(1) Proof blog posts so they say “disaffected” less often
(2) Be less of a ponce
(3) Spell better
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On the general viscosity of sanguineus
Obviously in a particularly pretentious mood this evening, but what does it mean, the phrase “blood is thicker than water”? I’m glad its never been used against me, as I’d be forced to question it, most prodigiously. Egads, three episodes of Jeeves & Wooster and I’m sounding like Bertie already.
Anyway; I mean, obviously blood is thicker than water; but how has “water” come to signify non-familial relationships? It seems a bit odd; and particularly for someone (like myself) who has been happily enjoying a friendship circle that in many respects supplements my familial relationships… In any case, when you marry water, it doesn’t turn into blood by default, does it? The whole thing seems slightly subject to slightly arbirtrary shifts in perspective… And following a water-blood paradigmatic revolution… well, then. Well. Then. Well.
Anyway.
Tthe inspiration for this post, such as it is, is my cousin Shayna’s impending marriage to the stalwart and enigmatically initialled KP. Am massively, massively excited for cousin Shay and am only slightly dreading a 13-hour flight home, and me with a cold and all. The next few days should be fun, busy, and see me maniacally supplementing my Flickr-stream.
iTunes to my ears
It seems a long, long time since I remember buying an album, sometimes two, in a haze of Saturday afternoon activity in Buckingham, or, on an exceptionally exciting weekend, in Milton Keynes or Oxford, and racing back to my room to listen to the Cranberries, Green Day, Weezer, Foo Fighters or the Offspring or some such on repeat until several things had happened:
(1) I’d worked out my preferred listening order (Offspring: Smash would alwas be track 8… folllowed by 4… and so on)
(2) I’d started to work out the chords or main riff out on guitar of the album’s signature single
(3) I’d annoyed the hell out of everyone in the immediate vicinity
A combination of general distraction, concern with real-life issues like women, jobs, family and other related (and, indeed, crucial) paraphenelia of life, has had me completely unable to find the same passion in music recently. The fact that I share musical taste with angry 15-year-olds may have also contributed to my general disaffection with the art form… Bbut the iPod nano, and the necessarry iTunes, which I recently mentioned, seems to have begun to change all that, and my life is once again beginning to have a soundtrack.
My Last.fm page is gradually being populated, iTunes has registed that I listen to Katie Melua and Weezer far too much at the moment, and I’m struggling to find new bands that strike the same chord of disaffected passion that I enjoyed in the mid-90’s without whinging my ears off.
Its getting exciting once again! But those who know me will know how painful an admission it is that something from Apple, a company I regard as being more steeped in marketing and design than in technological innovation, is helping my life in any way. And Gem will hopefully be gratified that she’s chosen a brilliant birthday gift which I appreciate enormously!
I just miss having the wonderful idle time to focus on music that I did in days gone by. *Sigh*. I’m properly getting middle aged now.
I want to ride my bicycle…!
Finally picked it up, and once I get over the worst of this cold nothing will get in my way! Except bad weather, London traffic, and the lunatics who drive buses and old mini coopers (the two categories of people I had near-misses with on the ride home). I’m particularly pleased with my snazzy cycle helmet. Thank you parents!!
Going to have to find some guides on not getting killed in London…
Puntastic
I can’t believe Chris didn’t appreciate the full greatness of this sun-tan shop in St. Andrews.
Birthday (phase the third)
Ok, I miscounted. Really there were three phases to the first round of celebration, and third was a great dinner on Monday that my brother cooked for me.
He made roast chicken in a bag which was great, and a rather marvellous salad, and we had some great wine and champagne – although I managed, to Arvind’s chagrin, to maintain my mid-week habit of not imbibing too much…
I also got AMAZING gifts. Gem got me an iPod Nano!!! I thought it was a double-CD when I saw the wrapped present! I still don’t quite believe it! They are every bit as beautiful and a little smaller than you’d imagine. I am going to have to plot something fiendishly good for her birthday to make up for it.
Siblings done really good. Some music and reading, a subscription to Private Eye and the box set of Jeeves and Wooster! And parents are buying me a bike, which my brother represented symbolically by laying his outer tyres around his living room with a bike helmet and a catalogue… hoping to shop for it today! So exciting!
It has been an awesome birthday – and the biggest party is yet to come! But I do already feel I have celebrated well, which is very satisfying, to say the least, and am massively greatful to friends and family for making it special in a dozen little ways.
Scary being closer to 40 than, erm, being born, though.
Fantasy
Been reading a lot lately; most recently finished Terry Pratchett’s “Thud” and the accompanying “Where’s my Cow?” (another gift from siblings), and this morning polished off the sequel to “Eragon”, which I blogged about a while ago, which is called “Eldest”.
I was jealous that the 15 year-old Chris Paolini had managed to get published when I was failing to even maintain my blog as adequately as I’d like — but that’s completely given way to simply being impressed. “Eldest” suffers from many of the things contemporary fantasy does – slightly derivative, pseudo-literary writing style that comes across as needlessly complex at times, and a moderately predictable plot.
That said, Paolini exceeds far more experienced writers with a maturity of style that really doesn’t give away the fact that he’s only just 21, with more believable dialogue and characters, with interesting relationship development and plot twists (even if they aren’t completely surprising) – and is, in short, inspiring. Its difficult not to judge a book by what you know of the author – indeed, what I know of Zadie Smith led me to have nothing but contempt for her Booker nominated “On Beauty” – so I don’t know to what extent my judgment is coloured here, but its probably enough to say that I enjoyed it.
Bring on book three!
Cake!!
Gemma made me a cake!! She’s a legend; that’s dedication for you…
Phase II of celebs were great, fortunately not being up too late last night meant not too knackered today for dim sum at Phoenix, followed by a rousing round of the hat game and some random Monkey Ball.
Had a great time. Fantastic to have siblings and good friends around. Shame few people couldn’t make it for various reasons, but I guess that’s what phase III of the celebrations are for!!
Anyway, will try to be less egocentric for a few weeks. But hey, at least the blog’s getting updated!
I’m PRO
Have just gone “PRO” on Flickr. Good business model; create a great product that doesn’t seem limited… and then have people discover the limitations just after it becomes valuable to them as a service.
Fortunately the US$ is still rubbish so it didn’t cost too much… a small birthday present to myself.
Birthday celebs (phase the first)
So, first stab at birthday celebrations and we went out to “Onanon,” a cheesey LNL venue in Piccadilly, which proved very entertaining.
Particularly pleased of this photo with Katie and Lisa which makes me look like much more of a player than I really am ;).
Although I was middle aged and “called” the evening at about 11.30 so we could all get last tubes home, we got a good bit of dancing in and I had a great night on the whole…
Phase 2 of celebs comes today with dim sum lunch… Yum! Majority of my celebrations, though, postponed till November for reasons too complicated to go into… People are being very charitable and celebrating with me multiple times!
More photos at my photostream, as ever. I really need to stick a static link to that in on the main navigation…