I’m thinking of getting rid of my car (not now during winter though, sod that for a game of soldiers, after the winter obviously).  I’ve been doing my sums lately and my car mileage to car cost ratio doesn’t add up economically wise.  I’m basically paying over the odds to keep myself warm and tucked up in bed for an extra hour.  So I may take the bold leap back into the heady world of public transport and trains.  I’ve never liked using trains though.

In massive stations, there can be multiple platforms with multiple trains on the same stretch of track.  The smaller stations I’ve been at are, at best, poor for sign postage.  It can be about as clear as mud where you should be to get the train you want.  I always have that pang of apprehension wondering if I’m on the right platform and always double check with someone – as if I’m not confident in my own reading ability…

In the past I’ve never lived/worked anywhere close to an accessible train route.  It’s only on the odd occasion when I’ve ventured out of the city without the brum brum that I’ve had to get the choo choo. 

Many moons ago I successfully made it cross country from Amsterdam to Brussels on a train and of all the times I’ve used a train (literally a maximum of 20 times) I’ve never got on the wrong one or had any mishaps.  So my apprehensions of the big metal tubes, that go dead dead fast with insane people, all herded like cattle into them, is at best…mental.

Buses never give me apprehension.  If you get on the wrong bus, it’s simple enough to get off at the next stop a few hundred yards up the road, or ask the driver to drop you at the lights.  You can’t exactly go up to a train driver and say “eh mate, can you let me off at the next junction?”! Instead you end up on some platform in the middle of nowhere with a trek and a (probable) long wait to go a few miles back to whence you came. 

The only thing I really use my car for is to get to work.  If I swapped to public transport *shudder*, it’d cost me a fraction of what I pay out now.  Moneywise it seems like a no-brainer.  So the metal box of convenience may be going and I’ll be stepping back into the gloomy, but brave, world of public transport again (only after winter though).

The gig going yet again continued over the weekend, this time it was the turn of Arctic Monkeys to embrace my ears.  I’ve now seen them 6 times.  I like them, but I don’t like them enough to warrant seeing them 6 times so I don’t know how that’s happened.  I think I’m just wanting them to repeat that first gig I seen them at in a university hall just as they came onto the pop pickers chart.  Whilst Saturday didn’t see them hit them highs, they were solid and probably the best I’ve seen them since the first time.  T’was a very fine performance overall.  As we all know I can’t do music reviews so I’ll leave that here!

Before the show however, we discovered the Manchester Christmas market.  Little wooden sheds (or chalets if you’re posh) selling all kinds of Christmassy stuff.  It didn’t take us long to find the German beer she…sorry…chalet and it was here we took shelter from the pissing down rain for a few hours.

It was also here I was ‘introduced’ to a member of the opposite sex…by her mate.  Now, the worst thing that ever happens to me on a night out with my brother is that he attempts to embarrass me in the same way when I mention someone being good looking.  Grabbing the girls attention: “Hello, this is my brother Cynical, what’s your name?”  and then he cajoles the unsuspecting female into awkward conversation.

This very thing happened to me on Saturday: given it seems to be my brothers forté I had to stop myself laughing from shock that the shoe was almost on the other foot…I now know how awkward it feels.  I was embarrassed and I seen her awkwardness straight away, especially with 5 of her mates all staring at me as if I was an animal in a zoo.  I mean what exactly are you supposed to say?  It was only about 6pm too, I hadn’t got nearly enough liquid confidence inside me!  I made my excuses and left…and left the safety of the shed.  We were leaving anyway but it probably looked like I was running away.  Sorry embarrassed female!

Given I moan about being single from time to time it’s probably these situations I should take advantage of.  However whilst I’m probably not too bad at small talk and teeing things up (so to speak), I’m utterly rubbish at going in for the kill….(I’m just staying on the zoo theme here, I don’t mean literally gnawing at her until death).  I’m not really sure what age of the female spectrum I’m attracting either because whilst this female seemed to be a few years older than me I was then chatted up on the train on the way home, by someone who was probably about 20.

I never normally get chatted up, it’s not normal and when it does, like at the weekend, I freeze like a rabbit caught in headlights!  That’s three times in the past 2 weeks.  I must be giving off some wild pheromones lately or something.

Maybe it’s the extra splashings of Brut?!  Hooah.

Kasabian:

Went to see Kasabian last night, my word, they were brilliant.  I’ve seen them a couple of times before, but only at Glastonbury and even though they’ve been good, I think bands are always better playing their own show.

They had the 10,000 odd strong crowd bouncing from the off.  Especially 3 songs in when they played ‘Fire’.  Got to be one of the best bands I’ve seen this year.  If you get a chance to go and see them, take it!

