Thursday 28 September 2006 22:04
Last year, each concert of the Eels With Strings tour began with an animated film. It was old Communist Russian, grainy, subtitled and kind of cool in a beer induced way. There's a picture here somewhere if you scroll back far enough. I didn't imagine that Chebarushka (the little thing with the crocodile) existed beyond that Eels tour, but evidently it does.
I can say with absolute certainty that this is the best present ever.
Saturday 23 September 2006 14:30
I had a weird experience at Gateshead metro station the other day. I'd missed the metro so I sat down for the ten minute wait for the next one. The station was deserted, but another man soon turned up. He came over to me and asked if I had a cigarette. I told him I was sorry but I don't smoke. He apologised for asking and said he'd offer me one if he'd not left his at home. He smelled very strongly of aftershave; I'm assuming he'd been drinking it since he appeared quite drunk. He sat next to me and appeared to be in pain. He told me that he'd hurt his leg and had a large bruise. I asked whether he'd had an accident and he told me that he'd recently fallen from his bike after colliding with a lamp post. Apparently, he'd been travelling at 40mph at the time.
He then said that I'd never believe the size of his bruise. I acknowledged his pain, saying that it did sound very bad. He then offered to show me and began to unfasten his jeans and pull them down. Worried about being caught on CCTV with a trouserless man, I told him that I believed him and that he shouldn't pull down his jeans in a metro station. He replied, saying that it was ok because he was wearing cycling shorts.
He was indeed wearing cycling shorts. Red ones. They matched the very large purple bruise which covered most of his right leg. Although my new friend had clearly had a bad collision with a lamp post, and his pain was barely anaesthetised by ingesting aftershave, I did feel a little uncomfortable sitting next to a man in a metro station with his trousers round his ankles.
Fortunately, the metro soon arrived. Less fortunately, my new friend sat close to me. He then proceeded to wink, nod and otherwise gesture in the direction of a girl wearing a low cut dress. I'm quite sure that he believed himself to be discrete, but regrettably he failed.
It was with some relief that I bade farewell to my new friend as he left the metro at Central Station.
Saturday 16 September 2006 20:04
One of the things that most attracted me to this house was the garden; that's despite saying I'd never have another house with one. I always found it a chore in my old house, even though I had a nice little garden. There was something about the garden at the back of this house, though. And the shed. We call it a shed, but it's an old outbuilding. It'd been used as a workshop from the 1940s for around 40 years and then as a shed until we moved in. It's taken a lot of work to make the it usable again. But now it's finally finished; it's just a matter of deciding what to do with it. There are a few pictures because I'm quite proud of it.
Tuesday 12 September 2006 11:59
Following several failed attempts at introducing poppies to the garden, I've finally had some success. Yeah, it's a small start, but with a little imagination you can picture the garden next year ... a sea of red.
And, with a little luck, white too ... well, every house should have daisies.
Tuesday 5 September 2006 21:48
I was shattered last night when I went to bed. I'd not gotten back from Telford until late, but still went to the Three Tuns for the quiz and then had a stupid marital squabble on returning home. I was still tired this morning and the three snooze alarms hadn't helped at all. It was still quite dark this morning as I dragged myself from bed too. OK, so I'm looking for excuses for going to work wearing two odd shoes. Idiot.Back to:
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