Snouty's Diary Creme

Thanks everyone!

2008-12-12T12:41:00.002Z

I'm looking forward to next year. Let's face it it couldn't be any worse than this one. :)

Huge thanks to everyone who's sent supportive or helpful messages. I appreciate it more than you can know.

I won't be posting to this blog for a while if at all. But my new writers blog is on:

http://goingdownwriting.wordpress.com

xxx

So long and thanks for all the fish

2008-12-03T10:00:00.008Z

Once again I find myself here at the end of a year and not as many blog posts as I would have wished. It's been a very odd year, and I felt it was time to do a summary of what's gone before.

We moved from the old place in Oakfield, as you probably know, and it was knocked down to make way for some starter homes. That was earlier in the year and they still haven't started building them yet.

We moved to our new place in town, Waterloo, by the market. It's a great house, a trifle too expensive at £775 pcm but for the quality of life it gives us it's worth the extra £100 a month it costs us to live here. Plus there really ain't that much worth moving to in these parts, I kid you not. More about being broke in a minute though.

Biggest change is back in the beginning of the year Mia and I agreed we would separate, she going back to Finland and me staying here. It's in no way an acrimonious split, being based mainly on the fact that we've finally been honest that we want different things, and really love and respect is not enough when you have different missions in life. All her stuff moved out in September and she followed on November 1st.

I have to admit for the last few months we were in a kind of stasis. I for one didn't really think much beyond getting her to the airport, and what happened after that was not very much on my mind. Now I'm in it and it's much weirder than I would have thought. She was a part of my life, and a good part, for 6 years. And now we talk infrequently, and she has her own life over there in Helsinki. I'm left with a kind of empty feeling which I know would be easy to try and fill, but I know it's best to let it go for a while. I'll miss her a lot, and I know she misses me too. Thanks for everything, baby, sorry it didn't work out. xxx

Fireworks night came and went and we had a BUNCH of fun for about £10. Hati and Teddy went to their Expo sci-fi convention, and I went with (pictures on my facebook page) and we started the long road down to Christmas...

Which is where I have fetched up. I'm broke again. I got paid on the 25th of November and today, the 3rd December, I'm flat broke. Now I don't know if you know what that means in my terms, but basically I have no money. I have no savings, no credit (tiny amount on an emergency credit card but that's it), no borrowing options at all. The kids and I have to live on air till the 19th December when I assume I will get paid again. Between now and then I have to find money for electricity, council tax, phone bill, insurance etc. I can't pay any of those things. If I have to pay them out of next month's salary I won't be able to pay them again next month.

Where did all the money go? Bank charges. I get overdrawn for a few days, then for each transaction that goes through it's £35 in charges. Only up to three a day but that's potentially £105 per day if I'm not really careful. I'm not very careful and sometimes I can't keep track. (I have brain troule I lose focus on things sometimes. Sounds like a silly excuse but it's true. Look up ADHD in your medical dictionary.) So, this keeps happening, and I asked the Halifax if I can increase my overdraft because the bank charges are killing me. They refused, of course they did. Why would they not. I can imagine them pointing to a newspaper saying "credit crunch". Horse shit. I and millions like me are keeping them afloat.

I'm being killed by bank charges again and this time there's nothing I can do. I already borrowed from friends and family beyond what is reasonable. literally for the want of £500 extra on my overdraft I'm going to be driven into more and more debt till I end up losing the house and my job.

Oh my job... I drive back and forth to Bristol every day, which is hard on a car, you know? My steering rack is loose and the transmission is going and there is no way in hell I can get it replaced. So I'll be carless probably sooner rather than later. Which means I'll be jobless. If I can't turn up for work every day I'll lose my job. Unless I live in my office during the week. None of the options are attractive.

And you can forget Christmas. I can't afford to pay my electricity bill let alone buy the kids what they might want for Christmas, or food. Not even a damn tree.

On the bright side I had a good run. I've survived for literally years on no money, with the good grace of my mum and others who've employed me I've kept the wolf from the door for 7 years since my marriage breakup and the following tsunami of financial woes, and that's something. But now I feel his breath on my neck and I'm just waiting for him to strike.

OKAY already I know this is a big rant, or has developed into one, but I feel the need to vent. I'm not a bad person. I'm not stupid, or talentless or evil. But I seem to be constantly blown by the winds onto any stray rocks which lurk beneath the seemingly still surface of my life, and it has been happening literally for YEARS. No rest for the wicked, but none for the eccentric either it seems. I can't remember the last time I was contented, secure, happy. I've had good times, sure, but when have I ever been without worries? Almost never since my ex first got ill and my life went to shit. It's been a ride, lovely good times and times which have melted my heart, and other times which make you question if there is any justice in the universe, one which allows such cruelty to those who least deserve it. Okay I'm done.

Before my Internet gets cut off I'd like to say thanks to everyone who's helped me, and look forward to seeing you in happier times.

god bless

Phil
xxx

BLOOD BANK single OUT NOW!

2008-10-29T15:02:00.002Z

My solo single under the band name of Blood Bank is out today on iTunes. Follow the link below if you want to buy it.

BACK TO THE BARBEQUE by BLOOD BANK

Anonymous Bosch is remixing the tune for release on our 2009 album, "Music for Kooks and Whackjobs".

Making Tracks Again

2008-10-13T15:38:00.009+01:00

Having a lot of fun at the moment. Well, the less fun part is I'm all out of money for the next week and probably going to die under a ton of bank charges. But on the up side I am making music again with Brent Jackson, aka The Infamous Burnt under our band name of Anonymous Bosch. We have even just set up a new Facebook page for the band. I urge you to go over there and become a fan.

But even better we have an "yeractual" web site www.anonymousbosch.co.uk which is where you can hear tracks from our forthcoming 2009 album "Music for Kooks and Whackjobs" at least that's what we're calling it at the moment. We are joined on this new disc by the lovely Rob Stride on guitars and production, so the flavours might get a little smoother from hear on in. It's like smoking Senior Service for years then finally getting a filter. Nicer on the throat. And also you can download all our previous albums FOR FREE if you are not part of our immediate group of fans who already have this stuff. Actually a lot of this stuff only I had on cassette until very recently because all other copies had been lost or destroyed. Dang I lose more music that way.

Oh and before I forget and HOW could I we already have a famous fan. Brent happened to be on David Bowie's web site when he popped on for a chat and slipped him a link to one of our tunes and he loved it. Cue 48 hours of Phil and Brent and Rob dancing around the room going WOOOOO.

Also at the same time I invented a new style of graphic imagery which I'm calling "codegraphs" (pro. CODE-eh-GRAPHS.) Click on the small ones to see how BIG they are! The process mimics in photoshop the kinds of processes used by screen print artists of the 60s and 70s and comes up with a weird and compelling new style which I'm using for all the Bosch imagery. I'm loving it, I want to take every picture I've ever seen and make it like this.

The cool part, apart from the fact they are cool, is that a lot of the originals I'm being sent are really crappy phone camera pics. Obviously the high contrast images work better, but I can rescue most things. All grey things with no contrast are a bit of a non-starter. But I'm starting to get requests from all over to do them for people. I'm going to start charging soon though. I could love doing this kind of thing for a living, making images. It's all I've ever wanted to do but lack the finance to kick off. Never mind, we'll get there in the end. The big lotto win must not be too far off now... or am I going to get hit by a meteorite. Not sure which is more likely.

Px

Zoe Keating is a goddess

2008-09-16T12:31:00.003+01:00

If you've not heard Zoe Keating's work then seek her out because I totally love her album at the moment. She uses looping technology of the same kind I'm trying out for a future performance... she layers up her cello and makes all the overdubs live while you are watching. Spelbinding.

See her website here.

And here's a taste from YouTube. Yeah, gothic looking women with bowed instruments: Good Thing!

Henry Cowell

2008-09-01T10:09:00.005+01:00

This is a fascinating audio autobiography of Henry Cowell where the early music pioneer talks about his work.

I love Henry because he was a child musical genius who gave up playing violin aged 8, the same age when I started learning guitar. His music sounds avant garde and a little dated, but then it is very old. He was also a colourful figure who was bisexual and has of course become a figure of some note in latter day San Fransisco, I think they even named streets after him.

I adore gays and bis, I love atonal music, and I love documentaries, so it's a three way tie for first place. Atonal music is great, it really annoys music snobs and music philistines alike, and frankly any art which annoys and bugs people is something I have a lot of fondness for immediately.

Henry Cowell is my new favourite musician.

Wikipedia entry
Documentary at Archive.org

New album by David Byrne and Brian Eno!!!

2008-08-25T14:12:00.001+01:00

How the blazing balls did I miss this? Lucky I found it out in time... Awesome new album by my favourite artists. Listen here now for free and by all means swing over to the web site and buy it for a mere $8 or £4. Made my day.

Enjoy!

YouTube Therapy

2008-08-11T22:10:00.002+01:00

I spent the weekend in my dressing gown watching YouTube. Do you think I am qualified to write a self help book? Maybe I could call it "Solve All Your Life Problems By Avoiding The Issue".

Actually it was a lot of fun and I had a really relaxing weekend.

Johnny Cash ladies and gentlemen...

2008-08-06T20:32:00.002+01:00

THIS is the most beautiful and heartbreaking thing I've heard and seen in many a long year. WONDERFUL. Combines two of my favourite things. Trent Reznor and Johnny Cash. Follow the link below...

HURT by Johnny Cash

Bristol Area Movie Help Wanted

2008-07-10T23:23:00.001+01:00

I'm just casting around for helpers for a little movie project (and animation) I want to get started in Bristol in August.

It's necessarily a little bit loose as I'll need to juggle people's schedules not to say my own. At the moment it looks like in the middle of the month or towards the end. The shoot should take no more than 3-4 days, and because it's a hit and run production I'm writing the script now around what we'll have.

If anyone is interested or you hang out with people who might be, let them get in touch so I know what kind of a crew we are working with.

The loose idea is to make a 10 minute video for YouTube which is kickass good and showcases big old me and of course anyone who helps. I'm thinking a sort of Hitchcock movie but with a 21st Century punk/goth flavour. You know, the kind of stuff I like. :) instead of Mount Rushmore it ends on the Suspension Bridge...

Register your interest ASAP so I know what kind of people I might be writing for. We've got a couple of people already on both sides of the camera... making movies with me is fun, ask anyone. :) Every year we run the 1st Year Video Project at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and it's always successful and productive.

Oh and any extra actors and crew who don't get cast in the movie can help me make a voice track for an animation I want to make in the Winter.

thanks

Phil
for the Untitled Summer Short Film Project (USSFP)

Staffan Svahn - fingerstyle of choice

2008-07-03T22:51:00.003+01:00

I know I'm just pasting things now... but that will change. Been listening to this guy, Staffan Svahn... wonderful fingerstyle guitarist. This is one serene dude. Check out his tunes and although he gives the MP3s away I bet you'll end up buying them like me. I like the little smile he does before and after each piece. :)

And there's so much nasty stuff in the world... don't you like me yearn for a little peace? Staffan has got lots to give away.

www.staffansvahn.com

A Thursday Afternoon with Brian Eno 1985

2008-06-21T10:22:00.006+01:00

Finally 23 years later, here is an interview I did with Brian Eno in 1985 for the magazine Electronics and Music Maker, under a pseudonym of Alan Jensen. It is available on the web elsewhere, but I recently re-read it and loved it so much I wanted to publish it again... ego? Moi? Perish the thought.

-=0=-

"There are three kinds of things I say at interviews," says Brian Eno as I pack up my tape recorder and notebook at the close of our meeting. "The class one things are really interesting, the class two things are fairly interesting, and the class three things are boring as Hell . People always publish none of the class one things, a few of the class two things, but all of the class three things." That, I suppose, is one of the reasons Eno has never given many interviews. I only got mine by sticking my foot in a lot of doors, being a nuisance on the phone, and being in the right place at the right time. The right place turned out to be the Polydor offices in London, the right time a quiet Thursday afternoon in mid-autumn. Coincidentally (I think), Thursday Afternoon is also the title of Eno's latest album. But more of that later. The surprising thing about Eno is that, in spite of what some music critics would have you believe, he's quite normal. He isn't a guru or a sage. He carries the air of a man who winces at praise, who shies away from the limelight. Yet in spite of all that, he's become one of the most influential figures in contemporary music. His records sell in small quantities, and he hasn't had a hit single in his life. But ask many of those who have where they got their inspiration from, and a lot of them whisper reverently: "Well, it all comes down to Eno, doesn't it?" Eno was more popular when he played synth (one of the first rock players to do so) in Roxy Music. He was even more popular (in the mid-70s) when he made albums of quirky, eccentric songs with the help of other musicians. He has achieved popularity indirectly through staying behind the mixing desk to produce records for the likes of Talking Heads, Ultravox, Devo and U2. But some while ago, he rejected further adventures into the Land of Pop, in favour of a style of music that's come to be known as "ambient", after a series of records Eno released under that title. It's music which assumes a place in the environment of a room, creating an atmosphere rather than demanding constant attention. Some of his music has been written and produced solo, some of it has been created with the assistance of others, like fabled Canadian producer Daniel Lanois. Some of his work has been written in response to commissions for film and video soundtracks. Much more of it has been used as incidental music by the makers of television documentaries years after its release on vinyl. And visitors to this year's Frankfurt Musikmesse trod the endless galleries of moving walkways to the accompaniment of Eno's ambient doodling, replayed over elaborate but discreet sound systems, in precisely the fashion its creator intended. Like everybody else who has an ambition to meet the man fulfilled unexpectedly, I had a lot of questions to fire at him. I had decided on my tactics. I hoped to draw Eno out of himself, forcing him to answer those questions on a broad, all-embracing scale. I got more than I anticipated. He grasped the thread of what I was getting at, often before I did, and phrased his answers in a very precise, thoughtful way, as though he was speaking in print. Now and again he'd doodle aimlessly on a notepad with a propelling pencil, drawing straight lines and shading enclosed areas as he paused for thought. A few years ago, all sorts of things would have been read into this by his hordes of faithful followers. But now, he's just doodling, occasionally using a drawing or two to illustrate a technical point or indicate a particular method of working. When I got home, I tried manfully to trim down what had been said to short, meaningful paragraphs, the way you're supposed to, concentrating on the class one bits. Out of context, that sort of editing doesn't really work. And anyway, any less than what I ended up with doesn't really convey the experience of a meeting with Eno. So here, with a little chronological juggling, is an impression of a quiet Thursday Afternoon with Brian Eno.

So why is the album called Thursday Afternoon ?

Because the music was written to go with a video called Thursday Afternoon. The video was called Thursday Afternoon because that was when it was filmed.

OK, so why has the album been released initially on Compact Disc only?

The quality of reproduction you get with Compact Disc eliminates all extraneous noise. My music is very quiet; silence is very important in my music. But then, having no silence in music is like having no black or white in a painting.

But the music wasn't recorded digitally. It was recorded on a 24-track analogue machine, and then digitally mastered. The drawback with digital recording is that it only gives you about 15% range, as far as changing speeds is concerned. As I work at a lot of different speeds, this isn't enough. But they'll change that.

I expect I'll be using digital quite soon, though. I'll cut my suit to fit the cloth, make a piece of music that doesn't require speed changes. The only reason I like to change speeds is because it does something to the timbre of sound that I like, by bringing upper harmonics into hearing range, by halving the frequency of them.

I'm starting to understand more about the harmonic structure of sound. I can make sounds, in the first place, that have a harmonic structure like the one I like. In the past, I didn't understand why slowing things down made things sound so much nicer to me. Now I understand... well, I'm beginning to understand. So now I can make them like that without slowing them down.

You've been involved with a good many exhibitions of audio-visual "installations" recently. In view of that, do you consider yourself a musician , or an artist?

I'd say that any good musician is an artist. I think that in the archetypal sense of the words I'm both, really. I seem to spend about equal time on both... and I mix them together as well. For me there's not a big distinction, because I think about everything in the same way. I'm after the same thing... things .

If people ask me, if I'm on a bus or something, I say I'm an artist. That way they don't ask any further questions. If you say you're a musician, they say, "Oooh, do you play with a group?", and I can't stand those conversations. I often invent occupations. If I don't feel like talking, I'll just say something like "import and export", and that stops people dead. They don't question you further about what you do, because it sounds so unbelievably boring. "Artist" is like that. It's the truth, but it sounds boring.

What, precisely, are the "things" you're after in your music and your art?

That's a difficult question, not because I don't have an answer, but because I have too many answers. What I'm after is creating works of art that are as awesome as the first works of art I ever saw. I'm trying to create an experience that I think of as the artistic experience.

Obviously I can't simply duplicate the things that have affected me in that way, because the familiarity of them prevents them from having that effect. The same way, I can't duplicate my own successes, because part of the creation of that effect is making something happen that you didn't expect; using materials you think you understand, to create a result you know you don't understand. The result is not predicted by the sum of the materials.

I want to make things that put me in the position of innocence, that recreate the feeling of innocence in you.

So you're often as surprised at the results of your work as someone who views it for the first time?

Oh, I always am. I think often I'm more surprised, because I know how it was made. It always seems unlikely that what I end up with has come from the process it has. I use a lot of very cold processes. They seem rather passionless if you describe them, but I think of them as... It's the same as when you're growing a garden. There's a routine part of that. You've just got to water it every day, or whatever you have to do, and it's not particularly glamorous or amazing or cosmic, you just do it. Gardening is an accretion of several processes like that.

And then suddenly, these flowers come out, and they are surprisingly beautiful and complex. What you've done is partake in a process, you haven't really controlled the process... you didn't make the flower. To see that happen always fascinates me.

When I finally make a piece that is better than, or different from, what I expected, I think: What a lovely feeling! But they don't last for long, those thought. I soon go back to worrying again about the next piece.

How do you go about producing a piece of music ? You say you worry about it, so that's obviously the first step, but what follows?

There are many possible first steps, but they usually take one of three forms. One is worrying about it, because I've accepted a commission or something like that. The second is arriving at it from an intellectual position of considering what I've done, sifting through and rearranging it, and trying to include more. That's designing a piece of work and saying this is the kind of method I'm going to use. And the third techniques is to toy with something, a new piece of equipment, a mode on the piano or something like that. Those things can start developing, of their own accord, into a feasible piece of music.

The third method is actually the way people think composers work - though it's not often true.

I don't know if you've ever heard something that Samuel Becket wrote. In that book, Westward Ho!, he says, "Try again, fail again, fail better." That's about the state of it I think. It's not a case of expecting to make a perfect piece of work, it's expecting to make a better failure than you did last time.

I really begin by allowing myself to make a mess, and then seeing if I can get out of it. There's nothing worse than a "blank canvas". Picasso said there's nothing worse than a brilliant beginning, and that's true. If your first move is brilliant, you're in trouble. You don't really know how to follow it; you're frightened of ruining it. So to make a mess is a good beginning - and I'm quite good at doing that.

What mechanical processes do you go through, working on a piece of ambient music?

I pick a note on the piano. I play it, or get someone else to play it, for several minutes. Sometimes it's more like several hours, piddling around with the sound until I make it sound like a drop of water falling into a pool, for example. Having doe that, I then record myself, or an accomplice, playing that note every... 23 seconds, or thereabouts. Then I do the same for another note, repeat the process, only this time playing it every 21½ seconds, perhaps. Then I'll get another note played every 17 seconds, until I begin to build up a tracery of notes which cluster together in interesting ways.

So that's a typical mechanical process - quite unexciting, really. Nothing much happens for the first eight or ten hours, doing something like that. You have to suspend your need for gratification for a while and just trust that it's going to work out.

You seem to be quite content working in this fashion, and producing ambient music. Do you have any traditional songs up your sleeve? It's still what a lot of people remember you for, after all...

People are always talking about that. They piss me off, quite honestly, because I know the very moment I decide to do an album of songs, everyone will have finally cottoned on to what I've been doing in the meantime, and they'll say, "Oh, why don't you do some more Music for Airports - that was great!" That's what people will be saying in 1989. It's the story of my life!

You know, when I was doing albums of songs, nobody had the slightest bit of interest in them - except people who are now in bands.

Everyone I meet from a band says "Oh God, your albums? Great! Really liked 'em. We based our whole band on your idea."

I get this feeling that everyone who ever bought one of my records is now in a band. The mathematics of the situation would work out, I can tell you.

So you aren't going to do an album of songs in the foreseeable future?

I just don't think about it, you know? If it happens, it happens. It doesn't preoccupy me much as a subject. I just do what I like doing. I always have done, and I always will... and... the proof of my pudding is that I'm still eating!

I have a wonderful life actually. Everybody I know in the business has got some kind of problem or other. They're tied into something they don't want to do.

Everybody says they don't want to write songs, but they've got to! They can't write, they don't have any ideas... all kinds of problems. They all say it. Well, I'm not short of ideas, but I don't have many for songs, so I don't write songs. I do the things I've got ideas for.

Let's talk about something you are interested in. You've been credited with playing a lot of different instruments on your various albums. What's your favourite instrument of all?

I really like pianos. Grand pianos I like a lot. And the tambura, that's a lovely instrument, a kind of four-stringed Indian drone instrument that's always used behind ragas. They pluck over the four strings so it just plays a continuous drone. I guess they're my two favourite instruments.

I like the bass guitar, too. It's the only instrument I have the remotest hope of learning to play before the end of my life - though I don't know what I'll do with it once I've learned. I have a lovely bass. It's an old 1962 Ampeg fretless, an absolutely beautiful instrument, with "f" holes cut through it. A unique thing, really.

What is it you especially like about the grand piano?

I like it because if the complexity of its sound. If you hold the sustain pedal down, strike a note and just listen... that's one of my favourite musical experiences. I often sit at the piano for an hour or two, and just go "bung!" and listen to the note dying. Each piano does it in a different way. You find all these exotic harmonies drifting in and drifting out again, and one that will appear and disappear many times. There'll be fast-moving ones and slow-moving ones. That's spell-binding, for me.

The interesting thing about the piano is that it's a kind of compromised instrument, because of Equal Temperament. You know, no piano you've ever heard is in tune. Pianos are not tuned to be perfectly in tune. You can't do it. If you did, you could only play in one key.

That's the interesting thing about chordal music. If you were only going to play in C major, you could tune a piano perfectly in C major. That is to say that the fifth would be exactly 1½ times the frequency of the fundamental, and the fourth would be exactly 1¼ times that frequency, and so on. Each interval would be a perfect ratio, the way Pythagoras planned it to be. But if you do that, you run into a problem if you want to play in any other key. This problem is called the Pythagorean comma or Syntonic comma. If you play in any other key, your fifth, for example, will be several per cent flat. This can't be avoided.

So naturally, most music is written not in C major, or any one key: it's written in several keys. Many systems have been evolved to make the compromise. What you do is say that you don't mind some notes being slightly out of tune. People usually decide it's easier to tolerate an out-of-tune third than an out-of-tune fifth, so they make their compromise on the third. There are lots of books about this. It's an interesting subject.

So you find the way people can't tune pianos interesting?

Yeah. I used to think the opposite. I used to think: Piano? Compromise! Pathetic instrument, can't be tuned.

But now I think what makes a piano so interesting is that it's generating so much complex information. Like... if you play an A at 440Hz, it generates harmonics at 880Hz, 1320Hz, 1660Hz, 2220Hz... and so on. These harmonics are very important to your appreciation of the feeling of a piano note. If you subtract these and just leave the fundamental, it won't sound like a piano.