Me:

Drinking on a school night can only lead to trouble.  it’s 9.43am and I feel like death warmed up.  I could gladly put my head on my desk and fall asleep. Only 7 hours to go…

I also proceeded to embarrass myself in front of a girl who was a friend of a friend.  First time I’d met her and she definitely had something about her, maybe it was the fact she was a bit posh and total opposite of someone who I’d attract.  I wasn’t doing too bad on the chatting up front and I kept catching her looking at me.   However, I had a fantastic bout of flatulence caused by yesterdays lunch of corned beef sandwiches (serves me right for eating corned beef).  Therefore my stepping backwards slowly skills came into their own several times during the evening.  As bad as I am at chatting someone up, the cause isn’t helped when I have to step away mid conversion in an attempt to disguise that it’s not me dropping bad eggs.

Sigh, another one bites the dust.

Who’s going for bacon sandwiches?  I’ll have HP sauce on mine, thanks.

Standing waiting for a band to come on last night (Frightened Rabbit – decent gig) I started to wonder what people think of others going to places on their own.   I’ve been to quite a few gigs on my own now and whilst it is a bit boring, it’s not the end of the world.  Looking around there are always a few other people in the same boat too (unfortunately I only ever spot males on their own).

In an instant I decided who the people were and made up a full back story of why they were on their own.  There was the lad who I presumed was in the same boat as me; the student geek who just had no mates and was a bit ‘alternative’ and the older gentleman (mid 40’s) who was into his music and went to gigs on his own all the time.  Moving on I decided that there was a gentleman trying to relive his yoof with a younger bleached blondie female (who was nothing to write home about, but thought she was gods gift); they met on the internet and she’ll end up stabbing him to death sometime over Christmas for not putting the kettle on.

Then I moved onto wondering if they were a font, what type of font they’d be (I wasn’t on drugs, honest..I’d only had 3 pints).  The single lad was Tahoma, the arty farty alternative guy switched between Veranda and Microsoft Sans Serif depending on his mood.  The couple: he was definitely a Times New Roman man whilst blondie was Arial.

Me?  I decided, my steady eddy self was Arial too (font size 10 incase you’re wondering…what do you mean you mean you’re not…).  Although at times I try and throw a bit of Calibri in the mixer when I want to shake things up a little and try and be a cool cat – like last Saturday when I was showing off my  ‘awkwarduncledancingatawedding’ skills.  Although at a festival I’m over the place and can probably be 10 different fonts at once.  Definitely windings at about 4am though.

This…THIS is what happens in my head when left to it’s own devices.  Although I’m thankful I’m not like a friend who is a graphic designer.  He can pick up a leaflet/menu or something and know the name of font which has been used…man, they’re fun nights out.

So, let’s pretend I’m on Blind Date…

”This is for Number 3, if you were a font…what font would you be and why?”

It started promisingly on Saturday when Morrissey came on stage and belted out This Charming Man for his first song.  Half way through the second song, Black Cloud, he was hit by a flying plastic pint glass, said “Goodnight” and promptly walked off stage.

Twenty minutes later one of the roadies came on to tell us he would not be returning to the stage.  Gig was over after about 5 minutes.  The shortest gig I’ve ever attended.

I’ve ranted about people throwing stuff at concerts before, I don’t and never will, understand the mentality of it.  I don’t understand what ‘kick’ the thrower gets out of it.

Anyone who throws bottles/pints/piss at a concert or festival is a knobhead pikey fucking chavy wanker cunt twat tit tool prick bastard.

Half of me thinks that Morrissey has been around long enough to have seen all this before.  After ensuring the prick was thrown out he should’ve carried on.  After all, there was another 8,000 normal folk there waiting for a performance which was spoilt by one idiot.  Not to mention the cost of travel and hotels that some people will have forked out for.

The other half of me says that he was 100% correct to not continue.  Not just Morrissey, but any other artist should not have to put up with it either.  When he went off stage I said he wouldn’t come back on and he didn’t.  He’s 50 and has just been ill, why should he put up with it.  If someone threw something at me in work I’d walk out as well!  Well done Morrissey I say.

I said as much at the time, the only way people will stop throwing things at gigs is if the artist/band refuse to play.

Quite possibly this is the only gig I’ll ever remember the full setlist for:

1) This Charming Man

2) Black Cloud (half of it anyway!)

right on the noggin

I’ve never been there biggest fan: I’ve found it quiet difficult to get into them, even though I’ve tried many times.  I avoided Muse at Glastonbury in 2004 (I think) but then heard they were amazing.  However I did watch them at Benicassim in 2007 and whilst I didn’t think were that good, they did a good little show (mainly because their video screen was very impressive). However, they’ve continued getting ‘best live band accolades’ all over the shop and I wondered why.  What is it I’m not getting?  So they needed ticking off ‘the list’.

