TO LIVE LIFE TO THE FULL YOU MUST LIVE EVERY NIGHT SITTING FLICKING THROUGH THE SHIT ON THE TELLY CHANNELS AS IF IT WAS YOUR LAST!

                                                                              To live life to the full you must live every evening flicking through the shit on the endless telly channels as your last!
       My missus the 'Lovely Lynne' works down in Birmingham all week and comes home at the weekend and quite often plays with the MANCHESTER SKA FOUNDATION band out and about,which she enjoys greatly, they are a popular bunch and have quite a following and are getting a lot of 'gig' work. The longest we spend together is going shopping at ASDA on a Sunday afternoon.

The Big 'Little 'un' is normally like every kid her age in another room ,texting away on phones or lap tops or ear phoned up so anything short of a nuclear explosion  wouldn't have a cat in hells chance of attracting her attention.

Me n' the dog have the living room to ourselves and the universe of choice that SKY telly has to offer....A mass of channels with absolutly nothing on,except some real shite. Now our telly has all the mod cons so i can record shite ;I can get shite ,on demand: I can buy or rent shite.

I 've even started reading again, normally it was just in bed ,but now in the evening , I feel like Ken Barlow on 'Corrie' as he is always sat reading a 'tome'.....I'm also ploughing through a heap of comics i have on disc...Marvel and DC ,but old stuff like TV21; VALIAN; LION;VICTOR and a heap of stuff  which have brought the schoolboy back out of this 54 year old fart and thats fine by me!

Me n' the dog sit together and discuss the affairs of the day ,i am getting worried as he's starting to make sense ,in fact more sense than me!

   

WHO SAYS DALEKS AREN'T 'FUNKY'...THE SKA-LEKS FROM SKA-RO CAN EXTERMINATE AND SKANK!

A wee while before the extreme excesses of the festive season kicked in proper i accompanied my missus 'The Lovely Lynne' to a very strange boozer in Oldham in manchester to see her and the rest of the hooligans and nutters that comprise the MANCHESTER SKA FOUNDATION play a 'gig'...The pub was called a very un-pub like name...AREA 51. Which as any UFO /X-FILES buff will know is where the yanks keep all the crashed alien space ships and flying saucers as well as their alien crew members who graciously help our transatlantic cuzn's to develop weapons based on alien technology. Whereas the real AREA 51 is in the middle of the desert, our AREA 51 was down a cobbled side street round the corner from some kebab and fried chicken shops which i wouldn't have been too suprised to discover had their origins in some dead alien crew members, i'm not too well up on how many alien ships make the journey across billions of light years to land in that region, but looking at a few of the people ....Quite a few!

THE MANCHESTER SKA FOUNDATION are a really good Ska cover band ,(MADNESS, THE SPECIALS,etc) and have a really good following who do follow them around quite big distances . I've gotten to know quite a few of them ,all lovely people, but totally nuts!...I looked to the side and there was a full size DOCTOR WHO'S T.A.R.D.I.S. I thought, "My the bands reputation is spreading!" I mean the good Doctor has Gasped n' Wheezed his way through time and space to get to a little back street gig.

Even more incredulous, alongside was a real genuine DALEK...It's true music can bring people together ,even eccentric time lords and gooey slimey globules with a sore throat and lousy singing voice that live inside giant pepper pots.

But the love of music didn't end there ,as alongside was a real CYBERMAN standing placidly by his worstest enemies in the whole galaxy

It didn't end there as alongside them minding his own buisness was 'ROBBY THE ROBOT' from 'LOST IN SPACE'.....He'd found his way through space ,but was lost in Oldham, don't ask me which is better or worse.  Oldham and the AREA 51 started to pale as it proved absolutly impossible to get served at the bar. Our interstellar Ska-Fans mustn't be drinkers as they placidly stood and listened to the 'gig', meanwhile there was almost mass 'Exterminations!' at the bar as people were trying and failing miserably to get served.

Although the T.A.R.D.I.S. was there, there was no sign of the DOCTOR. I think he was inside sulking....He'd travelled through billions of years , billions of light years and couldn't even get a bloody pint of GUINNESS at the end !

OF COURSE BOND IS BACK !...HIS HOBBY IS REINCARNATION, MAYBE HE COULD TEACH 'M' A FEW TRICKS!

During my blog layoff ,unable to put images on the computer i attempted a couple of purely painted images ,no pre sketches or computer imaging just some very battered paint brush, long past their chuck in the bin by-date and slapped on the acrylic paint to attempt yet another DANIEL CRAIG as we'd been   to see the latest ,much anticipated JAMES BOND  film, SKYFALL ,a few days before.

Yes i know its not like the old SEAN CONNERY style ,etc,etc, but the changes have to be made and let it evolve and i could see our mean rough tough DANNY BOY turning into an early wry smoothie OO agent, as it becomes clear the character and stories ,although they are set in the modern day are from the beginning of JAMES BOND and how he became what he did. Whether we'll have SPECTRE,SMERSH,BLOFELDT, the white pussy cat and shark tanks,etc, who knows, but i enjoyed SKYFALL and love DANIEL CRAIG ,in a manly butch way ,of course .....He's a hard bastard! But the film was interesting with plenty of twists and turns . People complained about being set in London and Scotland, but i enjoyed that, it made a refreshing change from exotic beaches, etc, apparently it was mainly financial reasons rather than artistic reasons, but it worked for me and, quite frankly thats all i'm worried about. 

The other main relief was the action scenes ,they werent the mad frenetic ,badly edited way ,as in QUANTUM OF SOLACE,esspecially. In fact they were quite good and able to be followed by us conneisseurs of extreme violence. The LOVELY LYNNE drooled over MR CRAIG for totally different reasons and even said she'd like to go back and see it again.....Praise indeed!

A few days ago i got dragged all the way to SKEGNESS as THE LOVELY LYNNE  and her band THE MANCHESTER SKA FOUNDATION were playing a 'gig' at a scooter rally. I had two C.D.'s of BOND soundtracks ,,One was GOLDFINGER and t'other was THUNDERBALL. when i used to drive around our green n' pleasant land i used to play them loud , it was great flying along the highways and byways overtaking everybody while the BOND theme boomed in you ears , i have to admit to the odd wry smile and cocked eyebrow, it was even better when i was going to a job and i was in a dinner suit....I was LEATHERBARROW!....TIM LEATHERBARROW!  So i gave THE LOVELY LYNNE  the best of JOHN BARRY,admittedly it wasn't what she'd've chosen if asked,but i didn't, so on went the Bonds! But when she heard all the Brass ,esspecially the TROMBONES she was happy. Whether the modern BONDS will ever match the old ones musically is ,sadly doubtful, but you never know...

It just ,so happened the following day Lynne had a 'gig' in Manchester ,so i stayed home and watched THUNDERBALL following the music as i still had the soundtrack in my head,  it was great, i've always lked THUNDERBALL,in fact i think its the first Bond i remember seeing on the pictures. I always remembered THE VULCAN BOMBER under the sea , a beautiful craft .Then a few weeks later bursting with excitment on seeing "the bond plane!" and excitedly informing my dad at Speke airshow as a kid as this gorgeous Delta-Winged vision roared over our heads, absolutly wonderful, its still the JAMES BOND PLANE!

JAMES BOND WILL BE BACK

(I do hope so!)