Just so you know ....

Underpass (Oil on canvas, 36 x 72 ins)

I know I've been letting my blog slide a bit, but there are mitigating circumstances. The cold I spoke of last time dragged on and dragged on and even now I'm feeling a few lingering effects. More importantly, the problem  I wrote about quite a while ago, the ocular hypertension in my left eye, continues to plague me and has now entered the stage of being classed as open angle glaucoma. There has been some damage to my vision and I'm learning to come to terms with that.

But I'm resilient and there are ideas buzzing around in my head that must eventually come out onto paper or canvas. I hope you'll stick around for the journey.

A Return is Foretold

ZipMedia is pleased to announce the arrival of a final report from Patsy123, our Roving Correspondent:

This is our last day & guess what? I have come down with a cold. suppose thats what happens when you share train compartments with folks for long periods of time. Spent yesterday spending money, no good bringing any back is there? Got one or two things for you.

I will try to give you a call from Heathrow tomorrow, just to check if you will be at the airport. This has been such a great trip, I've some philosophy ideas to share with you, but I am also looking forward to returning to you and my Tynemouth flat.

Woohoo! Patsy123 is coming home, bearing gifts, philosophy and a cold, all for me!

(Note to self: Make sure it's not one of those chicken colds.)

The Birds & the Bugs

I think I've already established my credentials as a man of the birds. Indeed Bob Eh from next door calls me the Bird Man of *Our Street*. I've spent more time this week waving my arms in the window to scare away the bullyboy magpies and jackdaws, so the littl'uns can get their grub, than I have coughing, and that's saying something.

It'll come as no surprise, then, to find me poking around in the RSPB website. And what do I find? An exciting new count they want us to carry out. We have to count bugs! Hurrah! This will show how available this valuable food source is to the feathered folk.

Not just any old bugs, however, but bugs that end up splattered on the number plates of our cars after each journey.

The count lasts from 1 -30 June and there's an online form to record your splatterings. Even better, you can get a downloadable 'Splatometer' - a grid to help you count the insects!!

And I don't drive! I don't have a CAR!

Do you suppose I could just hold a card in front of me and run Very Fast Indeed for a while, then count the splattered insects on my card?

Breakfast Waffles

Having spent most of last night coughing, hawking and spitting, I really wasn't in the mood for the arrival of Lucy Smooth's workmen this morning. They'd come to replace her front windows, and as I quickly learnt, this involved a great deal of drilling, banging, hammering, whistling (people still whistle!), repartee and of course, The Workman's Friend: a radio.

Unlike some lucky bloggers, who are troubled only by a noisy fondness for Radio 2, I had workmen who were into what sounded like Magic 105.4.

Putting in the URL, I discover to my surprise that Magic is a London station. When at University at Newcastle, we listened to Magic for a short while. Just long enough to realise that while they had a decent set of untroublingly MOR records, they only had about 15 of them. When they'd played them, they...played them again. And again. Nothing seems to have changed.

Amid the sounds of hammering and drilling, I shuffled about having breakfast and reading the post. Two letters from the same dental practice letting the man we bought the house from 12 years ago know his next appointment is overdue.

And another electoral address. This time from someone else crawling out of the woodwork: RESPECT, The Unity Coalition. I read it all carefully. I don't believe in dismissing people without giving them a fair hearing. I wasn't convinced, however, especially when I saw George Galloway's cheery face squinting at me from the back of the leaflet. Apparently, he's a "Respect MP."

I have little time for what's become of New Labour, and I generally show my socialist leanings quite openly, but most of this leaflet is of the old-fashioned, discredited kind of Old Labour.

"No to the euro and the new EU constitution."
"Raise tax on the big corporations to fund public expenditure."

In effect, let's get out of Europe and tax the big Internationals. Then watch them move out of Britain into mainland Europe, leaving us to our greater decline.

And inevitably: "End the occupation of Iraq." Couldn't agree more. The sooner the better. I was against the war in the first place. But how the hell can the Coalition forces simply pull out now, without at least trying to ensure some stability? I do think we're in a hole and digging fast, but what would happen to Iraq if it were left to its own devices now? Probably what I always expected: either an Islamic Fundamentalist government, or a civil war. I rather think one of these will be the outcome whenever we leave, but I don't believe our pretty soiled position in history would be improved by cutting and running now.

Notes from a Sick Bed

Not wishing to dwell on my near-death experience (AKA my cold), but it has kinda dried up my creative juices. Not only that, but I haven't felt up to doing much, so blogfodder hasn't come my way.

On Thursday, the Frootbat and I collected some of my pictures from the Biscuit Factory. Then, over a coffee back at Stately Zip Mansion, we exchanged our views on the increasingly cluttered Zip living room, bloggery, and loss of memory. I'm sure we touched on more, but.....loss of memory.

