across the Pond. Come on guys, sort yourselves out, we want so
It had to happen. As I crossed the main road to Swindons shiney new library the first signs of urban decay have been left upon it in the form of a dark blue squiggle. Nigel woz ere. Well thanks, Nigel, but perhaps if you learned to read and get of bed in the mornings you could drop in and enjoy the ambience instead of wasting your money on spray paint. In fact, there's a section on art, and if you peruse the books contained therein (is my english too advanced for you?) you might discover how com
Yesterday I found myself with an afternoon to spare. The good weather was literally too good to ignore, so I wandered into the depths of Croft Wood to find a tanquil spot and enjoy the sunshine. Even with cool temperatures and a light breeze, the day was warm. I know this all sounds a bit naff, but I do find it relaxing to sit listening to wind in the trees, birdsong, and the exasperated orders of dog owners.
On the way there I strolled through the park. It was the usual scene, a handful of
"How long have I got mate?" Asked an optimistic motorist at the bottom of the hill last night, planning to use the loading bays cut into the pavement. He was of course not asking the question to me, but one of the two traffic wardens busy handing out tickets to motorists who didn't think to ask.
I can't call them traffic wardens anymore (nor anything less polite). Instead, they're called Traffic Flow Monitoring & Enforcement Officers or something similar. I should know. I've applied to
In what way can a man describe himself as free? I don't mean John Inman style availability (ugh), but rather that sense of freedom that allows you to pursue interests without harm or hindrance. There is the restraint of law, applied by the state to control our actions, which is identifiably a boundary for the lawful. Of course if you happen to be criminally minded then it's a challenge of sorts, but then you risk even more confinement.
Strictly speaking our laws defend our freedom, even thou
What is it with banks these days? If for any reason you approach a teller with a request beyond simply giving them money they can't cope. "Why don't you do this?" They suggest, "Why can't you be the same as everyone else and ask for a service we know how to do?"
Because your clever automated system doesn't meet my requirements, that's why not. Why can't banks train their staff any more? What happened to all this wonderful customer service? In the television adverts everyone is happy, efficie
Heve you ever noticed how persitently the civil service agencies tell us how great their customer serrvice is? They hang posters on every wall, print colourful pamphlets, and assure us that everyone is equal and important to the world. The truth, as I've discovered, is that human beings fall well short of government guidelines. Not just the politicians, but those bureaucrats who work on their behalf.
I had a drubbing in public from Bovine Betty more than a year ago. I remember her deliberate
Today I think I shall struggle a little to find something to write about. So far the biggest event of the day was some guy having a loud conversation on his mobile phone whilst sat by the next computor to me. Hardly world shaking stuff.
Dying A Death
What on earth is all this fuss about Magrahi for? If the court was correct and he was guilty of causing the Lockerbie Bombing, then frankly I have no sympathy for him at all. So what if he's dying of cancer? There are people around the world d