To give you an idea of how important they are, take the example of a violin. There are about 27 audible harmonics, and they go up to really high frequencies. If you analyse a typical violin playing, for instance, a low D, you'll find that the fundamental note, which is the note everyone will say is being played, has the percentage of energy compared to its harmonics of 0.01%! So a minute fraction of the energy of the sound is in the fundamental. Most of the energy comes from the harmonics - and the fifth, for instance, is a C, so they're not even strictly related notes.

The nature of acoustic instruments - not synthesisers, I might add - is that they have these complex harmonics. Not only do these notes generate their whole harmonic series, but the harmonic interact. You get both the product and the difference of them.

So the ear already hears very complex sound from a simple instrument, But, further than this, because of the problem of Equal Temperament and Just Intonation, because you can't tune a piano perfectly, you never have such a simple interval. There are much more complex numbers than these involved with a piano, and that means you get some much more exotic harmonies, which really are very transitory. It's the most extraordinary instrument for that.

Finding out about harmonics is actually a good way of understanding a lot about music, I think. And finding out about the piano, and about the history of the piano, is like studying a history of music.

So much for traditional acoustic instruments. What about electronic ones?

At the moment my favourite synthesiser is a Yamaha DX7. It's funny; it's the single most popular contemporary synthesiser. Everybody has one. But nobody knows how to program them. They arrive with these factory-set sounds and that's all most people use. They never change those sounds.

I've become very interested in programming it because it allows you to create different harmonic series quite precisely. In fact, it's really via the DX7 that I got interested in harmonics, not the other way round. I would be doing things on the DX7 and I would notice that certain number relationships were interesting. So then I started getting books about acoustics to find out what I was doing, and how that related to ordinary instruments.

It's a very good synthesiser, I think. In fact, I'm very surprised that Yamaha haven't given me one free. I didn't own one for a long time, but I finally bought one. I finally gave in. I can't wait for Yamaha. I'll put in a good word for you, Yamaha, even though you wouldn't give me a synthesiser! I'm know I'm not a big seller...

You've been quoted as saying some pretty controversial things about the purpose of music. Can you put the record straight?

That's a big question!

It doesn't have one purpose, that's the thing. It has all sorts of purposes. All of those might be subsumed into one basic pursuit... which is the pursuit of "culture".

OK, so what is culture? It's the way human beings transmit certain types of information to one another. There are two ways of transmitting information. One, which is often genetic, is what we all do, quite accidentally, by having children. All creatures transmit information about their environment genetically. A species is the sum total of genetic information. So, that's one way of transmitting information, and it's... slow. And it's not accessible, the information is not available instantly. It's available only to the next generation.

Humans have developed another way of transmitting information, and that is "culture". Culture subsumes all kind of things, like mathematics, language, art, science, all those things. These are all ways not only of understanding things about the world, but of finding ways of telling other people. Some of them are very definite, like mathematics. Latin was quite a different form of transmission, which was why it was the universal language of the middle ages.

Others aren't so definite, but that doesn't mean they're of a lower quality of information. It just means that it's a different type of information that isn't susceptible to definite terms, definite language. Part of the nature of the information is that it has to be re-experienced and rediscovered by everybody.

I can't tell you about a musical experience. You might be able to understand my words, but it's not the same as having that musical experience. If I go and hear a new Steve Reich piece, write a report, and give it to you, you're not going to say, "Oh God! It's beautiful! Oooh!" Some experiences are not susceptible to the same kind of language. So people keep making these experiences.

Culture is all human behaviour, outside of pure instinct. Everything we do is cultural: gardening, cooking, different fashions, architecture.

What artists do a lot, in music in particular, is look at culture in the world. Music doesn't depict something, it's about other music. So quite a lot of the business of "culture merchants" like myself is studying how culture works - how it changes and how it changes us.

People who write about culture, critics and writers don't think about culture. It's not something they understand as a whole field. They think: Culture? What's that? Name of a reggae group, isn't it? And if you do say "culture" they think it's some snobby word for some kind of arty shit; nothing to do with passion and "on-the-strings". But ghetto-talk is culture, as well. Breakdancing is culture. The Smiths are culture...

...What do you think of modern pop music?

I rather like them, The Smiths. I think they're a good band. I think Morrissey is an extraordinarily arrogant person, especially considering that he's probably the most successful tone-deaf singer the world has ever knows. But that being said, I like his singing quite a lot, and I like their records. I could live without some of his studied miserableness, I suppose.

But I don't listen to records much.

Is that a deliberate thing, or do you find that you just don't want to?

I don't think about it. I don't have a record player, funnily enough. I think life's too short to listen to records, at the moment. Well, I do listen to some things, but I usually like to listen to the same thing over and over for months.

I'm quite happy to accept that I don't know most of what's going on in the world of music. I never have done. You have a choice when you get interested in culture., You have a choice of trying to absorb it all, the American style of "doing the sights" in two days, or else you can just decide: "I'll stay in this one place, because I like it here anyway, and I'll really understand this. I'll really find out about it." That's what I do.

I was in Venice a while ago. I had an exhibition there. Venice is a beautiful city. I'd see wolfpacks of Americans, running around with Nikons flying off their backs, bursting into quiet squares with a great crunch, going, "Ahh, where's Saaaan Marrrco?"

So I spent most of my time sitting in the back garden of a friend of mine. She has a back garden with high walls all around it, and all you can see is the tops of some other Venetian buildings. You can hear the gondolas going by.

I have the arrogance to believe that you can find out a lot more about a place that way, than you can by seeing the sights. I've seen San Marco a million times on postcards, and the real experience isn't dramatically different. But I've never had the feeling of sitting in a Venetian garden and hearing that sound of the gondolas splashing by.

Just to sit in one place and to soak up the atmosphere of that place... I mean, all spots have the same atmosphere at a given location, and somehow I think tourist sights have been robbed of their atmosphere by being tourist sights. It's as if taking too many photographs of something eventually makes it become unreal, become an image of itself. So I like, with music and with everything else, to stay in the same place for a long time... until I feel like moving somewhere else, then I stay there for a long time.

I've been living in Chelsea for a while, but I don't particularly like it. I've seen a flat this morning that I like a lot. So I might be living in a proper place soon. Expensive, though.

Are you an intellectual?

Sure! Most people are. I don't know what that word means, really. What does that word mean? Someone who uses their intellect? What do you think it means? That's my question to you.

Well, are you a person who reacts to things intellectually or do you react to things with your body?

I do them both. The former usually follows the latter. The first reaction is physical or emotional. But then I want to know why I had that reaction. I like to think why things have happened in a certain way. Is that what you mean by being an intellectual?

People usually use that word in a condemning sense, of someone who can't react in any other way, of someone who's detached from their real responses, because there's a huge body of "theory" that dampens every situation. Well, there are certainly people like that, but I don't call them intellectuals. I call them "clever people", "brainy people", "eggheads".

...I know I have a bit of an egghead; physically it's a little bit that way I know. But that's an unfortunate accident of nature. If I were a swarthy, ruddy Italian, with a greasy forehead, nobody would ask me if I thought I was an intellectual. I could say what I liked.

I think people who say they despise intellectuals are frightened of knowledge in some way. They're frightened that to understand something is to rob it of its power. In my experience that is never true. First of all, you can never understand something totally. But when you begin to understand something, you realise how much more there is that you don't understand.

Take that book on the table there. It's a book on the paintings of Ron Kitaj. I follow his work really closely. I like it a lot. I'm always looking at his work, and reading everything I can about him... and I try to understand this guy. Now, has this lessened my appreciation of his work? No, it hasn't. I find it even more fascinating and interesting than I ever did before.

People think that to explain something is to explain it away. That's not true.

You've been fairly nervous throughout this interview. Do you like talking about yourself?

Ah... yes. Well, actually I don't particularly like talking about myself. I'm not that interesting to me, because I live with me all the time. So there's no glamour in me for me.

But I like talking about ideas. I find them terribly interesting. God! When I lived in New York, I used to like overhearing conversations at café tables. That's a good way of finding out about a city, as well, much better than sight-seeing. In New York, everyone talks about themselves. The word "I" must permeate the air. If you could clean the air of every other word and just hear all the I's sticking out, it'd be like rain... I, i, i, I, i, i, I...

Everybody just babbles on about themselves. They all think they matter to the effing world. As if the existence of any of us makes any difference to anything.

One of the nice things about the kind of music I'm doing now, is that it makes me feel quite unimportant. I like that feeling. Rock music, on the other hand, tends to make you feel very important.

2008-06-20T15:54:00.000+01:00

This is SO cool.

Ultimate Little Dog and Beyond

2008-06-14T14:43:00.004+01:00

The aftermath of Manta's passing has been surprisingly easy. We miss the little muppet obviously, but that has been tempered with the fact that she was old and had a very good life. Her passing was fast and painless. We are all healing very well.

In many ways I feel a bit guilty about feeling so good. I paid all the bills this month, I'm sitting here drinking bourbon and coke on the rocks on a sunny Saturday afternoon in my stylish new town house, Bonobo is chillin' on iTunes through the stereo, I just spent a lovely morning walking around town with Hattie getting her glasses fixed at the opticians, looking in shops, eating ice cream and chips (not at once) and generally bonding. I even had a chance to sit for a bit and talk to some old friends.

It's so not like me to have a good time like that I have to wonder what's changing. I can sometimes relax and enjoy things. I'm unclenching. I must make it a policy, like that supercop on Dexter season 2, to sit and eat lunch every day. I must make an effort to go out for a drink with friends at least once a week. I must enjoy something and make something every day.

These are the tenets of my new lifestyle.

Currently recommending the following movies: Sunshine, National Treasure 2, Be Kind Rewind. Disappointed by "I am Legend". Real missed opportunity I thought.

Just about to watch No Country For Old Men, and REALLY keen to see new Batman and Indiana Jones flicks.

Musically currently loving:

"Beat Crazy" Joe Jackson
"Parallel Lines" Blondie
"Dial M for Monkey" Bonobo
"Mellow Gold" Beck
"Low" "Scary Monsters" "Lodger" David Bowie
"Songs From The Catherine Wheel" David Byrne
"Friend Opportunity" Deerhoof
"Gentlemen Take Polaroids" Japan
"Let Love In" Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
"Ghosts I-IV" "The Slip" Nine Inch Nails
"Party Fears Two" The Associates

and anything by Television (who I totally bypassed at the time) The Beloved or Sufjan Stevens.

Peace

Manta 1996-2008

2008-06-07T15:42:00.003+01:00

On 6th June 2008 our beloved dog Manta passed away aged 12 after a full and contented life.

She had been getting slower and more creaky over the last few months, but nothing overly suspicious. Periodic vet visits confirmed her heart was strong and while a little plump was only a little bit overweight for her breed and age. Her joints were getting creaky and stiff but fish oil chews were taking care of that and she was mostly pretty limber for a little dog of her advanced years. Cavalier's are not the longest lived of breeds, in fact they say anything over 9-10 years is most definitely borrowed time.

Around Wednesday or Thursday last week she started showing signs of being unwell. Previous days had seen her perky and ravenously hungry as she had always been. The decline was swift. By Friday evening it was clear something was very wrong. She was listless and still and anaemic. She couldn't walk without falling over. She was rushed to the vet, where our worst fears were confirmed. There was a lot of fluid in her abdomen, probably caused by an unforeseen tumour, most likely on her spleen. This happens all the time to elderly dogs, apparently, and because they are so good at soldiering on it's not obvious to the naked eye that there is anything amiss.

The vet said that nothing we could have done would have prevented this, and that even if they operated she wouldn't survive the procedure. This was going to happen anyway. We decided with heavy hearts the best thing to do was to let her go.

Mia is obviously devastated by this, but she is consoled in her loss by the fact that Manta had a long and happy life and was loved by everyone and loved them right back. Longevity and happiness, despite spending most of her life asleep and if unchecked eating more than a small horse. We should all hope for such a life.

She will be sorely missed.

Phil

Gorgeous Tiny Chicken Machine Show

2008-06-06T05:09:00.003+01:00

funny funny funny

This is at once the silliest and the funniest show on the net. Episode 11 stars Wil Wheaton, everyone's favourite teenage Star Trek TNG character. How can he be an adult? It's only like 20 years since he was on St... er, oh ok. Hey I actually met him a few times in about 1993. Did I mention that already? Dammit. My name dropping pool is really getting shallow. I got to put myself out there more...

Enjoy! Watch them all. Imagine a curious Japanese children's talk show with guest characters who seem in fear of their lives. Total comic genius. Written by and starring Kim Evey as Kiko and directed by her husband Greg Benson.

YouTube is the new TV folks. Deal with it. :)

Existential Gathering Gloom

2008-06-01T14:40:00.004+01:00

My gloomy state of mind is sort of coming and going. Being off sick makes you think too much.

I've spent a lot of time this weekend thinking. Mia is having a sleepover at our friend Ali's place. The kids are away as they are every holiday down at their mum's place. I've been mulling things over.

There's very few things in my life I regret. There's more good than bad. But what I hate most is the stuff I can do nothing about...

Ok don't really want to talk about stuff, but sometimes bad things go on behind closed doors. In the past I've been hurt and betrayed by loved ones, and friends and in-law relations just sort of stood about like they didn't want to get involved, like it was a private matter and taking one person's word for it wasn't enough to stick their necks out. I guess there was lots of stuff they didn't know about, so not entirely their fault. But nobody helped, even when I directly asked for it. And it's pointless raking that over now because too much oily spilled milk has drifted under the bridge. I do tell people about it all of course but it's more in the way of an anecdote. A funny thing happened to me on the way to the asylum.

If I could change the past I would, but I can't. And that's what I mean. I can't do anything about it and sometimes it really bothers me. I tell you what though it has made me a lot closer to my family recently. The only people I didn't ask for help from in the dark times were my own family. Stupid right? My mum and my sis especially who have come through for me recently in a big way. I can't possibly pay back all the favours they've done me and love they've given.

I was kind of a proud self-sufficient young adult, never asked for any help from anyone. I had to be literally unconscious from fatigue or grief or hunger before I would accept any assistance. So it was hard to ask but I'm glad I did.

But the dark times still come to haunt me sometimes, when I spend lots of time alone and unable to move about much. Like being off sick for 5 weeks or so. Oh and I'm sure that there are more dark times just ahead, I know it, but at least now I'm also sure there are some people in my life I can count on for support. That helps.

If there's a lesson here it is this: find out who your supporters are and cling to them like a rat. Oh and make sure the support is sometimes two-way or you will BE a rat.

:)

Yea, I am Mister Heartbreak

2008-05-27T06:41:00.005+01:00

After weeks of being in constant pain with sciatica, my throbbing sciatic nerve is finally settling down and at a certain point over the weekend I noticed I was was actually just watching TV... let me explain. For most of the last month I've been doing everything with my attention being grabbed and shaken by the constant, nagging, toothache in my hip joint, knee and ankle. It was the total focus of my attention. Reading, listening to people on the phone, conversations with the kids and Mia, surfing the Internet... all these things were just things I did while concentrating on the pain.

Sometimes they distracted me a little bit, but never very much, The pain was always foremost in my mind.

Then I noticed it, over the weekend, that first time. For a whole hour I had just been watching TV. I hadn't thought about the pain at all and I realised it was because for a while it wasn't there. I experimentally rotated my hip joint in it's cup. Nope. Nothing. I could sit comfortably upright for the first time in weeks, rather than be constantly favouring my left side. I could lie on my favourite side for sleeping, my right, and not have to move back over because the pressure grew too great.

After a while the ache came back. But for a while there it was bliss. Funny how you don't notice an absence of something. But it's all good. It means I'm definitely on the mend, and that's thrilling. My despondent feelings of the other day are mostly gone and now my focus is the exercises. I do them every chance I get.

Exercise brings an interesting sensation. As I bend my spine in a banana shape to the left, there is a sort of tingling down my right leg. The sensations are coming back, not exactly pins and needles, although I have had some of that, more a kind of heat and a not unpleasant but hard to pin down feeling of release.

It's good to feel that somehow this horrible disability is starting to end. I'm not a very good sick person, and my experiences with walking sticks and wheelchairs are going to stay with me for a long time. My whole perspective on wheelchair use has changed and I will never ignore a person in a wheelchair again.

Being off work for a longish while mean you spend a lot of time introspecting. For some reason when I woke in the night to take some more of the cocktail of painkillers I've been on, my mind was chewing on the subject of broken hearts. I have no clue why, it just popped into my head. I was pondering for no good reason I could figure out how many I've been responsible for.

Gratifyingly I can think of only a very few. But as the night wore on and the dull ache kept me awake I became fixated on the few that I'm sure were either deliberate or the result of selfishness or just juvenile inaction. The worst I can remember, and the one that breaks my heart when I think back is my first real girlfriend, Toni.

Toni was a boyish, bespectacled girl in my class, not obvious girlfriend material, but she was my friend and somehow at some point we end up thinking of each other differently. I think it was a thunderstorm when we were hanging out at some tacky shopping centre in my home town of Hemel Hempstead. I think it was The Heights. BANG FLASH. All of a sudden she was holding my hand, and I liked it. I held it and we jousted, verbally, our interaction while the same as before now subtly different, more intimate. I walked her home.

She was my first real girlfriend, not only because our relationship was physical as well as emotional (although sex would sadly be off the menu because we were as I recall only 14 at the time) but because it was my first adult relationship with someone of the opposite sex. We talked. Okay so we made out a lot too, turning kissing and heavy petting into an almost Olympic sport, but more importantly we got along. We enjoyed the same things, we hung out, we talked about stuff. She was, against all the odds, one of the best girlfriends a goofball like me could have wished for.

She had a job at a local newsagents on a Sunday and used to bring me snooty Sunday newspapers and bags of sweets, and we used to curl up on the floor and read and cuddle. She used to look after me when I was ill. She was around for one of my first weird scary migraines and talked me through it. She used to come into my bedroom some mornings smelling of the cool spring air and sit on the side of my bed and wake me with a kiss. She was the best.

Then came the fateful school trip.

At a certain point it was deemed useful for a group of us to go to another place and interact with kids from another school. We attended Highfield School, a Bauhaus inspired rectangular block on the hill, looking more like an open prison than a place of education. The school we were going to be paired with were Adeyfield, a slightly snootier school which co-incidentally was about 20 yards away from Toni's house and the newsagent in Queen's Square she worked at on the weekends.

Our teams from the two schools were shipped off to Hatfield and cooped up at the old Priory there for a week to learn how to interact with total strangers. We fought, we laughed, we danced, we got along. But what we also did was get ourselves exposed to a group of kids our own age who were not from our neighbourhoods.

Some of the girls were unfamiliar and kind of exotic looking. There was this one girl, Jan, looked kind of Mediterranean or maybe Indian. I got kind of obsessed with her. And one day, out of the blue, I walking into the oak panelled library to find her leafing through dusty old history books. We talked, we laughed. I thought she was stunningly, devastatingly cute and funny. I couldn't stop talking to her. When we were on the way home I asked a girl I knew to ask her if she wanted to go out.

Walking back from the coach stop I was walking on air. And that's when I saw Toni walking towards me. Of course it was school letting out time and the coach had let us out at Adeyfield... she was walking past my house on the way to her house and as she walked towards me I realised for the first time in my young life I was going to have to break up with her. I was in love with this girl called Jan. Toni was not as pretty, not as exotic, not as compellingly unknown as this new girl, and I wasn't old enough to have learned that all important lesson about not judging books by their covers. I was also not old enough to know how to handle a break up, it being my first one and all...

We hugged we kissed. I told her I'd had a great time and I'd tell her all about it later, but I was bushed and I'd see her at school on Monday. I then avoided her completely, and she found out we were breaking up from someone else. How could I have treated her that way? Easy. I was a kid and kids do thoughtless lazy and stupid things. But of all the stupid thoughtless and lazy things I have ever done, this is in the top five that I have regretted the most.

Later on I was hauled out of a maths lesson to apologise to her, I forget why... she was crying and distraught because I hadn't told her in person, and my maths teacher, bless him, raked me over the coals for being cowardly and potentially slanderous by saying things about her behind her back. I totally deserved it. It was a bastard thing to do to someone, and someone who deserved it less than anyone I've ever known in my life. I knowingly cast her aside for someone new. And as we sat outside the class, her crying uncontrollably and me trying to say something, anything to console her, and failing miserably, I learned a very important lesson. People have feelings. If you hurt them it leaves a mark, not just on them but on you. She hated me. She actually hated me and wanted me dead. And I couldn't argue with that. She was right.

I got payback though, and it was a bitch. Jan left me later after a year or so, then after a long time came back when I was about 18. We married when I was 20 and divorced when I was about 22. She ran off with one of my best friends, a scenario that played out several times in my life for reasons I have yet to grasp. Dumping Toni turned out to be not only one of the single cruelest and dumbest things I've ever done, but also set me on a path for some of my own most memorable and lasting heartbreaks. I think it was like about three in a row. Cruel slapdowns of the harshest nature. Fully deserved. I'd like to say I took them like a man, but I'd be lying. Those chicks ate me alive and spat out the pips.

So Toni, wherever you are and way WAY too late, I am truly sorry for what I did to you. You didn't deserve it, and I am almost certain my life would have been a lot nicer had I stuck with you a little longer and parted with you a little easier. Know this: you are still hands down one of the best girlfriends I ever had, and even 34 long years later I still remember your kindness, your wit and your tenderness.

I hope getting shot of my sorry ass cleared the way for the man of your dreams. I really do.

Px

I Am Leg End

2008-05-23T15:45:00.003+01:00

Coming up to the end of week three of the sciatica.

(Insert long, deep cavernous sigh here...)

Yeah, I had a very positive but also oddly depressing session at the hospital yesterday. I basically went because it's been weeks since I was stricken with this sciatica and I was getting a bit scared that it was never going away. I thought I was getting much better because I'm not writhing around on the floor in agony all the time. But I feared I'd reached a kind of plateau where it was getting neither better nor worse. It just aches all the time, even when I'm medicated up to the eyebrows. I needed some answers before I went quietly mad, so I asked to see a doctor who specialises in back stuff and a physiotherapist.

Turns out recovery time for sciatica is routinely 6-8 weeks, (god I wish they'd told me that before) and far from being stuck in a rut I'm informed I am right on track. Apparently I just need a couple of weeks more walking, physiotherapy and drugs and I will be, if not right as rain, at least right as a fine drizzle.

I've been signed off for another two weeks and been given a VERY strict regime of exercises to follow which I am told will ensure my recovery. I inwardly groaned at the idea of another TWO WEEKS of this, after all there is only so much Hallmark Channel and buttered toast a man can stand without losing his grip, but it was heartening in a way to know exactly what I have to look forward to and it's neither endless or hopeless.

So, having done all that, for some odd reason the main question on my mind was how can I minimise the inconvenience of me not being around at work for so long. I can finish up any paperwork by the end of the month, which now I have Internet (oh blessed relief) and space to set my computer up in will be a lot easier to manage. Plus I've decided I'll possibly go in a couple of times briefly over the next fortnight to clear up a few niggling little problems which I can sort out in minutes if physically present. (Plus I need to get away from the house before I go stark raving mad.) I think I might make it on the train provided I can stand up most of the way, but we'll see. Apart from anything else I need to touch base with my normal life before all my marbles roll off into the gutter, so to speak.