Later that day, I met Patsy123 in town. After a pint in the Bacchus we ate in Pani's again. Another good meal (lotsa chilli!). Then we went home. Then we had our Bourbon. Then we went to bed.

Apart from a bit of desultory grocery shopping, and a lot of hacking coughery, I didn't do much on Friday, other than finally get the solicitors to complete on my remortgage. Which is a good thing, in view of today's letter from the old lender, saying they're putting up the monthly payment by a tenner. I fart in their general direction.

I know going to bed early is always a good way to recuperate, but I did notice there was a serial killer movie on Channel Five last night. Classic Kill starred Molly Ringwald as a classical music radio DJ, stalked by a serial killer who kept knocking off people who'd offended her with bad reviews or radio rivalry. There was some romantic involvement with a rather forgettable and unattractive cop with an angular face and dirty-looking designer stubble. There were numerous, fairly obvious red herrings and no way to guess who the stalker might be because he wasn't introduced until the last ten minutes.

Worst of all, the killer got rid of his victims with a poisoned bottled of expensive red wine. Did they writhe? Did they scream? Did their eyes pop? Did they fuck! They just looked a little surprised and keeled over. If you're going to do a serial killer movie, you really do have to have an element of the Baroque. Think Se7en. Think The Bone Collector. Bloody hell, think The Abominable Doctor Phibes!!

Socks or Curry?

According to the Editorial in La Petite Zine, this is the remedy for a head cold:

Soak a pair of cotton socks in a bowl of ice water. At the same time, soak your feet in a basin of hot water (not scalding, but hot as you can take if you want to intensify the process, take a hot bath). Once your entire body heats up (a little bit of sweat on your upper lip may act as your timer), remove your feet from the basin (or your body from the bath, in which case, towel off immediately and get into your
pajamas). Do the following in quick succession: remove the cotton socks from the ice water and put them on your feet; put on a dry pair of wool socks over the wet cotton socks; get immediately into bed, under sufficient covers, and stay there for 8 hours. Ideally, you should complete this process at night, and go directly to sleep. You will wake completely cured. At very least, you will wake with a clearer head. It works.

So it's ice cold socks versus a hot curry and a lot of whisky. I know where my vote goes.

Tonight, I have been eating mostly potato and leek soup with added chilli followed by oranges and a banana. Rounded out by a small yoghurt, not apricot. There was a pear and a glass of fino as an apperitif, and later this evening, the bottle of Bourbon will be wrung out. Socks? Didn't even bother to put any on.

Oh, I do like to be beside........

Lest you get the idea from the post about my cold that I'm ridiculously superstitious, let me reassure you that I'm a modern man who is fully aware that colds are caused by viruses, not by casting clouts.

Last night, in the absence of echinacea, I doctored myself with a fiery curry and generous amounts of a rather rough Kentucky bourbon. This morning, I find I'm feeling less like a person at death's door. Indeed, I felt well enough later last night to post a longish piece about Cafe Society, as I hope you've seen. In his comment, the Frootbat hints at surprise that I remember so much about those balmy days. Actually, it's quite easy if you simply download a paragraph or two from a disc marked FANZINE, typed nearer the time.

I'm pretty sure that I picked up this cold virus at the market in Tynemouth Metro station on Saturday. I stayed at Patsy123's place on Friday night, and when she went off to the Metro station at 7.30 to help a friend set up her stall, I did my part by keeping out of the way in bed. So it was, that by the time she came back to look for me, I'd had a leisurely breakfast and watched an exciting march-past by the TA, complete with military band. I expect they were demonstrating the effectiveness of our coastal defences to the Enlarged Europeans still lurking offshore in their container lorries.

It was a gloriously hot day, as good as any I've experienced abroad. As we walked up the main street, the crowds were making the most of the weather, and I felt like I was in a modern day Donald McGill postcard. There were lots of fat women in tight dresses with screaming kids, queues for the fish and chip shop, abandoned ice cream cornets lying on the pavement waiting for someone to slip, and - the modern aspect - scantily-clad girls with their shaven-headed, tattooed paramours, sinking lagers.

It felt good to be in England.

Coldplay

I've often debated with myself the meaning of the old adage, "Ne'er cast a clout till May is out." I've generally come to the conclusion that the "May" referred to is actually May blossom, rather than the month of May. Seemed to make sense, in that, if the weather has been poor, the blossom will probably be late. Ergo, it will be too cold to cast any of those clouts accumulated over the winter.

But now I'm not so sure. There's certainly an abundance of May blossom about, and the excellent weather has seen me casting clouts like they were going out of fashion (actually, in the Toon, I think they are). But the month is not yet out.

And what has happened? I've got a sore throat, a snuffly nose and regular bouts of sneezing. I've got a cold! And is there any echinacea in the house? There is not. I NEED echinacea. For the love of god, ECHINACEA!!!