If you've gotta go, go with a bang

It's one of those days where I can't openly say what I want to. But those who know me know that if I have to work a fourteen hour shift, it's been a good day at the office.

Since my team was formed last July, we've been conscious that major success has evaded us. A near miss a couple of weeks back, lots of minor things, but none of the big stuff, and frankly we felt bad for our boss who's a decent sort, practical guy, one of my own grade on temporary promotion thus he's not yet tainted with the rubbish that goes with being management. We'd have liked to have got him something good before then end, I guess that's motivation, some kind of teamwork and proves I'm not completely braindead. The team disbands today. Yesterday we finally got our big kill, at the last possible moment. It could have been choreographed. And it went like clockwork, even to my anal standards. All the systems were involved, all performed their job right on the button. We've all already worked more hours of the year than we're contracted to, and the year (financial) ends on Saturday so given that we've worked a double shift, the boss has told us not to come in today.

What a way to go.

In response, a little spaced out today. Wasn't home til half two in the morning, slept til eleven when I woke to find the cat crashed out by my feet. Awwwww. As I've said on here before, he can be sensitive when he wants to. Don't quite know what to do with the day, or how to start it. There's things to sort and bills to pay, which I aught go get a grip of. However, I feel a little out of synch, that's the best way to put it. Not sure what I'm going to do, with whom or when. Aught to tackle this place but just feel out of sorts. I think a couple of hours mooching is in order here. Might pop into the office for an hour or so, see if there's anything for me to do.

Creaking at the seams

A reasonable few days at the Fun Factory. Tuesday was a rare day of sanity.... no properly considered work for us, but instead of the usual makework that gets dished out for us, we were actually allowed office time; bringing records up to date, consolidation time, case files. Thank gawd for that. Achieved more in three hours of relative inactivity than we normally do in a week. A little bit of activity yesterday, on a strange day that started foggy, got warm but never really burned off the mist and haze in the rivermouth, the foghorns were going all day. After we completed the days tasks, we took full advantage of the buy one, get one free offer at the local Domino's (still don't think they do them as well as Domino's Harrogate but beggars can't be choosers), chipped in a fiver each and duly arrived a simply enormous pile of pizza boxes, and doughnut boxes from Sainsbergs on the way back. Oh my. Gigantuan feast. It's ten o clock the following morning and I'm still stuffed. Good, innit.

This was to mark the shutdown of our team on Friday, and our scattering to the four winds, well the three remaining teams. For most of the guys, this is their first team, they all trained together and it's a very big deal for them. For me, teams come, teams go. I wish we'd have done it as soon as it was announced, less jawboning and whinging. As far as I'm concerned, my team has run it's course and I need to do something different. Hey, lets look back at this and see how I feel about it in two months time ! ! !

Going to have to scrape up some cash to put petrol in the car in a moment... running short of the old beer tokens at the moment. Thank gawd for payday! I've already got more commitment then cash next month!

London underground... hmmm, we know a song about them....

Anybody seen that news article about Transport for London getting totally prissy about the fella on Youtube who's posted a film of him ski'ing down the longest escalator in Europe? Urging the police to take the "strongest possible action" against similar offenders, and urging the film maker to "contact them so they can discuss the potential dangers of his stunt". Oh my. You boring, grey, flat little jobsworths. I bet you sound like John Major's Spitting Image pupppet. Didn't he fill in the proper health and safety risk assessment? Diddums. It's only stuff like this that brings any colour to this country anymore. Without it, we'd all be as grey and as boring and as SAFE as you'd like us, that'd make us all very managable. Don't like the sound of that. Transport for London, Shadey Mike would just like to say to you "get a bloody life and spend your time making the trains run on time, nothing more". And in the spirit of spreading the fun, for those who've not seen the stunt....

CLICKY LINKY HERE !

Chinese pisstakeaway

NEWS LINKY.....

"There are also proposals to assemble the MG 7 at Longbridge using kits imported from China"

... that's Rover 75's to you and me. Does that strike anybody else as obscene? If anyone can detect a very slight buzzing through their feet today, that's Fred Dibnah spinning in his grave. Oh my poor country, what have they done to you? Will the last person with any self respect to leave the UK please turn out the lights on your way?

Let's kill a rain forest

After every success some paperwork must fall.

So that was my yesterday, mass of reports and files to collate from one little win. And unable to find a damned computer anywhere do do them on. That's my fun factory. Ten people in, only five computers available and everyone busy. Good here, innit... Nobody knows for sure how we're supposed to administer one of these particular issues, it's been so long since we've had one. And there's a few, erm, inconsistencies about how the law says they should be run and how the brass say they should be run. I love my job.

Anyways, must rush, spring clean continueth.

Might have it finished by christmas.

Pussy cat pic

"the media made me do it...."

Comms down

Been a funny one... had about half an hour's worth of writing all set up and ready to go on here on Saturday. Went to answer the mobile and when I came back, the 'pooter's cheerfully rebooting, the answerphone's off etc... all work lost. Teach me to save things as draft. A power spike or something. Mind you, it's not like it was worth reading, it was a highly detailed rant on why my team at work are pissing me, which lets face it, you don't want to read and I don't really want to publish if I know what's good for me. It's good to vent. But not always clever. Anyway. Saturday's shift was a complete waste of time, everything we were sent out to do was foiled through no fault of our own and everyone was pretty low in their respective cages. Worked with a few guys of my generation, rather than the latest intake for a rather refreshing change, but hell... they bitch more than I do. Less jawing, more getting on with it, that's what I say. Not as if we can change damn all.

Sunday was looking at going much the same way, but in the end I broke a very important duck at work... something that's never came my way up to now came my way at last and I handled it as per the manual. I was always terrified I'd screw up the wording or stammer at an inappropriate moment of nerves. Nope, by the numbers. So today will be paperwork, paperwork, paperwork which under the circumstances, I don't mind.

Came home at gone midnight to discover no messages on the answerphone, the landline out of action and the dvd scrambled. Fixed it this morning, not sure what caused it but my money's on another power spike, or some kind of pulse in supply. This is not the first time it's occured around here, but never that bad before. It's great in the north, innit.

Numbered days

Could the end be in sight for the motoring bitch from Hell? Baz the Bike was over Thursday night for bevvies and alleges he knows where there's a certain 1.8 Vauxhall for sale at a most reasonable price... not what I'm actually after but frankly it'd do for a while, and I suspect the Hellhound Honda is terminally ill, leaking oil from the head like a good'n. I guess this space is one to watch, motoring fans....

