We Fins luv your soft rock stylings ya?

OK, it’s come to this, im going to have a roll out an other ‘when I were a rock star’ tale. Reason being that two of t’other legends have got blogs and are likely to mine this story soon if I don’t get in there first. Truth be told we were small fry, we managed to cultivate a reasonable close-to-home fan-base who would buy enough of our CDs to pay for the next one, and a great slap-up Christmas dinner. But one thing our illustrious manger did well was to publicise us in European countries who frankly didn’t know any better.

There was a period of two years or so when approx one long weekend a month we were jetting off to Scandinavia, Holland or Germany to rock the socks of the unsuspecting locals. Best part of it was without doubt, the fact that it was a free weekend away with yer mates. Most times we’d stay in hotels but some times we’d be sleeping on the floor in some random house of a promoter who looked like Ringo Starr. In retrospect those were the most craic - ‘getting in amongst em’ as our manager liked to say.

The venues would vary greatly, sometimes it would be a festival in a holiday camp near Eindhoven, next it was a youth meeting in downtown Düsseldorf, next it would be a wee pub is the snowy hills around Essen, or a beach hut along the Hague sea front or a summer festival by a late in mid Sweden. We never really knew what to expect until we got there.

One February weekend we were booked to play at an unpronounceable festival in Turku, Finland. We usually flew to Amsterdam then on to our location, this was a particularly cold weekend and when the plane landed in Helsinki it was minus 16 degrees. As we walked from the plane to the terminal the wings were being de-iced for take off (I wouldn’t have fancied the return journey). We got to the luggage carousal and waited as usual for our instruments and our bags to come around, as we always did hoping they hadn’t got damaged in transit (as was common). Fifteen minutes later we noticed that the bags had stopped coming, and the horrible realisation set in that we we’d been de-bagged!

Vox came to the fore, and marched up to the KLM desk to let them know that we were world renowned recording artists and we needed our bags by 11am the next day for a sound check. This seemed to do the trick so we made our way to the hotel, finding it all quite an adventure.

At the hotel we had a bit of banter at the bar, meeting up with a crazed fan (crazed seems harsh, but he was a bit of a mentalist). He was Finnish and had travelled to gigs in other parts of Europe to see us, and he was really proud to have us on his home turf.

We were still wearing the clothes we’d travelled in - I have an awful feeling that I opted for casual slacks and a polo neck sweater. We’d no wash bags or night attire, other than the wee wash pack KLM had given us on the plane. So when the morning came we were dying to get at our bags so we could have a good shower and change before the gig.

But yes, you’ve guessed it, the bags hadn’t arrived. At this point we started to get a bit concerned. The cavalcade arrived at the hotel to bring us to the gig venue and seemed uninterested in our story and more interested on getting us there in time. ‘Don’t worry we’ll sort it out’ seemed to be their favourite phrase. So in we got, still wearing the clothes we put on the previous morning and smelling like angry Swedes (that joke slays them in Finland).

As with all these trips we still had no idea what to expect. In my mind I was thinking it would be a little town square festival, where we played on the back of a lorry while some people listened and others wandered around the stalls. When we pulled up at the biggest ice hockey arena I’d ever seen we were convinced we were just using the car park.

As we got through the doors we realised that it was a 20,000 seater arena and they were hopeful of filling most of it. We started to get that pit of the stomach feeling of oh oh, we’re soooo out of our depth. They obviously think we’re something we’re not. Think about the stage at Live Aid, but indoors, massive screen each side of the stage, excited teenagers everywhere

THEN it hit us, oh my word, we’re wearing the clothes we travelled in, oh crap, we’ve got no instruments. The hunt was on scavenging and begging random punters to see if we can borrow a few guitars - eventually it paid off and we got what we needed (though I ended up playing this Level 42 like 5-string poncy bass). We jumped on stage trying to look like it was the kinda audience we were used to - shouting things like     Hello Finland!

When it was over we were euphoric, taking pictures of everything that moved, chatting non stop about the gig, but even as we were manning the merchandise booth, servicing a queue of enthusiastic Fins,  it was tempered with the melancholic thought that we would probably never play to this many people again. We never did, but we’ll always have Turku.

