iTunes recognises my CD of the Clientele live at Lynton (26th June 2003) as being AC/DC: The Interview.

Well, it made me smile.

posted by duke harringay at 9:36 PM

Thank goodness for dreams.

Last night I dreamt that I won a bicycle race. It was a mountain time trial, and I rode up the climb like Lucho Herrera. It was great!

Of course that’s the only way I’ll ever win a bicycle race. In real life I’ve only ever come close to last. Indeed, usually worse that close to last. But the dream reminded me of this article about Graeme O’Bree, which I read recently. O’Bree should have been the Face of cycling in the ‘90s for his exploits, but instead the powers that be made him out to be a cheat and outlawed his home-made bike and the position he rode in. It really was criminal. I’m so looking forward to reading Graeme’s autobiography ‘The Flying Scotsman’, when it’s published later this year, and I hope that the movie biopic about his life gets completed, because god knows there’s been so few great bicycling movies, ‘Breaking Away’ excepted of course. Anyway, that article reminded me about how I rode against Graeme in the Ayr – Girvan time trial that was his first victory. I came last, and it wasn’t for the first or last time!

Thank goodness for dreams.

posted by duke harringay at 9:36 PM

I’ve been thoroughly enjoying John Carney’s latest missives, broadly about the ‘easy listening’ revolution suggested by many at the start of the 1980s. It was good to read about Simon Booth and his efforts with Weekend and Working Week, as those groups were two of the groups that really made me start to take more interest in music that wasn’t strictly ‘chart music’. As I recall, the whole of ‘La variete’ was peculiarly anthemic back in the summer of 1983, and then ‘Venceremos’ blew me away. Scott and I used to share record buying duties in those days, and he had ‘Venceremos’ whilst I had ‘Trees And Flowers’. I wish he was still around so we could share records again, but that’s another story.

Coincidentally then, a new Strawberry Switchblade site informs me that Booth (along with Weekend luminaries Phil Moxon and Roy Dodds) performed on a couple of tracks that Rose and Jill lay down with Robin Millar early in 1984 for their debut album. Sadly the record company finally went instead with David Motion for the album, and it’s an intriguing thought to wonder what might have been… The site has a wonderful array of MP3s of demos, sessions etc, and I suggest you grab ‘em quick before someone like the BBC yells at the site to take ‘em down. Oh, you can also grab an MP3 of the original 7” version of ‘Trees And Flowers’, so, you know, go get it quick…

posted by duke harringay at 7:16 PM

Last morning of the holiday. Tomorrow back to the delights of school. What fun. Actually I’m kind of looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to the delivery of all the fab equipment, like the PowerBooks, cameras, software, DVD writers, printers and what have you. I’m looking forward to playing with those myself of course, but also to being able to do things with them in the classroom with the kids; something that’s just never been possible in the past. So whilst it will be like a leap into the dark, it should at least be exciting and challenging. I’d hate to be going back knowing I’d just be doing exactly the same thing as for the past god knows how many years: using the same textbooks, the same worksheets, blah blah blah… And the sad part is that I know there will be areas where that will be the case. Oh well.

I’m also looking forward to seeing my kids again. It’ll be our last year together… this time next year I’ll have a brand new clutch of 11 year olds to deal with. Ugh. I’ll deal with that issue when it comes up.

I’m not really looking forward to being saddled with the hassle of setting up and maintaining all the aforementioned equipment, however, but inevitably this will become a part of my job at least until we can get someone willing to do it for a ridiculously low salary. Huh. So I guess I’m going to have to become a Mac networking expert as well as an Art teacher this year. Ho hum.

So anyway, this the last morning coffee in the Boston… this the last relaxed stroll through town for a while. From now on it will be back to rushing, squeezing everything into so little time and inevitably fighting the darkness of approaching autumn and winter. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Let’s not get too melancholy just yet. After all, the sky is still blue, and it’s still, essentially, T-Shirt weather.

So I WILL squeeze in one last ride of the holidays this afternoon, perhaps out to Moretonhampstead, or just near and then back over to Hennock maybe, up through the trees which will be starting to turn. Certainly the leaves of the trees around our house are beginning to change, or at least the one behind us, the leaves I filmed when they were orange a few years ago for a Jamsine Minks video, and incidentally, how exciting is it that there will be a Minks compilation coming out on Rev-Ola sometime soon? ‘Very’ is the answer.

Still not heard from my brother though. I am now seriously concerned. I can’t even reach him at work, I just get his voicemail there and the calls never get returned. Nor do the emails. I figured maybe he’s screening calls and doesn’t want to talk to anyone… so I used C’s mobile so he wouldn’t recognise the number, but that didn’t work either. I know he was really pissed off with his job a while back, and sounded pretty depressed with it all. Plus he moved house and had a load of hassle selling his old house in Scotland, and he split with his girlfriend, and, uh, well, I guess that’s enough for anyone. But I just wish he’d let me talk to him. So I’ll try a letter to his work maybe, or try and reach his supervisor or someone, and failing that it’ll be a trip to Ware and camping outside the Glaxo factory, since no-one seems to know the address of his new house or anything, so…

Uh, okay, sorry to unload that.

Other things: Lots of students already moving back into the neighbourhood, although I didn’t think that the university term started for a while yet. So parking will now become a hassle for C again, not that I need to worry about such things of course, and ugh, it sounds like the student with the shitty red car whose alarm goes off everytime anyone so much as looks at it is back in residence. I heard it a couple of times yesterday. What a bummer.

One of the Boston staff is wearing really nice blue and white sneakers. I think they might be Gola’s, and I have no idea is Gola’s are hip or not, but whatever, they do look very nice. I really wish they would change the paintings hanging here though. They’ve had the same horrible big portraits hanging for as long as I can remember, which means at least four or five years. Probably longer. A few black and white photos appeared shortly after the portraits, and they are still there too, hanging in the corner. I mean, it’s a lovely big open space, but they should do something about those pictures. They should also stick in a wireless internet access point or two. That wouldn’t cost them much, surely? And I bet it would bring in a lot of custom.

My Inbox is currently empty, although I guess this wouldn’t be the case if I hadn’t lost some mail the other week when my Mac fell over and sulked. Even so, it feels good to be ending the holiday, or starting term with a clean slate.

And we watched ‘Manhattan’ last night and decided we need a wide-screen TV because lots of shots were missing the majority of a character. Is this an Allen thing, using the periphery of the screen? Or just a ‘Manhattan’ thing? I have no idea. I’m no film expert… In fact I’m no expert on anything at all. Oh well. But it made us want to go back to New York, which we’ve been talking about for years of course, ever since we DID go, and hmmmm, maybe we should spend some of the money earmarked for doing up the bathroom for that. Or for a widescreen TV. Whichever.

I should go. I have to buy catfood.
posted by duke harringay at 12:19 PM