No connection or linkage possible with the previous bit, but was speaking to an old buddy in the Northern parts yesterday; always nice to catch up with her. Crap, it would appear manifests itself mighty in her life once more. No names, no pack drills, no identifiable details but nasties that once loomed large in her life are looming again. Where I come from, we shoot mad dogs. Shoulders and opinions proffered as ever, it's bugger all use but if you get to read this matey, zen hugs.

Fairly joyless day at the Factory of Fun. Back again after a break of five days or so... I'd be lying if I said my heart or even my mind was in it yesterday. We were led to believe that our strange start time was due to us tackling what we call A.F.R. (another f****in' Russian). Not to be. I walked in bang on the clock to be faced with wall to wall white shirted colleagues. Oh. It's airport. Joy. On the positive side, we took the out dogs with us... always a joy to work with them, someone who actually enjoys working and doesn't get down by lack of facilities or office politics. Especially cute one yesterday, spaniel bitch with a built in perm. You have to find your laughs where you can these days, folks. My lot on are on call this week, so picked up the mobile for that.... you're not supposed to drink when you're on call, but bollocks to that, went to bed on a glass of wine. It's for medicinal purposes. If I didn't drink, I'd make some bugger very ill ! ! ! !

Loud music

A kind of nothing day yesterday... think all that earlier mad travelling imposed the need for a break; can understand that. Was going to take Bosscam2 over to Coningsby for a workout, but the weather stank, frankly wasn't worth the petrol. Been sitting at the computer instead tackling the job of squeezing cd tracks into the Ipod; been a fun reunion with stuff I've not played in years and I wonder why... Alice Cooper, Annihilator, Anthrax and I'm not even out of the A's yet. Good music. This may be a fun job.

Big wakeup greeting from the small hairy chap this morning; lots of chest stomping, bicep clawing, all signs of kitty good mood and general wellness... aww, isn't that nice, he's pleased to see me and wants me to get out of bed so he can be social. Don't believe the hype. Just wandered through into the bedroom and the little scrote's wrapped my duvet up like a nest that I've kindly warmed for him for the last eight hours. I tell you blokes, living with a cat's just like having a live in girlfriend, just without the sex. Hmmmm, actually EXACTLY like having a live in girlfriend mwahahahahah.

God bothering

Well, got the Easter advertising through from the local religion people. The local church have gone for the long haired hippy Jesus, looks like Bin Laden but with a lamb, staff and olive branch instead of an AK74. The Jehova's lot on the other hand have gone for a full colour, bruised, battered and whipped pre crucifixion mode Jesus with short beard, sun tan and glistening muscles in a purple robe. Action hero Jesus. They're also hosting a talk telling us "how you can feel safe in this troubled world". Mwahahahahahahahaah!!!! I look forward to it's sequel, "how to nail jelly to the ceiling". Folks, I felt a damned sight safer when facing the daily threat of nuclear annihilation in the seventies and eighties. Of the two leaflets, the local church one is a bit cardboardy, and I'm not sure about the print quality; that might leave marks... where as the Jo'Wits one is slightly abraisive, but not too much so that it'll remove skin, and not so glossy that you'd get a shiny white effect. Probaby that's better for a good effective wipe, and if you're tidy minded it's flexible enough to fit around the existing roll.

Oh, and for those who worried, or indeed knew, my appointment on Monday at the cardiac ward went without incident, the ultrasound says A-OK, so it's back to the waiting list for ANOTHER waste of time before my doc clicks onto the fact that my bad chest MIGHT just be be mild late onset asthma brought on by my crap working conditions, or stress.

The man from F.I.R.S.T. C.O.U.S.I.N. O.N.C.E. R.E.M.O.V.E.D.

Family trip yesterday... as it's my day off, put back into place the mission to go and see my cousin's newborn in Durham'shire that had to be aborted last week (god was it only last week...). Pointed the hellcar in a roughly northerly direction, wasn't happy with what the gauges were telling me so quickly pointed it back home, furtled under the bonnet to reveal that the water levels were fine but there seems to be a mighty oil leak coming from that dodgy cylinder head. Oil refreshed, plugged in the ipod so I didn't have to listen to depressing budget chatter, pointed the pointy toothed demon buggy back in the direction of desired travel...

Drove what I regard as an easy old commute up the east road, M18, M62, A1... used to drive this every week in different times and I like the run. Stopped off enroute at Leeming, a very pretty fighter airfield I know in North Yorkshire where the Dutch airforce have some choppers living for the week; a Chinook's not the most attractive thing in the world, but Leeming is the nicest backdrop to any airfield photography I've yet come across with those lovely rolling hills, so I'll stick in a pic anyway.

Just a five minute stop over to grab that shot, check my maps and head off again. On the way, saw in action what I believe is called a "rolling stop"; five police cars crowded around one dark estate at slow speed, two more with all lights on slowing down the traffic behind to keep space for them. I think for future trips the smart plan would be to continue towards Newcastle and turn back on myself, rather than do the logical thing and come off at Newton Aycliffe and go up the old main road, which is of course the direct route. The direct route is ok, but bottlenecks like a mad bottlenecking thing west of Durham, but I eventually got to the village where my rellies are living. It's a lovely spot, the sort of houses I'd give my eye teeth to move to and the sort of place that constantly knacker any ambition I have to move back south again. Took a wrong turning or two finding their house, ended up on top of a tall hill overlooking the village, with a field with a number of friendly horses standing at the stone wall lit from the side by the golden light of the dipping sun... I'd have loved to have stopped to take a picture - it was gorgeous, but I had places to be and people to see.

One of the things about me is that I'm a pretty sound judge of character, based purely upon gut instinct. I can smell a wrong'n at twenty paces. I've never had that aroma from my cuz's husband who's one of those rare blokes I instantly liked from first meeting, a really good egg. First time I've been to their pad, lovely stone built terrace, south facing living room that gets the sun, and nice gardens. Nice people in a nice place in nice weather. What can go wrong? First order of business.... what is Shadey Mike going to be called as far as young Megan is concerned? Uncle Mike, Cousin Mike or just Mike? Hadn't actually thought about this, I was of the "don't mind, whatever you guys are comfortable with" frame of mind. So Uncle Mike it is. In fact, if you're TV geeky I'm the man from uncle. Hey, actually this is quite cool. One of the sods with being an only child, as I am is that you don't get to be an uncle. Not that I am now really, and not that I was overly bothered with it beforehand, but it's still quite cool. Oh, and the baby? Healthy, reletavely well behaved for a small person with no bowel control and no time to learn manners, and still with a full head of dark hair. Cute, if I may say so without everyone thinking I've resigned my address in Planet Bloke and actually grown up at last. Got a memory card full of pictures for the female rellies down south, I'm not putting one up here, sorry. Hub's brother turned up, likeable chap... mother and child bugged out to safety while the lads talked geeky things, such as how to make things explode using ordinary household chemicals. Ah, my rellies........ !!!