A Real Checkpoint Charlie

As I’ve mentioned before in a rather long dramatic and hammed up post, my dad used to be a member of her majesty’s constabulary in Belfast, NI. It did lead to a couple of good blog-fodder moments, which im sure is why he joined. At the age of 16 I decided that having basically failed my exams that moving on to A-Levels and Sixth-Formness was just asking for trouble. So I opted to take a different tack… and go to college. I didn’t exactly know what that meant other than that I didn’t have to get a job, and it wasn’t school. I remember looking through the prospectus deciding between ‘Heating and Pluming’ and ‘Land Management’ I’d no idea what either of them really were but I was told these were the least subscribed courses so I’d a good chance of getting on one. In retrospect if I’d chosen Heating and Pluming I’d most likely be a lot richer than I am now… but at the time it seemed really gypy! I ended up choosing a generic engineering course - but that’s not the point of this post.

The college was at the bottom of Divis Street, beside Divis Flats, infamous for having a British Army lookout base on the top floor and for being a staunchly Irish Republican area. It should be noted that before I started going here I don’t think I had ever had a conversation with a Catholic -  not because I didn’t want to, I lived in a prod area and went to a prod church, all my friends where prods all my parents friends where prods - that’s the way it was/is.

Needless to say that it was enlightening being in a class of 20 boys where I was the only non militant Irish republican - I actually kinda liked it, I was their pet Hun! I started to take note of the Glasgow Rangers scores (even though I hadn’t before) so on Monday morning I could have a bit of banter.

It got a bit ropy at times, especially when there were a lot of car bombs going of in town. One day there was a bomb in the car park of Castlecourt Centre, just across the road. We were all evacuated but we were close enough to see it go of - all the boys started cheering and singing which was a bit of a reality check about the assorted political views.

Then came the moment. On a boring afternoon were all making some sort of electronic capacitance meter when one of the lads called everyone over to the window. There were a couple of police armoured Landrovers outside and they were just setting up a check point. The boys were hanging out the window shouting abuse and pointing rulers at them pretending to be snipers… nothing out of the ordinary really until my mate Connor (who’s house in Ardoyne I’d scarily been to visit) started shouting… “hey, look at the auld boy getting out now… fuck aff ya beardy bastard”. He caused a bit of a stir so I went over to have a look, with the intention of being the ‘sensible’ one and looking a bit put-out by it all. I looked out at the check point and got that sinking feeling in my stomach - the beardy bastard was of course my dad. I almost wanted to say hey, that’s my dad and for them all to be shocked and see that there’s actually a human behind the uniform but I realised that it wasnt the smartist move as some of the lads openly bragged about family in the IRA. I told my dad that night and he just laughed it of like it was nothing, and said he should have waved at me. I took it to heart though and it changed the nature of my relationship with the other students - I was much less of a gung-ho loyalist parody and just kept my head in my books (yeah right!  I just bunked off to listen to the CDs in the Virgin Megastore!!).

The nature of knowledge in the 21st century and beyond

OK, I thought of the title before I thought what it was going to be about. The idea I have in my head is the old put-down to thicko mate that goes something like hey! don’t learn anything new, there’s no room in your head and something important like how to walk might pop out the other end

It’s that … and it’s the fact that 8 year old kid can apparently instinctively pick up a Playststation remote and start playing in the 3D conceptual worlds that mystify adults or can text their chums on the mobile phone without a second thought to how the menu structure fits together.

My point (I think) that I’m driving at is … people today aren’t smarter than 10-50-1000 years ago, it’s just that we have a different kind of knowledge and about different things.

Maybe my point is that in the past knowledge about the things we use day-to-day was more fully understood by the masses. When you travel to work in a horse drawn carriage you were pretty much on top of the science that makes it happen, or when you played with a jack-in-box again even as a kid it’s not hard to fathom the mechanics, one period of physics the next day in school would suffice.

Today it would be impossible to be anywhere near on top of the technology and physics which we encounter on a daily basis, even the greatest scientists of our time won’t grasp all the physics, chemistry and micro-technology they come across by the time they get to work. This is a phenomenon which will only accelerate.