This has been a distressing and arduous few weeks, being in pain constantly is not fun; it warps your perspective on things, makes you grumpy and irritable, but in a funny way it makes you realise how relatively trouble-free your life really is most of the time. And as I said to a work colleague the other day on the up side it is very slimming and I very much think a book called "The Chronic Pain Diet" would climb the best seller list like a demented Spider-Man. What do you reckon? :)

I'm doing the exercises and it seems to be working. A friend has been berating me for not doing any exercises and as always he's right. I do feel a lot better now I'm doing them. I think the reason is that it hurt and I was afraid I was doing myself damage. All I really needed was to have a doctor tell me that I was actually making good progress to make it seem ok.

It sucks to be ill. Last time I was off this long I was suffering from nervous exhaustion. At least I could sleep and go to the bathroom. This has been the most boring three weeks of my life. Let's hope the next two are the end of it.

Px

Sciatica - not a futuristic thriller

2008-05-01T08:11:00.005+01:00

Day two of sciatica inspired confinement.

I had a bad back all last week, and it finally got better on Tuesday after many exercises and ibuprofen... then I got a giant horrible shooting pain down my leg and couldn't walk. I was reduced to having my daughter wheel me round ASDA in a wheelchair, which actually was kinda cool. Weird how everyone treats you when you're in a chair. It's one thing to be in a chair for 5 minutes play, but try one for a couple of hours and see how you like the world from down there. And people step aside, not in a courteous "sorry mate" kind of way but almost as if they were kinda going that way and just chose now to do so, so they don't have to acknowledge you. Why do we do that?

So it turns out I have sciatica. Basically it's a trapped nerve bundle in your hip/spine which travels down your leg like an electric bullet train at the slightest provocation. It's like a cramp, you can avoid it by not doing those things which make it happen. Unfortunately the things which make it happen change from time to time, and those include things like walking, standing, sitting, lying down, getting up, bending over. It's like back pain roulette, where she stops nobody knows.

So day two of total boredom. It's not like having a migraine or a cold where you can shamble to the toilet when you feel like it and go make a sandwich and put on a DVD. You have to do a round of the whole house, inch by painful inch, a couple of times a day, taking care of all the things you might want to do, food, entertainment, taking a pee, and then get back to bed or a chair taking at least 30 minutes to get comfortable again when you finally crawl back. And every once in a while you'll do something wrong and get the pain, which hits like a gunshot and drops you to the floor where you try really hard to find a leg position which will relax it and stop it hurting. And sometimes fail.

I'm hoping the mega anti-inflammatory tabs the doc gave me kick in soonish. I could really use the mobility. I start moving house tomorrow. Oh it'll get done, but I will owe the kids and Mia something for being my hands and feet.

Oh and in case I forgot to mention it to everyone, the web comic is going great guns over at www.idcomix.com. Been wanting to do some comics for a long time, and this is turning out really swell.

Px

Thrill Seeking, sure, but el camino del Rey...?

2008-04-16T10:20:00.001+01:00

Erm, how about no.

So much for regular, snouty

2008-04-06T23:02:00.001+01:00

Ok so I didn't fulfill my promise to blog every day while I was off. Sosumi.

I have been very busy though. Been making music on the computer I've been setting up for the last six months to do just this. It's awsome... I have an orchestra at my disposal, not to mention every synth and drum imaginable. I even have didgeridoos and other ethnic instruments. Really lifelike super sampled musical instrument. Best damn music setup I ever had. I did about 5 bare bones tracks last week and I'll be finishing them and adding vocals this week, or more likely producing another 6 unfinished tracks. I also had the ideas for two comicbooks and did an actual page for one of them. But again, I want to do it well and finish.

I'm all about finishing stuff at the moment. Making something, making it good intentionally, and finishing it, because yes... it ain't art unless you finish it, baby!

Oh and I've been watching a LOT of movies which I've been putting off till I had some time. I also re-watched things which I watched hastily at my desk at work and couldn't really assimilate. One in particular is "Manufactured Landscapes". Here's the blurb:

Edward Burtynsky is internationally acclaimed for his large-scale photographs of nature transformed by industry. Manufactured Landscapes – a stunning documentary by award winning director Jennifer Baichwal – follows Burtynsky to China, as he captures the effects of the country’s massive industrial revolution. This remarkable film leads us to meditate on human endeavour and its impact on the planet.

My favourite bit is where the occupants of 13 full sized cities are paid by the Chinese govenment to take their cities apart brick by brick to make way for the Three Gorges dam and reservoir. Wonderful movie. A movie that you can watch more than once because it's got a lot of real authentic content. What a shocking notion.

Check out the video.

Mixtape Redux

2008-03-29T14:24:00.006Z

I did a really cool thing today. I created a mix tape using a new service called Muxtape.com... it makes an online mix tape that anyone can listen to. Totally illegal probably but REALLY cool, and you can listen to a random sampling of other people's tapes too. Mine is at snouty.muxtape.com
All you do is click on the title of the track and it's buffered and played to you... cool, huh?

I'm embarking on another stay at home holiday for the next FORTNIGHT oh my lord I can't remember when I was away from work for such a long time. It's good because I have lots of stuff to sort out, packing, figuring out where we are going to live etc. I saw a great place today, a little more expensive than I can really afford but we'll save on Council Tax so it might even out. Wish us luck! Have to figure out how I'm going to pay the movers and the deposit and things. Is it just me or does everyone else have problems paying for these kinds of things? I don't have any savings or credit of any kind, so that doesn't help, I suppose. People live on credit, it does make life easier doesn't it, but at a price...

As usual when I'm on hols I'll try and blog every day to spice things up a little for you. :)

Talk soon. xxx

Guilty Pleasures and Remebering how to Have Fun

2008-03-20T21:30:00.003Z

This is a painting I did. Yeah, the first time I painted something for YEARS. I used Photoshop, a £20 graphics tablet from ASDA and some really cool new digital brushes by a French guy called David Levy. And it was fun. It looks kinda Mexican, doesn't it?

Makes me realise actually that in all the problems and stress of the last year or so I totally forgot how to Have Fun and I really need to put a little bit of thought and imagination into remembering how you do that. Painting is a start. Also while the school is on Easter break I intend to print some T-shirts, make an album of music of some kind, write the script for the Maxine animated feature I have planned, maybe draw some pictures for a comicbook I've been thinking about and finish another couple of YouTube videos... okay so I might do one of those things if I'm lucky but a man has to have goals, right?

Oh and I intend to watch a load of videos. I got a stack hip high of vids I intended to watch for the longest time and now is my time. I'm having an entire fortnight off. Okay so it's not the most relaxing time, what with having to find a new house and dealing with all these financial shenanigans, but I'll do my best to have a good time. Relax and try and get some perspective on my life, something which I need a lot more than a new house to live in, right now.

So term ended today and we showed the video projects. I'll be uploading them to YouTube so you can see them. I might have to bleep out some swearing... not sure about YouTube's policy on that. The movies turned out okay, and one of them was downright good. Not bad considering I took these kids from nought to filmmaker in about four days.

Oh and speaking of vids, I just bought "Footloose" in ASDA for about £3.00. I know you are not allowed to like this film. It is universally reviled amongst film buffs and fanboys all over. But I kinda like it. I love the title sequence, I love me some Kevin Bacon and I love that it's a crappy movie that everyone hates. I mean it has Dianne Wiest and John Lithgow, how bad can it BE? It's preposterous, it's cheesy, it has Kevin Bacon who as we know is the focus of all of Hollywood in six moves or less. But I like it. Okay? It's a guilty pleasure, like that awful "The Woman In Red" which I can't NOT watch when I see it on TV. That's why they call it guilty. Cos you KNOW it's bad but you do it anyway.

Life is full of stuff you shouldn't like but you do, and I say bravo!

2008-03-13T20:47:00.002Z

Ooops pic too big. It says "Ceiling Cat Creates Man" - click on it to go to the original page.

Thanks to everyone who got in touch worried that I was having a bad time... yeah I was but feelin lots better now. Now I only have a bad cold... brr

Enjoy this funny LOLCATS pic and I'll see ya soon.

Px

Everything Good Must Come To An End

2008-03-06T22:05:00.007Z

Okay so finishing off one of the crappest weeks in living memory, we finally got the notice for when we have to be out of this house so they can knock it down to make a handful of starter homes. May 8th.

So April is the month where everything happens.

I knew this for several reasons. Tax disc on the Honda is up in April. My favourite aftershave smell No 89 is back in stock at Floris in April. My phone contract is up in April and I can switch to pay as you go. My Easter hols are in March/April. Now the house. April is the last full month I'll spend there.

Finally finished the video project at school. If I get some time I'll tell you about it. Also got my new car from my lovely sis. Also tell you about that when I get more time, but it's fab and runs on LPG so very cheap.

But I am exhausted. 5 weeks of teaching. Debts up to my eyebrows, cleared now with help from my lovely mom, but very stressful. And to make this week even worse I broke a tooth at the weekend and it's like having a little miniature broken bottle in my mouth. (see pic I took while driving in today) My tongue is cut to crap. But I can't afford the dentist for a few weeks so got to live with it for now. Plus it is the only tooth I have on the left at the bottom so I won't be able to chew on that side after it is removed. I'll have to have falsies. Yep it's official, I'm an old man.

So, waiting, clinging on for grim death until the holidays. Two straight weeks of nothing, no work, no silly questions, no nothing. Just videos to watch and sleeping too much. I can't wait. Only a fortnight to go till the end of term.

Wish me luck.

Halifax's Whipping Boy

2008-02-28T20:20:00.004Z

Damn Halifax bank and their stupid overdraft facilities... I went over my overdraft last month. I tried to get some money in the account so I didn't incur any charges, borrowed some money etc., but it took too long to get into the account and I was overdrawn. They charged me £35 per transaction. It ended up as £245.

So I was already £245 down before I started this month. I went overdrawn, not much I could do about it. I called in some debts, sold a few things on eBay, still I ended up overdrawn. They bettered themselves this month. This month they will be taking £350 off me in bank charges.

So now I will be £595 down for next month. I will almost inevitably go overdrawn because of course I am going to be broke after I've paid my rent.

I hate my life.

Still I just ate a Raspbery Ruffle bar. It was yummy. It couldn't have been tastier if it tasted like the roasted hearts of Halifax shareholders. I hope they sleep well. Of course they do, they are growing RICH on the backs of poor saps like me with exactly zero effort. Damn them all to hell.

Nearly March and All is Well?

2008-02-17T15:55:00.005Z

Been a tricky but okay month. Started really badly with the bank taking £245 off me in £35 chunks for unpaid items, some as low as £3.00. Total bastards. I borrowed some money from my mum to pay some stuff and the bank basically stole most of it. That sucked a lot.

But otherwise I've been managing well. I managed to get paid some money, and sold a few things on eBay, something I've been meaning to get around to for AGES.

Now would I guess be a good time to check how am i doing on the old resolutions, it being nearly March now. Good time to stop and evaluate. Take stock. Check all the old ducks are in a row. Blah blah.

I have to say there's more good than bad... I am kind of spending much less time moaning, I have been out for two meals out with Mia and a couple of sociable drinks, and I've spent some time with the kids.

Not taken that many pics, but I've been walking and eating proper. I've not been keeping up with my blogs but I'm fixing that now.

Not a bad score, overall.

On the movie front, I've actually added a movie to the ones I want to make this year, and that is an animated feature based on my musical, Maxine. Yeah radical idea, I know, but one I've been increasingly interested in. I've been gagging to do an animation, and this is something I own! So I don't have to write anything it's already written. Plus I have not only the original cast members I still talk to but a fund of wonderful actors to choose from.

I was thinking about making the animation look like 16 bit video games. Just a thought.

More of this later.

Top picks for the month: currently watching "30 Days of Night" which is hands down the best vampire movie of the last many years. Based on a really good comic-book. A great movie with good popcorn chomping performances from Josh Hartnett and Melissa George.

I really liked the comic, I thought it was one of those fantastic "damn if they didn't think of it first" ideas that seems obvious, what they call "postdictable", like the opposite of predictable.

Out on DVD in April and I will be in line, even though I saw it already.

Also reading Sherlock Holmes stories in their original form, as facsimiles of the original Strand Magazines. Also kind of reading my way through all the James Bond books in the right order, as they were written.

AND I have another pile of books, on top of which are the Charlie Stross books that Matt Kelland got me for Christmas. I know Charlie, I worked with him but I never read his books. Time for catch up. Loving them so far.

Happy New Y... oh it's almost February

2008-01-31T11:49:00.000Z

Sorry about the delay. I've been working really long hours this term.

I was going to do a post on the 2nd January detailing my carefully thought out New Years Resolutions, but as I went on a total drunken BENDER for a few days over new years, I totally forgot. I was enjoying myself mostly, but actually I was really lonely. Once again I spent a lot of time on my own, and it was ok, I got things done and had some time off, but I was bummed there was nobody to share the time with. Minky was away in Finland and the kids were at their mum's.

I'm not spending next Christmas and New Year alone. That's resolution 1.

2. I will spend much less time this year moaning to my friends about how broke, depressed, tired, needing some creative freedom and other speeches best left to thin chaps wearing cravats and sitting on a chaise longue.

3. I will spend more time being sociable. It's been MONTHS since I went out for a drink on a regular basis. I have friends but you'd never know it. Most of them would have difficulty picking me out of a line-up.

4. I will make more time for the kids. They are 16 and 14 now. Soon they will leave home and forget me till they need money or solace. Okay they do the second part already but the first part will be hard and I want to be ready for any regrets that I should have spent more time with them. And hey, there is no such thing as "quality time" that's a myth we use to beat ourselves up about things, like "will I ever reach the perfect weight" and "i hope they knew how much I loved them"... stupid humans, always torturing ourselves with things we cannot know.

5. Take more pictures. I love taking pictures. It's a core part of who I am and I've not done it for such a long time.

6. Go for a walk every day. Eat properly. Take vitamins. No excuses. I gave up smoking cigarettes a year ago last October, but I still get short of breath when I climb a lot of stairs at once, and on occasion this effect is worryingly persistent. Having been a smoker for about 20 years I guess I have ground to reclaim, but all the same I need to feel no so out of condition.

7. A couple of my friends are dying. Is it wrong of me to want to go away and leave them alone? No it's human. I must fight the urge to flee. I must spend time with them before they go, or I'll wonder if they know how much I love them. (see 4.)

8. I will make at least 3 long form movies this year, and a handful of shorts maybe. I already have about 8 hours of footage in the can for my meandering biographical documentary babble, "Attention Seeker", but I also want to make a movie about my friend Brent and his music. The plan is to go down there with a couple of cameras and couple of movie lights and film some songs indoors, and then some busking, and fill the rest with conversations. It's a long weekend's work tops. Then I want to make a feature length narrative piece. I don't care if it's "The Sacrament" which I still do want to make, but it's going to cost... I'll write something new if necessary, but I need to film it at least before December 2008 to qualify. Goals are dreams with completion date.

9. I will get my podcasts going. I've been hoarding raw recordings and need to edit and publish them.

Making Better Movies

10. I will try and ramp up my blogging to make more regular posts, AT LEAST once a week from now on, and more frequently if I can make it.

Oh and in parting, for some reason listening to this nice woman talking about whiteheads and blackheads is really relaxing...

Twas the Night After Christmas

2007-12-28T16:15:00.000Z

...and all through the house, not a creature was stirring, not even my mouse.

Ok so that's not strictly true.

There's the doggie, who's snoring like a adorable adenoidal piglet under my desk. (Moments ago she was gnawping on a huge Jumbone in her basket and was so joyful she forgot to pull her legs in after her...) And then there's the cat, who's walping up and down the hallways looking for Hattie, because Hatbox has shut the front room door to keep the heat in while she watches "Memoirs of a Geisha" for the 50th time this week. And Tedbox is not exactly stirring, but while his body is immobile he's thumbing his Nintendo DS frenetically playing the Lego Star Wars: The Complete Saga game I bought him. I can't see his facial expression because his hair is so long now it hangs down to his chest. So effectively when he leans forward he's playing DS in a little tee pee of his own hair.

And me, what am I doing apart from finally blogging again? Pondering the Christmas season? Looking forward to the year ahead? Well, I might get into New Year's resolutions some time later on like on the 1st or 2nd, but not today. Still thinking about them. What I am doing is enjoying a well earned rest.

Christmas was kind of weird but very successful depending on your criteria; If by successful you mean it turned out okay, everyone got what they wanted, and we spent quality time with those we love, and Hattie baked a huge cake then yeah. If you mean nothing went wrong then hell unicycling no!

Turning up to Bristol Airport in the middle of the night on the 21st we found out Mia's flight to Finland was canceled. So after no sleep and as a kind of huge last minute pressie to my baby doll I agreed to drive her to Heathrow to get a direct flight. See? Commuting every day has its advantages. A trip to Heathrow feels like nothing to me, even though it is enormously exhausting and draining. Two and a half hours each way in the car? After an unexpected £50 parking bill in Bristol? Mere bagatelle. How far am I prepared to go to make sure Mia gets to spend Christmas comfortable in the bosom of her family? The answer is THAT far. Bring it on. I love making things happen against the odds. I live for that stuff. Oh and the really good news was she was so full-on nice to the clerk despite being last in the huge line she got bumped up to first class. Sweet as.

Driving home I was surprisingly awake. At Fleet services I fell asleep for a second while eating my burger, and for a while there when I woke up I had no clue where I was. I was sitting in a lounge with loads of other people watching a big TV which was saying that Tony Blair has converted to Catholicism. It took me a few minutes to realise where I was or how I got there, but I did think for a fleeting moment that it was a dream. A fleeting moment at Fleet. Mwah.

Got home. As soon as I walked in and called out to the kids I knew something was very wrong. Why was the house so cold? Walking around it became obvious the heating was off. Kids huddled in their rooms playing video games didn't notice. Turns out that 500 litres of oil is only enough for two months worth of heat if you are not really frugal with it... So there really IS no such thing as a free lunch, go figure. Called around. No deliveries till 27th now, as heating firms all gone home for the season.

Heated the house all Christmas with just a radiator in the bedroom, the electric fire in the front room and a fan heater in the kitchen. A pits end to a pits year you might say. Fortunately it was a pretty mild week so not too cold, but always a little edge of chill nibbling at your bones through any amount of cloth, except in the rooms with heat where it was mostly too sweatily hot to wear a dressing gown. Temperature differences whacking up and down for a few days mean I now have a terrible cold... So yeah, it was "a challenge", in the way actors say that on DVD extras when asked how was it swimming through a flooded kitchen set without air time after time to get through a hole two feet wide...

We got through though. I had to haul the table into the kitchen from the conservatory for us to have Christmas dinner because it was too cold out there and we had the kitchen heated up. Turned out okay. Dinner was sensational, despite me spending 3 hours prepping and cooking, it was over in about 45 minutes. We had three bird roast, reduced in ASDA from £20 to £6.50 because I didn't buy it till the day before Christmas Eve.

Christmas was fun in the end. And then we had a few days of quiet contemplation. The kids had something to do, I had lots of The Two Ronnies to watch, and fell in love with Tina Charles, you know, "I Love to Love", all over again. (He he.) ITV3 was running pretty much every season of Ronnies all through the week so it was like having warm comedy cocoa on tap all week. I drank deep from that well, my friends.

When the oil was finally delivered on the 27th I marked the level. Next day when Matt Kelland came around it had plummeted from about midway up the tank to about 5 inches from the bottom. Panicked and called the landlord telling him we had a leak. Didn't realise the tank was so huge, I thought 500 litres was a lot, but turns out the big old tank holds a good 2500 litres. Dammit. So there was air in the tube making it seem like there was more in it than I thought. That level would have been about 1200 litres. Bollicks.

So here I am listening to Timbuk3 with the heating finally back on and the electric heaters and their nasty dry uncontrollable heat finally silent. The presents have been given and received, and received well. I got a lot of very nice gifts. An FM transmitter from Ted which connects to an iPod or other music device and plays it into any nearby FM radio. Genius. Hattie got me a ring, which I haven't worn since Christmas day because my fingers are swollen, but it's lovely basic pinky ring which will make me look very sophisticated. Mia got me some Cefiro Eau de Toilette which I actually gasped at when I unwrapped it. I was so jazzed about getting it as I LOVE their perfume. Floris are a wonderful company based in Jermyn Street in London and of course were suppliers of Ian Fleming's favourite scents. She made me two ceramic angels which are temporarily sitting on top of my bookcase. She also got me the QI book "The Book of General Ignorance" and "Do Ants have Arseholes?" by the surviving authors of "the Meaning of Liff". I loved all my presents and I can't remember a year when I've ended it feeling so blessed. Not that it started that way...

Not to rehash the whole year, but in short 2007 was both a terrible and terrific year. I learned a lot about myself and what I want from my life, what remains of it. I was more broke than I've ever been in my life, as well as more desperate, more tired, more aimless, more hopeless and more depressed.

BUT... (and as you will notice that is a big but)

I've also had some of my hardest won and most gratifying personal successes. I got my writing career back for most of the year, which was without question no kidding the joy of the year. I started taking pictures again after my mother fronted me the money to get a new camera. I started to dream again, to fall in love with the possibilities of my future life, with Mia and with my kids. I thought I'd lost all hope but I found it again.

I thought I was useless and unemployable. Being good at writing again got me through it. I realized that not only can I still write but I am also DAMN good at it when I try, and on a good day I'm one of the best there is. It's true. I also met some really fine people and made some really cool art of one kind or another. I'm embarking on a new movie blog/podcast/ebook venture with Matt Kelland, which if I play my cards right might be a new job along with photography and other blogging. Fingers crossed.

Most importantly and I can't believe it myself, I survived the year to write this blog, for which I have to thank the lord, my friends and family and my lucky stars. Thanks to Matt and Ali Kelland, John McNulty and John Molloy for being my constant IM companions down the year. It's like having the smartest people on the planet as your own personal sounding board. Thanks to Brent for some really amazing podcasts.

Thanks to My Mum, Sheena Leigh Ross, for her enormous support during this very difficult year; David McCandless for providing good quality work (including being a contributor to the FAB book you can see to the right here) and huge amounts patient and unpaid time lavishing encouragement, support and succor to a broken, battle-scarred old warhorse who thought he was done; Sheree Burgess for being my big sister and helping me to find my courage when it repeatedly failed me; to John McNulty for work, companionship and support through this long dark teatime of the soul, and finally and most importantly the love of my life Mia, my darling minky, for staying with me through the hardest year of my life and helping me to stay focussed on what's important. Thanks baby, if I didn't love you already I'd love you just for that. Here's to next year bringing you everything you want in life. x

New Year's resolutions next time, but have a great New Year everyone. Meantime, keep smiling through. (as usual you can click on all the pics to get bigger versions.)

Lots o love,

Phil

Joy to the World

2007-11-27T09:40:00.000Z

After the miserable post about my photo taking aspirations being knobbled by credit scoring I have a much more positive note. On the way home from Jessops the other day with my tail between my legs I noticed a much older model of the camera in the window of the nice family run camera shop down the road. Second hand, a Canon 300D for a mere £220 ish.

I was thinking about this for a few hours. It seemed so right. I called my mum and asked her if, despite the fact that she's bailed me out extensively over the last few months, if she could front me the money. To my slack jawed surprise she said yes. Not only that, she bought the thing over the phone and within a couple of hours she texted me to say I could pick it up.