Scuttled away back south at a sensible hour, as their world is completely full of baby spotters at the moment and it only seems fair to give the poor guys some space, pointed the seething evil that is Christine in the direction of the south east again. Returned to Leeming to spot the remainder of the choppers that had returned home, having been away on their afternoon mission when I'd been there first time around and pressed the button marked "home, James", pausing only to pick up a tasty fish and chip supper (yes I know it's bad for my waistline, man is merely man) and back to Fortress Shadey and locked the door.

Oh, and beer review... St Judes Ipswich Bright. Not a lot of fizz, northerners won't like it. Quite a bit of sediment in the beer, puts one in mind of a good homebrew rather than a professional drop. But it's early days, and I've got several more bottles to try!

Due South

Remember me complaining that I didn't get any of the new St Judes beer from Ipswich at Leicester? Well, I've now got the full bottled range sitting in my kitchen, alone with some "Suffolk Gold" cheese, made in Coddenham, just down the road from where I grew up... plus a nice lump of Wensleydale and Yorkie blue cheese, and a big bag of seeds to low-calorie-snack on, don't know where I got that idea from. Yum. I've found a new deli/local suppliers shop in Ippo, so knocked my way through another big chunk of beer tokens on good tasty things. Thank you Yorkshire for re-energising my tastebuds, there's not been such a devastating effect on my wallet since I learned to shoot in '92. Was never solvent again.

Pointed Christine's hellmouth engine in an approximately southerly direction on Monday night, having booked some crash space at the hospitable house of Kev. Journey was.... well, rush hour A16 is never going to be pleasant, the weather was snotty and Boston was hell but suprisingly made it back to hometown more or less on schedule. The reason for travel, going to see Brian Ferry in concert with me 'muv. Scooted from where I left the car, a shortcut through Withipoll Street, across Christchurch Street, all the old rat runs, and down beside the Regent, although they've put big fences up to block the short cut beside the theatre wall. Had a pint, fought my way through the fortysomething once teenyboppers who once swooned to Roxy Music, ran into a guy from Harwich that I used to work with before he quit the job to go into law, and took my seat. Brian Ferry.... lounge lizard, crooner and father of idiotic upper class Jeremy who's convinced he's the national angry young man - twat. Now, Ferry's just released an album of Dylan covers. It's interesting to hear Dylan done by someone who can actually sing. He kicked off with one of his own, surefire Roxy crowdpleaser "Incrowd" before doing an eighty minute set. If he can't do a decent set by his age he's never going to, and he did a decent set... the obligatory miniskirted backing singers, eleven piece band.... more old stuff than last time I saw him, and because he's flogging his Dylan album, a lot of stuff that most people know so all in all, a worthwhile use of petrol. And of course it's nice to catch up with my mum!

Night via Kev Towers, morning via breakfast in a cafe in town (yum, civilisation... was a time I'd have made do with a cold kebab); tea and conversation at Kaz's house; lunch with my mother in a restaurant with broken gas supply so pasta and salad it was (healthy...) and home via gran's. Incapable of passing either mother or gran without a massive free resupply of food, don't you just love your motherly rellies... so impressively laden down, pointed the pointy toothed hellcar north through snowstorms and eventually made it back to what I laughingly call home.

A jolly trip... I'm thinking that I need to take a southern break, a week or so. Grounding time. Life's getting a bit mad, need to reconnect with the essential me. A few nights in the Fat Cat and the Dove, connecting with good old mates, and a trip to the deep south... a night on the beer with Ginger Chris calleth. Trip time.

Cold airfields

As I'm peppering articles with pics at the moment, here's a few of the big metal birds, or bits of them on freezing cold airports on Sunday...

East Midlands...

Doncaster... Dakota

Doncaster... Tornado bits... what are those cheeky aeronautical funsters up to ?

Jay-zus, how cold????

Why is it every time I go to Aeroventure at Doncaster that the weather completely sucks??? Once again freezing brass balls and sleeting as I arrived.

Actually, a more successful foray into where the parts of the world where real people are to be found, then Friday which was lets face it, an abject failure. Pointed Christine in the direction of Leicester, for once her engine didn't disintergrate in a shower of smoke and shite and after some procurement of petrol and a certain amount of driving, duly pulled up at my destination, Travel Inn Central. Collected my key, dumped my bag in my room - she wasn't coming with me (only joking folks, the Shadester only travels solo) and called a taxi.... "OI! You're a taxi!". Was marginally bothered when upon directing the elderly cabbie to Bay Street where the festival was being held, his response was "eh? Where?" and reached for a street guide published in about 1975. Was rather more bothered when he sat at a green light for it's entire phase without noticing that he was actually allowed to go, but providence was on my side for once this year and we got to the hall without incident or confusion. As it was Saturday, the festival was already running short of commemorative glasses, but I was able to haggle for a half pint one with this years logo on it, and set about making up for lost time attacking the bars. Identifed six or seven beers I was really keen to try; sods law was that all of these were already sold out. Still enough to keep me lively though, no complaints.




Part of the reason of going was to have a bevvie with my old drinking mucker TB... now, as has been said before, it may be weird planning to have a swift one with Tuberculosis but that's the guy's nickname and it stands for something else. As it happened, he'd arranged a meet of people from the old group for the same day, but lets make it really clear, I wasn't there to attend that meet, I was there in my own capacity so the first thing that had to be done was educating the masses as to my real name. Nice to see old faces though, no real tossers there, nobody I have major issues with and only one that I've never been keen on, even kept it friendly with him. See, not so psychotic after all. Did find myself surrounded by a bunch of language graduate people at one point who were drunkenly arguing about the punctuation errors in the event banners.... isn't it nice to have a life.... Chewed my way through a mighty assortment of bevvies, highlights were the Sarah Hughes Dark Ruby (yum!!), the festival homebrew "Clippies Stout" made at the Potbelly brewery by the festival committee, the Durham Nine Alters and my namesake from Buntingford Brewery "Stan's pale and peachy". Well, it had to be done. Being a sentimental kind of swine, I'd have liked to have tried the "Billy's last bark" from Steaming Billy, brewed in memorium to the late brewery Jack Russell; and I'd have liked a bash at the St Jude's, a new brewery from hometown, but all sold out. Never mind, another time.