What does it mean for us? Does it actually make us more gullible to bad-science? Is this why L’Oreal tell us that their shampoo can alter the nature of our hair DNA? Do we now just accept things on anecdotal evidence (homeopathy worked for my mate, so there must be something in it)? It’s partly why I see no end to religion and superstition - if someone says they’ve had a vision from Jesus or the virgin mary appeared to them, the reaction is usually one of ‘ who am I to say it didn’t happen’.

It might just look like it to me, but are we the first generation who doesn’t really care how things work? Men of about 60 (my dad’s age) are all about taking things apart to see how they work, they assume they can self-mend things when they break. For my generation and younger the idea of trying to fix a Playstation or even a car when it breaks down seems ludicrous.

What are the implications?

You’ll gather it’s not an idea I’ve fully thought out, im just sending it out there to see if I can find any traction.

Will Facebook become the prime source of email?

 

I like Facebook, i was an enthusiastic early(ish) adopter… as i am with a lot of things. Ive started to get a bit bored with it recently which was bound to happen, but one thing ive started doing more is using it for messaging friends - as a kind of email tool. There are many benefits, the chief one being the lack of spam - you only get messages from people you know. And there aren’t too many of them who advise me to looking into the possible of enlarging my member.

I think this could turn out to be the killer Facebook app, and im ALWAYS* right.

* for ‘always’, read  hardly ever.

Juries are gullible TV watching amateurs

As I finish my stint of jury service, I really hoped I wouldn’t be writing blogs along the lines of ‘I’ve lost my faith in the jury system’. But I have, a little bit. Both juries I sat on started of their deliberation saying ‘The police were rubbish here weren’t they’. It’s like they expect every drug den to be descended on by a team of 10 CSI officers who cordon off the area for a square mile and rummage in all the hedge rows for that one really small, but vital and interesting clue.

All the defence had to do in either case was to ask a policeman a question like, so did you finger print the back left hand side of the gas cooker (or the like) and the when the policeman says ‘eh, no’ The jury takes an intake of breath like they’ve just been handed their plot line.

So in the end it doesn’t mater that the nice young ‘misguided’ crack dealer had more gear on him to service an army, and hundreds of pounds in his drawer (which he just ‘found’). The jury say, well there’s not enough ‘evidence’ here - we know he did it, but it’s the police’s fault.

I can imagine how easy it must be in a complicated fraud case to put doubt in the mind of a jury, which is why I now run contrary to my libertarian instincts and say, in a lot more cases, it should be decided by a panel of judges rather than gullible, TV watching, think-they’re-so-clever amateurs like me.

Some nice pod casts

http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/culturevulture/podcast.xml

Paste that into your iTunes postcast bit… the best one, i think, if the Stephen Fry/Hitchens one on blasphemy - interesting as always. The theos among you will like his references to CS Lewis. If only that tw*t Hitchens would shut up a bit, which he does, after someone in the crowd shouts at him .

I think Stephen Fry is great but i think, as i say, Hitchens is on of the most annoying arrogant people on earth. Even though i agree with the large part of what he says - which just shows that sometimes it about ‘how you say it’.

You can listen to the MP3 here.  The first ten mins and the last ten mins are the best.

It’s not exactly a ‘debate’ as both are in more or less in agreement. It reminds me somewhat of those Greenbelt ‘debates’ i used occasionaly attend (but in the other direction).

Irish stew in the name of the law

 

A relative of QMonkey, lets call him Answer Chimp wrestled with a question this morning, the question of when is it ok to make a citizens arrest. Let’s put his case

There were a number of people walking ahead of me as I came out of the train station this morning, when a chocolate wrapper floated its way towards me (much like in a toffee crisp advert, except I think it was a lion bar).

.. 

I looked ahead (in the way that all the best witnesses look up after they hear the bang) and realised it had been dropped by a fairly professional looking bloke, who was walking along with a girl, who was also smartly dressed and a grown-up. I considered tackling him about it, and I even prepared my answer to the predictable defence I was sure he would use about him keeping someone in a job. Then I didn’t and I just sort of stared at him in a weird way when I overtook him.

