A few words on the subject
A few words on the subject
A few words on May 2011
A few words on August 2009
A few words on September 2009
A few words on October 2009
A few words on November 2009
A few words on December 2009
A few words on January 2010
A few words on February 2010
A few words on March 2010
A few words on April 2010
A few words on May 2010
A few words on June 2010
A few words on July 2010
A few words on August 2010
A few words on Sept-Dec 2010
A few words on January 2011
A few words on February 2011
A few words on March 2011
A few words on joy, alienation and small pricks
Sat 14th May 2011
What ho my cherubs, how the bally heck is stuff in your neck of the Hesperus?

Hoping you, where e'er you are, you have been finding small moments of joy within the darkness. Because this, let's face it, that's what it's all about. (Not, as it turns out, the Hokey Cokey). Small moments of joy. These are what we live for. It's very tempting to ignore these, or not relish them, and focus only on the bigger things. Holidays, exciting purchases, parties, weddings, whatnot. But life as we are stuck with is surely a matter of moving from small pleasure to small pleasure, recognising them when they happen and pausing for a moment to enjoy them.
If you are the sort of addled titwit who doesn't do this, and wanders through life comfortably numbed to the tiny morsels of pleasure that litter the hedgerows of our long leafy walk to the grave, here are some I suggest you stop to notice. Forget lottery wins and foriegn adventure. These come but once in a million lifetimes. Learn to enjoy a contented smug wriggle at:
1. Waking up in the dark, thinking it's nearly time for work, squinting at your watch and realising, yesssss, you still have a solid 4 hours sleep to have. Mmmmm.

2. For the fellas - the smooth sharp glide of a brand-new fresh from the plastic razor blade. And the resulting soft chinly result. Ahhh, smooooth.

3. Picking up a cup of tea at EXACTLY the right temperature and gulping a great orangey wash of mouthfull. Ahhhhh! That hits the spot.

4. Walking into the bathroom about an hour after you've given it a good clean. One of those proper hands-and-knees cleans. The tang of citrus, the gleam of taps. That glistening porcelian, dotted with dots of fresh cold water.

5. A big poo that you've needed for about 3 hours. Not hurried, not rushed. Alone in the house. No need to clench to hide noises. And - fellahs again - a battered Giles Annual from 1976 to read on your knees.

6. Sitting with favourite people during the first mouthful of cold lager on a warm summer evening in a pub garden on the Friday of a bank holiday weekend. Nice.

7. Out of the shower, snapping off the plastic tags and pulling on new socks, straight from the shopping bag. Oooh.

8. Heading home from a bingey shopping trip, going through your HMV bag, unwrapping a new CD and reading the inlay book on a train.

9. Napping on a Sunday, waking up with the smell of a roast dinner.

10. Lacing a brand new pair of Converse All Stars tight around your ankles.

These are the things that make life worth living. Don't let them pass you by, people. Don't let them pass you by.

Someone who spent quite a considerable time letting joy pass him by is the legendary rock artists Roger Waters.
Now those unfamiliar with Mr. Waters won't understand this reference. Those who do - well done, 10 housepoints, move on to the next paragraph. Those still with me? Okay. You doltheads. Roger Waters was one of the founding members of once-spacey-psychadelic-nonsense-songs-about-bicycles-later-plodding-prog-rock-acid-trip-hairy-arena-monsters-now-AOR-melodic-concept-album-squabbling-trillionaire-Live8-darlings Pink Floyd.

Now unless you're a fan, Pink Floyd will mean precisely this:
"We don't need no edyoukay-shunn, we don't need no, fort controwl..." being sung by London schoolchildren.
And that's fine, of course. It was the only time they really bothered the popular charts, releasing the oddest Christmas Number One in 1979 "Another Brick In The Wall Part II." The band fell out with the spectacular acrimosity that it seems only coke-addled Fender Strat weilding rock behemoths are capable, after the release of the album "The Final Cut" in 1983. Since then, Rog' (as nobody calls him I imagine) went on to record solo. The rest of the band - principally legendary guitarist David Gilmour - fought over the legal right to the name "Pink Floyd" and went on to release highly synthesised guitar solo echoey-sound effect albums and tour the world earning trillions of pounds. Roger sat home brooding and not enjoying snapping off the plastic tags and pulling on new socks, straight from the shopping bag.

So why am I telling you this? Well old Roger Waters has taken to the road once again, as you may have heard, and is touring with the rock spectacular stage show based on the 1979 album "The Wall," (the album that launched the whole "we don't need no edyoukay-shun" anthem to the world and had lots of confused children like me running about playgrounds in shorts singing and feeling pretty damned rebellious, before queueing up to go to class and doing potato prints until mum came to collect me at 3.30). And I mention it as I was terribly lucky enough to be invited by work colleagues to a private VIP box at the O2 Arena this week to watch the show.

And blimey o'bollocks, what a show it is. Floyd fans will be aware of the "extravaganzi" that their live performances can be. But this one blows the new socks, (straight from the shopping bag), right off 'em all. Fireworks, marching bands, a huge inflatable pig, 50ft marionettes of teachers and mothers striding across the stage, lasers, sound effects,
a crashing spitfire, video, Gerald Scarfe animation and a 30ft wall of white bricks built, throughout the show, between us and the band - a wall that explodes magnificently all over the crowd with fire, dust and smoke at the shows finale. Click here for photos, as my description doesn't do this justice at all. Highlight for us fans was track 6 of the second half - Comfortably Numb - (covered rather camply by the Scissor Sisters back inJan 2004). A song ranked 314 in the Rolling Stone Top 1000 records. A show stopper made even more show-stoppery by...oh my god you've got to be fucking kidding me... a spotlight hitting the top of the wall, picking out David Gilmour on guitar. A surprise one off reuniting for one night only of the original guitarist that sent the crowd into apoplyctic screaming mayhem of "fuckinell"ness.