It started badly when they came on stage at 8.20pm.  Since when do proper bands start that early?  8:45-9:00 you start, it’s only right.  Us drinkers know where we are with 8:45 starts, we can time that ‘have one more here, then we’ll walk over’ pint to perfection.  Sadly, whilst they bashed through their first song I was at the bar waiting for warm-ish bottles of Carling. 

Apart from all the green lasers they had swirling about the place the first half of their set seemed a bit sluggish and boring (I counted 10 lasers fact fans…yes, I was a bit bored).  Plus they were getting their moneys worth from the platforms they were going up and down on all the time.  There weren’t many arms thumping the air as everyone was waiting for the good stuff later on.  This was then made more unappealing by hearing the dreaded words in my ear: “the bar is shut” (9.30pm and they’d closed the bar).  Bastards.  Muse had to rescue this somehow.

Finally they kicked into gear and someone turned the volume up a notch – I think they even had me thumping the air at one point.  They also had an good video sequence in the centre pod hanging from the ceiling.  It was of a man, who was trying to escape/swim out of the pod thing which was filling with water.  Very impressive.  (I know, I’ve just sold it to you here…had to see it I suppose)!

I’ve no idea what songs they played on Thursday, I can only name about 4 muse songs anyway: Knights of Cydonia, Starlight, Uprising and the one that starts: da da da du du da.  Best live band in the world?  Nah.  I wouldn’t pay to see them again, they were just ‘alright’.  I think you either love Muse or, like me, you waver a little and give a shrug of your shoulders.

I still don’t get them, they’re good, but they’re definitely a bit overrated. At least they’ve now been ticked off ‘the list’.

(All dodgy photos courtesy of a mobile phone)

I made a whistle stop tour of Lisbon last week.  I was only there for 3 days and most of it, to be honest, is a drunken blur.

After landing in our hotel (not literally, we had to get a taxi from the airport…) to torrential downpour we found our way into the Bairro Alto – which is the nightlife area.  This was only after getting dropped off, at the wrong bar, in the middle of nowhere.  Brilliant. 

Within 2 minutes, we were greeted by Mr Portuguese man in the street asking if we wanted drugs (nice welcome).  We politely declined and took shelter in a nearby bar. 

A few more bar visits through the long and winding streets followed; including gate crashing some family karaoke party and belting out the hits.  Pissed Englishmen…on Portuguese karaoke…yep it was as good as you can imagine. 

A friendly cab man then found us a bar/cafe which was open all night after we found out the bars by the docks were all closed.  We somehow managed to get back the hotel at 7.30am – most of it was a blur, it seemed like we were only in there for an hour. Total wrongness.  Again I’m sure the proprietor loved us, they did keep serving us Super Bock all night anyway..

Thursday was a total blur again, I literally have no recollection of most of the day/night.  Only two minutes ago did that Portuguese karaoke thing come back to me.  I’m sure I was alive through adrenaline and alcohol alone.  But again we managed to find our way to the open all night bar/cafe and got back the hotel at a similar ungodly hour.  Not good when we have an 11am flight.  I was woken after a 30 minute “snooze”, in good comic book fashion, by my mate showering me with water. Grreeeeaaaatt!

Although having made the airport in good time, and the obvious long gaze into space, wondering why I’d punished myself with alcohol and little sleep did me no good.  I was about to go to the bar again only to hear my name get announced over the tannoy “last call for Mr C Sribble your flight is now closing” or something like that.  When the fuck was the first call?

I’d always wanted airport fame and now I had it, but fuck me it was a bad time to get it. 

“haha there’s them two knobheads who are about to miss their flight”

…is what I always say when I see people running through a airport terminal.  I was now that knobhead. 

Luckily, we made it onto the flight after the air stewardess search party greeting us half way round telling us we had to leg it because we had about 30 seconds to get on the plane. 

I was informed that “you fucking stink” on the plane – luckily only by my mate, but I’m sure I wasn’t in the best of states to others either.  Ho hum (literally), I’ll never see them again. 

Lisbon, it was a pleasure – or at least I think it was.

Far be it from me to turn my nose up at a person’s choice in washing products. However I’ve had recent suspicions of one of my housemates’ choice of product lately.

Ages ago, due the joys of house/bathroom sharing, I stopped keeping my ‘bathroom stuff’ in the bathroom. Mainly because I suspected my housemate was using my stuff:  He’s too much of a tight bastard to buy his own/ensure he didn’t run out. Yes, it’s a bit precious of me, but I’d only use other peoples stuff as a last resort (if I’d accidently ran out of stuff without realising I was low or something).

I get through a bottle of shower gel every few weeks. He, however, can seemingly make one last for about 2/3 months – this is with having daily showers…I have no idea how he rations it to last that long? Maybe I’m liberal with the shower gel. I’m shower gel rich? Who knows…

Anyway, he hasn’t had any kind of shower gel/shampoo/soap in there lately. Three weeks have passed with a bare bathroom so I asked him how he’s washing himself:

“..using the Carex Handwash”

Agog. I wondered if he’s using the same stuff to wash his hair…

“yes, it’s just soap isn’t it. What’s the problem?”