.. 

Should I have picked up the wrapper and tried to give it back to him? Should I have performed a citizen’s arrest?!

If I were writing this story, I would probably just go ahead and say that I DID make the arrest as it would add some spice to the tale. Has any one out there ever made a citizens arrest? What kind of offences does it cover?

As an addendum, GH (bloke who sits opposite me in work) actually made a citizens arrest last year (I just remembered). A local hood was trying to nick a car outside his house, so graham called the rozzers, then went outside to apprehend him. It should be noted that Graham is a hooker for Clifton Rugby Club (I advise you to follow the ‘hooker’ link to avoid confusion). He did of course, ‘give him a few digs’ before the constabulary arrived, leading the arrested crook to threaten legal action (no further news). A warning maybe.

Of a thursday evening

I’ll tell you who is hilarious. That Russell Brand. His Ponderland shows on Channel 4 thisweek have left me doing that quite embarrassing thing, of laughing uncontrollably in a room by myself. Tonight’s was on sport, as with all good comics, its the way he tells em!

I’ve now just turned over to BBC2 to watch some of Paul McCartneyon the electric proms. My good friend GB is a big macca fan, and will no doubt have loved it. Though it was ‘good’, when he plays the old Beatles songs it feels quite sad that him and Ringo are the only ones left. Anyway…….

Vox O’Malley has paid generous tribute, through the medium of the comic strip. A great all round artist, thinker and techno philosopher… he’s obviously found some new graphics tool and is going to town! a man after my own heart

University Muskahound Challenge

A guilty pleasure I must admit to, is watching University Challenge on a Monday night. Don’t know why I say it’s a ‘guilty pleasure’, just a way of getting the sentence up and running I suppose.

Part of the tradition is seeing how many questions the mrs and I can get right. It’s accepted that the questions are well out of our league, so answering say, one out of ten right makes us feel like we’ve moving up an intellectual league. If it’s a round on French Impressionist painters for instance, we both shout out MONET to every question and if we happen to be right one time we high-five with delight (I might shout Cézanne one time, to make it look like I’m thinking).

The other night was one of my favourite moments, it was Liverpool University vs. Magdalen College, Oxford. Liverpool were quite literally, being taken to school. So we along with most of the viewing public were hoping that Liverpool could scramble some resemblance of credibility. The question was on pre-revolutionary France, and who was the 16th century cardinal to Louis XIV. Immediately I shouted out Cardinal Richelieu! The one and only reason i shouted this had to be kept secret, until to my joy ‘Ling’ from Liverpool was overheard on the microphone consulting her team mate with the words ‘what do you call that one offa Dogtanian and the Muskahounds!?!’ They lost 230 - 80.

House price inflation

I was reading on the Internet today and hearing on the news that UK population is predicted to grow to 71 million by 2031. The first thing i thought of was, for the foreseeable future we’re looking at a housing shortage aren’t we? Demand is going to dwarf supply, what will that do to the market? Can’t be good. Overall though, there’s plenty of space - just not enough houses!

Dippy egg cooker

A while ago i blogged about the egg cooker I’d seen on Dragons’ Den, which i thought was great. Well, it still hasn’t come to market yet even though they have a web site… and this egg cooker is available. Sorry Mr Dragon tamer, you’re too late.

Borrowing a cup of sugar

Last week in the midst of nappy changing, dinner making and TV watching (only the later involved me, if im honest) the door bell went. As the Mrs was too ‘busy’ I had to get up of my comfy arm chair to answer it. It was the Indian lady from two doors down, who although she’s very nice , I think we’ve only ever had two conversations with her, once to get her to move her car for us, and the other discussing the trimming of my hedge. Exciting stuff! 

I said hello (as is polite) and she said, and I think I quote correctly (I’ll avoid trying to type in an Indian accent) ‘hello, you are how? Can I borrow a cup of sugar?’ (Handing me a mug). Because she’d asked the question so quickly my immediate reaction was to say, ok. Then rush in to the kitchen fill up the cup with sugar, gave it to her and say, there you go, goodbye.

