My parting video for the next few days is about Mega Plush (I ran episode one several moths back).
Have a peaceful time and I will tell you all when we return.
Nice 'n' Springy |
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Ah the joys of last minute pre holiday packing continues and me being me decided that there were a couple of extra things that I needed for my camera so we spent part of the day going over to Park Cameras in Burgess Hill. Then Donna suggested that we had a wander around the charity shops so that used up another couple of hours. If you are ever in Burgess Hill then The Book Den is a great place to go to for second hand books. They charge a flat rate of one pound sterling for paperbacks and hardbacks with the proceeds going to the Burgess Hill Lions. We had quite a good haul there. Returning home, I decided that I needed a couple of spare batteries for my latest toy (a GoPro Hero 3+ Black edition) so booked those and picked 'em up from Crawley. The house has now been cleaned to within an inch of its life and the cats are getting worried by all of the activity. So now all that remains is for us to eat a fasting day meal, get a good night's sleep and it's all systems go for tomorrow!
My parting video for the next few days is about Mega Plush (I ran episode one several moths back). Have a peaceful time and I will tell you all when we return. The house has turned into a turmoil stricken war zone. Actually, most normal people call it holiday packing but how Donna manages it, I don't know. I take charge of important things like which chargers and cables do we need, which cameras and associated stuff is needed and then I leave the white tornado (hands up all who remember that? What was the product? Come on...! Alright, it was Ajax cleaner) to tidy everything up. It has got to the stage that the only thing not packed are the cats and the house bricks. All systems are go. The rest of the day has been a mad dash of admin (book the car in for a windscreen repair, its MoT and annual servicing, visiting banks etcetera). The only moment of peace (apart from blogging, of course) was when Donna was chatting to her financial adviser when I found myself with a few minutes to spare to get a black coffee in Waterstones and start reading my latest purchase "Look who's back" a spoof take on Adolf Hitler returning and finding things aren't quite the same in modern day Germany. It's translated from the original German and the humour is dry and very amusing even if it is a bit of a taboo subject. The cover caught my eye a couple of weeks back - very clever. I think that it won't be going on holiday with me - not particularly when you know that our hotel is heavily populated with German guests! Time to leave you with some interesting guitar work. Eddie Hazel - sort of a poor man's Jimi Hendrix maybe? Equally as dead as Jimi but fascinating to listen to - some of his guitar work is fascinating. Here is his rendition of "California Dreamin'". This is going to be a short entry today - I know that a lot of Sunday's are but this one is going to be even shorter. What is one of the most beautiful sounds in an English countryside? I know that there will be lots of answers but for me (and many others like me) that one magical sound is that of a Nightingale singing. Nightingales perform a very arduous journey from their over-wintering grounds on the West coast of Africa and they choose to return to this grotty, soggy country where they sing the most liquid, musical and lugubrious song which is a pure pleasure to hear. So why is it that when I go to listen to the newly returned birds at Pulborough Brooks there are masses of other people who have come along too but they insist on talking in loud voices along the lines of "Isn't it beautiful? Do you know I could stand here all day listening to it. It isn't as good as last year though. Do you know...?" and they go on and ON and ON! In the words of Julian Cope "she's singing: World shut your mouth, shut your mouth..." I suppose that should be the least of my worries... Did you realise that India has a problem with people openly defecating in the streets? It has become such a problem that someone has created a website and campaign called poo2loo which is trying to stem the flow. The chap who wrote the theme music for "Life of Pi" has created the tune to the video below - NSFW by the way. What happened to the energy of yesteryear? Do you remember when you were a kid and you couldn't wait to wake up and get out and play? All that energy and unless you were summoned indoors for a meal, you stayed outside all the hours that you could. At night you would sleep the sleep of the dead and then the next day... you were raring to go out and do it all again. Nowadays, if I sleep at night it is only fitful and disturbed by anything noisy outside and as for energy during the day... well... We wee up at the crack of sparrows this morning and Donna wanted to go for a nice long walk. So we drove down to Bramber and then spent a couple of hours briskly walking along the banks of the Adur river. In those two hours we covered almost seven miles and despite the chill breeze blowing, I got hot enough to remove my jacket and tie it around my waist. We met lots of lovely dogs (an adorable Cairn terrier and a pair of black Scotties spring to mind) and their owners but at the end of it all, I was totally pooped. I had to