The Bells Have Made Me Deaf

Cooking spag bol last night I ran out of gas… just enough left in the bottle to finish boiling up the spaghetti. No need to panic. So today I load up the cart to go to town. Dog had a meagre day yesterday too, his food ran out on Saturday but I reckoned a day of not getting spoilt might make him a little more appreciative that one fifth of my weekly income currently goes down his cakehole and produces nothing other than maniacal behaviour and a dogpile of doo in the woods although sometimes he saves it for the beach to be sent as his little pseudo sausage gift bobbing over to England in return for the radiation they pass our way from Selafield. Huh? Pick it up? Well I would if I had waders and a net. Yes he poops in the tide!

Anyhow… driving into Ballywalter the sky turned Armageddon black. I parked right outside the shop door so as not to get wetter than necessary. Lifted a box of Bakers ‘goody yummy I’m a spoilt dog’ food and the cat equivalant some rice for me a bunch of bananas at a ridiculous price and yoghurt. Standing at the check out I realised I hadn’t brought the gas empty.. ARG!

I shall have to go back but maybe I’ll make do with the camping stove for tonight. Make a tent in the living room from bedsheets and eat beans direct from the tin.

I got a taste of what’s to come in the form of a roughly recorded track (called Waiting) from the Gabriel Kelley Band’s first performance. First few bars drew me in like it was something I already knew. I had that same feeling of familiarity with Gabriel Young’s music. I cant explain what causes something to give that feeling of deja vu when entirely new. I suppose it’s a matter of what the ears find pleasing… and now I know for sure where it was coming from all along.

I said a while ago that I find it hard to be excited about something I havent heard. Now that I have, I am excited to hear a depth of developing musical maturity that will make me look forward to more when it comes. Sooner the better. Yeah, we’re all Waiting!

They’ve played the single a few times on Radio 2 of an afternoon when I happened to be able to hear it over the drone of the boiler and machinery.

I suppose it’s good enough of itself but since the promotion brands him the voice and guitar of Pink Floyd, that’s quite another thing. To promote a new single with a past reputation that isn’t solely credible to one person demands that the new music lives up to the qualities of the old. This doesn’t. It’s all a matter of taste but Pink Floyd without Roger Waters was an entirely different band. Perhaps the marketing mentioning Pink Floyd was referring to post Waters. This being the case, then yes, I suppose the tune does live up to that writing quality.

I love Dave Gilmours voice. I fully appreciate his musicianship as an excellent guitarist. I get little from his writing skills, I’m sorry but that’s just the way it is. I do like the Crosby and Nash backing vocals… in fact it sounds more like a Crosby/Nash song

Maybe it’ll grow on me, although I said the same thing about the Division Bell and I think I’ve played that CD all of 3 times. I don’t know why but I feel like I’m missing something just because this music doesn’t ring my bell…

Ballywalter was cordoned off today for some reason. The coast road had a dirty big ‘Police, Road Closed’ sign on it and a blue and white police tape across the road at the end of Dunleaths estate. I wonder if it was something to do with the investigation into that girls murder last year. Had to head cross country towards Greyabbey and up the Tullykevin to get back on track. I was going to Bangor to deliver and collect. The tyre rack clanked down just before the diversion. I keep forgetting to tie it up before leaving… only remembering when miles away from home with no stringaling and forced to pull over every few miles for readjustment when it drops onto the road and clanks it’s rusty protests. The wise tell me that it only does this because there is no tyre in the rack. I point out that there is no tyre in the rack because the nice RAC man (who rescued me when the back wheel seized and burst the tyre) broke the bolt thingy that holds the rack up and claimed it was rusted through. Today I made it all the way to the six road ends before it dropped for the second time.

Arriving at my destination I moaned that my lateness was entirely due to a dodgey tyre rack to which my dear oul Da took scissors, cut string and went to tie it up. He came back in with his head covered in rust and an indentation of tarmacadam pattern on his skull where it had been leaning on the ground. Sure enough,, it didn’t drop once on the way back home… not even when I hit the humpies along the back roads at speed.

Now all I need is a spare wheel and a can of rust eater.

I blog you blog we blog they blog he blogs she blogs sitting by the sea blogs. The world and it’s granny blogs. All ferociously filling the internet with information it doesn’t need every day. I’ve been asking myself ‘what is the point?’ but as yet I haven’t answered myself so I can’t tell you what I said. I’ve become hooked on the pointlessness of it all just like all the other people out there who type their nonsense in the hope that it’ll develop into something worth while if only entertaining. I’m waiting for that lightbulb to come on, that unique idea that will make a blog of blogs, yes, a blog worth blogging in. Meantime, this is it.