Eventually we wobbled out of the festival and onto the streets of Leicester... my chest closed up with the exercise so I had to take a break for a bit, which gave the others a chance to pop into what was best described as a rank old shitehole with bouncers, a dancefloor and a danceDJ type curiously playing irish music at loud volume and claiming to be a black paddy 'coz his name was "Patrick". Yes folks, it's St Patrick's night, wall to wall novelty hats and plasticpaddy's everywhere. Remind me to come out on St George's with a twenty foot red and white flag around my body, and to start a fight with a Frenchman.

The man TB had a map, a plan and a destination in mind so we escaped the fake plastic paddyness and moved on to the Globe, which was better but crowded... by this stage we were losing folks to natural wastage. In that they were wasted on natural products. For the final move of the night, we left everyone but TB and I by the wayside and moved on to The Criterion, which looks like one of those concrete built sixties nightmare pubs from the outside but has been turned into a real haven inside. Advertising a reading by the surrealist poet Attilla the Stockbroker, I'm half tempted with that. Pity the young barman knew how good his pub was, and was appallingly smug - got up my nose, but you can't have everything. So I had the fruit beer on draft, as I was all flavoured out of British ale by this stage. Very nice it was too. Switching to the Budvar dark for the last drink of the night was a mistake, should have stuck with the light nice fruity goodness from Timmermans Kriekbier. And that, folks was the night. If I'm honest, got absolutely ratted in company, a good healthy reaction to a week that was tiring and heated in places. Got a few more beer festival dates... a good one in Chesterfield in May... and a few ideas for things to do.

Which left me waking up in the middle of the country, with far less of a hangover than I deserved, in time for a very tasty full english courtesy of the Travel Inn's linked pub and restuarant. For a chain hotel, this one's actually nicely built in an area that's not displeasing to the eye... surrounded by old restored hospital admin buildings, made in the time when government buildings were pleasant structures, not concrete prefab nightmares. None of the contact list reachable from Leicster were coming out to play, so I decided on a trip to East Midlands Airport's Aeropark and the Doncaster museum where I've not been for three years.

If you're not into hairyplanes, I guess there's not a lot to report for you. EMA's gotten a replica Spitfire, they've repainted their Hunter and they're beavering away on all kinds of things. Very sensible, keeping within their limitations, they're doing alright. Sleeting and blowing a gale, I didn't stay long. A big Antonov parked up on the airfield by the DHL facility, but no sign of it flying so no reason to stay. Doncaster seem to have a slightly more bizarre collecting policy, they've got stuff on show that makes you ask "just WHAT is the point". But they seem to do alright, stuff has progressed since I was there last. The Falklands veteran Wessex has been largely restored since I saw it last; the Scout nose section actually has a combat history that I wasn't previously aware of... it's the survivor of the two helicopters that went to tend to H Jones VC when he was shot and killed at Goose Green; they were notoriously bounced by Argentine ground attack planes and the other chopper shot down. Suprising that this aircraft survives only as a cockpit section, where the museum's intact Scout is a development airframe that did naff all. Strange... they've gotten these aircraft up in a Falklands 25 year exhibition, but the Gazelle they had ... another Falklands vet', actually shot down on the day of the British invasion is missing. Wonder where that's vanished to. They've gotten a Gannet they're working on, and the first Sea King in the hands of a private museum, they've got the Dakota in bits to be restored that sat for years at Ipswich Airport; but what interested me was the amount of identifiable Tornado parts they've gotten their hands on.... wonder what's they're up to!!

Spambot on steroids

Well, didn't the Spambots get their arses in a sling over that last post. Two hundred and thirty three comments made on it, all saying "buy firefox, buy firefox, it's great". Don'tcha just love the "delete all" function in the Moderate Comments menu. Which brings me to the latest corporate advertising evil, the automated cold caller. Phone rings, there's a pause and the robot voice says "this is a message to you....blah blah blah". Hell, does ANYONE listen to these things? Isn't it illegal? Didn't this feature in an episode of the Simpsons about ten years ago? It's not as if robots aren't regarded as the most annoying thing about telecommunications anyway... phone any utility company and you'll have to fight your way through three menubots before you get - IF you get to an operator; unless you know how to wangle the system you'll end up talking to a paybot; book a hotel and the odds are you'll have to talk to a bookingbot... oh god, don't get me started on these voicerecognitionbots that expect you to talk to them loudly and clearly to them, and then keel over when faced with any kind of regional accent... those things will push me from CALM to BROKEN TELEPHONE faster than anything else, and I am convinced are sold by the Phillips corporation to boost handset sales. Face it up, companies... your customers don't like them, and resent you for using them. Pack it in. Please. Or I'm going to have to buy ANOTHER handset.

Just re-read the end of the Harrogate beer festival article and it seems that indeed, the disasters have been saved for this weekend ! Never mind. Clearly I've been overdoing it, and my lack of drive yesterday was there for a reason as I was asleep by about eight last night, and apart from a short break or two was asleep til half eight today. Clearly needed. About to jump in the shower, do some brekkie, pick up a paper and head off Leicesterwards, beer drinking for the use of. Last time I went there, things were different and I ended up in one of the worst restuarants known to man; so bad in fact that I didn't eat. And the time before that was a whole different kettle of complication.

Balls

This is what happens when you spend your whole day being tired, unmotivated and mooching around. Have had to abort my trip to the Darlington beer festival - by the time I've gotten to my digs for the night, the last bus will have gone, and I can't afford taxi's into town at fifteen quid a pop. Also knackers my plan to see my cousin's newborn who's up in that neck of the woods.

Damn.

Checked out the train times for Leeds, as in up at Pudsey Plan B, the Leeds beer festival is on as well. The earliest train I can catch won't get me there until half nine, which is forty minutes after the last train home leaves.

Damn, and double damn.

In fact, I may venture as far as "soddit" and mutter two or three naughty words.

But I'll not punch any walls this time.