In retrospect I think it was the only time I’d ever been asked for the cup of sugar, I thought it was the kind of thing happened in the 60s and on TV. So I began to think that it was a little weird.

When I told the Mrs about it (she loves being called the Mrs, not!), she concurred that it was a bit strange. Given than we don’t really know her, and that we are two doors up, rather than next door, and there is a shop 100 yards up the road that sells sugar.

This is now what I think happened, and im a little embarrassed.

Last time we spoke to them, as I said, it was about them moving their car. Although it was no big deal, she had seemed a bit embarrassed, and said something about not wanting to upset the neighbours. So, I think she saw we had a new baby, and thought that this was a chance to get friendlier. She had maybe been watching Coronation Street and decided that it’s traditional in Britain to ask your neighbour for a cup of sugar, if you want a chat. So she did. And I just got her a cup of sugar, and sent her packing.

Embarrassing. Maybe I need to go ask her for something, and strike up a conversation. But too much time has past now, what should I do?

Blessed with faith

Last week I was walking down High Street minding my own business, when I was stopped by David Blaine and his ‘Street Magician’ camera crew (not really). He did his trick, the one he does on his TV show, he levitated before my very eyes. Like everyone I had the ‘whoa, that’s amazing’ reaction. Blaine walked on down the road, leaving in his wake his mesmerised audience.

I thought about it later in the day and for a moment thought - did he actually do that? Is he actually magic? Only for a moment though, because I know it’s impossible, and even though I’d seen it with my own eyes, I knew it was more than likely a trick, not a phenomenon. Not to say that impossible things don’t become possible, but Joe Normal tends to need a lot more evidence than one performance, under the circumstances of the performers choosing.

So, I don’t believe, or have faith that he really levitated, because it’s impossible according to the laws of physics. Yet I have friends and family who believe that a guy known as Jesus of Nazareth was born of a virgin, walked on water, raised people from the dead including himself. Why do they believe this? Because its written in an the Bible. In Gospels written decades after the reported events by guys who were trying, lets say for altruistic reasons, to get their religion up and running.

I recently met a lady on a couple of occasions, a friend of my wife’s, who literally believes EVERYTHING. You name it, she’s into it. Acupuncture, Reiki, homeopathy, astrology, cupping, Feng Shuiand that’s only the ones she mentioned in the 2-3 hours approximately I’ve been in her company. I’ve no doubt that she’d have no problem accepting the Jesus miracles as a positive probability. However, most people I think are open minded but heavily sceptical about miracles and physics defying events unless they are proven beyond reasonable doubt. For me, it’s really the only way to get on with your life - we can’t assume every claim of magic to be probably correct - the world would completely unpredictable - I wouldn’t want to get out of bed never mind get on a plane, in case aerodynamics suddenly changed its nature.

So why do intelligent people believe the Jesus stories? Let’s make no bones about it, smarter and more thought intensive people than me have decided in their heads that Jesus walked on water, turned water to wine and in some cases they believe that he guides them in their day to day life! (though obviously Gabriel only appeared to Mary, not Mohammad - THAT would be ridiculous). The answer is faith. I think it’s the same with most religions, but in my culture, Christianity is the major force, and a lot of my family and friends would describe themselves as having a faith in the god of the bible. I have recently had some interesting debates with them, and when it comes down to it, they don’t usually focus their argument on trying to convince me that the bible is reliable when it talks of physics-defying events, they say its at this point in your journey you need faith, and faith is the key.  An intellectual discussion usually turns into a theological discussion, and sometimes I get the feeling they are dancing and gloating in the space between that which we know and that which we don’t yet know. It goes… we don’t know everything, therefore anything is possible, therefore my position is intellectually sound - all i need is to declare my faith!! As soon as they proclaim that it comes down to faith, they admit that they can’t convince me that its true with evidence based enquiry alone - I need faith. In fact if it could be shown to me in an convincing manor, then it would no longer BE a faith.

The problem is I don’t have faith. I could pretend that I do, I could try to talk myself into it, but deep down I don’t have faith and I can’t help it. You can’t make a decision to have faith, I can’t decide in my head that I believe that David Blaine levitated in front of me - even though THAT happened before my eyes! So how can I believe the heavily processed story of a man 2000 years ago who apparently did some physics defying stuff. You can talk someone into believing facts through evidence based inquiry but whether I’m Joe Bloggs or Pope Benedict, faith is something you have or you don’t.

