Cider with Roadies

In the past I have had some ups and downs in my life.  Nothing surprising there, and it'd probably be more surprising if I hadn't, but every now and then something I read, or see, or hear, or smell, or taste sparks a memory, buried not too deeply, which elicits a automatic emotional response which might put a huge smile on my face, or make me laugh out loud, or make me smile inwardly, or cause me to wince, or make me go very quiet for a while, or make me sad, or make me burst into tears which last for only seconds.

Having previously read and thoroughly enjoyed two of his books I am currently reading what is pretty much an autobiography by Stuart Maconie, who can currently be heard as one half of the presenting team on a very good BBC Radio 2 evening show, and that book's rather wittily called Cider with Roadies.

I was lying in the bath while reading the book earlier this evening, warming myself after having been out for a bit of a run wearing shorts in the slowly melting snow, when one eight word phrase leapt off the page and in an instant had travelled through my eyes, passed into my brain, invaded my subconscious, and emerged again from those same eyes in the form of tears.

That eight word phrase is on page 168 (of the paperback edition anyway) and refers to his friend Jem having suddenly and unexpectedly taken his own life after losing his job, having marital problems, and being unsuccessful in achieving his ambitions.

That eight word phrase consists of the words

Crushed by the endless small defeats of life ........

Now I have never ever been anywhere near the psychological place which might have made me even remotely consider taking my own life, or even harming myself in any way shape or form, but Jem's problems struck a chord with me as they are not entirely dissimilar to some things which may have happened in my life, and that eight word phrase used by Stuart Maconie seemed to chime out to me and sum up a lot of how I used to feel a while ago.  I only wish I'd thought of it first!

Easter Eggs

It's looking good for the Easter Egg run tomorrow lunchtime. The snowy weather promised by the weather forecasters a few days ago is looking less likely and right now the BBC Website says it's going to be pretty reasonable.

So if you happen to be somewhere in the west end of Glasgow tomorrow, Easter Sunday, from 12.30pm, then look out for the 3000+ motorcyclists bringing all the traffic to a halt while delivering a huge number of Easter eggs, and a fair number of cash donations to Yorkhill Children's Hospital.

Obviously the number will be swelled this year by yours truly together with RE riding pillion. This year I will not be standing outside St Mary's Cathedral leaning on crutches and with a glass of sparkly stuff in my hand jealously watching the dirty filthy bikers go by, no sir, this year I will be one of said DF bikers!

So if you're trying to drive in a car in the west end tomorrow lunchtime I'd give it a miss if I were you!

The trip starts at the SECC car park and the route (see image) travels up Finnieston St, left into Argyle St, right into Radnor St, right onto Sauchiehall St, left into Rose St (past the Glasgow Film Theatre), right into Renfrew St, left into Cambridge St, left onto Cowcaddens Rd, bear left onto West Graham St which then takes you onto Great Western Road, past St Mary's Cathedral, left at Anniesland Cross onto Crow Rd (the eponymous road from the Iain Banks 1992 novel), left onto Dumbarton Rd, right into Bunhouse Rd (at the Kelvin Hall, the location of my Achilles Tendon injury just over 1 year ago which led to me being on crutches drinking sparkly stuff), left onto Old Dumbarton Rd, then right into Dalnair St to the hospital. Then a wee trip back to the SECC which is only a few hundred metres from the hospital by the direct route.

An estimated 40 minutes of slow riding at close quarters with lots of other riders. Lots of horn blowing and lots of waving to watching pedestrians, including those outside St Mary's. Should be fun. Report will doubtless follow.

One thing that strikes me as slightly strange however is that the IAM are not represented there. Yes, of course there will be riders who like me are members of the IAM, but the Institute itself is not officially represented as far as I can make out. I would have thought that the presence of thousands of bikers in one place at the same time might be seen as a God given opportunity to spread the word and, more importantly, capture the chequebooks of some new associate members. But apparently not. Outside the official season no doubt, so out of the question.

A year later

It's pretty well a whole year since I completely snapped my Achilles Tendon while playing badminton, on Sunday 18th March 2007.

A couple of months of being in a non-weight-bearing plaster cast, 3 months off work, lots of months of physiotherapy, and a year down the line my left calf is still noticeably smaller than my right one due to muscle wastage when the cast was on, and I still have to concentrate on not limping.

Relatively recently I realised that the reason I keep getting cramp and aches in my left calf is because without having noticed it I now tend to walk with the muscles of my left leg tensed. When I manage to relax it I can walk a lot better and without limping, but I have to think about it as it doesn't come naturally yet. It'll come though, I hope.

So, since my previous post what has happened? I made a fairly rare purchase from Amazon. Rare these days anyway, although I used to buy a lot more from the site. A couple of posts ago I mentioned a few books which had been recommended to me, so that's me bought all three. Additionally I chucked both the Long Way Round and Long Way Down DVDs onto the order because although I've seen various individual episodes I haven't seen either series in its entirety. I really shouldn't place orders online after returning home from the pub, because I also added something off my Amazon Wish List, namely a digital photo frame.