I love my mommy.

It's a perfect camera. Bigger than its younger brothers the 350D and the 400D, less megapixels only 6 as opposed to 10, but like the argument with breasts I always feel that anything you can't get in a 10x8 is a waste. All that megapixel stuff is just penis-waggling anyway. It's bigger and heavier than the new ones, but actually thinking about it that's a GOOD thing. You don't want camera to be small and light, not professional ones anyway. And it comes with the exact same 18-55mm lens I would have got on the 400D. All I need now is some extension rings or a non-Canon zoom lens, which I think you can get for £70 and I'll have the same kit I was going for without owing any money to Jessops.

Yeah, I love my mommy a lot.

So subsequently I've been taking pictures like some kind of crazed snapping monkey. I knew I missed it, I forgot exactly HOW much I missed it. And it's all coming back to me. I've found a flashgun in my photography stuff in a box in the loft, and spent many a happy hour bouncing flash of the ceiling and walls and trying out exposure settings. Nothing can compare to the creation of a perfect image... (check out the series I did of Hattie in her kimono...)

I'm so stupid. I could have been doing this all the time.

Okay, so I had all my cameras stolen from my office at school a couple of years back so I couldn't take any pictures for a long time. But I forgot how deeply that ran through the core of my being. I forgot how important it was to who I am. I also forgot how good I am.

Most important though is that it really dawned on me that I could actually earn money this way. Seriously despite being a pretty decent photographer with over 30 years experience I still only think about writing and web work when I think about freelance gigs. Yeah I really AM that stupid. Anyway, I'm now trawling the Internet for photo libraries and photography markets. This could be a new freelance job for 2008.

Anyway, thanks mum. Of all the things you've done for me this year this might be the most important.

x

48%

Amanda Mabro - Superwoman in the Making

2007-11-25T12:50:00.000Z

strangely drawn to this for some reason... mostly I would think for the presence of the lovely Miss Sugarpuss, a burlesque dancer of some note. Man I love burlesque.

More sensible post next time. Lots to talk about.

Bait and Switch courtesy of Credit Scoring

2007-11-23T20:38:00.000Z

Hi everyone... sorry about the static and the low hum for a few months but it's been kinda hectic at work. (I wonder how many times I've said that in this blog... I bet its lots. Or maybe I'm just getting deja vu. Or maybe I should just up my dosage...)

It's funny how when I'm driving to work I can think of endless things to talk about on the blog but so few when I actually sit down to write. Maybe that's why I've not posted much lately.

I tell you something I'm really bummed today. For months, years probably since my camera kit was stolen a few years back, I've felt this void in my life. It was photography. Not snapshots, because I take those on my phone. Photographs, images, pictures good enough for a wall or a book... those are the pix I crave. I want to take pictures. I drive past really lovely landscapes every day to and from work, especially in the morning. I want to capture that. I've been feeling wistful and sometimes a bit angry.

And I've had nothing really for the last two years to take proper pictures on... apart from a Minox 35mm compact which I can't find a replacement battery for (my fault for being a disorganised dope), my new Diana+ (see below), my 3.0 megapixel camera phone, the loan of a compact digital camera from school which has a fixed zoom lens, and is not much more than a glass bead... I think I have a 30 year old Nikkormat SLR somewhere, but can't find it and ANYWAY I don't really want to shoot film anymore. It's expensive and difficult to get it processed and into the computer. What a searing indictment of poor old film... But it's true. I'm a digital artist. I need to shoot digital, especially if I want to compete as a professional.

So I thought RIGHT, I need a camera kit. Now the Canon 400D comes as a special kit for £700, not too bad as these things go, I reasoned, with 10 megapixels, a wide to medium 18-55mm lens, a medium to telephoto 55-200mm lens, and a camera battery/grip. Perfect professional starter kit. A bargain as the second lens alone is worth about £300. And Jessops have a buy now pay in 12 months deal, more than enough time I thought to earn the money back taking pictures.... it was all too good to be true. Oh ok. So I was getting all excited about finally scratching that itch. They let me handle the kit as they were ringing it up... then the credit reply came back from Scotland. Declined. You could have knocked me over with an Indian headdress. Dreams dashed. Major jones to make pictures thwarted. Gutted like a fish. Shame because that was my freelance work strategy for the New Year. Might as well have bet on the Lottery.

So yeah, due to the stupid credit scoring system I'm not getting my camera. And most gallingly not because of my atrocious credit history either, which has been cleaned up, but probably because of:

a) an outstanding credit card which is still marked in error as still overdue rather than payment agreed,

b) not being on the electoral roll (my fault I only just changed it) but most annoyingly...

c) get this: too many inquiries on my credit history. WHAT??? I mean damn I did at least two of those searches myself to check what was going on, I hope they don't count those.

I was very upset in the shop. I tried to smile and act all casual and fair enoughish, but I was really upset. The guy was very polite but his manner changed from jokey-matey to very businesslike real quick, as if I was being nice to him as a con... I hate my life. I am a photographer who doesn't own a professional quality camera. The urge to make pictures BURNS in my blood and I can't sate it in quite the way I thought I would be able to. Rats!

Yeah, ok I made the mistake of pumping myself up about this a bit... I was looking at the landscape on the way into work again this morning. I was ticking off places I was going to go and take pictures this coming weekend. What a SAP. Setting myself up for a fall and breaking one of my own rules, Don't Get Your Hopes Up. After all the misery I've been through over the last few years I thought we'd entered a new era of luck and prosperity. The latter is yet to be proven and the former inspires a hollow laugh. But I set myself up. Won't that mistake again in a hurry.

Okay so, at least I got my Diana+ through the post from Lomography.com. It's not a work-a-day camera but an art camera. CLICK HERE for more details. Plus I wont be taking too many pix on it because film and processing is expensive. But I'm looking forward to the results. I'll post some here or on Facebook.

I really like the kinds of result you can get... I remember these things from the first time around. I bought one in our local toy shop, Taylor and McKenna, back in the late '60s. Cost about £3 I think, which was a load of money in those days.

More recently I got an ANNY clone of the Diana camera, and it was a super thrill when I found it again and added it to my camera bag that day I went to work. At last, I had a camera kit all in one bag so I can go anywhere and take all kinds of pictures... yeah the bag got stolen from my office. This was before I started locking my office all the time and before we had those CCD cameras installed covering all the doors. I lost my ANNY, but that was the least of it, a Canon IX7 SLR, my favourite camera of all time, plus a Hanimex pro flashgun, and a couple of little compact cameras... I can't tell you what a hole that left in my gut. Urgh. Bad times.

But getting the new Diana+ was a joy, and in a very small way made up a little for what I've lost, camerawise. Making up for what I've lost in other ways will take more than a reborn plastic lensed camera toy. :D

So I'm all about the photography now. My camera phone is hardly going to leave my eye. The Diana+ will be full of 12-shot 120 roll film. My Minox will have a new battery. I'm ALL ABOUT the image now. I'll do without my camera. But when nobody's looking I'll be biting my knuckle.

2007-09-19T10:22:00.000+01:00

Remember the Madonna tribute remix I made? Well here's the video from YouTube.

Enjoy!

Day Five - The Tooth, The Whole Tooth

2007-09-14T20:06:00.000+01:00

Had a kind of crap day which turned into a good day.

I woke up with the intention of spending the day in bed watching movies. But the kids needed something from the shop before school so I got dressed and did that. Then Mia's bus didn't show up, so I had to give her a lift in. I took the USB plasma ball to PC World and it was working fine. Go figure. Ate a sausage and egg McMuffin on the way back.

Got home with about 15 minutes to spare before my appointment at the dentist. I figured two or three fillings and the extraction of the stub of tooth left from when my cap broke off. Yeah I dunno if I mentioned this... after I took the kids up to my sisters the other day, I
chewed a sweet and the whole top of the gold cap I have in the back of my mouth broke off. Apparently the reason I've had problems with that tooth is because it was half broken and completely undermined. That's why I've been having bad breath. I had a rotten tooth and didn't know it.

So anyway I get to the surgery a little late. The session lasts about 40 mins with the dentist screwing the tooth out like it's a rusty nail in a floorboard. They say I look really pale when they're done, would I like to sit down before I fall down? Yeah I'm pale, that was hands down one of the most horrible dental experiences I can remember. Not their fault, but mother of jesus I had to stedy myself against furniture, doors and hedges and cars till I got back to my own car.

When I've recovered my composure and driven home I can't do anything. McNulty tries to talk to me online but I feel like refried turds and I need to lie down. I slip a few DVDs in the player and watch them one after the other. "Four Eyed Monsters" was really good, perfect sick boy viewing. I hope my films will be that good. Really nice job of filmmaking although I find autobigraphical movies to be a bad start on the whole. What do you do next? You either go on telling more of your story or you have no ideas. I hope these guys come up with something good.

"Inland Empire" by David Lynch on the other hand is not a film I would recommend to sick people who are in pain and on the verge of endorphin induced sleep. Now don't get me wrong, I love David Lynch, I think he's a genius, but sometimes his movies are more art than cinema... I kept nodding off to be woken by a blood curdling scream and opened my eyes to Laura Dern grimacing horribly into the camera. I don't have a single clue what the movie was about. Must watch it again some time when I don't feel like a car backed over my head. It was mostly shot on HD it seems to me, but I have to check that. Some really interesting things, but also some things which made me say out loud, "you had me with you there David for a while, but the people with the rabbit heads? I dunno..."

Finished the day watching stuff with Hattie "Farce of the Penguins" and a bunch of the US version of "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" which is one of our favourite shows. Ted was in his room doing his own thing. He's going through a bit of a solitary phase. I guess we'll see him later.

X

Day Four - Thursday of the Gods

2007-09-13T17:03:00.000+01:00

Managed to get my computer sorted out. I got a new Mac Mini to replace the old Mac Mini which was only supposed to be a temporary computer but I liked it so... had a lot of trouble doing what I though was going to be a two hour job MAX. Turned out I burned most of the day and half of my wits. Very frustrating as the migration assistant software wasn't working properly... I had to repair permissions and format the new Mac again. Got very agitated. This is too much like work.

Ah well. But it turned out okay because getting the computer sorted out and Final Cut and Cubase LE installed was one of my goals. I transferred the data from my crabby old Lacie drive to the spanky new WD MyBook Pro and now I have a powerful and yet portable system which can do anything anywhere. Unlucky for me I never go anywhere.

Shot some nice film for the movie - woke up and it was misty and lovely in the garden, then later sunny and Autumnal. Shot way too much footage of grass swaying on lovely full res HD.

Later on I watched "The King Of Marvin Gardens" on DVD. Wonderful. I forgot how good those old Jack Nicholson and Bob Rafelson movies were.

Finished the day shooting footage for the "UnFrozen" video with Hattie wearing a black feather boa and a cloak in the foliage in the back garden. Seems a bit half-assed. Maybe we'll do a better job of it tomorrow when we have more time.

Day Three - The Banks vs. Snouty vs. Madonna

2007-09-12T18:21:00.001+01:00

Woke up around 6.30am. Decided to cram more into the day by working my usual schedule. Tiring. How on Earth do I do this all the time?

I did however weed the paving in the back garden which has been bugging me for ages. Now it looks great and not like some suburb in Vietnam.

Most creative thing I did all day was make a mashup/remix of Madonna's wonderful "Frozen" called "UnFrozen". (Click on the link to hear it.) (Note this is a not for profit, fan produced tribute to Madonna and in no way a money making scheme, so please don't sue me, Madonna! I mean I'm practically your neighbour...)

I may actually make a video for this later down the week and upload it to YouTube. I might use it in the movie, but I might leave it out in case I get clobbered... mashups are supposed to be "fair use" but in practice they don't take that view... (The video is on YouTube now, so check a later post and you'll see it...)

What else... I bought some Lime and Mint flavoured juice, like a Mohito without the rum. It tastes like inflatable plastic pool water. Really horrible. Actually I kinda like it.

And also I was referred to this site by my broker, my debt management guy, and even my mum, Money Saving Expert. It's a VERY cool site that tells you how to reclaim your bank charges and lots of other useful money saving schemes. Wonderful. HSBC must owe me about £50,000. Let's hope so. he he he

Anyway, there you go. I'm sure I did more stuff today, but I can't really remember what it was. I'll come back and flesh this out, perhaps tomorrow when I'm a bit more compus mentis.

Toodles, poodles.

xxx

Day Two... the Oxbow Incident

2007-09-11T20:19:00.000+01:00

Today didn't go nearly as smoothly as yesterday, although I did end up being pretty productive.

I woke up at 7am because Hattie needed me to go get her some things for lunch today. Mia was still asleep beside me, which meant she had about 5-10 minutes before her bus to Bath left from outside the house. With the best will in the world she was either the going to miss the bus or break stuff trying to make it.... I said what the hell, I'll take her in.

Fortunately we had a SModcast to listen to, a hilarious podcast with Kevin Smith and Scott Mosier which they upload every week and is ALWAYS a hugely funny if a little scatalogical listen. That passed the time amiably, and we had a good trip. I ate breakfast in McDonalds which was dry and a little hard to swallow, especially as the coffee was NUKULAR hot. McDonalds is right next to PC World and Currys in Bath, so I did a little early morning shopping, buying a USB driven plasma lamp in PC World (which didn't work when I got home) and a pack of DV tapes to feed the movie camera in Currys.

I was going to film my journey back for the film, as it was a nice sunny morning. I'd grabbed the tripod and camera on my way out of the house but forgot the camera bag, and the bit between the camera and the tripod, the shoe, was on the other camera in the bag... d'oh!

When I got home I talked to McNulty on Skype for a while, then a guy I know called Mick Dunk came over to talk about me refreshing his web site www.admodelmaking.co.uk. I like Mick, he's an interesting guy. Had a nice time talking about life and managed to finish up by 3pm. Spent the afternoon talking to Brent on the phone recording a new Swashbuckler Epiphany, which I'll upload as soon as I edit and upload the last three. While I was talking to Brent on Skype Dr Gaz called from Wales and I called him back when I was done with the Swash.

The kids and Mia came home and I got into roasting some vegetables for dinner. We clipped and washed the dog on Monday night, and I noticed that there were some clumps of fur on the carpet that I hoovered. Dang it. I'll have to to do it again on Wednesday.

And that my friends was the day, busy but not entirely well structured or creatively productive, although I did salvage it later by recording a Swash. Better luck tomorrow.

Adios muchachas and muchachos.

Day One - Vacation 2007

2007-09-10T12:36:00.000+01:00

Alright, pop pickers?

Having failed miserably to do a blog at all in the last month I am serving a penance. I'm off work this week and I will use the opportunity to blog every day. I will even update the blog every day more than once depending on if I have anything else to say, so come back, I will be adding stuff all the time.

Chief among my concerns this week is that I don't waste the time spinning my wheels like I normally do. ADHD is a stern taskmaster and it dictates sometimes that I just spend my days walking from room to room getting five things half done. With this in mind I have given thought to how I might best use my time and what kinds of things I wanted to do this week. It's been a long time coming, this holiday, and although I'm too broke to go anywhere I intend this to be fun.

Long time coming? Apart from the fact that this is an annual event, I've been kept waiting for my holiday by none other than Dell computers. Yeah we ordered a bunch of computers from them and spent about £7000, then they delayed the delivery so much that we had to cancel the consultants we ordered in TWICE before they finally delivered the goods and enabled us to continue our schedule. I still haven't had a proper apology or any kind of compensation for wasting my time like that. I was intending to have a bit of time on holiday with my kids but because I've not be available they've had to have their entire summer holiday without me. Which sucks a lot. AAAAGH! Thanks a lot, Dell, you bunch of idiotic, inefficient, self important, time-wasting, penis jockies. I hope you all wake up one day as eunuchs. The least you could have done for wasting my whole summer was give me a bottom of the range computer. You suck........!

Sorry about that, everything went red for a second. Was I gone long? Now, where was I? Oh yeah holiday. So I made this list of things I want to have done by the end of the week.

Call all my friends for a chat.

Do my outstanding tax returns.

Shoot footage for my interstitial movie (see previous blogs).

Set up my new computer.

Make it ready for sound and video editing.

Copy some old tapes to MP3.

Copy some old videos to DV.

Transcribe the first Swashbuckler Epiphany tapes into a book.

Publish the book on Lulu.com as a hardback and paperback.

Do the same with my BLOOK. (although this is secondary)

Walk the dog every day at 1pm.

Wash the dog and give her eye drops at some point.

Hoover the carpet.

Record another Swashbuckler Epiphany with Brent.

And also read the stack of books and watch the stack of DVDs I got here, but only after I got at least one or two of the above done in a day...

So far this morning I wrote the above list of things to do, wrote this blog, shot some footage of plants in the garden and copied some old tapes. It's ten to one so I should walk the doggie soon. She was a little reluctant to get up this morning. She was kinda cute.

This afternoon I don't know what I should do. My tax returns are pretty important so I should do that before they charge me any more fees for late return. Once I've done them I could watch a movie or two, either "Blue in the Face", "Manhattan", "The Big Lebowski", "Four Eyed Monsters", or "Tajne Nikola Tesla". I watched "Four Eyed Monsters" or most of it on YouTube, but then decided I should contribute to the filmmakers debt and buy the movie. I paid $8 or about £5 to download a DVD resolution MP4 version. I hope in the fullness of time they return the favour with my film. Hehe. I've added a link so you can watch "Four Eyed Monsters" below. Remember to let it load a bit before you start. Go make a cup of tea and then come back.

***Okay this is later on. I walked the dog, did my tax returns, did half the hoovering and bought a harmonica. Okay that wasn't on the list but I needed a treat. I also switched the DVD player in the bedroom for one which doesn't interfere with the remote control signal from the TV. So a busy and productive day. Give myself a big pat on the back. Ow.

Laters patatas.

Yeah blog boy, make with the posts

2007-08-09T10:45:00.000+01:00

JUST sneaking under the wire of an entire month since a post. I suck SO much. Plus I have SO MUCH to talk about it's untrue. I'll try and be more forthcoming.

Mostly on my mind is that a friend of mine, a lovely kid called Lucie Brabyn, was run over and killed last weekend. She was 22 and having just graduated from the school after three years training she was up in London, I think starting a new job. I'll do a post about this properly when I've assimilated the enormity of it. Which I guess may be never. But later anyway, the point is too sore right now. Suffice to say, my thoughts are with her family and other friends, all of whom are writing tributes to her on Facebook. Funny, because my first impulse was to write her a message on Facebook as if she would read it. I discovered a few people were there ahead of me. Didn't really hit me till yesterday when I saw pictures of her people had uploaded... i cried like a child for about an hour. Every once in a while I remember she's dead and it's like a punch in the gut. We weren't really close but we talked a lot and I liked her a huge amount and so did everyone else. She WILL be missed, and as I've said many times since the news, the world is a much less fun place without her.

That sad news gently aside for the moment, what else?

The kids have been away for a week and half. It's been weird. You'd think a week and half would be a lot but it's flown by. I wish we'd had the money to go somewhere last weekend, but I'm still pretty strapped for cash so I guess we'll have to make our own fun. OH we did go to Stourhead on Sunday, and that was really cool. Mia liked it a lot. I enjoyed it too, much more so that I would have had we gone to Weymouth, which was another thought. That would have been RAMMED with people and we'd have been exposed to the sun all day which is something I really don't like.

I've started making a little film about ADHD and me, just a little fill-in project I can make myself while I'm waiting to get some money to get "The Sacrament" geared up again. I'm filming lots of time-lapse clouds and stills and recording a voice over. I figure I can make a bunch of video podcasts, 10 minutes or so apiece, and then compile them into a feature later on. It's going to be fun, and I like a project. I have to say response to my experiments so far has been really lukewarm. People have looked at the handful of hasty shots I ran together and some music from Edith Frost and gone "meh!" so I'm not going to show anything to anyone ever again before a premiere. I'm so sick of people not "getting" what I'm on about or being able to see through the superficial flaws to the core of what I'm on about. I dent my own belief in things I make if I show them to people too soon. I should keep them under wraps until they rock. I just want to share, but it's breaking one of my own rules for the sake of a little instant gratification. Well, more fool me, I say. (NB: Just a note from the future... I later on retitled this film "Attention Seeker". Catchy huh?)

Okay, more great news, Kevin Smith is directing an episode of the new "Heroes" spin-off series "Origins". Here's Kev talking about that at the recent Comicon in Los Angeles.

So pretty cool huh? I really liked the "Heroes" series, we downloaded them as they came out in the US and watched them on the DiVX player... WONDERFUL show. Can't wait for the next season. Kind of short of things to watch at the moment, so we are working our way through the backlog of things we copied or bought over the last three months or so. Watching Michael Palin's "Pole to Pole" at the moment at bedtimes. After that we have a STACK about two feet high of cheap £3 DVDs that we picked up in Tesco. Damn them and their easy to afford DVDs. I guess that's the answer to piracy though, huh? Make the product cheap and people will buy instead of steal. Simple. Take note, RIAA and MPAA.

Later kitties, I'm out of here.

Everything Wrong is Right Again

2007-07-12T13:51:00.001+01:00

Finally as the dust clears I stand back and survey the estate... yeah we're still living in a bungalow in Frome. It's a really nice place and as the weeks go by I'm increasingly amazed at how nice it is. The nasty taste of the old place has finally started to fade. Okay, so it's only a temp rental but it's about 1000 times better than where we were. And yes it's going to be knocked down next year to make way for millions of starter homes, like I give a rats ass. :D

Recently I've been thinking about presents. It's just a time of life thing, I s'pose, but an old friend of mine was talking about being given a Partridge Family DVD. It's nice to be given presents, but I suspect that was just something old, a 70s gift for a 70s person. It got me thinking. How hard is it to buy things for someone like me?

Yeah, also I wish every once in a while someone would get me something I really wanted. Like I have lots of packs of cards, I kind of collect them. I have sunglasses in every drawer. I own about 10 watches that work. I have about 10 nice pens I love. I own a lot of things with skulls on them. I own a lot of things with Hula dancers on them (I even have a wobbling one on my car dashboard)... I wear predominantly black clothes these days, after years of wearing the same brown and blue combos... I like cheesy British horror movies. I like odd ethnic music, especially new pop/rock takes on ethnic styles. So if you know me you know that I like those things. What is so hard about buying me a pack of cards, sunglasses, a watch, a pen, a skull, a hula dancer or a piece of black clothing?

It seems that no matter how individual you are, how particular your tastes, people who know you really well often still misread you or pay no attention to what you really like. But I suppose when they do get it right it feels all the more special.

Anyway, for the record:

How to buy things for Phil
(a users guide)
Buying for Phil is easy, as the man has so many regular obsessions you can hook into any of these and find the perfect gift, and in the process go as expensive and as cheap as you like. It's easy!

Phil likes the following things in no particular order:

Batman (esp. The Joker and Batman Begins)
James Bond (esp. the new Casino Royale and the original books)
Hula dancers
Sunglasses (new style narrow ones or wrap arounds esp.)
Cocktail accessories
Playing cards
Poker chips
Dice (esp. more than 6 sides or interesting materials)
Pens (black ink and either fibre or nib)
Skulls; all kinds
Black clothing, esp. shirts and jackets
Doctor Who (esp. Cybermen)
Yucatan cuisine, esp. puerco pibil and achiote paste
DiVX players
iPod accessories (I have a first gen iPod Nano)
Ethnic music, odder the better
Foreign movies, esp. French, Finnish or Swedish
Watches, esp. replicas but anything stylish or unusual

Oh, and before I go I just got two things for myself recently that I really like. A Casino Royale poker set, which I got for a fraction of the normal price, and a Japanese/Polish movie called AVALON (2001) on DVD for £4 on Amazon.co.uk.