have a sit down in the car for a couple of minutes before removing my walking boots and gaiters. My energy reserves aren't anywhere near the Whirling Dervish levels that they used to be even up to five years ago. At least at Swain's farm shop, my spirits were lifted by the sight of the new stallion foal that was born during the week. Oh well, such is life. Preparations move along for our departure to Madeira and over the next couple of days I expect them to reach fever pitch. I have even mowed the lawns in preparation because otherwise I would return to a lawn as high as an elephant's eye. Now all I have to do is pack the camera gear and chargers. A highly skilled and not too tiring a task! Now for you animation treat... Life has been cruel to our hero but even after he has finished with life, life hasn't finished with him! Life is Beautiful (Short) from Ben Brand on Vimeo. As the days count down towards our Spring break and Donna gets restless about what she wants to do, I struggle to find places to go. With the weather taking a turn for the worse a nice long walk seemed out of the running so it was a case of find somewhere else to go. In the end we decided on a trip to East Grinstead to visit the plethora of charity shops there. East Grinstead is a strange town. It looks as if it should be so nice but the number of cigarette smoking, track suit ridden youth and grubby mothers pushing equally grubby children around in baby buggies (why can't we return to saying pushchair instead?) is in the ascendancy. The charity shops content reflects this lower strata of human society in that there are nowhere near the number of nice goods and bric-à-brac that one would find in somewhere like Chichester, Midhurst or Horsham. There is one difference though. The charity shops in East Grinstead all seem to have had a makeover. Each of the shops is light and airy compared to their hard pushed colleagues shops in Horsham, say. They also play music but not the blaring thumping stuff that pours out of the boy-racers cars in the streets outside, there was everything from light classical to music from the nineteen fifties and sixties. The most brash of music came from a local radio station and even that was playing modern pop "classics". Anyway, after a disappointing trawl we visited Standen house for a trot around and a cup of tea and a scone. We have become quite the connoisseurs of scones recent;y (does that make us sconnoisseurs?) I'm afraid to say that the National Trust comes low down on the list with a small café in Steyning at the top and many others in the very pleasant bracket as well. Come on National Trust! Pull your socks up! I bet you wouldn't get a manky scone in Paris... Paris in Motion (Part 4) from Mayeul Akpovi on Vimeo. What sort of sign are we talking about here? A sign from God? No. Just an ordinary, good old fashioned metal road sign is what I am on about. Pray let me elucidate for you. Donna had itchy feet this morning and wanted to go out somewhere to make the most of the rather nice weather. I made a few suggestions that were met with a cool response and in desperation I started hunting for other places to go. Titsey Place for example. Nope - not open except Wednesdays and then in mid May it will be open on Saturday's too. Shipley Windmill? No longer open to the public. Then up popped Michelham Priory. It looked good, was only forty minutes drive away and was open today from ten thirty a.m. So we planned our day around that. Into the car and off we went with the GPS device blaring out in my ear but I wasn't too worried because surely there would be a sign to it from the A27. Most certainly not. The GPS got me to turn towards Upper Dicker and then just about quarter of a mile from the priory, we came across our first sign. Well, suffice it to say that we arrived in good time after the GPS had led us straight there and we have had a smashing time. What a magnificent place it is too. It has the longest filled moat in England, some beautiful walks around the property, multiple gardens (a kitchen garden and a physic garden included), sculptures and all sorts. Granted we had to share with some squeaky schoolchildren but they were whisked away by a teacher to go and do something studious and we were let to listen to the cuckoo, watch the waterfowl and fish and just unwind. We had a pot of tea for two and a scone for lunch and then went to the shop. In passing, I mentioned that there was no sign from the A27 and the lady running the till said that almost everyone comes from the A22 direction. What? Half of the local traffic is on the A27, that major East / West artery and people who are not in the know just won't know to come down and visit this marvellous place. All for the want of a few pounds worth of mild steel and permission to put it up on a major road. Talk about missing out on fifty percent of your available market! Never mind though, we had a nice peaceful time (apart from rescuing a trapped Jackdaw but that is another story!) Here is a very short animation with a killer of a punchline. Damp Spirits from Mr. Kaplin on Vimeo. So... how was our trip to Chichester today? It didn't start off well. The traffic was a bit heavy and when we arrived at the "best kept little secret" car park that we know and use, it was jam packed. This is because someone has erected a huge notice advertising it and the prices they charge. Consequently