travel – Page 9

A “Never Mind The Buzzcocks” Moment

Remember Let Loose? They reached #2 in the singles chart back in 1994 with Crazy For You? (you’ll remember it when you hear the chorus, I promise) Turns out that since disappearing off the face of the Earth, the guitarist has been running a fabulous little bed-and-breakfast in a tiny village in Essex.

He didn’t look too hurt when my boss and I, sat on his couch, asked about the silver and gold CDs he had framed and mounted in his living room, and, when he revealed his identity and, neither of us could remember who Let Loose were or what they’d ever done. And I think he’d forgive us for not recognizing him: I probably wouldn’t have guessed it was him on the Identity Parade round of Never Mind The Buzzcocks, even having seen the music video.

I quite liked Crazy For You. I had it on some compilation CD at some point. I’d somehow completely forgotten about it’s existance until I looked it up again on YouTube. Thank you, YouTube!

Quickly, Before They Turn The Glass Into Lesbians!

So, what have I been up to this weekend, you ask. Well…

“Cover The Mirrors” Launch Party

On Friday I took the train up to Preston. The train I was on broke down at Machynlleth when they linked it up to the carriages that had come down the Pwllheli line, and the repairs set me back by almost an hour, but it turns out that the rest of the rail network was running behind schedule that day, too, and so I didn’t miss any important connections. I arrived in time for a quick “birthday tea” with my family (for my dad’s birthday) before rushing off to the Waterstones for the launch party for my friend Faye‘s first published novel, Cover The Mirrors.

I drank as much wine as the store were willing to give me and bought myself a signed copy of the book. I even managed to get the photo, above, under the proviso that it’s only allowed to appear on the internet thanks to the fact that I’m holding a carrier bag in front of Faye’s face (she’s more than a little camera-shy). I haven’t started reading Cover The Mirrors yet, because I’m virtually at the end of The Night Watch by Sergei Lukyanenko, and I’d like to finish that first, but little doubt you’ll hear about it here in due course.

Dad’s Birthday

After the book launch, my sisters and I took my dad out for a few drinks to celebrate his 51st birthday. It turns out that, in my absence, Preston’s nightclub scene has really taken off. We started out in an 80s-themed bar which is part of a chain called Reflex. It’s so 80s it’s unreal: all 80s hits playing, David Hasselhoff and Mr. T decorating every wall, glitter balls and spots and mirrors everywhere… deely-boppers available at the bar… and so on. Really quite a fantastic theme venue. Then, under my sister Sarah’s recommendation, we tootled up the street and into a cafe/club called Manyana, where my dad got hit on by somebody young enough to be his daughter.

I snatched this picture. I’ve no idea who she is – we didn’t get her name – but she seemed genuinely surprised to hear my dad’s age. So I had the DJ announce it, just to make sure there was no doubt in anybody’s mind that there was an old person on the dancefloor.

This influx of Preston nightclubs is making them all remarkably competitive with their drinks prices, too. I bought a few rounds for the four of us and none of them ever came to over a tenner, and one – thanks to the “buy one get one free” policy at Manyana – came to under £6, which is quite remarkable for a city nightclub on a Friday night for four people!

Back To Aberystwyth

On Saturday I had brunch with my sister Becky, my mum, and her boyfriend and then got back onto the trains to head back to Aberystwyth. Owing to line maintenance, the stretch of track between Crewe and Preston is unusable every weekend within sight, and so I was re-directed via Manchester Piccadilly. Yet again, my train ran late, and I found myself sprinting across Piccadilly station, trying to find a train that was heading Shrewsbury-way…

…meanwhile, my friend Katie, having slept through her stop, woke up in Manchester Piccadilly and, not quite awake, clambered off her train in an attempt to find a connection. I’d apparently featured in her dream, and so she was quite surprised (and not quite sure if she was seeing things) when I sprinted past her. She sent a text (which I chose to ignore: my pocket beeped but I was too busy looking for a train to take the time to get my phone out) and then phoned me before she was able to confirm that yes, it really was me.

As we were headed the same way, she joined me on my train for one stop, which was a nice surprise for what was a long and overcomplicated train journey. A few folks have suggested that this might not be a coincidence, and that she might be stalking me, but I’m yet to be convinced.