To make it all worse, it's two of my fav' things this week, Comic Relief and St Paddies day. Great. Faux positive happy touchy feelgood times in the name of charidee, whereupon I am guaranteed to have to tell fat ugly codheads with collecting tins and "whacky" costumes to piss off; and a gratuitous marketing excuse on behalf of the Guinness corporation, taken on board by every drunken idiot without the wit to see it for what it is. Listen up Britain, your night on the piss is a foreign religious celebration with no significance whatsoever to the British way of life; it's like condoning going on a drugs bender on Ramadan. Wake up, wake up, you're ruinin' the country!! When they're blanket marketing Broadside and Black Sheep on St Georges day in Dublin, I'll take note. Until then, they can take their black shite and shove it where the sun shines not. Hmmm, cutting out the middle man, really.

On a more positive note, today I was called a "hippy in a suit". This was a compliment, and I'm not sure I mind being called that at all. It's interesting to see that someone else has seen what I've commented on before, an anti-authoritarian man in an authority job. Apparently I'm a walking mass of contradictions, impossible to pin down, every time it looks like they've worked out what I am another factor makes an appearance and queers the calculation. Well, that's me and I like being me; makes a nice change that other folks spot the fun too.

Marketing

I see it's seventies music week. Paul Weller's making a few quid out of the English Tourism chaps for letting them troll out "English Rose" for an ad once more. Hmmm, Happy Harry won't be too pleased with that. He was the somewhat dry brickwork instructor at Burwell in '88 who made us young trainee roadworkers fast forward through it on our mess room ghetto blaster, as it was his son's favourite track - his son had been killed the year before. The source of my brief flirtation with punk, that summer was, as well as my taste for The Jam and some solo Weller. My gawd, even Plastic Bertrand is gettin in on the act with Ça plane pour moi, in some add or other, and the early eighties are sneaking in there with Trio's Da Da Da. Now, that song was naff but I hate to say I liked it at the time and I still do, it's got a certain minimalistic cool to it.

And that Magners ad.... "we could tell you it's all about craft, heritage and tradition but we know you'll only notice one thing....". Yeah. It's cheap, tastes like wee and enables you to provoke fights outside pubs on a Saturday night. The stuff's evil.

It's time for a little of the Holy Bill ....

"By the way, if anyone here is in advertising or marketing, kill yourself. Just a little thought. I'm just trying to plant seeds. Maybe one day, they'll take root. I don't know. You try. You do what you can. Kill yourself. Seriously, though. If you are, do. No, really. There's no rationalisation for what you do, and you are Satan's little helpers, okay? Kill yourself. Seriously. You are the ruiner of all things good, seriously. No, this is not a joke, if you're going: "There's going to be a joke coming." There's no fucking joke coming. You are Satan's spawn, filling the world with bile and garbage. You are fucked, and you are fucking us. Kill yourself, it's the only way to save your fucking soul. Kill yourself. Planting seeds. I know all the marketing people are going: "He's doing a joke." There's no joke here whatsoever. Suck a tail-pipe, fucking hang yourself, borrow a gun from a Yank friend – I don't care how you do it. Rid the world of your evil fucking machinations".

Phew, didn't much sit on the fence, did he.

One better day

No, not really.

Currently one tired teddy. Been at work, yep. Was out and about yesterday, the team being led by one of the senior blokes, so missing the problem in the load we were sent to look at isn't really my fault. Honest. We reported it back as "nothing found but we're not quite happy" so a second team went out to check it out after we'd referred it back, and immediately identified a bunch of stuff that I feel I should have spotted first time around. All the parts of the puzzle were there to see, we just didn't put them together correctly. So, a major success was pulled by the afternoon shift, after we'd missed it; nobody's cross and everyone is justifying us, being ok about, but frankly I'm not at all happy. In fact, I feel pretty awful about it. Embarassing really. Hell, at the end of the day, we got the success, but I felt my team could have done a whole lot better and didn't join the celebrating but apologised to my boss instead. Didn't much feel like joining in today's routine inspections, so got a set of overalls on , got the hoses out and cleaned a bunch of our filthy vans instead... I don't think I was subconciously indulging in any form of self inflicted pennance, rather just wanted to get some time to myself to get my head together. Could feel the old Black Dog reaching out and a real cob on starting, so had to do *something* about it.

As it is, I've got a few days off coming up now, starting tomorrow so I'll get myself turned around, go for a big drink at the weekend and be back up and running next time I'm in.

Was wandering around Tommy Esco's an hour or so back, amongst the stuff I had to pick up was a Mothers Day card. Now, I'm not one for dissing yet another one of Clinton Card's opportunities to buy their chairman another yacht, but there's plantations in the Caribbean that are less sugary than the heavilly pink Mothers Day card isle. What I want to know is, just how screwed in the head do you have to be to write the verses that go inside? Surely it must affect your mentality. Can't be good. It's all marketting of course, and you know where I stand on that one. Was pretty restrained actually, didn't buy anything I wasn't supposed to apart from one book, "The lovely bones". Don't know a lot about this, except that Peter Jackson's bought the rights to make a film of it. Is it a suitable bloke for a blokey? Have I inadvertantly bought chick fiction? Answers on a postcard....

Anyway. Where has this afternoon gone? It's already five and I've not made the calls I had to make at three. How remiss of me. Things to to. TTFN.

Dodgy bird in my bedroom

Makes a change to find a fine bird in my bedroom.

Coz the cat's ususally mutilated them by the time I get to them.

B'dum 'tish. Made you look, made you stare, made you lose your underwear. Hey, did you use that rhyme at primary school, or was it just my lot? Anyway mucky reader, wash your mind out.

But seriously, a stressed out Sparrow fluttering about in my room yesterday, duly rescued. Fine specimen, young adult by the look of things, and bearing none of the usual signs of a close up dental examination of my pet, such as missing head, etc. Gizmo's seemingly becoming a bird specialist. A bit like his old man then. Ah-ha! Yeah right. It was actually a fairly busy one yesterday. On arriving back from the fun factory, dug out an old set of work overalls and set about the garden, the bike, the kitchen and lots of other things. Lots of stuff shoved in sacks and shoved in bins, the jetwash taken out and hit with hammers until it worked, and 500 miles worth of frozen roadgrime blasted off the Mile Eater. Going to be a big job doing a full clean on that, but at least the worst of it's off. The new numberplate is on and looks lovely. Actually, that jetwasher is a damned fine toy, glad I've bothered to resurrect it properly. Forgot just how useful it was for a cheap thing.

I think in fact what we've got going on here is a spring clean, at no point have I consciously decided to do one, I think it's just time. Huzzah.