rail commuters are flocking in there each day and paying less than the going rate for the station car park. The long and short of this was that we had to park about a mile away in one of the mega expensive multi-storey car parks and hoof it up to the station arriving just in the nick of time to catch the train. Can I say that after this the day just got better? Good... "after this the day just got better". The journey across country by train allowed me to see the countryside from a different viewpoint. For instance, I hadn't appreciated how green but marshy the land is around Amberley heading down to Arundel. I hadn't realised that there is a static display Hawker Hunter outside of Ford airfield and so on. The train ran smoothly and bang on time. Ere long we were in Chichester and walking up South Street. There are a plethora of charity shops in Chichester but in the first three we visited we found nothing so we wandered into the precincts of the cathedral and discovered that there was a free Peregrine Falcon event on. Once again the Peregrines have nested in one of the towers on the spire and the female has laid four eggs. The RSPB (manned by volunteers, one of whom is known to us) talked us through what was going on. Apparently there are now two pairs of Peregrines and the cathedral spire is very desirable raptor real estate sot here have been somewhat violent scuffles going on between the two males. Time for a break so a pot of tea for two and a fruit scone later we felt fortified enough to continue. The next spread of charity shops gave forth a veritable tidal wave of books and before too long we were being weighed down with carrier bags. In one shop we came across what could only be described as a real find. Two jugs made of cranberry glass and at a very reasonable price. I collect cranberry so I now have two new, very good examples in my cabinet. If I gave you some idea, what we paid for both pieces was less than a quarter of what one of the pieces would cost from an antique shop. After that the day slowed down a bit and after a very pleasant impromptu picnic in the Bishop's Garden we wended our way back to the station, back to Horsham and thence the mile back to the car where we had to pay an extortionate seven pounds and twenty pence for five hours parking. Thieving bastards! Here is a TED talk on ten things that will make your computing life easier and save you time. HOw often do we hear that the train companies are appalling in this country of ours? All too often but it doesn't have to be this way. The recent dealings that I have had with rail companies have been sheer joy. Donna and I applied for one of the new "Two together" railcards and despite a minor hiccough on their website, two photographs were uploaded, thirty pounds paid and in next to no time the card was manufactured, sent and it arrived within two days. How's that for service? We decided that we ought to christen our new card so we chose to make an excursion to Chichester. It seemed wise to book the tickets online. Qjump were greedy and wanted to charge a booking fee so we decided to check out what Southern Railways could offer. First of all there was ten percent off any price booked online for the trip we wanted to make and no booking fee. So we booked and got two adult return fares (off peak day return) for just over fifteen pounds. Today we went to pick up the tickets. Donna put the card she had paid with into the machine and it spat out the tickets for us flawlessly. Wonderful! That is so much better than the usual fuss. Anyway, we are off to Chichester tomorrow for a day trip and I will report on how the trains run after we get back. Another timelapse film today. Magical Europe. Magical Europe - Timelapse from StanChang on Vimeo. Part of the day trip to see my folks involved photographs. Every time I see Mum and Dad there are more photographs in frames and on the walls. Mostly they are photographs of Mum's relatives and wedding photographs but once in a while there are others too. During lulls in conversation, other photographic albums come out to be perused and tales told, most of which I have heard before. Fair enough; I like to see Dad's photographs of the time he was stationed in Cyprus way back before I was born but Mum pulled a fast one on me yesterday and showed me an album of photographs of her sixtieth birthday. What an eye opener. It wasn't so much the photographs of people playing embarrassing party games or people sleeping off the food and booze that got to me. No; it was the fact that most of the people in those photographs were about the age that I am now. Those photographs were a mirror of what I look like now and then looking at my parents as they are today what I will look like in twenty five years time. It is sobering to think that it really is all downhill from here on in. For goodness sake, my own sister will be sixty next year (not that I care). I don't mind the physical wind down but the mental and medical diminution does worry me. For instance, my Mother has been diagnosed as being in the early stages of Parkinson's disease but already the doctor has seen fit to prescribe her tablets that improve her mobility. Thankfully these tablets do exactly what they are supposed to do but it is worrying that she has had to move onto this medication so soon after diagnosis. At least it means that she can get around a little bit better now.