In any case, I don’t have a picture to go with this part of the story. Sorry.

Jimmy, Beth, and Troma Night

YATN. If you were there, you know how it went. Big thanks to Jimmy and Beth for coming along.

Lloyd Kaufman’s Visit

In case you’ve not been anywhere that I can pounce on you and go “squee!” recently, here’s what you missed out on. You’ll remember that last week I mentioned that Poultrygeist – Troma‘s new movie – was coming to Aberystwyth. Well, it did. And it rocked…

…and better yet, Ruth, Claire, JTA, Paul and I got to hang out with Lloyd Kaufman, president of Troma Studios and producer of The Toxic Avenger, for a couple of pints and to share a bowl of nachos. The guy’s fabulously chatty and friendly, and if it weren’t for the awestruck feeling of “wow, we’re just sat here chatting with Lloyd Kaufman in Lord Beechings” we’d have probably been more interesting company.

Dan, Claire, !!!LLOYD KAUFMAN!!!, JTA, and Ruth

When he said goodbye, kissing the cheeks of each of the girls, I genuinely thought that they were in danger of exploding with excitement. Thankfully they didn’t, because I’d already bought them tickets to see Poultrygeist later on.

Which was, as I’ve said before, fantastic. It’s even better seen with a nice, energised audience, and better still when the director and several other people who worked on the film are hanging around afterwards to answer questions, chat, autograph things and so on. There are apparently 15 prints of Poultrygeist and the capacity to make more on demand, so if you want to see it and can’t wait for the DVD release, go speak to your local cinema now and ask if they’ll show Poultrygeist, even if only for a week (as Lloyd himself said, it’s better than showing Transformers on all 24 screens of some soulless megaplex). And hell, with Troma’s current financial situation, they could probably do with a helping hand with getting into as many projection booths as possible!

The title of this post – Quickly, Before They Turn The Glass Into Lesbians! – is a reference to one of my favourite lines in the film.

Paul might have bitten off more than he can chew, though, as he hinted on his blog. After some discussion with Lloyd, Paul is likely to be responsible for:

Re-establishing the UK division of the Troma fan club.
Acting as president of the above, for the forseeable future.
Investigating UK distribution of Troma films.
Oh, and making an official DVD subtitle track for Poultrygeist: Night Of The Chicken Dead, which describes the Troma Night drinking rules and reminds you when you should be drinking. He’s got a few ideas about things that should be in such a subtitle track, too, and if you’re familiar with the rules you’ll probably be able to guess what he’s thinking about.

I’ll leave it to him to go into detail, if he wishes.

Matt In Hospital

Between places, we also joined a growing crowd at the foot of Matt‘s bed in Bronglais Hospital. His operation was a success, but he’s reacted unusually to the general anaesthetic and they’re likely to keep him in for observation for another few days. If you haven’t had a chance to visit him already, he’d probably appreciate the company (although Sarah seems to have barely left his side): visiting hours are 3pm-5pm, 6pm-8pm: just ask if you need to know what ward he’s in and how to get there. If you’re feeling particularly cruel, mock him by talking about how well your bodily excretions are working, or swap his drip with his catheter bag while he’s not looking.

But seriously: I’m sure we all wish him well.

Curry!

Finally – as if we weren’t full enough from a large Sunday lunch – after leaving the cinema, Gareth, Penny, Amy, ~~Ruth, JTA~~, Rory, Paul, Claire and I slipped down for a late-night curry at the Spice of Bengal. Which was delicious, although there was a little much food for those of us who were already quite full.

Nonetheless, a fantastic end to a fantastic weekend! I’m sure everybody else will have a different story to tell (Paul spent longer with Lloyd and went to more films; Claire and Jimmy got horribly drunk together on Friday night after she, Ruth and JTA failed to see a Meatloaf concert; Matt’ll have his own morphine-fuelled tale to spin, and so on), because it’s been a rich, full couple of days for many of us abnibbers.

How Not To Watch Comedy

We failed quite miserably to see any live comedy yesterday (although the day before was good). I blame the wine.

Y’see, we thought: you know what would be nice before we go out this afternoon? A quick bottle or two of wine.