Another lack of sleep last night, another day of work at the factory of fun. Managed to blag duty in the selection point with a fairly decent crowd this morning, so that kept me out of the rubbish. After which I got stuck in to a bit of self-retraining for a while before they made me go out and sing for my supper again. Well, ain't no other of that necessary re-training going to happen any time soon so I've blagged an enormous pile of notes and am sorting it myself. Actually remembered to bring my proper issue boots into work today... they're universally badly thought of, but they've got Kevlar toecaps rather than steel so they don't excite people with metal detectors. For the last few days I've had to resort to an old, but immaculately polished pair of the old ones. A much nicer, lighter, more comfortable boot, very much enjoyed wearing them again. But they charged their price... blisters on the toe joints and what feels suspiciously like an ingrown toenail. Nice, I don't think. Finished the day on rare good news. The management switch around I mentioned an entry or two back has been partially scrubbed, the bloke that was going to be leaving us for a posting in Hell is staying put... everyone's genuinely delighted; and the two days off I've put in for in the last couple of weeks have been approved. Yay! Got beer coming up at the weekend, including Leicster, so I need to arrange these things!

It's a glorious day, watch some b*stard ruin it

Nicest day of the year. Blue skies, sunshine, good heat, nice! Stuck at the challenge point this morning with the Boorish Bore, but I managed to keep on top of him, so that wasn't a problem. Started to get wound up on their team's lack of professionalism though; and then got grouchy about my own's, ignoring basic health and safety, common sense and not taking any notice when it's pointed out to them. Looking forward to the change around in April, it seems I'm the only person who is. The core of my lot have been together since basic training; I've got little credibility and not much respect with them; it doesn't help that the old Black Dog's had a pretty good grip on me in places in the last crappy year. Isn't really fair of them, as I'm actually pretty bloody good at my job, but they're a tough knuckle to crack and frankly I've never rated them as worth the effort. Teams come, teams go, I know that, but it's a shock for them. Never mind eh. Anyway... otherwise, a very nice day ensued, was overflown by a couple of F-15 Strike Eagles at very low altitude, presumably coming off the coastal bombing ranges. Used to see that sort of thing all the time as a kid and as a teen back home, but not so nowadays, it's a rare treat. I swore they were so low I could smell Kerosene but I suspect the mind was playing tricks.

DVLA are having a damned good go at spoiling my mood though. The old Deathmachine, living in the shed hasn't been run since 2001; it's kept on the basis that "I'll get it running one of these days". I "SORN" it every December, for the unvehicle'y, this is the doccument you send off instead of taxing your bike. Can't run the bike, but it notifies the centre that it's offroad and legal. Just whack the form in the post when they send it out, bish bosh, done. Sorted. Which I did at the time. Of course, it seems that the form either got lost in the post, or lost by DVLA. They've never gotten it where they need it, and have just fined me forty quid, the bastards.
A phone call solved nothing, other than the fact that I apparently am supposed to monitor them to make sure they're doing their job properly, therefore I expect to see them lay off all their managers in the next savings review. Hells teeth, that's old fashioned, blank faced civil service arrogance and other than going down to their collections department with a couple of petrol bombs and a crossbow, there's damn all I can do about it. Which is why I've now got a mark on my kitchen wall and a badly bruised right hand. Temper, temper.

Mashed

I hereby declare the 2007 Summer Rampage open for business.

And the business of the day was a return to an old stamping ground of mine, back up to North Yorkshire, Harrogate. Been going there for years for various reasons and various people, I feel as at home there as anywhere else, haven't been back in a while. The business of the day was that popular old favorite of mine, beer drinking and drinking beer. In this case, the Harrogate Beer Festival. Now, if you've not been to one of these before, the idea is basically to turn up and drink a load of beer. Complicated, it's not. Nice, it certainly is.

Packed a daybag, bought tickets, bought a newspaper and jumped on the permanent way over to the north west. Changed at Doncaster, also at Leeds and duly ended up at Harrogate station on time, no crisis of any kind, no drama. Believe me, this is unusual. As there was time aplenty, I took the opportunity to refresh my acquaintance with one of my favorite establishments, Alberts bar and restaurant on Albert Street. Last time I was here was in honour of a departing Big Gay Al; it all went dreadfully wrong; vast amounts of champagne chugged, mixed with beer, sambucca and tequilla. You just knew it was going to end badly, and indeed, I broke myself rather stylishly. Anyways up, I can't honestly say I've not missed the place, I was very glad indeed to stroll in, buy a much overdue pint of delicious Black Sheep ale and munch on a dish of their special home made Parsnip Crisps - still warm, and a nice steak sandwich.

Under ordinary circumstances that would have been my afternoon made up, but there's business to take care of in this town. Made my way over to the international centre in good time, to be told that the beer festival didn't actually start until six. Ah. Knew it had been too well organised to last. If this had been a CAMRA beer festival, the odds were on all day opening, or at least an afternoon session. This, however was a Round Table effort, such things aren't to be taken for granted. Should have thought of that. Or even checked it on the website. But I didn't, hey ho, got three hours to kill, half cut in the middle of town. Nothing lost, only gained. Strolled back into town with my trusty Good Beer Guide in my hand, searching for a pub that might have the rugby on. I had in mind the Coach and Horses, it's been a few years since I've been in there, but as it happened, I happened across the Old Bell Tavern instead.

Now what is is about me? Am I putting out some kind of pheromone only detectable by gay blokes or something? I can't seem to go out at the moment without finding a nice gay lad to have a conversation with; not that I have a problem or a predjudice with this - I don't, but it'd be nice to modify it to work on women with big knockers and dodgy morals instead. Once again, my afternoon is spent talking to a very nice chap of the pink persuasion called David and drinking lots of very decent beer. I've spent copious time in H'gate over the last two years and I can't for the life of me work out why I've never been to this pub before. It's a good one. I think that one of the things you can judge a pub by it's bogs, and this one's got very interesting vintage porcelain, from an era with a GR stamp on it; if it's survived that long, the pub's not the sort of hellhole with broken Armitage Shanks that I avoid. More Black Sheep (why muck about with a classic); Saxon Strong from the Mighty Oak Brewery; Sparth Mild from Riverhead Brewery and nice European strawberry beer from Chapeau. The thought struck me that I'd blown seeing the rugby, so I got the scores texted to me instead; the rather more ominous thought arrived that I'd be ratarsed by the time I got to the beer festival. Hey ho. I'd had the idea during the afternoon that it'd be nice to go over to Knaresborough during the three hours I had to kill and have a bevvy in Blind Jacks, but I'd clearly killed the afternoon effectively already, this plan was shelved. But will be returned to another day soon.