Debating the probabilities and possibilities of various iconic events and the evidence thereof, is destined to lead nowhere. Because depending on what religion you’re talking to, your faith has to be different. It’s not ok when talking to a Christian to say you have faith that you will be re-incarnated when you die, or to a Muslim that you have faith that Jesus was the son of god. To be a Christian you have to have been blessed with the ‘Christian’ faith - I wonder how many little children in Surrey wake up one morning and say mummy, I’ve just been given the faith to believe that Mohammad was a prophet of god.

So either you’re A) lucky and were brought up as a Christian and pretty much taught the bible as fact, so the need for faith is minimal, or you are B) someone who believes absolutely every extra-physical hoodoo, without extended inquiry, or C) god decides to bless you with faith in later life.

This is a dilemma, because it’s not my fault that I don’t have faith. If you believe in the god of the bible then the only outworking of this is that some are blessed with faith, faith is god given. If it is something that some are given and some aren’t then why do Christians try to convert people and tell them the ‘good news’, they might have some success with the lady I know who believes everything from astrology to Reiki, and obviously a child will believe pretty much everything a trusted adult tells them, but as for the likes of me, according to John 3:16 I’m doomed to a fiery eternity because I don’t have faith, which is a smidge unfair I think.

There are of course valid attempts to explain the quandry, but the logic seems quite circular - usualy about ‘letting god do the work’… but there’s a big assumption which has been breezed past - which is of course his/it’s ultimate existance and involvement. Most times when i hear people stuggling with these questions - i fear they have missed the elephant in the room, that it might just all be in their heads.

The gumpy miser in me

Monday lunchtime I decided that Kentucky Fried Chicken would be the best option when deciding how to make myself fatter. So I headed up the hill at Broadmead, past the Odeon to my fast food purveyor of choice. All I wanted was a Zinger Meal with Coke, the last thing I expected was a moral dilemma.

The young girl behind the till took my order in double quick time, almost before I had said it, then she inquired, in the space usually reserved for ‘is that all sir?’,… ‘would you like to donate 5p extra for the World Health Organisation?’. Without skipping a beat I said ‘no’.

She looked at me with a confused grin and an almost disbelieving gaze, as if had just stolen a bottle of Lucozade from a thirsty African child. When the Zinger Meal arrived she mumbled ‘enjoy your meal’ with undertones of ‘unlike the poor children’.

As I tucked into my, admittedly still very tasty chicken burger, I tried to determine where my sense of charity had gone and why I was suddenly a grumpy miser. It was only 5p for goodness sake. I like to think I’m a caring person, with a generous world view, who does ever such a lot for charity… but doesn’t like to talk about it much. So where did this ‘no’ come from?

I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s the same ‘no’ I give in response to questions like ‘would you like to save 50% on your electricity bill?’ or ‘can you spare some change’ or ‘do you have two minutes spare to stop and talk about Help The Aged?’ Compassion fatigue I think they call it and it looks like I’m well and truly infected.

My immediate reaction to any question I’m asked by a stranger is to end the conversation as soon as possible. Whether it’s a charity plugger in the street, or a phone call from a someone who miraculously knows that my contract is almost up - no matter how to-good-to-be-true the deal sounds my only feeling is to say as little as possible and end the conversation. This can’t be a good thing.

If I had the moment again I would say ‘… only if Colonel Sanders agrees to give 5% of his profits to a charity of my choice’ (but quick thinking like that only happens to people on clever American dramas). I think that’s the core of it, it’s the thought that a multimillion pound company ‘giving’ its customers the opportunity to donate money to a charity of KFC’s choice, while they charge us £1.99 for a Coke that cost them 10p to produce! But that won’t stop the nice young KFC girl telling all her mates that I’m a grumpy miser.
 

Fox News started the Calafornia fires

Just when you think Fox News can’t get any worse. They imply that Al Qaeda might be responsible for the California fires.

Scaremongering ? us ?