Six bottles of wine later, the plan to go and watch some shows somehow mutated into a different plan – and I use the word “plan” in it’s loosest possible interpretation – involving:

– Board games
– Partial nudity
– Talking bollocks
– Chatting to an ex-bodybuilder who got hit by a car and now runs a kebaberie
– Swimming
– Saunaing
– Watching films

Today we’re all sleepy and confused.

Edinburgh Fringe

Well, we made it to Edinburgh. After scooping up (well, not literally, although that could have been funny) Ruth and JTA from Maulds Meaburn we zipped off up the motorway and soon were completely lost in Edinburgh. Now I don’t want to point a finger of blame here, but I’ll say this: if Ruth’s contribution to finding the flat we’re staying in wasn’t a hand drawn map with only three road names and a “here be dragons”note in the corner, we might have found it a little easier. Thankfully the GPS unit in my mobile phone was able to show us the correct route, despite a few early hiccups in it not sufficiently distinguishing between a bridge and a junction, leading to dialogue like this:

Dan (staring at phone): Turn left.
Claire: At the roundabout ahead?
Dan: No, now! Oh, you’ve missed it.
Claire: We’re on a bridge, Dan.

Anyway, we somehow finally reached the flat. It’s a little less spacious that last year’s, and a little further away from the city centre, but it’s nice and it has a garage to put the car in.

[pause in typing to have sex]

We’ve been to a handful of shows yesterday and the night of the day before. We’re basically following the formula we settled on last year of Peter Buckley Hill’s Free Fringe all the way. We’re also taking every opportunity to evangelise against this year’s new rival, the Laughing Horse Free Festival. You ever seen an argument between advocates of different Free Software licenses? Same thing, really: we feel that Laughing Horse is providing the Wrong Thing [TM] to it’s comics. Anyway, that’s a debate for when I’m not blogging from my phone.

It’s nice to spend time with Ruth and JTA, anyway, because I always forget how much I end up missing them in Aber.

Oh, and I AM checking my friends’ blogs, too, but posting comments is challenging, so: congratulations to Paul on his new upcoming job, to Andy for getting Radio One airplay (wish I’d heard it!), and to Faye for finally learning to take time off. And to those of you who’ve commented on my recent posts or e-mailed me: thanks, I’ll reply eventually!

Suppose it’s time I got up and had a shower.

Le Grande Tour

Firstly; thanks to everybody who tested my kitten-based authentication system yesterday. It seems to be working quite well.

Claire and I are undergoing a grand tour of the United Kingdom this coming week, as follows:

This afternoon, we’re driving (in Claire’s car) to Cardiff. Coincidentally, Gareth, who was visiting us this weekend to help me with a programming project we’ve been working on quite a lot this month, is also travelling from Aberystwyth to Cardiff today. In Cardiff, Claire and I will be meeting up with my mum, her boyfriend, and my sisters, to see the War Of The Worlds Musical. My mum and I have had tickets for this every year since Red Planet Productions – who were trying to get it started back then – announced it, but this is the first year that they’ve actually performed it. It could be good, or it could be disasterous. We’ll see.
After the show, we’ll either be (a) retiring to Gareth’s parents’ house for a few hours sleep; or (b) driving straight on to Preston: this mostly depends on how tired Claire, who has to do the driving, is. My personal preference would be to drive right on up to Preston – the night-time traffic will be far better than the morning’s traffic (even on a bank-holiday weekend), and there’s a bed, rather than a couch, waiting for us at my dad’s house. In either case, we’ll be in Preston either very early in the morning or very early in the afternoon.
Next stop: Scotland – in Preston, we transfer into my dad’s car, and we’re joined by his colleague and family, by my sisters (who are staying overnight in Cardiff and travelling North in the morning), and burn our way up the country to Aviemore. For those not familiar with Scotland, this is a Long Way North… so; yeah… more travelling.
Tuesday morning – snow permitting, we’re skiing in the Cairngorm mountains, near Aviemore. Wednesday, more of the same. Claire’s never been skiing before, and people have been, in a curiously counterproductive way, trying to reassure her that it is both safe and fun by recounting their horrific skiing injuries to her. Yeah; thanks guys.
On Wednesday night we’re driving South to Stirling, and, at this point, Claire and I will make our way three miles East to visit Kit and Fi. It seems silly to travel the first 600 miles of the journey to their house up there and not the last three.
On Thursday and Friday(?) we’re going to Nae Limits, an adventure sports activity centre thing. Zorbing is off, so we’ve cast votes on the activities to take part in, and I’m not yet sure what won. Claire and I voted for river bugging (in which participants are strapped into what are basically inflatable armchairs and pushed over waterfalls) and canyoning (in which we’ll probably be climbing back up those same waterfalls). Having watched The Descent last night at a special Troma Night at Adam‘s house, canyoning doesn’t feel like such a good idea any more! They don’t have subterranean flesh-eating monsters in Scotland, right?
Immediately after this, on Friday afternoon, we’re travelling back to Preston… via Gateshead. My dad’s got his new business to run over there, and has set himself up a flat in which to live the weeks he’s working on that side of the country. Guess who needs his ADSL set up?
Back in Preston, we’re off to The Comedy Store in Manchester.
And then, finally, on Saturday, we’re travelling back down to Aberystwyth… just in time for Troma Night!

