Blog Standard Stuff

Poor
Mutt

Last night the dog started hyper ventilating - 1 breath a second by my reckonings - and we’d been out so it’s anyone’s guess when she started, but at 11:15pm I decided it was time to call the vet in to check this out.

Just waiting now to see what the outcome is, but the duck that she ate earlier might have something to do with it. The thing is, even if she has got something lodged, this is not necessarily the least of my worries now. When the vet checked her out he found a heart murmer - a cystolic heart murmer to be precise; her heart is not pumping quite as well as it should be but you wouldn’t know it to look at her.

Holiday is booked for Saturday. Scooby, you have great timing ;-)

Update: Had a call back from the vets and she does have a heart problem. It turns out that she has a diseased heart valve in the atrium and rather like a saloon door in the old westerns, it’s flapping back and forth instead of going only one way and, consequently, blood is coming back the wrong way. As a result, the chamber has increased in size to accommodate the extra volume of blood but it will only do so up to a point. After that point, things will get trickier. The vet thinks that she will need to stay on medication, and she could have between 1-2 years in her. Scooby doesn’t know this, of course, and is behaving as if she’s a 2-year-old still.

The
Joy of Decks

After something like 13 years, I have finally ditched my faithful old mixer (for decks, not food, you know). I bought it from Tandy for what seemed like a king’s ransom at the time — heck it didn’t just have the turntable inputs, it also boasted faders for 2 other line inputs (switchable, giving me 4 potential line-ins, although not at the same time).

Many years ago, I decided to build a housing for my turntables (SL1210s), the mixer, a mini amp (that I could use to power a monitor speaker). It seemed like a sensible thing to do, as I was taking the kit out a lot at the time and it afforded some protection. The problem was that because of the way that I had built it — one long unit made from MDF — the whole lot weighed a ton and needed two people to carry it around. No sooner had the ‘mobile’ (ha, some irony) work dried out than I set to dismantling the unit. The problem was, when I got to take the mixer out from the recessed area, I remembered that I had taken off the base of the mixer to save on room in the unit. Now I couldn’t find the metal base, and so for the last few years I’ve had the decks free-standing while the mixer is in this monster-sized wooden housing!

Now I am the owner of a shiny new Numark mixer. It doesn’t have any inputs other than the decks — I don’t need any others these days, what with the digital revolution, the tape deck is packed ready to be sold, the CD player went to my sister’s house years ago and all I’m left with is vinyl. Delicious, scrummy, touchable vinyl.

I don’t care what anyone says — you simply can’t beat picking up the record, slapping it on the turntable and knocking together a mix, manually. No pressing of buttons on a computer keyboard or CD deck to shift things along, just good old-fashioned hands-on-decks. And scratching on a CD deck? I’m sorry … I’m the first one to try out gadgets, but really, you can’t change my opinion on this one! So, with a few hours to kill and a shiny new mixer to play around with, I re-discovered the joy of decks, and put together a couple of CD-sized mixes. (OK, so you can’t beat CDs for mastering, I’ll admit that much)

Happy Happy Housey Housey

1. Congress - 40 Miles
2. Pamela Fernandez - Kickin’ in the Beat
3. Kym Mazelle - Was That All It Was
4. Rhythm On The Loose - Break of Dawn
5. Ruffneck - Everybody Needs Somebody
6. UNI - The Organ Song
7. Fire Island - Fire Island
8. Farley & Heller - Ultra Flavor
9. Alcatraz - Give Me Love
10. The Bucketheads - The Bomb
11. Stoneage - Distraction
12. Pandella - This Time Baby
13. X-Press 2 - Muzik Xpress
14. Degrees of Motion - Shine On
15. Shiva - Work It Out
16. Pauline Henry - Love Hangover
17. Full Intention - Uptown Downtown

Trancy Stuff (I’m great with inventive titles, aren’t I?)

1. 6 By Six - Into Your Heart
2. Joshua Ryan - Pistol Whip
3. BT - Flaming June
4. Underworld - Dark and Long
5. Nalin & Kane - Beachball
6. Grace - Skin on Skin (Orange)
7. Transformer 2 - Just Can’t Get Enough
8. Paul van Dyk - Avenue
9. The OT Quartet - Hold That Sucker Down
10. ATB - (9pm Till I Come)
11. Warp Brothers vs Aquagen - Phatt Bass
12. Paul van Dyk - For An Angel
13. Humate - Love Stimulation
14. Nylon Moon - Sky Plus

Confessions of a Next-door Neighbour

Oh jeez, where do I start with this one …

It had been a noisy night on account of a house further up the road inviting all the noisiest drunks in Swindon to a house, front yard and back garden party. This later spilled out to the back alley, and with all the traffic of drunk, noisy people going up and down the alley I found myself keeping watch, big Mag Lite in my hand at the ready. At around 1:50am Manda woke up and came downstairs to find me. I gave up night watch duty and washed/brushed teeth etc, ready for bed. And that’s when the music started next door …

Now, they’re not a bad bunch next door, but this one guy who recently moved in is always playing his music loud - and it’s always R&B along the lines of R Kelly (if I hear another muffled-through-the-wall version of Ignition I will scream). In short, it’s the kind of music that always has bass stabs designed to piss off the next-door neighbours. That’ll be us then.

So, it’s 2am and despite the fact that his music is on his stereo in the back room and we’re at the front of the house, the bass is still too loud. It’s been one of those nights - I’ve had enough and I have to say something.

I first try knocking on the door. No answer. Try the window. No answer. I then try the letter box, loudly. Several times. He can’t hear me - must be that the music’s too loud, eh?

Plan B - I decide that knocking on the wall is not the answer (I prefer to address face-to-face), so instead I climb out the bathroom window on to the flat roof and walk across to his bedroom window. I raise my hand and am about to knock on his window when I spot it - through the crack in the curtains, Mr Skinny White R&B Lover, eyes shut (thankfully), and a large black shape moving up and down in front of him. The black shape is a T-shirt that is stretched across the rather large back of a young lady who, judging by her position and his expression, is doing something some men pay good money for. "Holy crap, he’s getting a blow job off a fat chick!" I think to myself.

I decide not to knock on the window and instead opt for a hasty retreat before I’m spotted and labeled a peeping Tom - or worse.

10 minutes later, the music is still going but they are not. Outside we can hear them arguing and I catch the words "knocking on door". Was I seen out of his window as I clambered back into mine?

I can’t help but wonder what would have happened had I simply knocked on the bedroom window without peering through it first. I’m sure it would have made him jump. Which in turn …

It’s a strange old world …

Comedian straps engine to dead pig and uses it as a boat

"Animal rights activists are furious after a Norwegian comedian attached an engine to a dead pig and used it as a boat."

George Bush says "Bring it on" to Iraqi people - ever the statesman, then?

And finally, another little gem - the Complete Acme Catalogue, as seen on countless old cartoons (most memorably Wile E Coyote). Personal favourite has to be the Jet-propelled Pogo Stick.

We’re all screwed

You know that things must be getting bad when huge gasses of galaxy-sized clouds are giving us the middle finger. We’re all doomed.