Lots of people leaving work at the moment, and all my favourite students of the last three years... going to miss everyone. Makes it harder to stay here and do this job when you're not surrounded by friends. And saying goodbye to lots of people you really love is hard on the soul. Ow. Gonna take a lot of absinthe to make this poor old heart grow fond again.

Peace out.

(Apologies to Sheree for reusing a lot of this from an email to her. She'll understand...)

Everything in its place

2007-06-11T21:49:00.000+01:00

...Well kind of.

It's about a month since we started moving house and we are IN. The Acorns is as nice to be in as I assumed it would be. I've still got a bunch of boxes around in "the study" as I am pretentiously calling the office. I'll probably finish those up this weekend. Well, I'll try anyway. It's a tricky task because I have very few bits of furniture to put the things into.

The actual move was gruelling. The week following our actual moving out day was filled with arrangements I forgot to make and had to fix at the last minute. It wasn't all my fault for leaving it till the last minute as you might think. The moving day stayed the same even though the echange and completion days changed, which meant we had a week off the back of the move to sort stuff out, but there was a (huge expletive) load of stuff still to sort out which I had to do totally on my own while doing my day job. I barely finished in time. When I was clearing out rubbish bags of stuff out of the back garden the new people were parking the van moving in the front door. That was a bit too tight.

Still, as moving becomes a slightly acid memory, we're now settling into a slightly less debt ridden and fraught existence. I've been working quite hard on the Secret Project I can't talk about and doing great editing and visual effects. One day when it's all out in the open I'll let you all see the film I made, but for the moment it's firmly under wraps. It has been tying me up in the evenings for weeks but now it's finished. Looking forward to the next stage, because I get to refine what we did and make it even better. But I'm more proud of this than I have been of almost any other work I've done in the last year. Working for clients really ups your game.

Actually having a bit of leisure time has been weird. I don't really know how to relax, I've forgotten how. But I'm working on it.

Saw some really good movies recently: "The Notorious Bettie Page" was superb, and while a little tittilating, was actually a lot more touching and wholesome than you would at first think, and I really loved it for so many reasons. "Perfume" was the most amazing thing and features a most amazing spellbinding performance from the young man in the leading role, Ben Wishaw. And "The Fountain" which is the new movie by one of my favourite whacko directors Darren Aronofsky.

That's enough for now. It's really hot and close and I think we need to get to bed if we want to watch the season finale for "House" we just downloaded.

Toodles, poodles. xxx

Out with the old, IN with the new

2007-05-05T20:29:00.001+01:00

Okay, bald facts mostly because a) I'm tired as hell after packing, emptying the shed, taking stuff to the dump, etc. b) I just swallowed two really large gin and tonics and they are are starting to kick in. Funny I never normally drink at all, but lately I've been hitting the booze. I'm just figuring out all my friends who drink all the time don't give a crap what's happening to them. Taking a leaf out of their book, or a glass out of their drinks cabinet.

We exchanged contracts on Friday, which means the house sale is definitely going through. It's costing more than I will make though so a mixed blessing.

Spent the day turfing stuff out of the summer house/shed. Carved a bloody smile in my finger getting the sack truck out of the car... spent the rest of the day driving grime into the cut. Ow.
And emptying out the shed... the spiders have held sway in there for YEARS. There was cobweb in a fine mist all over the floors and walls. I spent the day trying to wipe sticky web stuff off my hands and face and failing. I am grimy to my very bones. I want to burn these clothes.

But the good news is that we will be moving into the new place, a bungalow called The Acorns. It's a very cool place. I hope we will be very happy there. We are moving on the 10th May, and will probably not have a landline phone so will only be available on the mobile.

Funny because it looks a lot like the houses I pass on the way to work which I've been being very jealous of.... now I'm moving into one. I'm hoping in this new place to get a lot of new memories. All my old memories of my past life have been made so painful to me, it's going to be nice to start making new ones. I need some happy memories and this old house has nothing but bad ones. I can't wait to get out of here.

Oh and for those of you groovy cats out there, I'm on Facebook and got LOADS of pictures on there, more recent ones than on any other site. Must throw them on FLICKR and MySpace too.

Just had a sensational meal, kids and Mia very well fed. And more booze. I'm gonna sleep tonight.

Peace out. xxx

Party Boy (NOT), Jealousy and looking Famous...

2007-04-21T22:49:00.000+01:00

It's Saturday night, and am I out raising a ruckus? Nope, I'm sat indoors with my son watching first "Tank Girl" and then "Supersize Me" and now "Daredevil". Three movies back to back. Mia is out with her Finnish girls for the evening, Hattie is having a sleepover at Hettie's. Yeah she has a friend called Hettie. Go figure.

I had another of those jealous moments taking her over to Hettie's house. It's in a really lovely village off the beaten track outside town. REALLY big houses, old money, and quiet leafy lanes... my dream. I can console myself with the fact I will be rich one day and live in a place like this.

I'm getting nervous about the house sale too. I still have a background feeling of dread. I guess being broke and having gone through some of the things I've had to put up with in the last few years makes you kind of paranoid and easy to spook. I'm sure it's all going to be fine, but I just want it over. Still filled with very mixed feelings about the whole thing. Been wanting to leave for YEARS, but now it's coming down to it I'm filled with this feeling of sadness. Weird huh? Human beings are crazy, and me more so than most is seems...

Celebrity Look-a-likes
On a slightly more upbeat note, I ran my picture through the Celebrity Collage program at My Heritage.com, which processes your face with face recognition technology and comparesit to famous people to seewho you look like. It's kind of uncanny, but...

Hey, I'm as susceptible to flattery as the next man, but am I in any way facially similar to these distinguished gentlemen?!? Answers on the back of an envelope containing warm fivers, please.

Yeah, I dunno. I'd like to think I resemble these guys, but hey. If Ilook like any of those guys I'd say Micheal Keaton maybe, just cos he's a Batman actor. But Johnnie Depp? Get the flock out of here. And who the crap is Javier Solana?

Anyway, I'm in a very odd place right now. Should be full of joy, but I'm feeling uptight. Having trouble bringing my side projects to fruition, too. Both the things which I look on as ways out of my current career and financial flux are taking time to get sorted out. Very frustrating. At least I should be happy that they are still on the table... But I believe that everything happens for a reason. I just wish that I could believe that the reason was that good things are about to happen to me. Really big good things.

Don't get me wrong. I know the tone of this blog is very down, and to be fair the trend is generally upwards; the house sale, my career prospects, my creative juices, my belief in myself... all these things are on the up. I just can't seem to get the breaks to be where I want to be, and it's taking soooo long. I have hope that is about to change.

xxx

House sale, cigars, Hitchcock, Sony Ericsson and Splenda in the grass

2007-04-15T23:16:00.000+01:00

Well the house sale is going through. I'm more surprised than anybody. In fact we are all taken a bit by surprise, and I fully expected it to all fall through... so we are at this stage when we have a completion date of 11th of May and as yet we got nowhere to move to. Gulp. We've seen a few places but because we have pets and kids our choices are narrowed a little. Ah well, I suppose we HAVE to get somewhere so it will get done somehow.

But having said all that I'm still having a nice time, despite all my problems. Having given up smoking in October last year I really enjoy the rare occasions when I do smoke... what? Smoking? Yeah I have a cigar every once in a while. I know that could be construed as smoking. But there's a vast difference between puffing the odd cigar and chugging 20 cheap fags a day. I have found a brand I really like, AGIO Mehari's (sweet orient flavour) and they are wonderful. Smoking is always a law of diminishing returns. You smoke more and enjoy less. This way you smoke less and enjoy more. I LOVE expensive cigars like H. Upman or Montecristos. Maybe when I'm fabulously wealthy I'll buy me a humidor. :)

Plus I bought a pack of Gitanes the other day, purely for nostalgia's sake, and I'm happy to report I can no longer inhale a cigarette without coughing. I smoked a few of them like cigars and they were quite nice. But the difference is I'm no longer an addicted smoker. I'm a recreational smoker. It feels good.

Plus I'm really glad I can't smoke anymore because I'm starting to get my singing voice back, and to honest that was my main reason for giving up, not really the health aspect or the expense, although of course they were issues too.

Also not smoking means I can afford the odd treat. I bought myself a nice watch for £45 the other day, and some wonderful Hitchcock and Truffaut DVD boxed sets on eBay. Well when you are not spending £120 a month on fags you can afford to spend a little money on yourself every once in a while.

And I got a new Sony phone the other day. Sony phones have come on a lot since my old Sony flippy phone. The software is much improved and this one is really cool because it has an actual Cybershot digital camera built in. It's the Sony Ericsson K800i, and in silver rather than the usual black or brown. I got a really good deal from O2, the handset was free and the contract is for just £20 a month, with 75 mins of calls and 300 texts. Not bad. That's like ten texts a day, which is easily what I send in a month. And 75 mins? I only really talk on the phone in emergencies or when people call me, so that's going to be cool. My old Orange contract was like £40 and I always ended up going over my minutes. And may I say despite their really cool caring sharing image I found them to be a really crap carrier. Expensive and not very supportive. My 2p.

And wow those DVD sets are great. £12 each and 34 Hitchcock movies and 12 Truffaut ones. Okay so the transfers are a bit minky in places, but for the price you can't argue. And they come in wooden boxes. God bless the Chinese, their attention to detail, design sense and wonderfully lax copyright laws.

Okay time for more coffee with hazelnut Splenda. Yum. And a ceegar. Ker-puff!

Paper Props, Starbucks and eBay: all your basic building blocks

2007-04-02T23:24:00.000+01:00

Okay, so I'm mildly obsessed by paper props at the moment. I discovered there's a kind of subculture among movie fans and prop makers devoted to making letters, passports, tickets and other replica documents. That was interesting enough (It's like discovering a tribe that you belong to...) but to find out that some of them are freely available on the web... wow.

I especially like the LOST food labels, designed to look as though they are from the Dharma Institute.
They look like items from the pantry in the LOST bunker. I printed out a few of them and dressed items in fridge and cupboard one night when Mia had her friend Tonja around for a LOST evening. Then I left them on the table to cause a bit of a stir.

I've discovered som really cool Serenity/Firefly stuff too, and also Back to the Future. Some movies and fans just lend themselves to imitation. Batmanmovies less so, but Indiana Jones? There is more stuff out there on the Grail Diary of Professor Henry Jones played by Sean Connery than almost any other paper prop on the web.

Also in abundance is CTHULU stuff... it seems 1940s stuff for role playing games and cosplay is the main area of experimentation for the paper propmaker. Lots of stuff exists for aging paper and distressing materials. Makes me want to go to a craft shop and get some saucy ribbed paper. Yes I am a stationery whore.

What else have I been up to? I bought a new Starbucks mug... last time they brought out a new range I bought one for Mia but not for me. They were a little bit gay, blue and pink with flowers and stuff. Now I'm secure in my sexuality, make no boners about that, but I'm old-fashioned. I don't like to look a fairy. Now they brung out these new brown 1950s looking mugs which look really cool and have the name inside so you can read it even when you are drinking your joe. Sweet.

Still waiting for my next delivery of Splenda flavor blends, a flavoured sweetener for coffee. I import them from the US because you can't get it over here, but I have an eBay contact who ships it over for me. You can get it in a few flavours (flavors) but I prefer the French Vanilla and Hazelnut flavours.

In fact I got a lot of stuff coming from eBay, all £2 here £2 there, all cheap stuff. But I love getting stuff through the mail. I LOVE IT. And I used to get cool stuff in the mail all the time, in fact my attic is full of it. But I've gone through a really bad time of being really broke. And after that what I really need is parcels from abroad. :)

Back, Break, Bond, Batman and a couple of other things not beginning with B

2007-03-28T10:04:00.000+01:00

I've been meaning to post to the blog for weeks but not quite gotten around to it. Finally got some money in and topped up the phone, fridge and the car. It was weeks though. Weeks without a single penny. Mia helped as much as she couldbut she hasn't got a lot of money either, but when I got paid I let her have some back. She's going to Finland again in a few weeks, but once again I'm not going with her. Couldn't afford the fare when the tickets had to be bought, now they are too expensive. Ah well.

Oh and did I mention we had an offer on the house and I accepted? We're proceeding to contracts and so it means that I got to find us some place to live in a bit of a hurry. More about that some other time. It's less of a joy after a year of selling than it would have been, and not even a relief. It's just painful with lots of paperwork. Plus it means I have to talk to my ex at some point which I loath. I was always very kind to her, even when she was mentally ill and being spiteful all the time... and for some reason she's always treated me subsequently like I stole her wallet and killed her cat. I just get waves of hate. Well, after five years of provocation and screeching down the phone at me she's got her wish, now I hate her right back. Any of you who know me will be aware how very hard it is to make me hate someone. I don't like it but like any dog, kick them enough and they will turn. Angry? Moi? Moving on...

It's finally the school holidays. The Bristol Old Vic Theatre School finally ended for the Easter break, and I have to tell you it's been 11 weeks of hard slog. Joyful slog but hard. I directed four student films for the techie students, and basically taught them how to make films from 0-60 in about 6 days end to end. The results are a lot of fun and I may post them somewhere but we used commercial music so they are not really web safe... fun though. We had one story about a serial killer asking some nice young girlto marry him, and she hums and hars and then says yes. Then we find out she's a serial killer herself. (Real EC comics plot that one) Then a preist who seems as though he is a paedophile but in fact is just the real father of the kid he's watching. Sweet. Then we had a man visiting his girlfriend after being missing in action. Turns out he's dead and it's his ghost visiting her, but then we find out she's actually dead too. Dan-dan-daaaaan. And finally, we have a couplewho spice up their sex life by staging a kinky kidnapping, only to have the car stolen outside a shop when the husband goes in to buy some whipped cream. All of them enormous fun to write and shoot, but obviously being trsaining exercises filmed at a run, they are flawed and incomplete.

Going off to either Reading or Godmanchester next week to do some filming. John McNulty, my inventor friend, has come up with a brilliant idea and we're going to make a promotional film about the prototype device, then we're going to take some "background plates" and I'm going make a special effects driven "artists impression" of what a full size one might be like. Fun holiday job. :)

Saw the new Bond "Casino Royale" the other day and I was blown away. It's now my "go to" movie, if I want something to watch I'll just put that on. They really went back to basics, like the recent Batman movie. It's "Bond Begins".

And speaking of Batman, I saw this brilliant teaser poster for "Dark Knight" the second Batman flick. It's a photoshop job, and it looked really familiar to me... then I realised the face is Conrad Veidt from "The Man Who Laughs", the 1928 film which inspired Bill Finger and Bob Kane to create the character of the Joker in the first place... Genius.

Been listening to lots of new music and lots of old music. After my divorce 4-5 years ago I realised I'd not been listening to any music for years, and I resolved to fix that by listening to at least one new album a week. I now have a HUGE iTunes library and have picked up on some peopleI really like. This week on the playlist in the car is zany US guitar guy Beck's album "Guero", Japanese zany guitar guy Cornelius and his album "Point" and a 1995 album from Mazzy Star called "So Tonight That I Might See". Also listening a lot to my friend Brent's band Dogs Will Be Dogs.

Okay plenty of other things to say, but I'm tired and I'll save it for another day. Here's a bit I found on the web about the original Star Trek communicator prop. Fabulous detailed and reverent look at this icon of sci-fi fans and propmakers alike. I'm in awe.

Laters!

Spring has sprung, the grass is ris...

2007-03-07T11:34:00.000Z

...I wonder where the birdies is.

March, and another birthday looms on the 10th. As I turn 47 I am wondering to myself, did I ever suspect I would live to such a ripe old age? I feel old and distinctly ripe.

I buried the last of my grandparents yesterday. Frances Harriet Why was aged 95 when she died last week, and Tuesday 6th March was when we buried her near her home in Northolt, Middlesex. We lost her husband, William Why known as Bill, over 6 years ago. Seems like yesterday, and yeah it still hurts when I remember his passing.

It was a beautiful day when we laid Frances to rest, warmest day of the year so far and wouldn't you know it myself and all the South males who perspire so easily are all wearing dark suits in the sun. It was a sad but loving occaision. It was a Humanist ceremony, so no religion, although time was allowed for prayer because Humanists don't begrudge anyone their beliefs, apparently. But due respect and kindness was shown, and the service was dignified and stately and everyone had a discreet cry, even my little sister who never cries about anything.

I met a lot of family who I haven't met before, and everyone said I didn't look my age. I get that a lot. Ate cake, drank tea. Shot the breeze with my two brothers Andy and Tim, and talked to my sis a lot, although we only saw each other last weekend when I was up in London for a 50th birthday... oh and a gay wedding.

Oh man last weekend. A friend Damian asked Mia and I up for his 50th birthday celebration (my second close buddy to reach the big 5-0) We danced the night away with gays and lesbians. Really had the best time I've had in ages. Got a cab back to my sister's in the wee small hours.

They apparently are going to sign the papers soon, but after 15 years Damian and Nigel are getting hitched. Well it's a Civil Partnership, but it's married in all but name. Legally partnered. And I couldn't be happier for them.

So it's been a week of ups and downs. Now I'm down again. Coming up to my birthday and I'm flat broke again. Can't afford to put gas in the car or top up my phone. All be solved next week when I get paid again, but no phone or Internet till then... might actually be a bonus. I'll have to read a book or watch TV.

Back from the land of the dead

2007-02-03T13:04:00.000Z

Okay, I'm back. What a mill I've been grinding through since I last posted. Holy momma. If anything could go wrong it did, and as bad as it could.

Where have I been? Well the short answer is right here. I've not gone anywhere and not done anything. My freelance writing has been going very well, and I'm close to getting the kind of life I want for myself. But...

The house still hasn't sold, well over a year after it went on the market. My ex has been hassling me to drop the price but I can only just afford to drop it because I need to pay back my secured loan.

It was on my mind all the time to make a post to let everyone know I was ok, but stuff gets in the way. Financial meltdown grabbed my full attention over the the last few weeks, plus I had horrible flu for at least two of them. Now I’m better, I put my financial affairs in the hands of a debt management agency, and I have a freelance career of sorts, so all is well.

Christmas went without a hitch, despite being home alone. The kids were in Cornwall, Mia was in Helsinki and me and the dog were in Frome. I worried about being lonely and booked up to go to a friends house for Christmas and New Year, then arranged for another old friend to come and see me to plug the gap. Ended up moaning I never had any time to myself over the holidays. :)

And did I tell you about all the time I had off for nervous exhaustion during November and December and how my managers raked me over the coals when I returned?

What else? Oh man, Brent.

My good friend Brent is pretty seriously ill, had exploratory surgery, and now an operation. I talk to him all the time, we do a podcast together, and he’s one of my closest friends. But he sometimes worries when I don't reply to his texts that I’m irritated by him. He asked, are we ok? I said, bro, you and me, we’ll always be ok.

Then he texts me last week.

We text a bit about him leaving me all his stuff, and I'm baffled. Then he called me, it was late I was half asleep, and he told me he was leaving instructions for all his writings and drawings to be sent to me and said “I’m going into hospital tomorrow, and I didn’t want to go without telling you I love you, man.” I told him I love him too and cried myself to sleep.

Thinking about it, it’s been a really crap few months. But you know what? Even though I'm barely making my mortgage and loan, doing work I love but hating "the job", and everything is going west... I'm still the most positive and motivated I have been in years.

People are saying to me I look young or at least very well. I had my hair cut and I'm about to shave my beard. I have plans, goals, interests, dreams and aspirations. I know who I am and where I want to be. In understand myself better and in ways I couldn't have anticipated.

But I hope it's not too little too late. :)

More later... Oh, and PS. I shaved my goatee beard off today. I grew my beard as a kind of protest when I broke up with my ex. I also started smoking again and treated myself really badly. Now I quit smoking in October last year, I treat myself well and now I lost the beard. Normal service will be resumed assoon as possible.

Peace

Px

A year of passing comments

2006-11-22T10:41:00.000Z

Yes I've been doing this for a year now. Weird huh? I've never kept a diary this long in my life, and yeah okay I know that I didn't do it every day for a year, which was my goal, but I did it way more than I thought I would. And it served its purpose.

I read back at some of the first entries, and one of the reasons I did this originally was to give myself a journal, a writers workout, every day or at least every other day. I think in the end I did 169 entries. I intend to make a blook out of them. A blook is when you make your blog into a book. A blook. Geddit?

Not a huge amount has changed over the past year, apart from perhaps my attitude and my willingness to change.

As to where I've been for the past month. I'll talk about that in while. That's a major entry in itself. I just wanted to mark the passing of the one year mark. I'll let you know when and where you can buy the blook if you are interested. Probably through my publishing empire... SACRAMENT PRESS,which you can find at www.lulu.com/sacrament. I'll jack it up with photos and footnotes and other stuff, but it's going to be interesting to see it all in one place.

After I make the blook I will possibly resite the blog, maybe take it into my IDEASDIGITAL domain. But I'll let you know where it goes so you can follow me there.

It may be a while before a new post, but I'll keep you informed.

Px

Week Two of No Smokee

2006-10-19T15:32:00.000+01:00

Yeah I'm back... been busy working. And working. And working.

Since the beginning of the month I've gotten a lot of freelance work. I'm ghostwriting some stuff for a fellow writer I've known for a long time, high profile stuff so can't really say what. But I heard someone praising his review of something the other day and realised halfway through that they were actually talking about me. :) That was cool.

Plus I have at least two other and maybe three other freelance blogging jobs. Which means of course I have no time or energy to blog my own life, cos I'm too busy blogging someone elses.

But still I reckon I can still manage a weekly update for those of you that are interested.

I've finally moved offices at BOVTS. From my mouldy rat infested hellhole next to the toilet has given way to a roomy ex-soldering lab at the front of the building. I have somewhere to hang my broken and fixed life mask of Grace Kelly. (see left) I can see out of a window! Heck, I now have room for all my crap! I'm now getting so much daylight it's positively unhealthy.

Oh and speaking of which, big news of the week - I quit smoking last week on Friday, which would be um... Friday the 13th October? Well, let's see how long I last. I got no problem with it at the moment, but the reason I kept smoking was because I enjoy it. I suppose if I could only do it sometimes then I'd still do it but at the moment I can't just do it once in a while. I have to do it all the time... so before I can be a social smoker I have to stop being an addicted one... I might have the odd cigar, cos I like those, but for the moment I REALLY have no need for the health problems or price of smoking 20 cheapo fags a day. I'm better than that.

I have had some health concerns over the last few weeks... I've still got this damn low level cold bug which is dragging the hell out of me. But underneath all that I just feel worn out. I'm on the verge of going to my doctor and getting him to sign me off for a few weeks. I really just need a few weeks lying still. I'm burned out, and not because of what's been going on this year, although that has been very challenging to say the least. It's what's been going on for the last 5 years.

I'm finally reaching some serious conclusions about my life. Where it's going, what I want to do and how I need to get there. So of course now would be the perfect time for all the stress I've accumulated over the last few years to crash and burn me. Hopefully it won't come to that...

