The strangeness of an empty childless house….

Tuesday night was strange.
Molly was invited round for a sleep over at her friend Ellen’s house.
Molly & Ellen have been friends since nursery, or rather Louise & I have been friends with Ellen’s mom & dad particularly since one horrible episode where we trundled along to Ellen’s 3rd or 4th birthday and discovered we were the only parents who’d bothered to come along. Which, when you really think about it is a terrible thing for the other parents to do, luckily Ellen is a great kid and she and Molly had a great time. All of us have been firm friends ever since.

So anyway, she was over at Ellen’s for a sleepover. She waved goodbye and disappeared.
Now I know it’s a good thing that she’s growing up to be a confident assured little girl.
But a bloody hug would have been nice.

6 years of worry, late nights, broken sleep, doctors, A&E, cuts, bruises, tears, stress, infections & more time, effort and money than you could calculate and all I get is a quick goodbye and a wave as she takes off. Bah.

I met Louise in town and had a quick drink before the football. Then we came home and had that strange feeling that our house just wasn’t right. It’s amazing how quiet and empty the house seemed. Strangely enough, even though we knew she wasn’t there, we still instinctively left the landing light on, lowered our voices on the way upstairs and there was even a jarring moment for me when I went to look in on her and took a moment to realise that she wasn’t missing.

If you don’t have children you really have no idea of how quiet your house is. Even when they’re especially good like Molly they generate their own residual noise. Even something as quiet as their breathing in the night-time can be missed when they’re not there.

If it’s like this now, heaven only knows what it’s going to be like as we come back to the empty house after dropping her off to University and stop to hear the silence that will envelope us.
So it would appear that the noise of a child, no matter how quiet, is a glorious noise*

*Okay, I will concede that a child’s noise is not always glorious. For example; the child I sat next to in the doctors tonight. Hideous noise. But admitting it in the main section ruins the sentimentality of the piece.

World Cup 2006 England 3 – Hungary 1 (9 days 16 hrs to go)

Very tired
Headache that feels very much like something small and evil is pogoing just behind my eyes
Must get to bed.

But before I go …

It wasn’t great but it was good enough for a start.
Owen looks slow and unfit (never mind completely unsuited to playing as a lone forward)
Gerrard did okay as second striker.
Beckham still puts some of the most wonderful crosses in. The two for the goals were just divine.
Crouch looks better each time I see him – well, obviously not literally, he still looks like a 7 foot mega-geek with acne and a permanent “punch me I’m stoopid” look on his face.
Walcott looks very fast but once he actually gets the ball it doesn’t look like he really knows what to do with it.
Neither Carragher nor Hargreaves looked great as holding midfielders. Carraghers too defensive and once he has the ball, doesn’t think to put it forward. Hargreaves just looked lost.
Maybe Carrick will get a go. Sven’s pretty much tried everyone else in the role after all.

Overall, not exactly reassured. Beginning to think we should play Crouch from the start with Gerrard up front against Paraguay.

Roll on Saturday & the next friendly against Jamaica.

Seen at the Botanical Gardens……

The Botanical Gardens also does weddings. There were two on yesterday.
And I happened to have my camera with me.

On the left:
Is this the worst shirt/tie combination you’ve ever seen?

On the right:
Perfect example for a caption competition.
But dear god sir;
shave the hair off.
It couldn’t look any worse

Apologies to you if you are the gentlemen in the photo,
but you really should take the advice.

Photographing Peacocks at the Botanical Gardens?

We were at the Botanical Gardens in Birmingham at the weekend.
The Botanical Gardens is a wonderful place. But not, I think, for the reasons the board of directors think it is. Sure, some people come for the plants and a nice walk. But the majority of people come to bring their children to run around and play on the nice playground.
The advantage of the Gardens over the local park is that it’s an exclusive place. Because you have to pay to get in (very reasonable annual memberships available!) what we’ve found is that the place is full of a nicer class of people. (How terrible does that sound? But I’m only saying what everyone thinks) No graffiti, no spitting, no swearing, no loutish behaviour, no ball games, no scooters, no skateboards. It’s very safe and very relaxed. But I don’t think the creators of the Botanical Gardens would be very happy knowing it had turned into an exclusive children’s playground.

Anyway, the point of this post.
One thing I did see yesterday that really amazes me was one woman doing the same stupid thing I see at zoos and animal parks all over the country.
I’m walking down to the playground when I stop in my tracks.
Two women in front of me.
One points and the other takes a photo.
Of a Peacock.
Why?

Why do you insist on taking a picture of something as mundane as a Peacock. Yes, I know they’re lovely and very pretty, but this sort of thing happens all over. People will take pictures of all sorts of animals. But I can never work out why.
Are you that stupid that you need a constant reminder of what a Peacock looks like, or a dog, or a tiger? or a snake?

Or is it just me?

Messing about with the weblog…. again.

Spent a few very late night hours tinkering last night with the posts and the sidebar.

Have managed to categorise all the blog entries (except for posts in the first month, which just refuse to play along). Just click on the category and you should go to a page with the relevant posts.

