Rant result...

Since my last post, when I began to get cross about our local playing fields being used just for growing grass, something's happened...

On a day last week, I saw two lads chipping golf balls from one side to the other, which is an encouraging sign, and just now, there was a older lad, (older than me actually, which is saying something), doing the same thing!

Hurrah!

Now all I have to do is work out how to retrieve a Dunlop 65 from a small dog's bum.

But it's a start!

Lost opportunity...

While walking little dog on the playing fields early one morning, it struck me that when the football season has finished, and during the nano second before it starts again, there is a quiet time of inactivity on the sward.

We used to have a cricket team here, but the square was deemed too dangerous, and all matches were stopped. Very occasionally there are a few kids playing in an organised junior games session, but little else happens in summer now.

Several years ago, when the square was usable, the football pitch was in regular use on one side, and there was also a big area of spare ground where nobody played anything. I was Chairman of our village Rugby Club then; we barely had enough players for one team, but as is usual in clubs like this, the spirit was great, and we enjoyed the camaraderie and the occasional win. We decided to try and get our home matches played there.

No chance said the Parish council; (although our club sponsored the village fete several times, and spread the money round the local charities). We asked them if we could use other open fields in the village. Ooooh no, they said, we may want them one day; (still taking the cash). We tried for planning permission on a private field next to a lively pub; (we paid for that). Application voted down by the same council; (inappropriate use, could turn into a sports stadium one day)!

This self-interested, small-minded, inward-looking bunch of sad individuals effectively caused the club to wither and eventually disband, and stunted the growth of another national sport in the village. And so there are the groups of fat, idle kids wandering around the playing field now, leaving the usual collection of sicky drink bottles and crisp packets. What a legacy!

So the current Government betrayal of sports organisations and facilities began long ago, when MPs were just narrow-minded Parish Councillors.

Electro K Bass 2...

Electro Kevin kindly asked for a few more pics...

Of course, I'm a shy and retiring man, and not looking for acclaim. I only spent four months making this in the shed, where there is now about three inches of sawdust all over the place, so I'm not proud...

Oh alright then! Just this once...

Rhythm stick...

Electric bass.

Veneers – old MFI chest circa 1969
Body – old kitchen worktop
Tail and cross bridge – piece of oak from Dad’s greenhouse
Strings – old redundant stock from brother-in-law’s shop in 1971
Original neck, held in place by pieces of beech from a 1920’s wardrobe.
Knobs – same beech wardrobe

And…

Electrical kit – from old left handed bass, found forgotten in younger Daught’s chum’s flat ten years ago.

Design and manufacture – Scroblene Enterprises Inc.

And I wish I could play it like Norman Watt-Roy, in Ian Dury’s ‘Hit me with your rhythm stick’. (Mrs S might also hit me with it if I leave it hanging around, cluttering up the place and gathering dust…)!

Working on Saturdays...

I was sending a reply to Electrokevin just now, in response to his post saying he had to work on Saturdays.

Somehow, this has triggered a warm feeling of companionship, and while Mrs S is reading the paper (she's had a crap day and deserves a break from me and reality), I thought, that this response may make others feel better, and hopefully not worse.

Here's the note: -

EK,

Sorry you have to work the weekend.

I haven't had to work on Saturdays since the 60s, when we had to do alternate Saturday mornings at the estate agents (don't you love 'em...) where I was based. As junior, I had to operate one of those awful office telephone exchanges, and regularly squirted the noise of the ringing bells down the ears of the partners, by putting the keys in the wrong holes!

After all the bollocking, I really said 'Sod it', and went on to better things.

I must say, however, that now I am continually involved, night and day, seven days a week, in our development business, which takes up every waking hour; I really enjoy talking to good guys like you, and Tuscan, and Hitch, Lilith and Hatfield Girl, and even Guido and Iain Dale, when I'm feeling vociferous... and occasionally a chap called O. Gosling Esq - or whoever he is this month...(Sometimes I even pretend to be a Lt.Col. with an errant sister, an estate)!

So that, in a nutshell, is what I'm doing at the moment, and life ain't as bad as it's cracked up to be. Have some good moments on me this w/e anyway; we've mostly all been there anyway!

Cassettes are best...

I read this week, that very soon there won’t be any music cassettes in production, as they have been superseded by MP3 players, Ipods and the like.

So what the hell do I do with the three hundred odd music cassettes that I’ve got stashed away then? Also, there’s a two-foot high pile of LPs in the roof, and also a box of 78s (cost me ten bob in 1968). I do have quite a few CDs as well, but they don’t count here.

I don’t hoard these things as I still like playing the cassettes in the car, (they are the only things that play in a cassette player, funnily enough; CDs were hardly invented when my car was made…). I can still get the guitar solo from ‘Cinema Show’ from ‘Selling England by the pound – Live’ at full decibels, and even the traffic in the other lane on the M25 slows down thinking they’re going to be treated to yet another prang…!

So presumably, I’ve either got to buy them all again, or download them, or borrow them and copy them, beg them from Daughts, or spend ninemonths putting them on my PC with a new record player (more cost).

Or say ‘Sod it’!

I’m going to use younger Daught’s old ghetto blaster in the shed, keep the car forever, and use the portable CD (£9.99 from the supermarket), on the train in front of every MP3/Mobilephone/DVD playing owner, and watch their faces as I extract the machine gently from my battered briefcase, place the rechargeables softly in the slot, and turn up the volume to maximum so everyone can hear me enjoy ‘Owner of a lonely heart’ at 8 million decibels!

That’ll show ‘em!