A night to remember.

And finally, it has been a week of "somethings to remember" somewhat, as I finally - after about 20 years of humming and harring and well-maybeing and no-that'd-be-silly/maaaan-that'd-be-cool-ness, I ventured forth and booked myself in for a long awaited tattoo.

Yes. Me. A tattoo. (the same month I tried to learn to ride a motorcyle? A midlife what? I'm sure I don;t know WHAT you mean...)

A word on tattoos. You have one? I imagine some of you might. Tattoo victims seem to fall into 4 camps:

1. Metallers: Leather, facial peircings, big spiky boots, filthy denim. Greening arms full of flames and skulls and crosses and swords and other teenage crapola.
2. Outdoorsy surfy types: Big feet, flip flops, Aussie / South African accents / beachwear, lots of friends, barbecues, loud voices and broad shoulders. Usually striped with "ethnic tribal" affairs on their massive shoulders. Swirly patterns, tibetan letters and other new age bollocks.
3. Young women: Hipster jeans, crop tops, visible underwear peeking from straps and waistbands. Flowers, hearts, poems, birds, dragons, cupcakes and other doodles scrawled onto hips, shoulders, wrists and - oddly enough - feet.
4. Aging rockers: Skinny, pock-marked, greasy, bequiffed 50s teddy boy biker types, handing off dodgems. Spiderwebs and swallows on backs of hands and necks.

I've nary ever had much of a feeling about these people or their chosen form of needling adornment. Until recently, of course, when I decided that - yes - what I was missing was a personal identity stamp, scratched into my skin forever, to embarrass elder self with. There was only, and has only ever been, one image that has stayed with me throughout my life that is:
1. Simple enough to be jabbed onto skin with needles
2. Unambiguous enough not to need explaining to everyone
3. Classic enough to have 1 meaning and 1 meaning only
4. Old enough (70 years and counting) to be considered a milestone in graphic imagery
5. Fitting my hobbies, interests, passions and personality.
So it was a picture of this I took, with trembling fingers, to the "parlour" over the road from my workplace to book an appointment. Very nice chap. Surprisingly few tattoos, but of the example 2 variety (above) by and large. We discussed the procedure for a few minutes. Minutes I spent, with a small voice whispering "er...Rich, what the fuck do you think you're doing man? What are you, 16? You own Church's brogues and a felt homburg. You are nearly 40. You have the word "manager" on your business card. For chrissakes, you have a fucking business card. You might see yourself as being rather rock n roll, but to everyone else you're just turning into Peter Stringfellow. We thought the motorcycle was a stupid fucking idea. What next? A mullet? A red sportscar? Leather trousers? A fucking earring? Run! Run from this place of antiseptic wipes and buzzing needles and reclining chairs. Go! Like the very devil was at your heels. One of those devils, up there on the wall, with the grinning face and the pitchfork and the word "Arsenal" underneath it."

But I foolishly drowned this voice out by humming a Cole Porter medley to myself, booked my "session" and returned to work.

7 things about tattoos that I believed at this point:
1. They hurt like fuck. A needle? Puncturing the skin? A needle? Like...a needle? So we're talking the pain of standing on a drawing pin, right? But over and over and over and over again for an hour or more? Jesus christ...
2. The "artist" draws the image from his head in permanent ink and pretty much you're stuck with the look, the design, the mistakes and the position you get.
3. They will bleed and scab and seep pus and weep and stink and generally be bandaged up like the self-inflicted pointless war wound they are.
4. The needle has a tube of ink attached, like a tiny hose, which pumps ink under your skin.
5. Did I mention it would hurt?
6. You're not allowed to whimper or cry or say "ow" as the tattooist will think you're a big nancy boy.
7. You immediately regret having it about a day later as it stares back at you in the mirror and you realise you have made an absurd sartorial decision that you now have to live with forever. Like being stuck with the same haircut until you're 80.

7. Things I understood afterwards:
1. It hurts. But not the way you'd imagine. If you can, recall the worst sunburn you ever had. I mean a really sore, stinging patch that you couldn't brush or touch without yelping. Got that? Now imagine someone scraping a sharp thumbnail across that burnt patch for 10 seconds at a time, for 40 minutes. Yeah, it's unpleasant. But you eventually get used to it.
2. The artist is essentially sketching a permanent advert for their work onto you. So they are keen to get it right. The image is traced, agreed by you, printed as a line drawing onto your body in a place you agree (feel free to say "no, not there, left a bit" or "sorry, there was a misunderstanding. I meant on my shoulder blade, not on my scrotum."
3. Once done, it gets wiped clean with antiseptic cream and wrapped in a bandage. After 24 hours, bandage comes off and one applies a fingertip of Bepanthen (tm) - a nappy rash cream - to the image every three hours to protect and moisturise.
4. The needle has no ink fed to it. Much like a painter or using a quill, the artist dips the needle into the coloured ink and buzzes it along the skin for a few seconds, then goes back for another dip-dab on the nib before continuing.
5. You can say "ow." Although a more manly flinch and a sucking in of air, in the manner of Indiana Jones getting ointment on a facial cut, is more acceptable.
6. When you peel off the bandage and look at yourself in the mirror, you wonder why you haven't had it forever, it being a somewhat marvellous addition to an otherwise pasty featureless upper arm.
7. Wives tend not to like them very much and don't believe you'll get one until you do...and then sort of roll their eyes witha defeated "whatever makes you happy dear," sigh.

You'll be thrilled to know that I can't get my webcam to work, so no picture is available of said scarring. However I have found someone else who has the same. So click here to see what now nestled stingingly on my upper arm...

Love, truth, justice and the American way to all
Rx



A few words on April 2011