There's a lot of the Harrogate International Centre. Eventually found the right door, and even then, there were dickie bow tied hordes going to see the ballet in a different hall, as this crop headed, drink addled grinning creature in denim jacket and big leather boots wobbled through to the door marked "beer". I love the anarchy and confrontation of moments like that. Or am I just a pretentious tosser? Could be. Found my way in - unusually for a Round Table effort, you got a proper marked souvenir glass with your entrance fee, which was very reasonable. The hall itself was unusual; quite the least characterful hall I've ever seen. Shiney white floor, walls and roof. Almost clinical in it's nature, and very brightly lit.

According to the tasting notes I chomped my way through Daleside Special (the local boys); Consett Red Dust (tasty, that was); Rudgate Ruby Mild; York Lubelski (made with Polish hops, is there no sphere of life those buggers won't infiltrate) and Sierra Nevada Pale Ale from the USA. Now, while it's nice to see the septic's having a go, and although I have to admit it was nice enough, I made the rather caustic comment in my tasting notes that it was "a bit like lager spliced with kerosene". I think they're a long way from worrying the Europeans on beer quality yet. As my allotted time came to an end, I grabbed a picture of a crowd of very strange chaps... they paid money to get into a real ale festival, yet they're sat there drinking bottled Wife Beater by the gallon... weird.

All good things must, and do end. The appointed time, stupidly early, had arrived, my cab was waiting and off I scuttled. Yes, I know the station is within walking distance, but I'm not a well man, ok? As I was slightly intoxicated by this stage, it was acceptable to eat a kebab (yuk yuk yuk, see my previous comments on this subject) so in the spirit of reviving old acquaintances I popped in to Skewers while waiting for the train to arrive and proceeded to stuff my horrible prize down my neck before anyone I knew could report my drop in culinary standards. And what was amazing was that the journey home went by with no major or minor mishaps. Two changes of train to negociate, with the ipod, hip flask for my company... nothing went wrong. No falling asleep on the train, no other foolishness... textbook.

It must be saving all the disasters up for next weekend.

Pulling the birds

The cat, that is.

Sounds of activity from the bedroom... it's not me, I'd notice. Wandered through to see what was what to discover a large and annoyed Starling sitting on the lampshade. Clearly hadn't had it's lunch as it didn't crap all over my bed. After a brief spell sitting on my shower, it was rushed back into the bedroom where the nice big man opening the windows appealed to it's better nature and it zipped out of my dingy home like a bat out of hell. Always amazes me how quite a small cat gets a fairly large bird through the catflap. A Sparrow aren't a problem to him but a Blackbird or Starling should make him work for his jollies. Maybe he'll take after his mum and graduate to seagulls?

The end of my horrid early shift today. Until Monday. When it all starts again. Yay. Weekend beckons, there's a beer out there with my name on it somewhere and I propose to find it....

Things move on

A moment of silence please. The last of my big belt buckles has expired and had to be thrown away, marking the end of a clothing fetish I've had for twenty years or so. The petwter hook on the back has given up the ghost, rendering it useless. I just can't find anywhere anymore that sells them, at least not ones I like. Oh well. Somethings change, some stay the same.....

Hullo Megan

First child to my baby cousin Claire and her hubs Gideon; Megan Ruth, eight pounds seven. Hello chuck, it all goes downhill from here!

The satirical nature of ASDA

I don't mind shopping in ASDA, even though I obviously disapprove of the market dominance of the Walmart group, and all the other international monsters... it's a bit of a dawdle and my thoughts get surreal, for instance I've just found the shopping list I was working from on Monday and when I was walking through the pudding section I seem to have scrawled "Spotted Dick? If I wanted that, I'd go out on the pull in Cleethorpes and not use a condom". Also "Have you SEEN the f*cking price of grapes???". I must have been bored. I've been buying some old classics... thanks to certain people who apparently from time to time frequent this bloggette, I'm pretty good at farm shopping, markets and buying from producers when I can. But this week, I had a real urge to buy some shite food. Among all the healthy stuff came canned spaghetti in tomato sauce, canned ravioli, canned macaroni... the sort of rubbish I subsisted on when I first moved out of home and had to prevent myself starving to death before the next food package from my gran arrived. Don't know why. I'm not regressing or anything, just an urge I had. I've said before, I think this supermarket "good for you/extra special/yada yada yada" branding thing is over-rated. I think if I were in marketing, as soon as I'd gotten a proper price for my soul I'd put in a brand called "bad for you" and sell pies, pasties, processed chips, beans and cream cakes and watch the profits soar.

So today... the constant run of early shifts is beginning to bite; I'm averaging only five hours sleep a night and that's not any good for anybody. A decent day though; mixed the teams today, so I ended up working in a van with one of the old boys and my boss. Team Old Bloke. Had a very jolly time, enjoyed it tremendously. I've concluded I don't much like working with these virtuous new guys, who've been bumped up from the office and believe all they've been taught; I'd rather work with old monsters with time in who know every twist and can actually teach me something. Of course, it was a nice hot clear day and that improves everybody's mood. Problem was, with this sleep thing, I got back and crashed out on the couch only being woken by some bastard who wanted to try and sell me facia's and was probably suprised to find an obviously freshly woken large growly bloke clearly not at all happy to receive him "what the F**K do you want with waking me?". I should be nicer to trademen, but hey, he's a cold caller and deserves everything he got. Totally knackered my plans to get to the post office, get into town, get the kitchen ceiling painted and the bike cleaned in daylight. Guess the old body takes sleep when it needs it. Not so stupid that I try to fight it with caffeine anymore like I used... But it cost me the afternoon.

MICE. While typing this, was alerted by noise from downstairs and went down to see the lad himself , with a clearly alive mouse grabbed by the back, in his jaws. Weird things mice, this was just hanging there, not struggling, seemingly waiting for it's next chance without damaging itself further. Maybe not so stupid. Anyway, executed a textbook rescue. Not that I'm especially prissy about cats killing rodents; it's what they do. But I don't like treading on the corpses on my perfectly camoflaged carpet. And I don't like them being left under radiators, or where I see them first thing in the morning. So Mr Squeaky gets a lucky break. Textbook rescue, using a chinese takeaway box (hey, probably origionally contained rats anyway), I've awarded Gizmo the catch for stats purposes anyway, and lets face it, he'll probably go outside at the first opportunity and finish the job anyway. But what's important here... and I mean that in a very real and humanitarian way.... is that I don't have to clean the bits up afterwards. Yay !