It's hard to describe. Superficially I feel fine, especially now I gave up cigarettes. Every day I feel better, get a bit of my sense of smell back (not all good news there by the way - life stinks when you have a sense of smell) and get lung capacity back. But I'm kind of low grade nervous all the time, and I don't feel tired exactly but "under strain". I looked at the bottle of Kalms I've been eating lately and it's apparently good for periods of "nerve strain". Yep, that's what I got. If it was the '60s I would be going to the Doc and saying, "Doc, it's me nerves."

But "in myself", as they say, I feel good. Not James Brown good, just good. One of the main reasons I feel good in myself now is the work. I've probably got a freelance podcasting job, but I can't spare the time to go to France and talk to them about it, which is a cause for concern. I have a really good feeling about this job, like it could be my new day job... but I have to not lose the job through waiting around for the best time to do something about it. I have to strike when the iron is hot. All my best oppotunities happen when I do that.

Anyway more of all this later when I have the time. Meantime you can check out my lomohome. Yeah, I forgot about that. I mentioned it a while back in this blog... see it on http://www.lomohomes.com/snouty

(You know you can click on any of the pictures and see bigger versions, don't you? Just checking.)

And so on... oh and a giant bunny

2006-10-01T15:34:00.000+01:00

Still feeling a bit run down. Nasty virus has laid everyone a little low, and members of staff at the school are now complaining of feeling "a bit crap".

We had a viewing today so we had the usual two days worth of cleaning and tidying effort for a total of five minutes viewing. (sigh) The woman looked impressed though, but it's hard to say. They are always complimentary when they are in the house, but I bet they say bad things about it when they leave.

Also for the last three days we've been trying to de-flea the house as we have a particularly nasty infestation. Dog and cat have been brushed and spot-on'ed and washed. All the linen in the house has been washed. Then we fumigated the house with nasty insecticide yesterday. Hopefully that's all of it. But I am whacked. I got to get some sleep. May have a snooze later.

Meanwhile, all my tiredness and woes are made better instantly because of two things: now I know there are Giant Bunnies in the world. Check it out. Click on the pic to see a bigger version.

Our killer bunny army will soon be complete. Mwah ha har!

And secondly, Virgin Galactic are selling tickets to space next year. I kid you not. www.virgingalactic.com

Day two in hell

2006-09-26T20:59:00.000+01:00

Had the day from hell today but it ended well. I set off bright and early at around 6:50am so I would be in Bristol in good time to take pictures of all the new students who started today at 9:30am. Around 8:30am I was still stuck in traffic just outside Bristol. At 9:00am I'd moved about 100 yards. At 9:30am and still stuck in traffic I was looking for a discarded spoon in the car so I could scoop out my own fricking eyeballs. Yeech.

I arrived at work at about 9:50am, and had a backlog of students to photograph, and I was still busting for a pee after three hours in the car. I hadn't had coffee or a cigarette, and I was starving because of the early start and I couldn't have anything to eat before I went... I took pictures all day till about 12:30, about which time my bladder had had enough and bounced to the bathroom all on its own. The cigarette I borrowed from a 2nd year student went outside and smoked itself because it got tired of waiting. Someone brought me a cup of coffee but it went cold and I had to drink it that way, tasting like stale muck from the bottom of a thermos flask. I yelled out the window to anyone who would listen "kill me now, shoot me in the face, someone." A few students smiled and waved cheerily. Sigh.

On the up side I did get the pictures into the office database in record time so that lecturers with no short term memory can use them as a crib sheet to figure out who the heck they are talking to. Plus my friend from France called on my Skype hotline to tell me my proposal was accepted and can I come over to France for a meeting some time in the next couple of weeks. This is really cool but I can't process this information with the crap day I've had. I'll get excited tomorrow.

Hattie was off sicktoday and stayed home,but I forgot to call the schoolto tellthem she was off sick. They'll probably send a truant officer.

If you don't watch Ze Frank on the Interweb, you really should. If you like his stuff then click on the ad at the end so he gets paid. Here's a sample of one of my favourites:

the show with zefrank

2006-09-25T22:25:00.000+01:00

Spent the evening creating new T-shirts in Cafepress.com. Got some cool new shirts for the film:

Sacrament T-shirts etc.

And some really cool Japanese Sacrament T-shirts too.

Then there was my Ideas Digital stuff.

I got a bunch of other stores on Cafepress.com but I won't bore you with them.

Later!

Deadline Day

2006-09-21T23:38:00.000+01:00

After being back at work for a few days it occurred to me that term starts soon and I have a deadline to meet with the 3D character I'm working on. It'snothing but deadlines at the moment. I'm ramping up my freelance work to hopefully hasten the day when I can go totally freelance again, which I'm shooting for this Christmas or thereabouts. So anyway this 3D work...

Dean Cook, an old mate of mine from way back, and we're talking before I moved to the West country over 14 years ago here, who I used to do a lot of writing web and graphics work for got in touch a while back and asked me if I could make a 3D character for a client of his. He'd actually been looking for me and finally tracked me down, but I cover my tracks on the Internet so as to minimise the dreaded SPAM,so it was a bit of detective work. Not having been using my 3D program Lightwave 3D for the longest time I was afraid it had been so long I wouldn't know how to use it. So I did an all nighter and got the thing pretty much done.

But it wasn't finished and I was conscious that time was marching on so I took today off and worked all day from 8am till now to get it done and it looks pretty good. I can't show you any of it because it's commercial work and the client hasn't even seen it yet.

Actually not using the program for a long time and coming back to it was a really good thing as it turned out. I watched a tutorial video (from my friends Desktop Images) and relearned it from scratch. I learned a good few cool new habits, and forgot all my totally entrenched ways of working with the old version of the program.

I also reacquainted myself with some good old friends in the process, as I asked a few questions on the Lightwave forum, and some people were like "Phil glad to see you welcome back" which touched me, really. One of them, Ben Vost, an old chum from back in the Amiga days, is now actually working for NewTek in Paris, so I hooked up with him and we might be doing some work. Cross fingers.

Anyway check out the picture (click on it to go to the original page) and laugh as Lee Harvey Oswald jams along with Jack Ruby...

Laters

urrr... argh... !!!

2006-09-18T22:13:00.000+01:00

Man I feel crappy today. The virus that's been going around is playing havoc with me. First week I felt all throaty and headachey, then last week I had no energy, now this week I feel fine apart from the fact I ache in all my joints like my bones are grinding together. (long sigh)

Went to work today but felt kinda weird. Woke up way too late and took Mia into work because both of us ignored the alarm. Fortunately the kids had an early night so got up and were ready for school.

And yeah, the title of this entry is an impression of the Mutant Enemy logo from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I feel like I'm walking around like a stiff zombie or something.

Took a call via Skype with McNulty about our secret animation projects. Got some stuff really worked out. I'm using Skype more and more as an office phone. Obviously it's the same number wherever I am, at home or at "work" at the school. Good for the future when I go freelance again, which I have to say is much on my mind after the year I've had. We'll see.

Oh and check this out NewSight 3D displays. Really interesting 3D TV sets. At the moment apparently they just rent them out for £4,000 a pop, but I'm reliably informed that such technology is coming soon to a front room near you...

Spent some time this evening making Hattie's Web Site for her podcast a blog so she can do her own show notes instead of me having to hack raw HTML after publishing each show. All I need to do now is teach her how to work Podcast Maker and she can publish them too.

Anyway feeling crappy so time for bed.

Nighty night.

Late Night - No Reason

2006-09-17T14:19:00.000+01:00

Dang. We stayed up really late last night for no good reason as far as I could see. Ted and Mia were playing "Juiced" and "Midnight Club 3 Dub Edition" on the Playstation 2. I was on the Internet applying for writing jobs, calling a few night owl friends like Brent, and playing with some new bits of software I got. Hattie was trying to get to sleep without much success. Literally I think we were up till 4.30am. I still have no clue why.

I think partly it was because Mia was waiting for me to finish noodling about with my computer, and I was waiting for her to stop playing games so we could go to bed.

So what was I noodling about with? I got a demo copy of a really cool piece of software called Maxwell Render, which is THE top notch realistic renderer for 3D software. You can get close to full reality with this thing, I kid you not. Go see their web site by clicking on the name back there in the last sentence and you'll see what I mean. Check out this picture by Mike Verta, and click on it to see it full size. You would not know this was CG. It looks like a photo. Amazing.

Oh and I was also using a piece of software called Crossover that allows users of Intel based Macs to run PC software. Yeah, you just run the software on the Mac side and the Crossover program emulates everything the software is doing and makes it work on the Mac. Genius. Okay so if you were running really heavy duty PC programs which "hit the metal" as we say, or use the hardware directly, you might consider using Boot Camp (a way of booting the Mac into Windows mode) which is going to be way more stable every time. But as a quick fix for any little Windows software gadgets, you know... KOFF-keygens-KAHAK! Sorry, I have a cough. Anyway, little programs will be fine. Running MAYA 7? Nyah, not so sure that would work.

Oh yeah and I also put up episode 6 of Hattie's podcast, which of course you know you can find on iTunes in the podcast directory by typing "hattie south", or by going to the Advanced menu, chooseing Subscribe to Podcast and typing in: "http://babypodcast.ideasdigital.com/babypodcast001.xml". That should fix you right up.

I discovered something really cool too. If you update your podcast regularly, you might have to wait a few days before iTunes updates it for you, but what you CAN do is type this into a browser:

https://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/MZFinance.woa/wa/
pingPodcast?feedURL=http://(INSERT YOUR FEED ADDRESS HERE)

and that pings the Apple iTunes server to seek out your feed and change anything you altered in the iTunes directory. Okay so I only did it yesterday so it might not work, but we'll see.

And I had the most EVIL time upgrading to iTunes 7. If you are an iTunes user I suggest you hang back for bit before the upgrade from 6 to 7. I had the worst trouble getting it to work and I am a total iTunes/podcast NUT right now. The way I got around the fact it crashed all the time was like so:

make sure I had the latest Quicktime installed, which I didn't
delete everything apart from my tunes in the itunes directory within the music folder on the Mac
re-import all the tunes after iTunes sorted itself out

It was torture and burned a lot of my time on Saturday after two days with no iTunes.

Okay cats and kittens. Be good.

Click Here for cool Maxwell Render Demo

2006-09-14T12:58:00.000+01:00

ugh... been ill these past few days...off on Tuesday and now its Thursday and I'm still here, sat in my dressing gown on the bed using my Powerbook via wifi...

What did sick people DO before wifi and being able to browse the Internet to follow up random thoughts they had while they were tossing and turning in a paracetamol induced stupor? I guess they just wrote it on a tissue and then sneezed into it before throwing it in the bin. I've been following up a few thoughts I've been having about my film and where it fits into things that are going on.

One thing that is going on is the wholenotion of taking back control of media production, culture itself, from greedy corporations. In my recent email update to may cast and crew I expressed it like so:

"As I say we’re not going to be seeking any traditional movie funding because a) that really sucks, b) it’s exactly the opposite of what this film is all about. The old traditional ways of distribution for music, films, books etc. really suck ass. Why? Because it’s all based on a BIG corporation deciding what people are going to like and then making it and forcing down people’s throats through sheer WEIGHT of marketing spend. But this is all changing. And it’s all about who owns the distribution. If you can make your own music (YouTube, MySpace, GoogleVideo), movie (iTunes, YouTube, MySpace, GoogleVideo) or book (Lulu.com) and distribute it yourself, then all the money goes to the artists, and the distributors (who basically contribute nothing to the process of creation) get cut out of the business model. (Big smile) As a HUGE proportion of the cost of a work, CD, DVD, book etc., is distribution costs, this means consumers win and artists win. Fatcats lose. (Bigger smile)

"I’m all about being a part of this new revolution, and I mean that in it’s purest sense, and The Sacrament is a tool for proving this point. Instead of ramming some crap down people’s throats the public gets to choose from an almost infinite range of niche products, niche markets become bigger, and the good stuff floats to the top. I swear to god it’s the future of media."

I heartily reccomend the book "Free Culture" by Lawrence Lessig which talks about this stuff in far more detail and with greater authority and clarity than I could muster, even if I didn't feel like I have Planet Earth shoved up my nose and a rusty spike through my skull.

No videos today. Got bored with that. Or did you like them? Let me know.

Oh ok, tsk. Slave drivers...

Make Time - Use it or Lose it

2006-09-08T18:23:00.000+01:00

Okay, so we have a visit on Saturday, the house is a mess and I just spent two days at home and nothing got done. Oh I was working, but also sleeping and ... you know what the worst part is I can't actually remember what I spent the last two days actually doing. It's a lot easier to keep tabs on your activities when you're going to work. There you go, another worry when I finally go freelance again... will I succumb to the addictive lure aimless pottering. Well initially I might I guess. But I'll settle down. Depends if I have enough projects.

I came to a decision today though. I am going to MAKE TIME for stuff. There doesn't seem to be any time for stuff. By stuff I mean things I would have liked to do. I don't get enough time sitting watching DVDs. I don't get enough time just talking with the kids. I don't get enough time just talking with Mia. I don;t get enough time... for whatever. I think I am to blame though. I lead a busy life, sure, but I don't manage things very well, especially my time. But if I'm serious about improving my quality of life, I need to relax more, not stress myself out by staying up too late and gnawing away at projects when I should be kicking back and partying. I used to be that guy before now I'm turning into him again. It's got to stop, I tell you! :)

Oh, and check this out, it's awesome. Can't wait to see the rest of it.

Ah a couple of days peace

2006-09-07T09:25:00.000+01:00

After a turbulent Summer of not quite having any time off, and when I did either having to work or look after the kids, I finally got a couple of days off. Yeah, I'll probably waste time and not get anything done but I'm fine with that. We have another viewing on Saturday so I got a bit of cleaning and tidying to do, but hey... I'll get done what I get done. The house has been on the market for about a year now so basically weneed the right person to come through the door. What we do to the house is not going to affect that at all.

Hattie is doing another performance of Wagner's Ring Cycle, a kind of cut down version by children but featuring live musicians and opera singers. It's at the Bishop's Palace in Wells on 14th September. She was really good in it when they performed it at St. John's Church in Frome, and all the adults working with her said she was a joy to work with. And she was the only kid on stage going for a proper performance. She wants to be an actor when she grows up so this is a good start.

Also big news Hattie had a couple of poems published. She entered a competition to win a place in a compilation book of poetry, and she got that but also they liked her stuff so much they took another one off her for another book. There's no stopping that girl. Oh and plus she's up to episode 4 on her podcast, but I talked about that already.

I'm still working on pre-production for my first podcast, Making Better Movies, based in part on the book I was writing. Actually what I may do is spin off interviews and ideas from the podcast to form the backbone of the book. Damn I love reusing assets. :)

Anyway, it's morning,
I've got a couple of movies to watch today along with a few bits of work, so I'm going to go now, but check out this clip I found on Revver.com... I like the sound of this movie.

ciao, cats and kittens

Music and Cheesy Spider Monsters

2006-09-06T20:37:00.000+01:00

Two things today:

check out the work of Jonathan Coulton. Great lyrics and a twisted sense of humour. He's my current favourite musician, along with Kevin Reeves and my chum Paul Parker. I'll be featuring all these guys in upcoming podcasts.

And finally this... yeah it's cheesy but it hits me where I live. A dubbed movie which features long leggy women from the 50s and spider monsters? What's not to love?

So long suckers! OXO

Later that day...

2006-09-05T15:44:00.000+01:00

Yeah... i was pretty tired today, so work is going really slow... I did however find this on the Internet while I was waiting for it to crash this afternoon...

I never do titles - wonder why?

2006-09-05T01:15:00.000+01:00

Hi chappies,

after a long time of having days off, working a little bit, looking after the kids, I'm starting to gear up for next term, which starts in about four weeks. ONCE AGAIN I'm sorry about the lack of postings lately. I've got a whole bunch of new great tools on my Powerbook which will make this easy, even if I'm not online.

So what have I been up to? Oh lots, and I'll have to read back to see what I've said and not said... but anyway. I've been learning how to podcast, record and publish, do RSS feeds etc. As a product of this, and typically for her, Hattie said "oh, I'd like to do a podcast"... so I cut my teeth on doing Hattie's weekly show, "Baby Podcast" which now on iTunes. You can find it by typing "Hattie South" into the podcast directory. She talks (and talks and talks) and plays a few tunes from International bands and local bands. It's a pretty good show, and although she cusses a lot (sigh) don't let that put you off. That's why the show has the EXPLICIT tag. As I've said before I cuss a lot myself, working as I do in theatre. I choose not to cuss a lot in this blog for two reasons, firstly I think it's more intelligent to find proper words for things, and secondly dammit my mum reads this. But I allow my kids a certain amount of lattitude in their speech. Why? It's the modern vernacular, and also it breeds a certain relaxation in a home that has had its swimming hat on too tight for years. The kids have had it really rough during the marriage break up and their mum's illness. So what little freedom I can offer them I do. There's a bunch of stuff they can't do, but almost no words are off-limits.

What else? Apart from making and listening to a load of podcasts? Not a great deal. If you're not into podcasts I recommend you start. Get iTunes on your computer, click the PODCASTS menu on the side, and look up stuff to listen to. It's like radio on demand, and if you have an MP3 player or iPod then get one of those too. It's so much nicer, more diverse, more interesting, than the crap they broadcast on the radio. I can recommend "Digital Production Buzz", "The Daily Source Code", "Baby Podcast"of course, "Coolness Roundup"and the wonderful "Suffolk'n'Cool".

I've also been listening to the amazing Podsafe Music Network, a collection of largely unsigned bands whose tracks you can play on podcasts without any payment or rights violations. Any world where record companies and radio stations become unimportant is a good place to be.

Okay, enough for today I really have to go to bed. More of this either later today or tomorrow.

Until then cop this from Comic Strip Blogger:

Later dudes!

2006-08-07T10:18:00.000+01:00

Wow. It's been since the 18th of July that I last did a post. Well, things have been a little hectic.

I've managed to fit in some time off, and that's been way cool. The kids have gone away to their mums for a week and a half and come back. Weekend before last Mia and I even fitted in a little holiday, but more about that tomorrow.

In the meantime you can get a preview of the holiday by going to my Flickr pages... www.flickr.com/photos/snouty I'll tell you all about this trip tomorrow.

Mostly what I have to report is this, or should I say these:

I've had some very interesting job prospects emerge over the last few weeks. Some in Bristol, some from home. This makes me think more and more about going freelance again this September when term starts again. I would like this because I reallyneed to work from home again I really miss it, and this would allow me more time to make my film. I can still freelance for the school, and that would be fine. I would get to do the jobs I like and none of the ones I don't.
The film is going ahead as planned. I sent out an update to the cast and crew yesterday to let them know things are still going forwards. I finished some updates to the script and figured out where we are going with this project. I may post the update to this blog...or maybe I should start a movie blog? Hmm. (Actually I did this... Click)
I'm planning to make my own podcast. Or two actually. I'm so into podcasts right now and if you aren't you really should be. If you have an MP3 player or iPod they are the best thing since radio. Think democratic radio in the hands of anyone with a computer distributed on demand to anyone who wants it. Some good some bad but almost all interesting.
I bought an iPod Nano. (see 3.) I cannot recommend these things highly enough. You can get a 1Gb mp3 player for about £50 but if you are in the market for one I would spring the £90 for a Nano because a) they are really cool, b) they are robust, stylish and do the job perfectly, and c) don't even bother thinking about the new Zune player from Microsoft because it's too little too late. iTunes and iPod are the way to go.

So, if I forgot anything I'll let you know tomorrow, but for now check out the new trailer for the movie on The Sacrament web site. Click Here

If that doesn't work (and I've had some weird technical problems) there are links to the video on MySpace, YouTube and GoogleVideo.

toodles poodles

2006-07-18T15:14:00.000+01:00

As I said the other day, Tommy had to be put to sleep by the vets the other day.

Had a really crap day last Tuesday: all my camera kit was stolen from my office, I burned a tiny hole in our new carpets that had been laid the day before and then the coup de gras...

Just about to go to bed and I heard a walping sound from outside the front door. Opened the door. Tommy is sitting on the front path. I call him and he moves. Well the top half of him moves but his back legs are dragging along behind him. I grab him and bring him inside. I call Mia and get her to watch him while I run down the garden to get the dog carrier out of the shed. I'm convinced he's been hit by a car and probably has internal bleeding. He's always running back and forth across the road, so it's an obvious choice.

I put him in the basket and call the vet's emergency line. The woman on the other end tells me she'll meet me there in 20 minutes, i.e. 12 midnight. I'm ready to go, so rather than waste time I go. I'm there in 5 minutes. Wait around smoking and stroking Tommy through the bars.

The vet arrives and examines him. Says he actually has an embolism, or a blood clot which has lodged in the artery which serves the back legs. His feet are really cold. They go set up his hospital bed for the night and I sit with him for a minute, talking to him and calming him down. I'm almoist certain this is the last time I'll see him so I say my goodbyes without actually saying the words. He knows what I mean.

They are all set so I have to go and let them get on with their work.

Morning rolls around and I call them. He's okay but really we need to wait to see how he does and let the anticoagulents and sedation do their work. The doc says this is all because of a heart condition. There's no guarantees he wont throw another clot even after he gets over this one.

Call the following lunchtime. I'm in a bar in Bristol at a friend's leaving do. The docs voice is very grave. He says he's not happy about Tommy's condition. He'sbeen fine up to now, but now he's panting and obviously in total cardiovascular distress. What would I like to do?

I'd known this was coming. I also realise that it will have to be done now, while I'm sitting in this bar chatting, because I can't make him wait till I get home. We need to let him go.

I put the phone down and lean on the wall away from the table for several minutes and a wave of sadness washes over me. I excuse myself and go to the gents and compose myself for a few moments. I can't believe I'm going to do this, but I go back and act as if nothing has happened. Plenty of time for sadness and greif. This is a happy occasion,and I'm not going to spoil it with my sadness. But I feel bad for Tommy. He was among sympathetic people when he died, caring sensitive professionals. But a small knot in my gut tells me that what he really wanted when his time came was me and I couldn't be there.

I'm glad I decided to end his suffering. I'm glad his end was pretty quick. He got sick, went to hospital and got shot up with painkillers, then he died in his sleep. All done in 48 hours. But I regret very painfully that I wasn't there at the end.

But hey, he's gone and all I want to do now is commemorate him in some way. I think a little plaque in the garden or something. Not sure. Plenty of time for that when I've stopped feeling like I've buried an old friend.

So Tommy, here's to you, Tommy-tom-tom. Faithful friend, morning person, cold blooded killer of birds, field mice and baby bunnies, and grey faced observer of all my good times and bad times for over 10 years. Yes. Here's to you, old friend. Sleep well. Enjoy your rest. See you around. xxx

2006-07-12T13:13:00.000+01:00

Tommy our grey cat had to be put to sleep today.

Tom Kitten "Tommy" South
1995-2006

I'll do a more detailed post about this in a few days.

2006-07-10T22:53:00.000+01:00

What a weekend. I got the Carpet guy coming over to fit some carpets today in the front room, utility room, bathroom and foyer. In order for him to do that I had to clear the rooms, and Mia and I did that in relays over the weekend. And now, the first day off I've had for ages, (it being the Summer holiday now of course) I spent the day finishing up the rooms, scraping foam stuck to the floorboards, and hoovering...