I had a friend request on myspace yesterday from a local chap with a blog on blogspot. It was his list of links that led me to read a few other blogs and finally end up somewhere in the tool section at B&Q. The internet rabbit chase…. one click, and one more. Tangents, tangents chasing rabbits. It’s Alice in Wonderland. There is a centre of the universe (Ballywalter) and there is also a centre to the internet. The hub, the place to which you gravitate. Everyone orbiting their own centre.

I’ve been lost online this past week too in the maze that is LL Bean. I’ve gone back several times when I’m feeling brave to try and figure out their sizes compared to British sizes and come away flumoxed. They have Misses and Womans sizes which look to be at odds with each other. I am in conflict with being 43 and sized as a Misses rather than a Woman… but what is the difference? Is Woman the term now given to something outsized? I had trouble… so I looked at the non clothing range. Boots. I really like their boots but the size is weird again. I think I’m going to go for their Bean boots and closet them for next winter (if I can find a conversion table for feet). The sizing being confusing enough. They then state:

Bean Boot Fit Information
The fit of the Bean Boot is generous to allow for insulation in cold weather.
To wear with light or midweight socks:
If you wear a whole size, order one size down from your normal size. If you wear a half size, order one and a half sizes down.
Example: If you wear either a 9 or a 9½, please order a size 8.
To wear with heavyweight socks:
If you wear a whole size, order your normal size. If you wear a half size, order the next whole size down.
Example: If you wear either a 9 or a 9½, please order a size 9.

It’s Bean fun so far. hehe! I’ll get around to ordering this weekend come hell or high water. Probably some camouflage long johns to play safe. Those are bound to fit.

Nations divided by a common language and weights and measures! It’s the doing of the Babel language division. What would the world be like now if we had all spoken the same language and understood each other from the onset? Inihilation by the 2nd century or sooner? Harmony? What if the moon is cheese.

Why do they have so many O’s in Goooooogle? The more I sit here and look at it in wonderment mesmerised by the cleverness of it all and how on earth the google folk know how to coincide the ads that appear with content. Well, I suppose in this day and age it isn’t so impressive and yet it still is. A few centuries since and they’d have had to sit the dunking stool to see which was witch but a little knowledge being a dangerous thing back then is not so much the case nowadays. Fear of the unknown has been usurped by paranoia and declaring war on people before they get us first just in case they MIGHT be thinking about it… taking little time to realise that panic collapses anything from the ‘within’ without the need for outside infiltration or effort. All the enemy need do is sit and wait until the fat rat afraid of losing it’s wealth and power finally farts and blows it’s own head to kingdom come.

No, this is not some deep and profound ramble, it’s a very shallow one since I don’t wish to dip more than my toe into the pool of current affairs troubling our very small planet. It’s a smaller planet the further into the future we travel since the advances in technology have made it nigh on impossible to escape any major world catastrophe. The global village is shrinking to the point of ‘this town ain’t big enough for the both of us…. and it ain’t me who’s gonna leave…. do do do dodo dodo do do do dodo do’. Unfortunately we can’t get off. There is no escape…. unless…

Buying moon acreage from the Lunar Registry who boldly claim

It’s not just a piece of paper. It’s a ticket to the future.

may be an investment for the future but I would almost guarantee that by the time it becomes a valid claim, some moon government agency will say that your claim isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on. What you bought was not real … a mere novelty to fund the space race. Just you wait and see all you owners of moon. So what do you call a person who lives on the moon anyway? Moonian doesn’t sound quite right… nor does Mooner or Moonish or Moonites. Is there a proper term for Moon dwellers? MOONIES!! yeah it was meant to be.

Here’s to the Moonies… the satellite pioneers!

Woke up this morning with no desire to get out of bed. Wind howling outside coming in off the sea from the east with a bitter chill. Some weirdness overcame me when I finally did get up and dressed in deciding that I would not give in to the discomfort by burning electricity nor by lighting a fire and so I sat eating breakfast watching my breath in the air and the steam off my tea gathering on the window pane. This madness lasted until after lunch when I had to go to Kircubbin for lack of vitals. The heat in the van spoilt me totally. I came home like a wimp with another bag of coal and logs.

Walking the dog was a fast job. He with his fur coat stood shivering in the wind and no inclination to go further than the small wood for an emptying. Made soup or began the process. Lit a fire.

Spent some time putting Google Ads on everything I can think of in the hope that it’ll make enough money to pay for the hosting next time it’s due. Waiting for the soup to cook I’ve treated myself to stale cake with a capful of Bushmills poured on. Leftovers from my visitors yesterday. Cousins with new Ba. He’s a wee dote. David tells me of his intention to join up and volunteer for service in Afghanistan. I tell him he isn’t wise but I think my protests fell on deaf ears. I kept my comments brief but didn’t ‘rah rah’ his suggestion. I think Jo is happy enough with the idea even though she would be alone with a new baby for 6 months. It was good to see them.