One of the best voices I've ever heard...

It seems ages since I played some music by 'The Carpenters', and as time has moved on, and I'm now without, and missing terribly, Senora O'Blene, I have to revisit my favourite songsters from our past, which is sometimes very difficult.

The other day, YouTube put up a link to Karen Carpenter's piece from years ago, where she shows off her prowess as a fabulous drummer - it's here: -

She was so talented on drums - with a superb bass player and of course, her brother, they made some marvellous music! Some of the best guitar riffs are also here in that fabulous song, 'Goodbye to love' too!

Don't you really miss the days when there was no screeching, thin, weedy voices, squealing inane 'lyrics' to a pretty dire 'beat'?

Clunk...

Scrobs was watching the excellent film last evening, 'The Train', yesterday, with the superb parts played by Burt Lancaster and Paul Scofield. It's a good story, with plenty of suspense and drama and well worth a revisit. The final stages have a background of an engine cooling down, with an unmistakable noise of contracting metal - rather like my old Riley 1.5, but that's a different story! Somehow, that noise adds to  the scene as a kind of programme music, there doesn't need to be anything else, and I found it added to the finale in a most unusual way!

Earlier in the day, I was mucking around in the kitchen, and decided to make some bread in the air fryer - a pastime which attracts me more than somewhat, as I'm forever trying to perfect a skill which is taking ages...

While everything was steaming up, my Alexa was playing the fabulous album, 'Aerial', by Kate Bush, and the song 'Joanni' popped up. Now, I love that song, it's one of my all-time favourites, partly because I used to play the whole lot on an ageing MP3 player on the train, and woke up one day, with the unforgettable 'clunk' of the percussion ringing in my ears, and also just in time for me to get ready to get off before I ended up in Hastings!

My theory, which actually needs testing by the ridiculous BBC 'Verify', is that the drum beat was pinched from the final moments of 'The train', and I challenge anyone to disagree...

Gene Hackman R.I.P....

I was saddened to read about the extraordinary death of Gene Hackman and his wife.

I'm not really a film buff; in fact the last time we went to the cinema was to see 'Philomena', and that was years ago, but as live TV seems so dire these days, with tiresome over-woked (sic) re-makes of old series, cobbled together for a diminishing audience, I've bitten the bullet, (on advice from ED), and taken up an Amazon Prime subscription! It has been a game changer, and while I used to read quite a lot, I'm finding so many good films are available for just a few pence, that I'm back to getting as interested as I was well before we bought our first VHS machine!

When I heard about the Hackman tragedy, I thought a re-visit should be made to the old favourite, with the car chase, but while skimming through the titles available, I found one which also looked good, as I like Dustin Hoffman as well, and thought it would be worth a pop. Gene Hackman plays Finch, and it is one of the best films I've watched in ages!

The plot is just amazing, and as the 'fixer', Hackman displays a masterclass in playing a most disagreeable chap!

The story has so many facets, the ending is extraordinarily exciting, and although I see it came out in 2003, it seemed as fresh to me as if it had just been released!

And another good issue is, that if you couldn't understand the plot at any stage, and wondered why so-and-so said or did something, you only need to dial up the credits on Wiki, or other good sites, and get your answer!

But I may actually watch it again, just for the pleasure of seeing such great acting from a good guy!

Scrobs gets political...

I find that the resident media we have to endure these days has very little to accommodate the minds of the middle-aged, and the elderly citizens of our country.

I read the tax-paid BBC stuff on occasions, and their ‘opinions’ are pretty well aligned with the Starmer obfuscation, so it’s clear that I’ll never believe a word they say, but others are just chucking out negativity in all directions like a man with no arms!

Whatever happened to local friendship, lovely chats with neighbours, decent approaches from newcomers to the village? Is it ‘money’ or a flash car? What section of a race of indigenous British Citizens craves far too many badges of some sort of Facebook cult, to make others think they’re important?

Beeboids thrive on the inadequacy of such shallow values, with their ridiculous praise of ‘diversity’, foreigners and even worse! The substitute for normal British behaviour is being eroded by the disgraceful Beeboid agenda to make normal British Citizens think otherwise, and it ain’t going to work Chez Scrobs, I can tell you!

(Posted elsewhere, if you see it, emial me and I'll send you a chocolate orange)!

Clouseau's busted doors...

Last evening, I wanted to see a scene from The Pink Panther, where Peter Sellers, wearing a suit of armour, calls out, 'Follow me men', and collapses as the double doors open, and he is flattened on the floor!

I don't know why I want to see this again, I just want to, so there it is!

So, the DVD set bought on Ebay gets a dust off, and the movie begins - or does it...

Sold a pup! The bloody thing stalls, shakes, changes etc., and the immediate scene I wanted to see for a huge laugh got missed because of a 'jump' and a stall in the playback!

And I still haven't seen what I wanted!

Whaaaaaaah...

'Voice coach'...

"You're only supposed to p**s off normal British citizens..."!

 

Three footer...

 I've just managed a three-footer!

What! You may ask?

Well, I'll explain...

Michael Parkinson once said that if you could wee a stream of at least two ft in length from your trousers to the porcelain, then you probably don't have a problem with the prostate issue!

I've had all the tests like many men of my dotage, and so far, touch wood, there's no problem, but while this bloody five hours chemo every few weeks for Mantle Cell Lymphoma is continuing, (at least for the next three months, so roll on Easter), I just get a little bit twitchy about any consequences, so anything which makes the day a bit rosier, is fine by me!

36 inches isn't a bad score, I mean, I have to stand well back to achieve that, and my doctor, (a good friend), once said that after initial tests, he wasn't even going to bother with the telegraph pole interrment, or whatever it's called, and sent me home with a couple of Smarties, which you used to get for a vaccination, back in the fifties...

Half-way through the treatment is such an achievement, and life is in the Spring now, with bulbs showing, plants popping up here and there, and plans are a-foot, so we're well on the mend!