Then as I was finishing up and waiting for the man to arrive, I got a call from the estate agent asking if I could do a viewing today. The house is a wreck, furniture piled up in the middle room, washing machine and drier in the kitchen, all the contents of the bathroom piled up in the storage room (which we call Henry's Room on account of the fact the hoover lives there)... not to mention we still haven't finished shifting all the junk out of Hattie's room.

But thinking about it, what would be the best way to see the house? Completely trashed so you HAVE to use your imagination in order to see the spaces? I said bring them on. Sure enough, Ben from the agency arrived at 12. The prospective buyers arrived and I said "Welcome to my beautiful home..." They laughed. Seemed like a nice enough couple, though, and they didn't mind at all that the house was a complete wreck. They have dogs too, which can only be a good thing.

So as they were walking around the carpet guys arrived. Bedlam ensues. Ah well.

Also, the Internet and phones got cut off because I forgot to pay the bill. Ahem. Okay, my fault. But darn it I paid the bill yesterday and today they were still not on. I called Telewest. They said did I check the phone socket with another phone. No. Bought £4 cabled phone in ASDA. I tried it. It worked. Doh. Base station on the DECT phone seems to be busted. Weird co-incidence. Okay, Internet... Reset the Internet router. It worked too. I suck. I manage the phones and Internet at a large school, and I can't even manage my own phone and Internet. How crap am I? But I'm glad today is over. The house looks wonderful though. Worth all the effort.

But after this week I'm going to have a week off. Bliss. Watching DVDs all day,
running programs on my brain machine, writing a new screenplay maybe, and most of all spending some quality time with the kids. We'll have a bit of proper holiday time for Mia and I later in the Summer, but for now I can only really think about it a week at a time.

2006-07-05T18:36:00.001+01:00

Listening to Hall & Oates on Radio 2 reminds me what a strange decade the 80s was. When hair and clothes looked like they were designed by a child with one of those life sized Barbie heads and a pair of toy pinking shears...

The final week of term and finally things are winding down. I had a dental appointment today and had a couple of fillings replaced which have been absent for a long time, I don't even know how long. Might be as much as two years. At this moment I feel like I have a couple of ping pong balls under my top lips in my cheeks. Weird.

Had a meeting with Louella, the producer on "The Sacrament" about how we are going to do this shoot in the Summer. Basically we've been dithering about whether we should seek some finance or just do it off our own bat with what we can scrounge. We came down on the side of seeking finance because it's the only way we can get it done the way we want. But the clock is ticking.

Ted is waiting to go to Tai Kwon Do so I'm going to have to give him a lift in a minute. He's been going for three weeks now and he's really enjoying it. Everyone agrees that he's long overdue for physical hobby. Which makes me wonder about my own fate if I go freelance again. At the moment I have a pretty physically demanding job, hefting equipment around most of the time and running about the building. What is going to happen to my perfect 83kilo score once I spend allday sitting about doing animation all day? Well,I've gotten in the habit of weighing myself again so perhaps I'll keep an eye on it and do something about it if it strays. Or take up badminton. Yikes, did I say that? What kind of a sick twisted world is it when a guy like me talks about getting regular exercise? Scary.

2006-07-03T10:44:00.000+01:00

Apologies up front for not keeping up to date with the posts lately, but all I can say is it's been a few really mad weeks at the school and I've been up to my EYES in work.

Lots of coolstuff has been happening though. I'm prepping for my film shoot in the Summer which is proving exciting and depressing. I've got a really cool cast of actors in the film but they are all graduating this year, partly the reason why they are cool, but this causes a problem. They will all have AGENTS by the time I want them to be in the film, so I will have to negociate with the agents to give them an acceptable deal so they can be released to work on the film. Plus we haven't got any money so it's all going to be deferred payment. I've taken advice on this from people who know and they say just TALK to the actor's agents and maybe they will see the quality of what you are doing and let them work with you.

Apart from that I'm starting to think about freelance work for the Summer. I'm really getting back into photography. Those of you who know me will realise I'm a pretty decent photographer and it suddenly struck me, why am I not making money from this? I'm going to get some professional kit to get me back in the game, namely a Canon 350D digital SLR, 8 megapipxels for big piccies, with a 18-55mm lens, and this is part of a kit which also has a battery/grip and a 55-200mm lens for £699. Not at all bad considering what you're getting. Plus Jessops has a deal where you don't pay anything till this time next year.

Also I've revived my Lomo web site www.lomohomes.com/snouty. Those of you who don't know what Lomography is, it's a kind of cool, shoot from the hip, style of urban photography first popularised with the use of the Russian LOMO compact camera. I had a LOMO anyway as I was a huge fan of Russian optics when I was an impoverished teen, plus I also worked in a camera shop in the 1970s so had access to all that stuff, like Zenith SLRs and Holga 120 cameras... all very nostalgic for me. Anyway check out my LOMO site and look around at the other stuff. This is the Internet at its best.

2006-06-22T11:54:00.000+01:00

Oh, and those who are interested might like to visit my recently updated web sites:

Ideas Digital
http://www.ideasdigital.com (currently ungoing a total revamp)

Ideas Included
http://www.ideasdigital.com/ii3d/index.html

The Sacrament
http://thesacrament.ideasdigital.com

Enjoy?

2006-06-20T14:29:00.000+01:00

Why is it taking so long to get to the end of term. I'm not wishing my life away, but about this time of the year at The BristolOld Vic Theatre School my mind is turning to Summer jobs, time off, getting work done when all the students are away, that kind of thing.

Ah well, soon enough they will be off and I can settle down to tidying up my office, straightening out my life in general and prepping for the Summer shoot of "The Sacrament".

But oh man... I read something today which really made me angry. The CAPS or Computer Animation Production System that Disney used for all its movies, from "The Little Mermaid" through "Beauty and the Beast", "Mulan" and "Tarzan" has been scrapped. This from Wikipedia:

"In 2004, Disney Feature Animation management decided that audiences wanted only 3D computer animated features and closed down their traditional 2D animation department. CAPS was dismantled and the custom designed equipment was scrapped. As of 2005, only one desk system remains, in order to read the data for the films that were made with this ground breaking system."

Whaat?!? They decided audiences wanted 3D movies? Did they ask anyone? No more traditional 2D animation from Disney? Mother of God. I may have to have a lie down. Why wasn't there a huge crack in the sky, a storm, dogs and cats raining down from the heavens?

It's a sick twisted planet that could allow something like this to happen. Call the cops. It's a crime against human culture! Get me the UN on the phone. We need to send in the troops before its too late...

2006-06-12T20:39:00.000+01:00

I know, it's been at least a month since my last confession, sorry, post. It's been a turbulent month. Financial trouble still dogging me, and I've had to get another loan to help pass the time between now and when the house is sold. Part of the reason for this is so we can do the decorating the house needs to make it attractive to prospective buyers.

But enough of all that. It's depressing. So what else have I been up to this month? Well not much progress on the film. We are entering the time of the end of summer term at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, and the grad shows are going up at the Bristol Old Vic. We've all been busy with that, even those of us who are not directly making the shows. I've spent some time filming dress rehersals for the archive, so I got to see the shows in person for a change. Most of the guys in my film are in an Alan Ayckbourn play called "Sisterly Feelings" which is really funny. Ayckbourn specialises in series of plays which are like movies shot from different angle. You see one play on one night then see the same play again from a different perspective, so when people go off stage in last nights play they come on stage in tonights, etc.

The other play which is on at the moment is "Under Milk Wood" by Dylan Thomas, which frankly I thought was amiable but nonsense. It's fun to go on the ride but at the end you are thinking what the hell just happened. Apparently I'm informed by Welsh friends that being Welsh and coming from a small village helps. Okay I'm out of that club. The students have done a great job though. These are big plays in big spaces, proper theatre, professional shows. It all looks and sounds amazing.

Start of the month I had to turn the heating back on because it was like December out there. Mid month, I'm driving along the road in my 1995 burgundy Honda Accord (damn I love that car) wearing just shorts and a t-shirt with the words TRAILER TRASH on the front, smoking a Black Russian cocktail cigarette, flicking my ash out of a fully open window, which along with the sunroof stays open all the way to and from school even if I don't smoke on the journey. The road is dry and has heat haze on it. The music on my stereo has to be turned up loud to be heard over the growl of my engine. The landscape looks amazing, all blue and purple skies and green hills. When I get out of the car my hair is all tangled up in my sunglasses, which are now permanently either on my head or over my eyes. Summer is here, and it's trying to boil me alive. Musically I've been listening to soundtrack music, either music for my film by Dallas Takatimu, or music for Japanese Animes, like "Cowboy Beebop", or more recently "Kill Bill" vols 1and 2.

Mia went away to Finland for 10 days mid month and I watched both "Kill Bill" movies about 8 times apeice. Got really hooked on it. I even bought a kind of fake Samurai sword based on Uma Thurman's sword from the movie. I'm going to use it in my film, but I need some others too. Cheap £25 swords like the "display" sword I bought don't have the blade continue into the handle like a real sword. (It's called the TANG) So hit them hard enough and the buggers break off at the hilt. No matter, it's only stopgap for pictures and practice. I have a number of online stores which can sell me great swords when I have the money.

Speaking of swords I like Summer at school because the actors do their fight training in the car park and I spend many happy hours watching them, trying to steal some combat staging tips from our excellent combat tutor Jonathan Howell. He's told me he will give me a few sessions on Samurai sword so I can block the fights for my film. It's a shame because all the time I will be filming Jon travels. In the holidays he tours Estonia, Latvia, Sweden, Finland etc., bringing his style of fight arranging to the Baltic and learning from his collegues in those fine countries. But you can bet I'll be leeching him dry of any hints and tips he can give me before he goes.

On an unrelated note, an ex student called Jon Edgely-Bond came by the school, and it turns out as well as being an excellent bloke, he and some friends are running a stage combat company, organising combat performances all over the place. Their web site is www.liveblades.co.uk. I heartily recommend that you hire them. :) He's put me in touch with some excellent fight arrangers who specialise in Japanese sword styles, so that might just come in handy as I'm making a vampire movie with lots of samurai swords in it. Hmmm.

Oh and we've had a couple of events. First we had the Grad Ball, which was held at Kings Weston House, a lovely little stately home venue to the north of Bristol. Everyone was dressed up, and it's the first time I've seen some of our techie girls in a dress. They all looked stunning. I wore a black suit and a bow tie. Looked very James Bond. Well, James Bond with slicked back hair and a pony tail. I have very long hair these days. People are starting to complain. Cool. That's why I did it!

The other event was just this last weekend, the 60th Birthday celebration of the BOVTS. The school has been 50 years at its current location on Downside Road in Clifton. Before that it was 10 years in another place in town above a grocers shop.

Former pupils from all down the ages came back for drinks, I met up with a LOAD of people I haven't seen for 2-3 years. Had a lot of hugs from people who remembered me fondly for all the help and encouragement I gave them while they were training. Which is more than I get for my trouble in the normal run of things. :) All in all it was a good if tiring event, and I re-acquainted myself with some really good people. None of the famous people I'd hoped would turn up actually came, like Patrick Stewart, Pete Postlethwaite, and Greta Scacchi for example... at least I didn't think Greta was there. Maybe I just forgot what she looks like... Actually you know looking at the pictures there was someone who looked like her... Damn!

Oh yeah, and I saw Samantha Lawson, a former student who I only really got to know just before she graduated a couple of years ago. She's been off working, and has had some success. But she reminded me that she was a really good fighter. I told her that I'd love to have her in the movie. She was quite excited to be asked. That's really cool, as I like her a lot and would love to have her involved. It's like all my favourite people are in this movie, now.

And finally there was a display of fighting for the assembled alumni, and guess what? All the fighters were the leading actors in my film!!! They put on a really good show, Ben Mansfield, my leading man, looked really cool, and Sam Swainsbury, Vicky Borham, and Matt Odell looked really great too. When they finished I went over to congratulate them on a wonderful performance. Matt wrily said, I bet you really got the horn to make this film now, don't you? I said, yeah!

Anyway, after all the excitement, trauma, bad stuff, good stuff, hard work and tough decisions, I'm hoping things are going to calm down now. Please god let me have a few quiet weeks because I'm so tired. I need like a 10 week holiday. Plus I'd really like to get back into making the film. As Matt so picturesquely put it, I'm "excited" to get started again.

More of that as it happens.

2006-05-08T12:16:00.000+01:00

Just had the most marvellous weekend. I was the surprise guest at a 50th birthday party in honour of an old friend of mine, Gordon Lynch.

I first met Gordon in about 1977 or thereabouts. "Star Wars" was in the cinema, and Meco's disco remix of the theme tune and Gerry Rafferty's Baker Street were favourites on the radio. Gordon used to come into the camera shop I worked in, Global Cameras in the Market Square, Hemel Hempstead. He used to bring in film to be processed and buy various bits of camera equipment for taking pictures in caves.

Yes, Mr Lynch was a former geology student who went caving in the Mendips (and various places around the globe, but mostly there) and used to drink in a pub called the Inn On The Green in Harpenden. We became good friends and we used to drive in Gord's red MGB (known as "The 'B") from Hemel to Harpenden most evenings to go drinking. Full of Harp lager and eastern promise we would return to Hemel in the 'B at high speed, down winding country roads in the dead of night, sometimes in the seat, sometimes sitting sideways on the parcel shelf with the roof down... middle age makes you think better of such behaviour, but I was a late teenager and Gord was in his early 20s, so we couldn't be bothered with road safetynot tomention personal safety.

Then we started coming to the West Country, specifically the Wells, Shepton Mallet, Glastonbury area. Friday night we'd travel down after work, go down the pub. Wake up, go down a cave, come out of the cave, go down the pub. Wake up the next morning, go to lunch in the pub. Then drive home.

Eventually Gord moved down to the West, and many years later, possibly as much as 10, I followed with my wife of the time, fetching up in Frome, where we had kids, got divorced and spent a bit but not much time with Gordon and his wife Hil. They moved up to Rugby after a while, where they now reside. But I miss Gord. He's one of those friends who I see really infrequently, but every time I do it's like no time has passed, like I just went for a slash and came back into the bar rather than walked out of his life for 10 years. He was my mentor, cave buddy, drinking partner, philosophy professor, and older than me (enough) to teach me a about life at a time in mylife when I knew nothing. A lot of the ways that I view the world as an adult grew out of my many conversations with him, in a car, in a pub, in a cave... well anywhere we were together.

So getting the chance to hook up and catch up after all this time? Count me in.

I figured it would take me about three hours so I guessed I'd leave at 3pm and get there at six. It took me three hours but I didn't leave till damn near four so got there more like seven...
Greeted by Gord's sister Karen and son Ross. Hardly recognised either of them. Last time I saw Karen she was a Goth, always seemed to be unsettled and unhappy (totally my opinion, she was probably fine). But now she's happily settled with a reallynice bloke called Adrian, looks beautifully relaxed, curvy and middle aged, not the edgy teen I remember her as. It was lovely to see her that way.

Now Ross was tall and handsome, got a real Ben Affleck thing going on there, and was the nicest guy... all night he was keeping an eye on me, making sure I wasn't left out. Kirsty is similarly tall and womanly, so not the preteen girl I knew before, and black hair... hmm, Karen passed the baton? Kirsty is fianceed to a guy called Ed who it turns out is the biggest Star Wars fan... apart from me. Still, I got two decades head start, so it's not a fair comparison.

So they bundle me into a cab and we go to this cosy working man's club off in Rugby town somewhere. We drink a little and Gordon is eventually steered into the room on some pretext, and is gobsmacked to find all his friends. I hide, despite being near the door. Want to save the moment. After the introductions, a small speech... Hil comes over, beckons me over to come see Gord. She introduces me. For a moment he doesn't realise it's me. Then his face was a picture, shock surprise and joy in equal measure. We hug, which is amazing cos he's not a huggy guy. I was so happy to be there, for Gord, for Kirsty, and for seeing the years fall away on Gordon's face when he saw me.

We ate, we drank, we danced.

I met Wilf, Hil's brother, so was the nicest guy. Had lots of chats with him and his jaw-droppingly beautiful wife. Turns out his wife is Swedish. Ah, thought she looked familiar. Scandiavian wives and girlfriends... it's like buying a new car, suddenly everyone's got one overnight.

After the party, Gord and I sat up most the night, talking bollocks, comparing life traumas, waxing lyrical and drinking Scotch, grappa, and pretty much everything we could fit in a glass. We resolved to not leave itso long next time and me and the whole brood are going to go up there in Summer.

It was so good seeing everyone again. Gord and Hil looked great. Their children were beautiful like movie stars. They have a lovely home, warm, friendly and with good feelings. They have an enviably huge array of really good friends.

I wish I could bottle this weekend and take a sip of it every day to warm my soul.

2006-05-04T21:38:00.000+01:00

Sorry about the lack of posts to the blog. I just got through having a conversation with someone about people who have blogs then don't use them. So when did I turn into that guy?

Anyway, editing and post production on the demo of "The Sacrament" have been going really slowly. I had to replace an audio production machine, so my pet spare G4 went to fillthat slot, so now I have another one which is not so good. Ho hum. On the up side it has WAY more memory so it might turn out for the best.

Basically I have to edit the scene together, then ADR/loop/re-record the dialogue and sound effects. Then I have to separate the shots out and motion track and add backgrounds. Then mix and add music. Then cut together a short teaser trailer. Then and ONLY then can I start sending out applications for funding. I'll be enclosing the footage we've done (the demo version), soundtrack music, story boards, screenplay, production designs, costume designs, production photos, etc. so we'll be looking like a going concern rather than just a half-assed idea.

Budgetwise, my initial maths indicates we should go for £150,000-250,000. Funnily enough, getting hold of small amounts of money is harder than getting larger amounts. You can get £4,000,000 for building a statue to honour someone on a nod and a wink, it seems, but getting £16,000 means losing a limb or first born child.

My guess is that we are going to have to start filming and get the money while we're doing it. If that's the case, this will take a lot of fast talking to persuade people to stay involved. But I think they want to do it enough. We'll see.

Just about to go away for the weekend to be a surprise guest at a birthday party. Won't say any more about that till it's done, for obvious reasons. I'll tell you all about it on Monday.

2006-04-26T22:46:00.000+01:00

Started playing with some images in Shake to see if we got it right with our filming. The results are kind of cool...

2006-04-23T22:42:00.000+01:00

Totally chilled weekend. Mia went to see her friend in Burnham on Sea. Me and the kids pretty much stayed in and watched "Family Guy".

Ain't life sweet?

2006-04-21T22:52:00.000+01:00

Wow. What an amazing day. Some other key members of our cast, Ben Mansfield, Vicky Boreham and Matt Odell came in for publicity shots. Plus we had some really cool pickup shots and leftover setups from yesterday.

[oh yeah, be sure to return to this and the other shooting week
pages because I'm going to add pictures when they're developed]

Ben and Vicky play our heros, Frank McCol and Sister "June", our Batman and Robin if you will, our Kirk and Spock, our Jay and Silent Bob... Having them on set in costume sent a chill down my spine. I'd always imagined these characters and how cool they would look and the image of them in my head was good, but seeing them in the flesh was, creepy, crazy cool, fun, and deeply surreal. We had the bag of prop guns on us and we shot Ben and Vicky pointing their guns in various directions for the trailer. They had such fun doing this, but as I told them if they think this is fun wait till they actuallygetto do actual scenes with guns and swords.

We also shot a couple of clips of Matt Odell as Edmund Wrenfield. He doesn't have a gun in the show but we let him pose with one, and a pair of my sunglasses. He was on set for a total of about 15 minutes but had a lot of fun doing it.

Then we did Vicky's shots from the actual script. The scene called for her to be posing as a receptionist in Dr Bone's clinic and we had her sitting at a desk with the same intercom as we had on Dr Bone's desk earlier in the week, to make it look like they used them all over the building. Movie magic huh?

Vic turned up in her street clothes, but when we called her to the set she'd changed into her temporary costume and looked amazing. All black clothes and really dark eye makeup. We had a few discussions about her costume, and we wondered if she had anything we could use for June in the publicity shots later. She said to me: "I've got a boob tube in the car, I could go and get it if you like..." I mean, how many times does a girl say that to you in a week?

Yes, it's official: Directing movies is the best job in the world. You get to hang out with interesting, funny people, tell women what to wear and how to walk, play games with guns, knives and fake blood, and when the shoot wraps, you get kisses and cuddles from everyone telling you what fun they had and how great you are for writing and directing such a fun movie and casting them in it or hiring them onto the crew. Then you get to mold this raw material into something really cool with music and sound effects. Then you get the pleasure all over again when you show the cast and crew the movie you made. God I love doing this.

We wrapped about 6pm, we made an arrangement to meet up for a wrap party at Channings, a popular bar just down the street from the school. Everyone came to the bar about 8pm and I had my regulation pint and a half chased by about twelve cokes. We talked a lot about the shoot and how much fun the film is going to be to make, provided we have enough persuasive power in what we've shot to get the funding. I found myself getting stuck into talking about the same things, over and over. I figured out I was so blissed out and I was so blown away by this week I could hardly string words together. Mostly I spent the evening laughing at Simon our absentee DoP, who's been working hard on a shoot up in London all week. He was really tired and a bit drunk, and he's stand-up comedian funny anyway, so was hilarious all night if a little scary to those who don't know him very well.

I got up to leave around 11pm and was besieged by all my favourite people saying goodbye. Cue the aforementioned cuddles followed by a warm glow I've only experienced once or twice in my life.

I'm having trouble processing all the information that's pumping into my brain. I'm amazed that we got done everything we had to get done and had such a ball doing it. And yeah the post production on this stuff we shot is going to be a bitch, to say the least. But as I walked back to the car it started dawning on me that, if only for a short time, I'm living the dream.

2006-04-20T17:16:00.000+01:00

Second day's shooting on The Sacrament. Well when I say second day's shooting what I mean is that we are into the second day's filming of the demo of the first bit of the movie.

(pic by Matt Kelland, left to right; Phil, Joe Pitcher, Natalie Ball. click for bigger version)

More shots, more setups, more of everything. Today we had the addition of Natalie Ball as Nurse Hellion. Nat couldn't be with us yesterday so we kind of filmed around her. But today we filmed her entrance into the room all dressed in milk white pleather. The costume was custom made for her by our incredible costume supervisor/designer Haldis Gothard, and it looks amazing. People were swinging by the set just to see Nat in costume. She did look fabulous. Her eyes are made up really black so when she widens her eyes the effect is totally electric. We've got so many really cool shots this week. Several times today instead of "cut" I said... well it wasn't cut, anyway. There's something really cool about "getting the shot". The more I do this, the more I think I'm all about "getting the shot".

Had a visit to the set today from Matt Kelland, who regular readers of this blog will remember was kind of a prime mover behind this project happening in the first place. I think the phrase he used was "I think you basically got to stop talking about it and actually make this movie." Anyway it was nice to see him and show him what we were doing. I think he had a good time watching a movie being made. Also he shot some pictures, which is something I wasn't able to do very much, being busy an'all.