Have also decided to put loads more links on the sidebar to all the reviews; comics, graphic novels, books and films I’m doing.
And have put a list of weblogs I’m currently reading.
Have also put a section in there to some of my favourite posts from my blog (and why not – it’s my blog and I like it!)

There’s an addictiveness about all this tinkering. Just as I think I’ve settled on a good look combining functionality, readability and content I get some stupid idea for something else to add in! I wonder whatever next?

One side effect of the late night tinkering is that I collapsed into bed at 3am this morning and never got around to choosing a new book, so more decisions later tonight!

Obviously not alone in the Duran thing then….

So I have a Duran Duran weekend and to end it on this Bank Holiday Monday BBC Radio 6 are having a new romantic documentary.

I have to admit, it’s not just Duran Duran that I love, it’s most good new romantic stuff. Although I do have favourites particularly Duran Duran & The Human League (up to and including Dare) & most of my love of New Romantic stuff and New Wave is all tied up with a love of that early synth and electronica sound.

Strangely I actually owe a lot to Dudley public library. They had a good record lending library & even more importantly for me with no access to my own record player, but having a double tape player (bought to copy cassettes for my ZX Spectrum) the record library had a good cassette selection.

I have to publicly thank the record & tape buyer who made sure the library was well stocked with Kraftwerk and Cabaret Voltaire. Two bands who have always been in my favourites.

So through the record library I got into all these great bands, New Romantic and many others. Of course, I was between 13 & 18 when i was using the library – that’s 1984-1989 & of course, one effect of using the record library for a lot of my music meant I was quite behind on some of my musical choices. But they were very important for introducing me to the wonders of Kraftwerk, Cabaret Voltaire, The Cure, The The, The Damned, The Fall, Half Man Half Biscuit, The Cocteau Twins, Siouxsie & The Banshees and many, many, many more.

Alex Toth R.I.P.

June 25, 1928 – May 27, 2006

Another great comic artist leaves us.

via comics reporter, wikipedia entry

New book decisions……

Having just finished Moondust (see post) I’m left with the fun of the new book choice.

To explain: I’m a voracious reader. There’s always at least one book on the go, plus magazines, plus comics & graphic novels to read and review for Nostalgia & Comics and this here weblog.

But I’m also a sucker for bookshops. Now, even at the pace I started the year off with a book a week on average, that’s only a maximum of 52 books in a year. But I always ask for books for birthday & Christmas and will always look out for new books I’m interested in at Borders or Waterstones and then there’s the lure of the charity shops and second hand shops particularly on holidays.
All this means I usually have more books on the shelf unread than I can actually read in six months. Currently there are 29 books sitting there, daring me to read them.

But which one to choose?
decisions, decisions……

Having a bit of a Duran Duran moment…….

Greatest [CD + DVD]
(Amazon Link)

I’m having a little bit of a Duran Duran weekend. I tend to do this every so often, where I’ll get something in my head and it won’t go away until I’ve played it and played it.
This time it was Skin Trade by Duran Duran.

My love affair with one of the most despised of 80s bands started with an ex-girlfriend.
I’d always known their music, growing up in the early 80s it was pretty unavoidable. But they were just too popular for me to like.
However, this ex played their 1986 album Notorious to me and I loved it. Of course, me loving the album wasn’t a good thing for the band because their popularity and sales took a nose dive after this and they were suddenly considered old and rather naff. (Interestingly a similar thing happened with A-Ha as well – I start liking them after their second album and their popularity never recovered either.)

But I prevailed, loving every Duran Duran album* after that. But Notorious remains a favourite and Skin Trade still ranks as one of my favourite tunes.

And this weekend I’ve been having a bit of a Duran-a-thon. Sad but true.

*Not quite true – don’t like the new one “Astronaut” with the original line-up. Seems like a backward step to me.

Moondust by Andrew Smith – book review

Moondust: In Search of the Men Who Fell to Earth
(Amazon Link)

The premise is to track down and interview all the surviving astronauts who made that giant leap for all mankind and set foot on the moon. It’s now down to just 9 men and there will soon come a day when no one is left alive who’s actually made this greatest of journeys.

That the experience of traveling to the moon changed the astronauts is unsurprising, but what I found intriguing was how they coped on returning to Earth. All of them seem somehow distant and unfulfilled with their post moon landing lives. Not really surprising I suppose, after all, once you’ve done something so incredible and unique, it must be difficult not to feel that your life is now a little bit of an anti-climax.

The other sad thing about the book is the regret voiced by many of the astronauts about the stalling of space exploration. The shuttle was merely a space freighter and has never really accomplished all that much. The lack of grand ideas and the acceptance that manned space flight is something that belongs in the past is a terribly shortsighted view.

I wasn’t fortunate enough to experience the Apollo missions, but the idea that we should be venturing into space, should be going further out into the unknown seems vital to our development. Without it, we become mere observers, wondering what is out there but not having the bravery to take the step.

Space is important, it’s out there waiting for us to explore. Moondust merely made me wish we had the vision to actually return.