In the flat I rented for a while before buying this house I had my PC in the living room, and quite enjoyed the experience of watching the screen saver of my photos randomly displayed (or rather, displayed in a random order). Since moving however, the PC is in a separate room and I've been missing seeing the photos. No one really ever looks through their photos and I found the screen saver to be a good way of looking at them with no effort involved. So anyway, I have been looking for a digital photo frame for a while, but haven't seen any, apart from pretty expensive ones, that I fancied.

So, I bought an expensive one. On the bright side I saved over £100 on the list price, but it was still well over £100! And it's a 10" one rather than the more usual 7"-8", so although size isn't everything (!) it means I can see it from the other side of the room quite easily.

And it's Wi-Fi enabled so I can just connect to my home network and display all the photos on my PC without having to transfer them to the frame. In theory anyway. I'm having a few teething problems and although I have connected it to the network, it keeps rebooting randomly every so often, so this week I'll have a proper look at it to see if there's something in the settings I need to change. Otherwise it'll go back to Amazon to be replaced.

On Saturday evening a friend, RE, and I were invited to a whisky tasting evening at G&G's house. Could have been messy, but it was actually damned civilised! When we were told about it, in the pub last week, there was some discussion about what the dress code would be, and "dress posh" seemed to be the order of the day, but in the event it didn't end up like that. However in the meanwhile I had decided that this was probably just the right time to splash out on some new accessories for my kilt. I've had the kilt for a number of years, but generally when I wear it it's worn casually with a big jumper and some heavy boots, and when I need the formal look I've always hired the smart jacket and brogues etc.

As an aside, my kilt is the Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) tartan which is rather nice I think (see image).

So I went to Slaters Menswear and bought an Argyll jacket in a lovely charcoal grey colour and with bone buttons rather than silver so it's kind of semi formal, ghillie brogues, black socks, black sock flashes, and a new kiltpin. All for the bargain price of about £200.

As I say, the whisky tasting turned out not to be a posh dress event, but I wore the kilt anyway, and I'm very pleased to have at last got round to buying the stuff I have spent a fortune hiring over the past years! And a good time was had by all while tasting the whisky.

Next weekend will see this year's Motorcycle Action Group Easter Egg Run from the SECC to Yorkhill Children's Hospital in Glasgow, with 3000+ bikers bearing donations and Easter Eggs, and RE has agreed to accompany me by riding pillion on the bike. This morning then was a small scale trial run when we made sure she was OK riding pillion and I was OK with her on the back. Went well, exceptionally well, and we both enjoyed the experience, made better by having a decent intercom so we could speak to each other as we went along. So next Sunday, Easter Day, should be fun. I will, of course, report on it in due course.

The great whore of the east

I've had a very enjoyable weekend across the other side of the country in (mostly sunny) Edinburgh with a friend. Went to a concert of, amongst other things, Vivaldi's Gloria, visited two new pubs which have yet to be added to my Website, had too much beer, attended a Presbyterian (Church of Scotland) church service, visited two, yes two, art galleries, and met some very nice people. All in all a good trip.

One of the nice people I met, Mike, has recommended a couple of books related to a topic close to my heart, motorcycling. They are Way to Go: Two of the world's best motorcycling journeys, and The Road to Gobbler's Knob: From Chile to Alaska on a motorbike, both by a friend of his, Geoff Hill. I've located them on Amazon, and I'll order them in due course, but suffice to say they seem to be similar to the higher profile Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman Long Way Down and Long Way Round trips, only this guy apparently did it all first and without the backup and infrastructure surrounding McGregor and Boorman. And I'm not having a go at them for that, what they did was still pretty impressive.

Mike has also written a book, The Blue Cabin: Living by the Tides on Islandmore, and I'm going to order it as well, not just because I've met him, but because the Amazon reviews rate it highly, and I've also had a personal recommendation from a friend who has read it.

Life is good at the moment and I am generally very happy, and getting happier.

Oh, and the title for this post relates to the city of Edinburgh, not a person!

Grammar Nazi

First, congratulations to Emma & Andy Mogendorff on the birth of their daughter Dara, a sister for Toby, a few days ago. Andy used to sing in St Mary's Cathedral Choir, but now lives across the pond in Minnesota. Andy's Blog is always worth a read.


I've just finished re-reading the rather excellent A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson. I heartily recommend it to you if you haven't already read it, particularly if, like me, you're a sucker for that very modern genre, books on Popular Science. The image on the right kind of sums up the sort of normal "easy" explanations you come across, but Bill Bryson's book is wonderfully well written and explains things to the layman.




Apologies for the image below (no, not really, I make no apologies for anything written in or displayed on this Blog) but it's on a subject close to my heart. Grammar that is, not necrophilia. The Website from which it comes contains brilliant cartoons, but let's just say they aren't always ones you'd allow your maiden aunt to see. In these days of youngsters often spelling using txt spk, even when not actually using Short Messaging Service (SMS) on their phones, it saddens me that spelling and grammar seem to be dying skills amongst a large part of the population.