Additional missions we’re on include:

In accordance with tradition, if we visit anywhere with a Tesco, we’ll bring back cookies and doughnuts, although we anticipate you’ll all be full of chocolate this week anyway.
Paul‘s asked if we can get him some shortbread while we’re up in Scotland. I’m sure we can manage that.

Any other missions you’d like to assign to us while we’re out? No, Matt, you can’t have a cornetto. You’ve got perhaps a few minutes to tell us before we go.

I’ll be trying to keep online with e-mail access and perhaps even a blogpost or two while I’m away, but I can’t promise anything about my connectivity. Phone signal should be okay if I’m needed in an emergency, though.

Llanwrtyd Wells Real Ale Ramble

What’s everybody doing on the third weekend in November? If I could find reasonabley-priced accomodation (everybody likes camping, right <wink>), who’d be up for the Llanwrtyd Wells Real Ale Ramble – two days of trekking over hills and being fed real ale at various points along the way?

From the web site:

The Real Ale Ramble is held annually in conjunction with the Mid Wales Beer Festival. All the walks begin from the centre of Llanwrtyd Wells, the smallest town in Britain. This is an area where the pace of life is relaxed and traditional, where the inhabitants are friendly and welcome visitors who come to enjoy the unsurpassed scenery of this little known part of Mid Wales.

The Real Ale Rambles are non competitive, the entry fee for 2004 [think they mean 2005 – they say 2005 everywhere else, and the information seems to still be accurate] is £16 per person which covers 2 days (booking by the day will cost £15 per day) and there are choices of 10, 15 or 25 miles daily. All routes are waymarked, and a refreshing glass of Real Ale will be free to all registered participants at the various checkpoints en-route. All walks take place off road, so you can enjoy the beauty of the landscape, forest, moor and mountain in this spectacularly beautiful area of Mid Wales. Those who finish their chosen walk can purchase a medal or badge and track suit badges will also be on sale.

I’ll get an information pack on it’s way to The Flat. And before you ask, Llanwrtyd Wells is less than 2 hours drive away.

Catch-Up: Concerts

Yes, it’s true, I’m bad at blogging. But as we all know, weblogs suck anyway. Regardless: here’s the long-awaited catchup of my whereabouts and doings of the last week (as all I’d previously said is that I’d left and that I’d got back again.

Claire and I went to Preston a week last Thursday evening, for a busy weekend of travelling around and attending concerts on what turned out to be the hottest weekend of the year so far. At the Old Trafford Cricket Ground, Manchester, on Friday, we saw REM, who are absolutely stunning live, it turns out: on stage, they throw a lot more energy and a lot more emotion into what is (in recordings) quite quiet and sombre tracks. A wonderful concert, although we did get somewhat crushed when we were (at the start) within spitting distance of the bands, and so we had to retreat back before the end. Supporting them were Idlewild, who turned out to be brilliant, Feeder, who were very good, and The Zutons, who weren’t so good. Claire was more impressed by the latter, but I think that may just have been because she could look down on their saxophonist (not in height, of course, but in saxophone skill).