So, photograph albums are nice but not when they hold up a mirror to where we are now. I think that I will stick to taking photographs of places and things, not people. Speaking of things moving quickly through time, here is a hyperlapse film of Bern (best viewed full screen and in HD) Not a lot to report today. No chocolate, a drive up to Hertfordshire to see my parents and a soggy drive back home again. Thankfully the sun is shining again, there is a cold beer in the fridge and familial duty has been performed for both sets of parents. Let the Easter holidays begin!
Have a vaguely Easter themed animation to finish off today's short blog entry. I have been creating this blog (mostly) every day now since December 2009 and apart from a minor technical glitch at weebly.com there have been no problems. Now I have written myself into a problem. On the right hand side of this blog you can see a list of archives from previous months and years. Just recently I noticed that the months of March and April 2014 were missing from it which means that people would not have been able to go back to recent articles very easily (they could if they new the structure of the URL for a given archive though). This means that I am going to have to keep a close eye on my blog fro a couple of months now to make sure that they entries either come back or (I shudder at the thought) I am going to have to delete some of my output so that I don't exceed whatever limit has been set. In the case of the missing months, I managed to delete an older archive yesterday - one that I had set up in error for 1969 and the missing months returned to the list. With a little bit of luck that means it is date related, not the number of entries so I could be OK. Otherwise, I will have to start some serious housekeeping and delete whole months of blog output to keep things current. Would this be such a bad thing though? I don't know. When I have visited some of the archived entries, I find that some of the links and videos don't work any longer so there is no great loss there then. However, some of those links do work still and could be useful. I am torn between doing what will become a bit of a headache as each month comes along or not bothering and hoping that people know how to get to more recent months archives if they really want to. Here's a fun Youtube video called "Don't squeeze the last gas" and it's an anti-fracking advert Those of you who know me will know that I like my techno toys and that I will try and push the envelope a little, learn a bit about the toy and then will customize that toy to suit my purposes. That has got the little bit of history and information out of the way and I will now move on to the subject for today. First of all a question. If someone came into your home and cooked you a meal that you didn't want, what would you do? Phone the police and get them to remove the intruder? Tackle the intruder and physically throw them out of your house? Or would you just eat the meal and put up with it because you don't like to waste food no matter how abhorrent it is? Why do I ask? The answer is simple. Samsung (who is the manufacturer of my smartphone) have decided that there are applications that I am going to have on my phone whether I like it or not. Some of them come installed on the phone straight out of the factory but just recently, under the guise of an operating system update, they installed two other bits of bloatware that I just don't want. To make matters worse, they have made it impossible to uninstall these bits of bloatware and even worse they have tied them into system software so that if you kill the processes behind them, the phone will stop working. Why, oh why does Samsung think that I need an application that allows me to store my loyalty card details on my phone, particularly when they need me to set up an account and give them a credit card number as part of that account? It is just asking for trouble. This is like the stranger coming into my house, cooking me a meal and then possibly having the wherewithal to steal a large sum of money from me. I have expressed my irritation through the comments section on Google play services and I have contacted the manufacturers of the software directly but it is to no avail. Samsung tell me that they need the software to work and the companies tell me that their software won't work without Samsung's system software. I am caught in a vicious circle. One of the suppliers told me that I could be passing up three hundred and fifty dollars of discounts per month. That is a fat load of good in the United Kingdom and whenever I see rubbish from UK agencies that say things like "Three hundred and fifty pounds of vouchers inside!" I know that none of them have any relevance to me at all. So all I want to know is how to stop these "well meaning" software companies from automatically installing shit onto my phone that I (a) don't