Later in the afternoon, one of our actors was having trouble with his lines. Nick only got the script the day before we started filming and he's been up against it all the time we were filming, but this afternoon the pressure stepped up as we were doing his stuff to camera. He fluffed a few times, then that led to drying, and finally I could see he was getting really frustrated. I changed approach a little to compensate. We'd been shooting whole scenes to get lots of coverage, shots we can use to patch holes in the edit, and this was working well with Joe and Natalie who'vehad weeks to prepare. But I decided there and then to shoot small fragments with Nick to allow him the time to focus on it. We ran the lines one by one. He nailed every one of them.

Nick had the toughest time through the shoot and he was the one who came the furthest. Joe and Nat were already two of my favourite actors, but I didn't know Nick at all and he was a bit of an unknown quantity. But he worked so hard in the face of really stacked odds and I have to love him for that. I have a really great cast and I'm really looking forward to working with them on the full length film.

Final day of Easter shoot tomorrow. We'll be getting some other cast members in for publicity shots, and hopefully I'll be able to get a sword or two. I will be packing a bag of prop guns too. Oh yeah we'll also be filming Nick's capture (Nat clubs him in the head with a hammer) and Nat leading him down into the torture room. We'll also be performing a pickup shot or two and Vicky Boreham (as Sister June) posing as a receptionist in Dr Bone's clinic.

After all the hard work of this week it'll be like playtime.

2006-04-19T21:11:00.000+01:00

First day's actual shooting after yesterday's prep work. Got in about 8.30am and let the Skeleton Crew into the studio, where they set about setting up the green screens which had dried overnight. I asked them to put a grid of dark green camera tape blobs on the screen to help with matchmoving.

Then I raced over to the school to pick up Haldis, our costume/make up supervisor, who brought the costumes with her. For a costume budget of £40 she's tailor made one wonderful sleazy vampire nurse, a brilliant all white vampire doctor, and a detective sargent.

Dr Bone, our vampire doctor, is beautifully and creepily played by Joe Pitcher, and he turned on a truly chilling performance. We have a small cheap track, and some of the shots which track into Joe when he'sin costume send shivers down my spine.

I spent between 9am and about 12 noon rehearsing with the actors, then we set up for the first shots. We broke for lunch around 1.45pm a little behind schedule, but finished around 5.15pm so ended up only 15mins late.

The day went very well. Our stand-in detective, Nick Whitley, who only got a script yesterday, wasn't off-book yet, but he worked really hard to get it down all day, and I gotta love him for that. We'll work on his performance again tomorrow, and I'll try and direct him better. I was at a bit of a loss what to say to him at times, and I think his performance suffered. My fault. I must try to BE BETTER.

After work got home dog tired to see that the first direct debit bill for ages has been bounced by the bank, which means Oh Joy I'm running out of money again. Sigh. Hopefully it's not going to be too long before the house gets sold. Might have to get out another small loan to tide me over.

But all that can't touch me today. For the last two days things have been going so well with the film I've been walking on air. Watching the monitor and seeing Joe and Nick running the scene, saying my words with lights on them in front of a green screen... it was surreal. I never really believed it would happen, even up to this Monday. But it's happening, all because of some good friends who have expressed their love for me in one of the most tangible senses. They made my dream happen. It don't get any better than that.

2006-04-18T22:00:00.000+01:00

Today was a really odd day, one of the strangest of my life.

This week is the initial shoot for my film, "The Sacrament" and up till this morning, despite the fact we are shooting tomorrow, we didn't have any green screens. But this morning I went to pick up some green screen paint from the school's paint shop, and lunchtime we secured a van to transport some old theatre flats from the school to the studio. Around 3pm we started painting them and by 6pm they were done. That was amazing, and "The Skeleton Crew", Chris Sealey, Emily Key, Julia Chiavetta, Rebecca Moffatt, Felix Pickles Harvey and costume supervisor Haldis Gothard were all working hard to make this happen.

Several strange things though. The initial idea for this film came from a conversation between myself, my friend Matt Kelland and a guy called Chris Nuttall who apart from many cool jobs he does is Tim Burton's 5.1 sound guy. So get this: the green screen paint we got is leftovers from "Corpse Bride". Weird enough. But one of the flats we painted over was a scenic art project from a few years back of "Beetlejuice". Good omens, clearly, but very strange co-incidences as everything happened in isolation.

I feel the gods of cinema are with us, and just letting us know they are keeping an eye on us.

2006-04-17T22:11:00.000+01:00

Spent a relaxed Easter weekend, doing very little apart from worrying about the shoot next week. Thursday and Friday Mia and I were alone, watching movies and just hanging out together. The kidscameback from their break in Cornwall with their mother on Saturday morning, then Sunday and Today just chilling and eating chocolate.

Ain't life sweet?

2006-04-16T22:51:00.000+01:00

Heard today that Nicki, that friend of mine's wife who had the brain haemorrhage, died today after a few difficult days in hospital. I was really upset about that. I didn't know her very well, but everything I ever heard about her informed me she was a well loved wife, mother, partner, daughter and person. My friend is devastated by the loss of his wife, and why wouldn't he be? When a perfectly healthy 40 year old woman pretty much drops dead on one of the happiest days of her life, what else can it do to you?

My heart goes out to my old friend Clive Arrigoni and his four young children. In his heart rending email which he sent around to everyone who wished her well, and I respect him for having the wherewithall to even DO that, he ended with the following which makes me cry every time I read it:

"Last night as I kissed the children goodnight and gave them the cuddle I had brought home for them from their mummy, Helena said "Is mummy an angel now?" Yes she is, and she always was."

2006-04-12T20:44:00.000+01:00

Today was a blur of questions and answers. Costume wanted final fittings from the actors, camera crew wanted a definitive list of shots (to which I reply in the manner of Scooby Doo, "I-dwont-row") and Becca my 1st AD seemed to pull a coherent schedule out of thin air by overhearing what we were saying and making sense of it.

Simon came in again and sorted us out. Kinda makesme feel like a blundering amateur standing next to someone like Simon who has real professional filmmaking experience. I think of myself as a professional, but that's only really in the creative sense, not really the technical sense. I'm a producer and director not a lighting or camera technician. Fortunately, what's really going to make this happen is the people I have around me, "The Skeleton Crew", so called because while few in number they all of them do the work of ten people. I love them all and I want to adopt them.

More of that later.

2006-04-11T20:39:00.000+01:00

Another day another dollar. Went into work again, but this timeI did some work prepping the shoot next week. Or rather my crewledby the inestimable Simon Ridge prepped the shoot and I just kinda stood there like a lemon. Cori our production designer came in and showed me some wicked boards, paintings of rooms into which we are going to put our characters.

Simon walked me through the pages we were doing, and we realised immediately that we weren't going to able to do the first 11 pages, more like the first 5-7. That's more manageable anyway, and I'm happy with that.

Left exhausted, but feeling that everyone else did a lot of work. Go figure.

2006-04-10T23:42:00.000+01:00

Back to work. The weekend went swimmingly. That is to say we stayed in bed practically the whole time. (Wipe that grin off your face, nothing happened. As far as you know.)

Coming in to work this morning I felt oddly relaxed, almost as if, well I hate to say it, I actually WAS relaxed. I'll check with my doctor but I'm pretty sure that I'm actually relaxed. Or I'm having a stroke, not sure which.

Oh god, speaking of strokes which I really shouldn't be joking about right now, an old friend of mine emailed me over the weekend and told me that his wife suffered an unexpected brain bleed (sub-arachnoid) and fell into a coma which she is not expected to wake up from. The poor guy has four small kids. I mean, what a tragedy. They were one of the happiest most successful couples I knew, lovely children, idyllic lifestyle... all trashed in an instant for no good reason. Thinking about it, the guy actually nearly died himself a couple of years ago through some similar medical catastrophy.

I hope this is something I can take with me into life. At any second, for no apparent reason, your life can end. Not your fault. Bam. You're dead. What are you doing with your life? What legacy can you leave? Who will remember you? Who will miss you? Will it be a live well lived full of love and happiness? Or is it a life spent waiting for the big score, the lucky break, the time when you can finally relax and get on with your life.

I'm guilty of that. Waiting for my problems to be solved before I start living. I should really stop doing that. Life is for living not just surviving.

This isn't a rehersal. This is the show. And you're on...

2006-04-08T23:35:00.001+01:00

Got up late and drove the kids to "checkpoint charlie".

It was beautiful driving down there, and despite the kids not wanting to go, they were secretly excited about the trip. Not sure if they say they don;t want to go because it's what they think I want to hear, or if they really mean it. A little of both I suppose.

The drive back took a while and I didn't get back till three. Mia was in bed watching "Tomb Raider". I joined her, kicking off a weekend of lounging about watching stuff on the TV. Bliss.

I'm going to enjoy the peace and quiet, Mia and I just sitting there watching stuff or doing Sudoku puzzles while smoking in the kitchen... but I'm also going to miss them. I've stopped worrying about the kids being with their mum, and now I can for the most part just enjoy being free to think for five minutes without someone asking me a dumb question. I love my kids, and they are two of the smartest, funniest and up-together people you could meet... but they are kids. It's in a kid's contract to be in your face asking dumb questions or telling you about something really complicated really fast so you can hardly follow it, or being loud and hyperactive... so the peace is nice. A part of me kinda misses all the chaos though. Nothing is more distracting from the woes of modern adulthood than kids messing with your radar all day.

See you Saturday, babies. Luvluv.

2006-04-07T23:17:00.000+01:00

Back at work today after three whole days off. Managed to spend some of it lounging in bed watching DVDs, and also managed to spend some quality time with the kids before they go away tomorrow.

Didn't actually intend to come in to work, because there was a problem with my drains at home and I needed to stay home and get that fixed. But I got a call from work to say there was an IT emergency and could I come in as planned. I got the kids and the dog in the car and went. We sorted out the problem, kids played on computers, I had a few meetings, we went home. Picked up Mia on the way home as we were way later than I thought we would be. Despite all the travelling and the fact I had to be in work, we had a good time.

Last evening with the kids. We watched some South Park and a movie then they went to bed. I'm taking them over to their mums tomorrow. Well, we are meeting at "checkpoint charlie", AKA junction 27 on the M5. There's a services there and it's about half way between our house and where there mum lives.

2006-04-04T23:16:00.000+01:00

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

At last a day off. Okay so it's not the five full days off in a row I was looking for, but hey. I have no plans all day and it's great.

Slept in, watched a movie with the kids, "Catwoman" with Halle Berry, and then went to ASDA for food and clothes. Assed about all afternoon, doing various jobs which needed doing.

We watched "South Park" and "Robots", and at some point during "Robots" I fell asleep. Damn that was a good movie, but I was soooooo tired. I got about a year of getting 5 hours a night to catch up on. :)

2006-04-03T23:05:00.000+01:00

Drove in to work with Ted on board. The kids are off on their two week Easter vacation, but Hattie is going shopping in Trowbridge with her grandma and so Ted's with me.

I hoped that it would be a nice quiet day but the wretched Easter schools are on. Damn. Lots of kids all over the school, younger and noisier than our regular students.

Plus for some reason I have an assload of technical problems to sort out. Why doesn't everyone just go home? It's a holiday for crying out loud.

Didn't have time to go and see one of my clients, so booked him in for next Monday at 2.30pm. Called Tantra, our computer menders, to see if they can fit some new keys to my Powerbook when I'm over there on Friday.

2006-04-02T22:40:00.000+01:00

Weekend of love... we did naff all.

Oh yeah we went to McDonalds and stuffed our faces, adding more Monopoly tiles to our game cards. We are such suckers for those promotions. Well, there's £100,000 up for grabs if we can get Mayfair. Mind you there has to be only two of those tiles in existance, logic dictates. And also logical is that the best time to win one is when the promotion starts. If they put the winning tiles in halfway through there's a chance they might be accused of trying the fiddle the draw to leave them unclaimed. So the odds are good we are wasting our time. But we still hold out hope, despite evidence to the contrary that we might still win. That's the gamblers disease.

I stopped myself suffering from that ailment long ago. The penny push machine at the fair cured me of it. "It's so close, I can win all those pennys, and probably that watch, if I can just put enough pennys in" I said. I ran all the way home. Begged my mum to give me more pennies so I could overload the machine and pay her back a hundred times over. She smiled enigmatically as she forked it over. Did she know I was running for a fall?

I ran back down to Gadebridge Park to the fair... the machine was still loaded and I painstakingly slotted my coins in, one at a time, timing my shots and waiting for the perfect moment to win allthat moolah. My heart was in my throat and I had a gamblers fever. If only, if only... My last coin fell and nothing happened. Nothing. Not one coin dropped. I was too young to know the addage that "the house" always wins. I was devastated. But I learned a valuable lesson. There really is no such thing as a free lunch.

Oh except I won a free cheeseburger instead of the £100,000.

2006-04-01T23:10:00.000+01:00

We had another visit from a potential buyer today. But last night the shelf above my computer fell down scattering CDs and DVDs everywhere and landing on my Powerbook breaking off the I and O keys.

I had about a half hour to gather up the CDs and shove them under the bed, and liquid nails the damn shelf back on the wall with a few empty boxes on the shelf to cover up the leaking holes.

Nightmare.

Plus now I have to use an external keyboard with my powerbook cos I can't type on the little rubber nubbins which are under the broken keycaps.

Bummer.

2006-03-30T22:23:00.000+01:00

One more day to go till the end of term... I can't wait.

It turns out that my holidays have been modified a little because Nigel and Esther and I didn't co-ordinate well enough. So I'm off Tues-Thurs next week, back on Friday. Then back to work Mon-Weds and off Thurs and Fri. Then worryingly I have a shoot.

The more I think about this the more I worry about how it's going to go down. All I seem to deal in these days is worse case scenarios. In this case the worst that can happen is we shoot a bunch of stuff for the trailer. But I'd like as far as possible to get some of the first 11 pages in the can if we can. We'll see.

Got a message from yesterday from the estate agents saying could they do a viewing today. Yikes. Called them and asked if they could do it tomorrow. They said yes. Oh and they called back and asked if the could do another one on Saturday mmorning at 9.30am. Well I'm keen to sell so I said yes, but I bitched about it all day.

2006-03-29T23:27:00.000+01:00

Had the mother of all bad days today. Well good and bad in equal measure and equal strength.

Got in late about 10, put my bag in the room and turned on the computer, went to get a brew and talk to someone in the tech office about the ProTools computer which is acting up, went back to my office with a guy who needed his computer looking at only to discover in the 10 minutes I'd been out of the room someone had come into my office and stolen a students computer and my DVD player.

I didn't realise what had gone on for a while, but I pieced it together. When I'd come back into the room my computer was switched off. The theif had come in, turned off the switch in the middle of my bank of switches which runs the computers and the DVD player, unplugged the students computer (not mine thankfully) and the DVD player, stuffed them under their coat and left the building. So after having found the perfect little DVD player, first it broke and I had to get it replaced, then it was stolen. Someone doesn't want me to have one of those things. The students computer that was stolen was broken, true, but it was her Powerbook and she was very shocked to have it stolen as she was very attached to it. Felt really guilty about it being stolen while in my care, but I wasn't to know that burglars knew anything about the layout of our school. Obviously they've been doing their homework.

After all this at lunchtime I was due to take a meeting of the cast and crew of "The Sacrament". After having my stuff stolen I wasn't really in the mood, but I thought it was our last chance to get together before the break, so I thought what the hell.

As it turned out it was great. I talked to them about our plans, Haldis the costume supervisor showed them some of the designs for the costumes, I showed them some storyboards done by my friend Lee Sullivan (www.leesullivan.co.uk) which were really cool, and then I showed them a teaser trailer containing a CG image of lamia's lair and credits I put together in iMovie. As Nigel Thomas, a friend of mine said at the time, I did the thing you should always do for actors; show them their name in lights. There was a cheer as their names came up, it was a beautiful moment. Then the coup de gras, at that point I showed them what I had in my bag... a load of prop guns.

I showed Ben my leading man the Mac 11 with silencer that I want his character to use. That closed the deal pretty much. A lot of the other actors handled the guns and really liked them. (I have a very large collection I've been saving for just such an occaision.) So all in all everyone left totally jazzed about doing the film and on board for the forseeable. After the actors went I stayed behind with Simon my DoP and Corina my production designer and shot through a few ideas. Cori has come up with some wicked concepts, but she said she had some more pictures and would bring them in.

So from one of the worst days of my life to one of the best in the space of about an hour and a half.

After work I went out with Nigel and Paul, an ex-employee of the school and we went off on what could be described as either a pub crawl or a bender, take your pick. We got ass-faced and staggered about being noisy and lairy and had a thouroughly marvelous time. We ended up in Renatos, a famous late night theatre drinking hole down in King Street, tired as a newt and eating pizza. Got back to Nigel's about 3am and fell asleep as soon as my crumpled body hit the spare futon.

Ah blessed whirling black oblivion, welcome your tired brother into your inky spiral.

What a day.

2006-03-27T12:56:00.000+01:00

Yeah I missed a week. What of it? :)

Nah, seriously... Titanically busy since I last posted. I was going to go through and write in an entry for each day, but in the end I bottled out. You can't really complain, 124 entries since November and not a day missed in all that time.

As things gear up for the end of term I've been busy finishing the 1st year video project and doing the assessments and screenings. We showed the films to each group individually last Friday, then talked to them about their experience. Then we had a screening of all four films together for all four groups and anyone else who wanted to know.

Missed the Memorabilia show at the NEC in Birmingham again. Check it out. Not very good guests this time anyway. Maybe I'll shoot for the November one and get some signed pictures and pick up some movie props. Next time we have Andrew Robinson and Alexander Siddig from Deep Space Nine, so worth a trip.

Also our friend Mikko from Finland has been over this week, so Mia has taken the time off till he went back today.

2006-03-19T22:10:00.000Z

Having got the consolidating all our Divx CDs onto DVDs project done (well Mia did the work, I just heckled and got in the way), I realised that I needed to make Ted's bed. And I don't mean put sheets on it, I mean build the sucker. We got his bed from him mum's house months ago when she moved, and it's been in Hattie's attic bedroom since then. Now Mikko is coming over again on Tuesday, it means Ted is sleeping in Hatties room next week so we need to make room. Coupled to the fact that Ted's current bed is a heap of crap.

So having gotten up way too early again (damn my body clock) I was looking forward to getting a nap this afternoon, but I didn't get it because the bed project got in the way. Rats!

But it was okay, and as a side dish we figured out what we should do to Ted's room to make it look less of a crappy piece of crappy crap for potential buyers.

Got to bed late again. (Sigh) Okay so there were reasons for that, having too much fun to sleep*, but I REALLY have to get some sleep this week. Got a long and difficult day brewing on Tuesday and I have to get sharp for that.

Fell asleep watching the X Files around 1.30am.

*Okay, wiseguy - having your teeth fixed means you spend more time kissing your partner. Draw your own conclusions.

2006-03-18T22:04:00.000Z

Got up at 9am without an alarm. My body clock just wakes me up in the morning now. I really have to work on this because I actually can't sleep in now. I've trained myself to exist on so little sleep that I can't stay in bed once I open my eyes.

The kids were ready to be picked up by ex-mother-in-law Rose at 10am, and they went off to visit cousins for the weekend. Mia and I just sat about doing various projects and soaked up the endless blissful silence of not having the kids around. Deep joy. Yeah of course we love the kids, they are beautiful, wonderful, well rounded, funny, intelligent and glorious people. I'd be proud to know them if I wasn't their dad. But they are also noisy, irritating, large, all-elbows and knees, sprinkle sweet wrappers into every corner of the house and always in your face.

Fell asleep to more "Stargate Atlantis". Zzzzz

2006-03-17T23:54:00.000Z

Hattie had a day off for study time today so she came into work with me. She's actually studying her Wiccan stuff, but hey, she can do what she likes within reason. She's 14 and therefore responsible for her own timetable. I don't beat her up about going to bed on time, she doesn't bitch about being tired. It's an arrangement we have. :)

I had Ben and Vicky a couple of the actors from my film come over the office to say hi to Hattie, and they came by, which was really sweet of them. I know they are busy people and I really appreciated they took the time as a favour to me. Hattie loved meeting them. She's read the script and she knows the characters, plus Vicky is a fun gal and Ben is really hot so she was feeling frisky all afternoon. She's a fan.

Got halfway home and had gassed up the car and was standing at the checkout when I realised I'd left my debit card in Choices Video earlier in the day. ARGH. Really embarrassing. Luckily I had my wallet in my bag, so I could use one of my broken old credit cards. But then had to drive all the way back into Bristol to get the damn card, then all the way back home. I was really pissed off.

Oh yeah, then I remembered I had to pick Mia up again. By the time I got home I was spitting feathers. Ate a grumpy meal and schlumphed off to bed.

2006-03-16T23:48:00.000Z

Final day of editing on the video project. Okay so there's a little contingency time and we've going to finish up and polish next Tuesday, but basically we're done.

This is the group I was most worried about. They had an ambitious story and they were running ahead all the time so they missed a lot of stuff they really should have grabbed at the time. I was so busy reigning them in all the time I missed loads of stuff we should have done. But it's getting made and as usual you can fix most things with perfect editing.

We finished around 5pm and I raced home to pick Hattie up to take her to a meeting at her school about her GCSE choices. She's picking Textiles, Sociology, Photography, Religious Studies, History and as a backup subject Geography.

Just got home at 8.30pm and then had to nip out and pick upMia from Trowbridge where she was out drinking with her work buds. Dog tired when I got home. Really must work on getting more than 5 hours a night. It's doing my head in, gradually.

2006-03-15T23:14:00.000Z

Bought a DVD player today. Yeah I know at last count I have 9 DVD players or devices capable of playing DVDs. But this one fills a niche, and it was cheap. Okay, yeah and it was a cool toy and I just wanted it.

The Durabrand DVD-1005 is a small DVD player which is the size and shape of a game console, like an old Playstation 1. It's silver and plugs into TVs via a SCART or composite lead. Plus if you know the right key combo on the remote you can hack it to be multiregion.

Okay all the cute rationalisations aside, why do I need this? Well I need to play multiregion DVDs and I need to do it in my office while I'm working. I could play them on my computer, but I'm working on my computer and I don't want to tie it up. Duh. Plus I might want to go and work at our other location and take the DVD player with me. So the solution to this "problem I didn't even know I had yet" is that it needs to be multiregion and portable.

So when I saw this puppy in ASDA I was interested immediately. Only because it looked cool and at first I thought it was a portable DVD player with a screen. (Which by the way I look at all the time even though I DEFINITELY don't need one of those.) Then I saw it was £17.99. Okay, I just slipped it right into my basket right then and there, because I didn't have a single reason not to have it. It's less expensive than the last DVD disc I bought.

(Note: since I wrote this, I've had some problems with the thing, but those problems went away - it's working at the moment and, bottom line: for £17.99 I can just toss it and buy a new one if it breaks.)

So OH happy day. Nothing better than getting a new toy which fills a need, is cheap and works okay. It's a win win. I'm sure something else happened today but you know what, I have no idea because I was too busy playing with my toy. We men, we are SO easily distracted. :)

2006-03-14T22:02:00.000Z

Penultimate edit day with the first years, oh apart from the Monday morning session next week to finish off the first group's stuff. This one was nice, got some really nice performances from the guys from Swindon, and the editing went real smooth. Got some really nice cuts in there.

Also the group listened intelligently to all my explanations. Got loads of stuff across to them. They are a good group anyway.

Went to Tescos on the way home and got an ASSload of food. Only cost £50 too so "result". Filled the fridge and cupboards to brimming.