Then, on Saturday, we travelled down to Milton Keynes to see Green Day at the Milton Keynes Bowl. The bowl is, to all intents and purposes, a large grassy crater just outside of the city, in which they’d erected an enormous sound stage. Green Day were supported by a handful of pretty nondescript pseudo-rock bands, much of which we slept through with our t-shirts over our faces to help us breathe in the sticky air until the sun set. Green Day themselves were brilliant – aside from a slight problem with the video link (the difference between the speed of light and the speed of sound meant that by the time we could hear what they were singing we’d already seen them mouth it): they could have done with repeater projectors as well as the repeater speakers they had – a royally rockin’ gig. A good selection of stuff from their new album and older material, lots of crowd enthusiasm, a few bottle fights, all the stuff you expect from a nice, loud concert. We spent the night at a draconically-run travel lodge-like place a little way between Milton Keynes and London.

And on Sunday we went into London (well; if you’re going to travel 700 miles around the country anyway you might as well take a minor diversion if you pass a place of interest) to go to the National Science Museum, which was good as ever. Their new “Hitch-Hikers’ Guide To The Galaxy” exhibit wasn’t very impressive, but I don’t know what I expected from it, though.

The highlight of the trip has to be a conversation between Claire, my sister Becky, and I in the cafe at the Science Museum. It went thusly:

Dan: Claire doesn’t like carrot cake.
Becky: (to Claire) Have you ever tried carrot cake?
Claire nods
Becky: (to Claire) And did you like it?
Claire nods
Becky: (to Claire) So… do you like carrot cake?
Claire shakes head

Unfathomable.

Photos From Malawi

[this post was lost during a server failure on Sunday 11th July 2004]

[an image in this post was recovered on Thursday 30th December 2004]

Here’s some photos of my trip to Malawi, as the group have now started uploading photos to me at last!

Dan looks down on Lake Malawi.

Dan on the descent.

Two baboons, at Vwasa National Park.

Livingstonia Hospital: This woman and her baby have both been diagnosed with AIDS
Thanks to ARVs, the woman’s condition is improving. Her baby cannot be treated and will die.

Beautiful waterfall, on a river running from Livingstonia to Lake Malawi.

Will post more when I can be bothered. Meanwhile, photos are continuously being uploaded to Scatmania’s Malawi Album [update: link killed 2006]

Off To Malawi!

I’m off to Malawi!

I’ve found my bus ticket (stupid train strikes), my passport (stupid immigration laws), my juggling balls (stupid… no, wait… juggling is good)… I guess I’m ready to go.

Contrary to my assumption that my bus would be leaving from the bus station, it’s apparently leaving from Plascrug… which is… somewhere… hmm…

Anyway, y’all, take care, have fun without me, blah blah blah, be thinking of you. Will try to update this blog (or at least phone-in an update that can be appended as a comment) while I’m on the road. And sorry I couldn’t get Product ‘X’ working better than it does before I left.

Hugz & kittenz;

Pre-Malawi Update

Here’s the state of play before I leave Aber for awhile, in answer to all the questions that people keep on asking me and that therefore I ought to answer in a centralised manner, here, to save them from doing so (and me from repeatedly having to say the same replies):

Yes, I leave for Malawi on Wednesday the 16th on June, early in the morning. Yes, I realise that this is Claire’s 21st birthday, and for this reason we’ve re-scheduled her birthday for the more convenient Tuesday 15th (meaning that she’ll get one day longer of being 21 than most people get… except for those for whom their 21st falls before February in a leap year, or after February the year before, I suppose).

No, I’m not taking my bike: I’m acquiring one out there. Yes, I’ll be back on the 30th June, string-and-balsa aeroplanes permitting. Yes, I’m aware that (despite now no longer being illegal) long hair on men is still frowned upon in some parts of Malawi, and I’ll be concealing mine tucked-under a hat.

Yes, the side-effects of the lariam have mostly stopped, now. I still have interesting sleep patterns and really, really weird dreams (I haven’t been blogging them because they’ve all either [a] been more disturbing for those who’d read them even than the one about Matt was, or [b] because I’ve only remembered fragments of them).

Right; and on that note – I have things I need to get on with. I’ll post one more update, at least, before I leave for Malawi: other than that, I’ll be quiet on the blog front for the next fortnight.

