Another Note

To add to my mention of American attitudes to food, the commentators have just been talking about how one goes about eating a 72oz. steak.

Baseball Has Started

Spring training starts today. At this very moment Im hearing the first ads of the season for "large pepperoni pizza". I love the American carefree attitude to snacking. They just dont give a shit. Fantastic.

The Phillies have made very few changes to their world series winning team of last year. Losing Pat Burrell was a shame as he was someone who was great to watch when he hit a hot streak, but theyve traded up in Ibanez. A few changes to the bullpen, which should hopefully not disturb the best pen in the league. All in all I think we're still better than the Mets. Also great to see Jamie Moyer still going for another 2 years. Hes going to be 48 and still playing in the Major leagues. I think it goes to show cricketers are retiring a little too early. No reason spinners like Murali cant go into their late 40s as long as they are up for it. Far too much pressure is put on the older players to 'make way' when they hit their mid 30s. In baseball, due to the franchise system, you play as long as you perform and want to. There are disadvantages to the franchise system, but Cricket could learn a lot I think.

Just recovering after a completely pointless day. Spent most of the morning gathering all my applications to show the jobcentre Im worth their paltry 25£ a week, which they refused to even look at. This is the so called interview you get every 3 months where you are supposed to prove you are looking for work. Of course I never had a problem as I've been a non stop application machine, but it slightly irks me that someone could have done bugger all in the way of job hunting and be earning 100's of pounds a week. Oh well...

Lastfm seem to have a lot of Tom Paxton, who is the only performer of note Ive had the opportunity or money to be able to see live. A famous product of the Greenwich Village scene, Tom writes about crack cocaine addiction and the lives of hookers, while looking like the sort of chap who should be dishing out Werthers Originals to his granchildren, while rocking in an armchair round a fire (maybe he does). Try his eulogy to the 9/11 firefighters who died in the twin towers The Bravest and this wonderful song. A true living legend.

Interview

Just got back from my agency interview. Seemed to go well despite having a nasty cold coming on. I'm back in bed now dosed up on painkillers. Most annoying thing was their excel test based on the 2000 version. I use 2007 at home and wow does that old version bite.

Ive recently got onto spotify, which is a bit like lastfm, but is a downloadable prog and has lots of different stuff on there streaming at 160kbs, which is plenty for my non audiophillic ears. I recommend a look at the smithsonian folkways recordings, which are there almost in their entirety. Broadside Ballads, Vol. 3 is a fantastic listen. They also have a near complete collection of the fast folk recordings, which was a musical magazine running through the 80s and 90s in greenwich village. Such distinguished names as Tracy Chapman, Dave Van Ronk, Shawn Colvin and the afforementioned John Gorka all recorded for the magazine. There really are some lost gems on there, interspersed with some weird shit as well.

Still jobless unfortunately. Might be getting some admin work soon if my interview on friday goes well.

Lots of new music recently too. Today I am recommending Mary Chapin Carpenter

Ahh I need to update this thing, too much to do

Album Of The Week

Hi Again, much applying going on today. Have six applications on the go at this very moment. Fingers crossed one of them will at least let me interview.

Today I was helping clear the hedges at Parks. We've overfilled a skip and filled 5 sacks with bottles and cans. Unbelievable what you can find in a hedge if you care to dig deep. There were broken windows, carpets, cans of unopened lager and car tyres. Fun stuff.

Currently on Rateyourmusic.com there is an album of the week group, sharing an album of any genre once a week. Next week it's my turn and I've decided to go with one of my favorite Canadian folksingers, Stan Rogers. Have a listen to Turnaround here. It starts with an Archie Fisher cover, but the rest of the album is self penned. It should make a bit of a change from the last few choices - electronic, straight up rock and some sort of instrumental kung fu hip hop.

Another Tip

Todays music tip is John Gorka. This album is the best Ive heard so far this year - which is saying something because Ive listened to a LOT of new music in the last month.

England Cricket Shambles

There was a sense of perverse pleasure as I saw the team of overpaid whinging gits get bowled out for peanuts agianst a West Indies side finally showing signs of life after all these years. I remember only the back end of the West Indies era of dominance. The 95 series in England was the first year I really followed cricket, Walsh and Ambrose were in their prime, Lara had just done the double and England were woefully inadequate. There were hints of that all over again here, and it isnt such a bad thing.

Now if we can find a big dark hole for Ian Bell and Steve Harmison we might stand a chance in the next game.

Pizza

Today I thought it might be an idea to try making a pizza, nothing particularly unusual about that. I'm far too lazy to actually make pizza dough, so I bought some bases and tomato puree from the local shop. While I think the exchange of a pleasantry or two is perfectly acceptable, I found myself in a rather uneasy situation.

The local corner shop is run by a couple who's son was in my class at school, which always leads to the inevitable 'how are you, what are you up to' sort of thing. I dont really know them from Adam though, and they have such a strong accent that I have a hard time picking up what they are saying half the time. Anyway, on seeing that I was making pizza, this kind old lady starts on a monologue with no turning back. I picked up several words, 'herbs' 'don't buy that puree, buy the jar'. Boiling and steaming was also mentioned. Unfortunately the only bit I got was, "we have that here" and that sort of look like, you ought to buy that. 

How you are supposed to steam a pizza I'm not sure, but I'm sure she mentioned the exact recipe somewhere in this conversation, it's a pitty I wasnt part of it. Knowing I had no money left, I made a complete arse out of my self, nodded and smiled and walked out. 

The Pope is a Tosser

Darth Ratzi as he obviously likes to be called, has just named a new bishop, a Mr Gerhard Wagner. This guy thinks hurricane Katrina was Gods way of getting rid of New Orleans brothels (a little bit of an unwieldly way to get rid of a few buildings considering he is all powerful) and that the christmas tsunami was Gods way of getting rid of gluttonous american tourists (never mind all the thousands of poor innocent locals that happenned to get in the way).

The pope is a giant inflateable turd, the sooner he dies and a nice senile moderate is put in his place the better. Git.

I think Im going to have to let off a little steam. I know people tend to think I am a glass half empty kind of person, which can be true about some aspects of my personality, but I really am fed up of listening to people whining about how terrible things are at the moment. These are people with money, family and friends. What is there not to be happy about? Sure there's not as much money about as there used to be, but we're a lot better off than most in the world. Get a grip people! Life is all we've got - enjoy it for fsm's sake. 

Right, back to bed.... I do love my bed.

This weekend has been fairly manic. It started with a a few too many drinks on friday night, followed by a bar shift on saturday and trying to deal with a dispute between my grandparents and the neighbours somewhere in between. I've again been in to town today (not feeling 100%) and am now catching my breath before the tedious and dull task of application writing begins in earnest again on Monday morning.

After nets I've also come to the realisation that Im incredibly unfit. A slight jog seems to get me out of breath. Im afraid Im going to kiel over before I can chase a ball to the boundary come April. The answer is to do some light jogging for the next few months. I absolutely loathe exercise for the sake of it, but if Im going to be any use whatsoever to the club this year I've got to get in to some sort of shape.