Not Buzz

Well, here's today's horriblescope.

Wednesday, March 7th, 2007 PST

"You might sink into a temporary funk as the Moon returns to your sign, but you won't likely sink very far with optimistic Jupiter holding your hand. It's easier than normal to transform any negative emotional patterns into positive ones. Journey within to do your work, but then come out into the open to receive the benefits of your process. "

I sometimes thing tarot.com tap my phone. I'm certainly in a bit of a funk today, but I'd call it reflective, and was before I read that just for those that think I'm pretentious enough to fit my mood to my predictions. I've no idea why; but when it comes to funks, this one certainly beats the ever popular black dog that used to drop on my head from a great height, and occasionally still does. I'm just ruminating about life and currently finding it lacking. Oh, the social life is as full as I can handle, and I'm not short of people. Just not especially satisfied with it. Life's humming along, but it doesn't make me buzz. Has something happened along the way; is "ok" now not good enough any more? Do I need "bloody spectacular" to make me smile? Maybe. But why ask me, I don't know, my name's Shadey Mike, not Freud.

Done today's stint at the Fun Factory; it was alright. Back to the ranch for leftover Chinese for lunch. Todays promising sunny afternoon looks like there's a big black cloud coming to knacker it, that's physical not psychological. A million things to do. I'd like to get at least two done....

Benefits of shift working

Taken from the works car park at just gone six this morning...

Makes it worth coming in for.

Foiled by crapness

So it was, Saturday afternoon I scuttled out of the office at the end of the shift and back in the general direction of homewards; with every intention of eating pies, drinking beer and maybe watching far fitter persons exert themselves on television, whereupon crossing the single track rail bridge by the dock eastern entrance, I see a crown of what can best be described as camera wielding elderly anoraks.

"What ho" says I, "something here worth a little of my time, perhaps", pulled the car over and bimbled back to see what gave? Transpired that there was a steam train run going on; the old LNER locomotive "Green Arrow" pulling about ten coaches was on a run from Lincoln and known to be heading this way. Bizarrely it's planned route went through Immingham engineering yard, and that way looping back onto the main line, back south, thus the camera bearing hoards on the bridge. I had no decent camera, but the cam'lette on the phone's pretty decent and I decided to go for video footage, stood and waited; chewed the fat of the day with an perky old chap with magnificent sideburns that you need to be retired to get away with. As I stood and waited, it gave me an opportunity to study the structure of the rattley metal bridge I'd just banged over every day for the last four years and never really considered... boring blokey bit coming up. They've actually scooped the roadway out of an existing, older bridge that never would have handled the current level of road freight traffic over it, built up the approach and just laid the modern equivalent of a Bailey Bridge over the top of it; thus preserving the old bridge, not blocking half the dock access and not having to close the railway line. Neat. Quite a good view of the track into the engine yard too, if I were a proper anorak I might be found up there on my days off. But I'm not, and and it was I was terrified I'd be seen by worky folks geeking! So, stood and waited some more.

And some more.

Somebody received a text message.... the engine driver had passed a signal on "danger", two miles down the track. Big rule breach; train stopped, driver relieved, no backup of course what with it being a steamer, train no longer moving. No funky steaming smoking goodness for us. Bummer.

And to foil things still further, no Indy available at the newsagents on the way home, so "BAH", no slightly pretentous things of interest for me to read.

Home, Shades....

It's coming back that gets me down. Doesn't matter how nice an evening you have away, sooner or later this town opens it's mouth like a raddled old toothless predator that's beyond the point it should have died and drags you back. Which is why I'm sitting here on a glorious afternoon where I should be out doing things, and frankly aren't, 'cause I'm a little mardy.

Been off on my travels, putting the world to rights with a buddy in the west; very entertaining evening which involved an excellent public house, and a very large amount of excellent beer (Cains FA and IPA, both excellent beers of their type; Little Valley "Tods Organic Blonde"; Handby Cherry Bomb (another big six percenter, a British fruit beer) and a nice bottle of Leifmanns cheery beer. Clearly a night for fruity bevvies. Didn't leave me much in the mood for travelling on Friday morning, but drive I must as Warton beckoned. Never been to this factory airfield of British Aerospace, and I forgot my airband and my maps, so I just bimbled into the approximate area and drove about until I found somewhere with a runway view. Not, as it turned out, the spot that everybody else uses but not a bad one anyway. My time wasn't wasted, I shall pay it another visit later in the year. A couple of unusual things ... saw something today I've never seen before. Polish planespotters. We're used to seeing the Dutch around, but here's a couple of guys with Z's in their names. Working here of course, but hell, not something I expect to encounter! And midway through the afternoon, there was a very pretty rainbow, but at high altitude. No idea what could have caused that. But considering Warton's a research airfield, maybe it's best not to ask.

So, monster hangover ensued, for which as we all know the best cure is continued exposure to the British climate, jet engines and burnt kerosene. Departed Warton, tried to find the BAe plant at Samlesbury and it's two gate guard airframes, but the AA's map lies and I ended up struggling to get out of the middle of Preston. Next trip, I shall see them.... I am patient..... Eventually pointed Christine in the directon of Manchester, then home, via a couple of rest stops as I was really quite knackered; and thus the dull feeling kicks in as you know home's coming closer with no real reason to be there. To be frank, the going's better than the coming back these days.

So onwards... today at work is just a day... not that I can't say anything about it, it's just that there's not much to say about it. Controvosy still rages about aforementioned staff redeployment, morale has taken another knock. Curiously, I'm not much effected by this; unlike our new guys I've no illusions about the character of the organisation that pays my wages, so it just washes off me. Looking forward to the rest of the week though. A beer festival at the end of next week; followed by three in four days the week after. It's an insane idea to attempt to attend all four. But then, always was a sucker for insane ideas....

Oh Hunter, where art thou?

American Politics Linky

Hunter S. Thompson did such a neat job of analysing from a outsiders point of view the 1973 Democratic race, and eventual presidental campaign in "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail" that there's not really anybody else I want to analyise the potential Democratic race between Clinton (H), Obama and maybe, just maybe Gore. A shame then that he capped himself in the head a few years back. Wish he'd not have done that.