Oh! You’re Going To Malawi? While You’re There, Pick Me Up Some AA Batteries…

[this post has been partially damaged during a server failure on Sunday 11th July 2004, and it has been possible to recover only a part of it]

As most of my readers will probably be aware, I’ll later this year be cycling around Malawi as a sponsored stunt with Cycle Tracks: “A Truly Charitable Bike Ride through a Truly Beautiful Country”. In any case; I’d never have thought that our group (11 of us) would be roped into so many other things while we were there.

Our team leader, Alistair, writes:

Eleven is also a fine number for a football team. So maybe at Phoka we could engage the local team in a game. Their handicap is that they are all under 12 and don’t wear boots. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that it will be a walkover as we shall all be totally exhausted from cycling to Phoka and unable to walk never mind kick a ball.

You may be interested to know that we have been offered football strips, boots, footballs, gloves and goodness knows what else for the kids at Phoka. I haven’t figured out how I will get them out to Phoka. They are in 3 kit bags but I don’t know how heavy they might be. Might split it amongst the group for the flights.

Suddenly we’re delivery cyclists, too…

But that’s not all; we’ve got another mission while we’re there: a …

Handles; Life; And Grabbing The Latter By The Former

[this post was damaged during a server failure on 11 July 2004; it was partially-recovered on 13 October 2018]

Oh yeh – we went to Brum on Saturday, but Bryn tells that story far better than I did, with all of it’s visiting Scottish girlfriends, fallen trees (and phone lines), visits to Newtown McDonalds, and enormous shopping centres, so I’ll not bother repeating anything to do with that. Troma Night, when we got back, was good, though.

What I did want to share with you was that there’s a lot of pleasure to be gained by ‘grabbing life by the handles’, hence the title of this merry little post. I’m sure Andy knows what I mean, and Kit, with his ongoing evacuation in the direction of Scotland, understands too.

What I’m talking about is leaping on opportunities; not being tied down by pessimism. And doing things just to remind yourself that you can, because you’re wonderful and you can take on the world if you’re that way inclined. It’s pushing yourself that little bit further for nothing more than the satisfaction of a sweat. It’s letting yourself show off how great you are …

Back In Aber

As expected, I had very little internet access over the Christmas period. And now I’m back in Aber. Mozilla reports 688 new e-mails. Joy.

Will say more when I can be arsed. I came back here from Lancashire via Merseyside and Norfolk. That’s a fair journey by anyone’s standards.

Hugz;

Off To Norfolk!

Claire and I are leaving Aberystwyth for Norfolk! Off to spend Christmas with her folks before heading up to Preston on Boxing Day to be with my family.

Have barely begun wrapping presents. For that matter, I still haven’t had delivered my mum’s present. Or one of Claire’s. Damned freaky postmen. Or something.

In any case, I’ll be in and out of internet access (well, technically, I’ve now put my Psion 5mx back into active service, which, combined with my funky GPRS mobile phone, puts me online ‘everywhere’, but hey: I think I’ve downloaded a telnet client so wherever I go I *theoretically* have e-mail access… we’ll see).

I’ll drop a blog entry or two while I’m gone.

In the meantime: Merry Christmas, y’all.

Reb Leaves The Country!

It turns out that Reb (my ex-) was trying to get in touch with me to tell me that she was leaving the country: she’d decided on Saturday night that she wanted to tell me that today (Tuesday) she’d be leaving the UK to go and work for six months in Benidorm, returning for a few weeks in January before (if she can get a visa sorted out) moving to Egypt.

This is good for two reasons:

(a) This is something she’s wanted to do pretty-much since I met her, six years ago. She suffers from Seasonal Affective Disorder, which causes her to become depressed during shorter days as a result of a dependency upon sunlight to make ‘happy chemicals’ in the brain. Moving to more equatorial regions – at least for the winter – should make her a happier bunny.

(b) I no longer have to share a country with her. Seriously, it’s a great relief. I’m sure that folks in Preston will be glad to hear this news, too. Apparently she had a party to commemorate her leaving. I wonder if I can organise one, too, to celebrate that she’s gone.

But I suppose that’s excessively harsh. When I spoke to her on the phone on Sunday I didn’t even for a moment get a compulsion to put a spear through her chest and skewer her to a tree, and I even smiled at the fact that we were talking (and not just at the fact that she was leaving).

She said that she misses me. I said that I was glad that I didn’t miss her, because she’d caused me enough self-abuse in my lifetime. She changed the subject.