It might just be me, but that has all kinds of wrongness written all over it.

It is just soap in a differently labelled bottle, he’s right, and I’d probably use it myself in emergencies, but to use it everyday in the shower…as a matter of fact?  It gets a big fat "HMMMMMMMM…" from me.

We should start using Fairy Washing Up Liquid in the shower, just re-label the bottle “3-in-1” (dishes, bodywash and shampoo).  After all, according to the Fairy Liquid website: it ‘cuts through grease better than any other washing up liquid and lasts a lot longer’.

You wouldn’t even need a daily shower according to that tag-line.

Why, I might even just curl myself up into the dishwasher this evening, put myself onto a hot wash then, when it’s finished, nonchalantly throw myself into the tumble dryer to dry off. 

Fucking tramp.  Him.  Not you.

I’m not the most prolific reader in the world, but I do like to keep a book at hand to read when the fancy takes me. One thing I’ve never done though, is read a book twice (unless looking through lingerie sections in a catalogue as a rampant teenager counts…).

I’ve just started reading The Stand by Stephen King again. I first read it about 10 years ago and even though it took me literally 6 months to wade through the 1400 pages, it still ranks as one of the best books I’ve read. I kept telling myself I’d re-read it again, you know, just to check that it still ranks up there, but I was put off because I’d know what would happen and remember bits of the story.

A bit like re-watching films or TV shows I’ve seen, I hardly ever sit through them again – mainly because the element of the unknown has gone. I’d never be able to recapture the “fucking hell, I didn’t see that coming” moment such as the last few minutes in The Usual Suspects when Kevin Spacey stopped being a gimp (although that is one of the few films I’ve managed to sit through more than once). Similarly, as fantastic as they are/were, I can’t re-watch The Sopranos, The Wire or The West Wing (does all good stuff start with The?). Likewise there are also only so many times that guy in Anchorman can say “I love lamp” until it stops being funny.  I’ve seen it; I know what happens…it’s never as good.

So, anyway, back to the book.  I’m 300 pages in so far and even though I know the outline of the story, I don’t feel like I’m repeating myself yet.  I don’t feel like I’m repeating myself yet.  So I’ll let you know if re-reading something is any good and *does that wanky speech marks thing with fingers that them people do.  You know, THAT thing that makes you want to smash their face in* “gives me a greater understanding of the book”.  Or something.

Given the speed I read and my attention span, I probably won’t finish it until March 2010 anyway, by which point I’ll have forgotten all about this post and why I started re-reading the book in the first place.

I had a better ending to this in my head 10 minutes ago, but I can’t remember what it was now. See what I mean about the attention span?

Don’t worry it wasn’t anything profound or life changing. You’ll live without my wisdom.

Chop chop, move along, nothing to see here…put your chairs on the desks before you leave and NO running inside the building…

My little warped mind is a mish-mash of plans for visits to far flung places and world domination lately.  In short, I have absolutely no idea what I want to do.  My latest ditty is:

Instead of planning a mad lengthy (and expensive) Australian visit, then why not just do a short one….soon.  Yes, I am an impatient bastard.  I could treat it as a scouting mission, ib dib dib and all that.

I’m thinking Chrimbo/New Year time.  Can I raise the necessary cash to go before then?  Probably… at a very a big push (i.e. not leaving the house, ‘forgetting’ to pay some bills and eating just beans for a month) but then I’d be pushed for spending money and have to count the pennies.  In all honesty I can’t go, but it hasn’t stopped me checking out flights/hostels etc.  Although it would satisfy my itchy feet, the money I’d spend would be better spent on a superior visit next year.  A man can but dream.

My next, currently in progress plan, which is more realistic (and cheaper):  is a visit to the Big Apple for Christmas or New Year.  I don’t like Christmas/New Year, but if I was in New York I could pretend I was in Santa Claus: The Movie.  How brilliant would that be?

I have a friend who moved there a year or so ago and none of us have been for a visit yet.  I’ve never been over there before so I suggested it to a couple of mates last month and they’ve said they’ll go, but we’re yet to confirm/book anything.  I’m kicking people’s arses as I type because the longer we go without booking anything, the less time this penniless gimp has to save/beg for cash.

So many ideas and plans.

Oh, and even though I can’t afford it, I had a “fuck it, why not…yes, I’ll go”’ moment last week…and I’m going to Lisbon for a few days in a couple of weeks.

So little money.

I’ll be outside the train station (with a dog tied to a piece of string), selling The Big Issue before I know it:

“Big Issue….thanks anyway, have a nice day.”

I’m sure I can pull that off with some panache.  It never fails to make me feel a bit guilty.