want and (b) can't uninstall. Otherwise, it's the same as inviting unwanted guests into my house. I might just as well open the front door of my house and put up a sign saying "Help yourself!" Now, if my mobile phone could do what this chap discovers whilst digging in Egypt, it might be more useful. Les Pyramides d'Égypte from Kheops Pyramides on Vimeo. With all of the travel details, tickets etc in hand I decided I would go over the luggage allowance for the few days we are away. Hmmm. Twenty kilograms each. That's forty kilograms all together which is eighty eight pounds. Sounds all right, doesn't it? Well... you can lose a little bit because the cases weight a little bit so lets be generous and say that we can take eighty pounds of luggage away with us... that should be masses of luggage, shouldn't it? Hell, we might even be giving some allowance back to the airline! Hang on moment though. Clothes weigh quite a bit don't they? Then there are shoes... weighty little beggars at the best of times. The medicine bag and cosmetic bags - they are quite heavy too. Stuffed pink toy unicorn? I am sure that he needs to lose some excess weight! Then there is the plethora of chargers and cables that one needs to take on holiday to power the necessary electrical items that have become so "vital" to existence. On top of this there are the essential devices themselves - they have batteries in them which are mean little suckers when it comes to adding weight into the mix. Then there are the incidentals like excess camera gear that won't fit into the camera bag. They are definitely vital and subtract from the rapidly diminishing avoirdupois allowance. Before you know it, not only have you not packed everything but you are seriously overweight. Dear Mr Airline, please could I have some more luggage allowance? I have lost weight since I last flew with you so can I have those few pounds extra to add to my suitcase? I haven't managed to squeeze a half decent, sturdy tripod in there yet! Oh well. At least it should be easier on the return trip where we inevitably dispose of some older clothes and shoes... yeah; right! The exact amount saved is taken up with gifts and knick-knacks that more than make up for the weight loss. "Is it all worth it?", I ask. To which the answer has to be "YES!" Now if you will pardon me while I tap the bottle of spirit that I bought in the duty free shop... Here's a fun animation called "Writer's Block" Writers' Block from WÖNKY Films on Vimeo. Thou art more lovely and more temperate. That was how Shakespeare put it, wasn't it? Yes, it has been another magnificent sunny day with me up early and on the exercise bike in my undies at seven o'clock this morning (now there is a frightening sight). I'm afraid that the concept of lying in doesn't seem to have caught on with me yet until you realise that seven o'clock is a two and three quarter hour extra time in bed for us. Anyway, shall I compare thee to a summer's day? I would have to describe you as very cold first thing in the morning then - bitterly cold in fact with a very chill breeze whipping around my ankles as I went to get some fresh air in the garden following my exercises. Today was the day when we took three cakes down to the monastery so that they can finish Lent with a bang. We couldn't rouse the brothers from their devotions so I had to put these massive and gorgeous smelling cakes into their mail tray through the postern gate. Let's hope that the brothers found them before the Postman arrived! Back to comparing you to a summer's day. Where are you off to for your summer hols? We are taking an early break in Madeira (again). We had received a telephone call yesterday to say that all of the tickets and the like were in. So we made a quick trip into Horsham to pick them up. It would have been a quick trip except that Donna strayed into a shoe shop where there was a sale on and I ended up getting a new pair of semi smart shoes. Then the sale in Marks and Sparks called. You know the sort of thing... end-of-spring-but-before-the-summer-sale-starts sale, final reductions etcetera and I came away with two rather nice fitted cotton shirts for only £4.99 each. Should I compare thee to a summer's sale instead perhaps? Back to the summer's day comparison thing. We went down to the RSPB sanctuary at Pulborough Brooks for a walk but had to take a bit of a detour because of the ongoing, long-running roadworks near Storrington. It gave us the opportunity to take a look at the church in Thakeham to see if there was a mass dial (there wasn't). However we did find that Thakeham is a most delightful village (down by the church that is) of half timbered houses. It was a picture postcard rendition of what everyone imagines an English village looks like. All that was needed were some cawing Rooks and the sound of a cricket match in the background and it would have been spot on. On into Storrington where