Pieces of a Man Think it. Do it. Be it. Embellish.

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Bought the new Doves album at lunchtime today. "Doves return with a follow-up to The Last Broadcast that, unexpectedly, is something of a concept album. Some Cities builds on that titular theme throughout the course of its wintry--and, at times, monolithic--citysongs." (Amazon Review)

First impressions mostly positive. There's not an obvious big track on there like There goes the Fear on the last album, but the first single Black Town, White Town got stuck in my head after a couple of listens to its catchy Northern Soul piano hook. I've read a bit about the track Walk in Fire on the web, but don't quite see it. Still, it took a while to get my head round the quality of their previous album, so let's wait and see. The tickets for the gig arrived this week, too. I'm so looking forward to that one. Big venue, hometown crowd. Should be massive.

Labels: 2005

Malcolm X was shot dead at a Harlem rally 40 years ago today, as reported in The Guardian on this day in 1965.

Labels: 2005

Last words of air crews in crashes detailed in air traffic control transcripts and MP3 cockpit voice recordings. A few would be comical if only they weren't tragically real; Oh Shit!! and Mountains!!!.

Labels: 2005

The skies looked bright inland so we decided to head out to North Wales and revisit the scene of a lovely day on the beach last year. What a different place in winter. Everything shut. Freezing cold. Biting wind. Tide in. Still, we didn't have to stay long, preferring to cut the losses on the beach after Oscar threw a beach pebble and caught Yani on the back of the head. Happy Valentine's.

Labels: 2005

Went to see The Magic Roundabout today. The instincts from the reviews I glanced at last week were more or less right - it's a load of nonsense.

The main problem of the film is the lack of initial scene setting. The basic plot is that the Zebedee alter-ego escapes imprisonment of many years and unleashes all kinds of naughtiness on the world. Gang have save the day. It's a familiar device, but while the grown-ups might understand all the 70's characters, they're just as baffled as the kids as to why Zeebad has this grudge.

It's shakey ground for what follows, which is a series of disjointed chase and action scenes interspersed with some weird song set-pieces which serve only to crowbar in tunes for the 30-somethings ('Mr Blue Sky' by ELO was the highlight).

This film tries, as do most kids films these days, to please about three different target audiences on the instruction of the marketing executives, but the mess they end up with doesn't pull it off. The kids miss most of the trippiness and hippy characterisation of the original, but didn't seem to have anything else to replace it with but strange events happening to unexplained characters.

Oscar spent the last 15 minutes of the film shouting 'I want to go home'. I was thinking the same.

Labels: 2005

Next time I'm undecided about going to a football match, I need to look back on today, which was a series of annoyances and misfortunes the like of which couldn't even be scripted.

In the morning a trip to the sweetie shop and the park with the kids set the tone for the day. Oti had a tantrum in the shop which resulted in having to drag him out, nearly toppling the display of Cadbury's Creme Eggs, and the playground in the park was padlocked shut, allowing only a 10 minute stay, long enough for the kids to get covered in mud.

Cleaning off the mud meant a late dash to the train station to meet up with everyone else. Unfortunately, I'd misread the web information and now the train was leaving from Manchester Victoria rather than Piccadilly, meaning I'd miss it and have to travel up the game alone an hour later than everyone else.

I finally neared Blackburn with 20 minutes still to kick-off and left the train early on the advise of the conductor to catch a taxi from a stop just outside town. Turns out the cab company probably only had a couple of cabs and there was a queue. Plan B? Fortunately not the 45 minute walk that the guy at the cab stand first mentioned, but instead a sprint across town to catch a bus just as it headed off to near the ground.

Finally arrived gasping about 10 minutes after kick-off and for my troubles was treated to one of our worst performances of the season. We blew three gilt-edged chances before gifting them 3 soft goals and going down 3-0. The salt in the wound was having to sit in the crappiest seats in Ewood Park.

Needless to say, we missed the train home by a couple of minutes and were stuck in Blackburn for an hour longer than anyone should have to be there in one lifetime. We worked out a joint spend of about £150 on this disaster of a leisure opportunity. At least there wasn't a 7-hour trip back to Norfolk.

Labels: 2005

Today is the start of Lent, and since I could still feel last night's single can of Red Stripe this morning it seems as good a time as any to quit booze for 40 days and nights.

Oh Lord, what have I done?

Labels: 2005

It's Bob Marley's 60th birthday, and crazy old Rita wants him exhumed and buried in someone else's country, despite the apathy his religion has always received in that part of the world;

"For a long time, Ethiopians had little idea of what to make of him or Rastafarians. When Haile Selassie made a brief visit to Jamaica in 1966 he was so surprised by the 100,000 Rastas at the airport that it took half an hour to coax him out of the plane. " More...

Gary Younge also has related piece in the Guardian this week on the tensions between race, identity and belonging.

Labels: 2005

Took at trip out to Hope Valley to have a walk and watch the kids throwing sticks into a stream. Also had a sideways glance into some of the estate agents' windows thereabouts. Bit out of range to get a comparable propertly in that neck of the woods for a couple of years, but it's a nice area. Local dress is hiking boots rather than shell suits.

Labels: 2005

Da Mayor: Doctor...
Mookie: C'mon, what. What?
Da Mayor: Always do the right thing.

Ossie Davis died today. I knew he was a great actor from all the Spike Lee joints, but it was only from reading up for the trip to New York last year that he was a lot more besides - writer, director, civil rights activist and friend of Malcolm X; a true (Harlem) rennaissance man.

I'll remember him best for two roles - Da Mayor in Do the Right Thing, opposite his wife Ruby Dee as Mother Sister, and in Get on the Bus as Jeremiah , the old man taking one last trip on the Million Man March before he dies.

Labels: 2005

One month of new exercise regime clocked up today. Have managed to stick to plan to use the treadmill once a day, and it's actually become a fixed part of the routine. Have lost about 6 pounds, which is nice, but the best outcome is the new and tasty pleasure of guilt-free Chinese food at the weekend. Definitely a motivational regime from the Homer Simpson school of thought.

Labels: 2005