the summer's day was somewhat spoiled by a suspect smell in the air. I couldn't quite place it at first but now I know that it is the smell of newly turned wet clay. Sort of a cloying and soured milk smell. That made us feel a bit nauseous but we had no idea where it came from unless it was from the nearby roadworks, So how are we doing on the summer's day bit? Not very well at the moment. I shall skip the search for good old fashioned hot-cross buns (cranberry and date yes, wholemeal yes, fruit and spice... difficult) and pass over the hasty walk around the RSPB sanctuary, save to say that this year they have two breeding (hopefully) pairs of Avocets on the brooks. We felt honoured to see one pair of them going about their business, using their long, delicately turned up bills, dredging yummy things out of the mud at the bottom of the brooks and doing a bit of spooning. Apart from doing a bit of gardening this afternoon, it has been almost an ideal day. Who could say more than that? So... shall I compare thee to a summer's day? No. I don't think that I will, after all that but I will let you have some cute sloths to end the day with. Another glorious day and despite not really wanting to go to Horsham, we had to so that Donna could talk to a financial adviser (who seemed pretty useless because he couldn't answer most of her questions!). Anyway, sunny days bring out the best and the worst in people. The best bit is that people seem to move out of the lumpy thick clothes that they have worn for all of the winter season and move into brighter coloured clothes. They seem to smile more too. In terms of the worst, it brings out a swathe of ignorance, ill manners and body odour. Not exactly the finest combination is it? Let me deal with the ignorance side of it first shall? Whilst Donna was dealing with matters financial, I went to a local café for a black coffee. My chosen establishment has a very small service area which already had three people in it (one young couple and a "loose" lady, as it were). Eventually a serving lady appeared and asked "Who's next?" whereuponthe couple looked at loose lady and she looked back. No move was made to say anything. I was about to say "in which case, I'll have..." when loose lady says "after you" to the couple. No problem, there was obviously a queue in operation, so I stood back. The male member of the couple stared at loose lady and she stared back, no word was said. The serving lady disappeared to do something else. Eventually the male half of the couple said "I know you!" to loose lady and a conversation ensued. Serving lady returned... "Who's next?". The couple stop talking, as does loose lady and look at each other. Serving lady moves away again. By now there is an increasingly restive queue building behind me, so when serving lady returns and asks the inevitable "Who's next?" and couple plus loose lady continued being ignorant and gormless, I stepped in between them and asked for my coffee. I was just plain tired of waiting for the joint intelligence of the couple and loose lady to twig that (a) someone is trying to run a profitable business (b) people behind me were building up and getting rather irate and (c) don't get in my way when I need caffeine! I was tutted at by both the couple and loose lady for being so rude when in fact it was their dog-in-a-manger ignorant behaviour that was causing the unrest. I just broke the vicious circle. The other height of ignorance arose later when I was standing to one side of a shop, out of harms way and a cigarette smoker broke loose from the crowd, breathed a lung full of smoke at me and then threw his cigarette end into the shopping bag that I had with me. I gave said person a right mouthful of abuse but he just stared glassy eyed at me, furrowed his brow slightly and walked away unaware that he had done anything wrong at all. As for the ill manners elemnt? Well, I decided to empty the bag of the cigarette end and then decided that I would be safer in Waterstone's bookshop. As I made for the door, it burst open and a mob of schoolchildren barrelled out and barged into me almost knocking me over. They were shouting and laughing and just got themselves into another unruly mess and moved off without a an apology or anything. Just imagine what could have happened if it had been some poor old granny that they had run into? They could have knocked her flying. As for captain body odour... well this chap in Swan Walk mall just stank so badly that people moved out of his way... I can still smell it now. So, out of all of these people who do reckon should win the Paul Everest grumpy rant prize? Answers on a post card please. After that, I need some violent action to take my mind off ignorant folks. How about some rather extreme vehicle crashes? |
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May 2015
AuthorPaul Everest - Shining wit (at least that is what I think they said) |