Friday 27 August 2010

V2010 Day One - a BlackLOG pictorial

I don't know what it is but sorting and loading the pictures seems to take far longer than putting words onto a page. Once again it proved fairly easy to get The Beast into the VFestival, although it took even longer than last year to get through security. Almost an hour to move about 30 meters, very frustrating and resulted in us missing 'The Pretty Reckless' and 'Daisey Dares'.

Joe, Mrs B, yours truely and The Beast
Picture courtesy of Mini Beast and Kirsty
bum fluff courtesy of Joe....
The Music

The Magic Numbers
The result of the security delay was that the opening group for us were The Magic Numbers. They were OK but for some reason I got it into my head that they did the song "3 is the magic number"  since they didn't and didn't even have the good grace to do a cover version of it,  I soon discovered I didn't really know any of their songs. Plus they can best be described as quantity rather than quality....

Romeo Stodart
"Forever Lost"
I'm not sure exactly how you could misplace him?

Michele Stodart
"Close your eyes"
Looks like Michele took the song title to heart... 
  
The Divine Comedy
I quite like Mr Hannons clever lyrics but it was never going to set the festival a light, more suitable to a cosy gig somewhere...

Neil Hannon
"Gin Soaked Boy"
Well cerainly a wine drenched man....

Paloma Faith
At last things started to pick up, great singing and she had a good sense of humour as well 


V good Miss Paloma.

“Does anyone here like David Guetta?
Are you going to watch him later?
I'm not a big fan myself but …
I have done this cover though which
I think you will find is rather good….”

You tell them girl....


"Do You Want the Truth or Something Beautiful?"
I do hope she's not calling me too honest....

Parlotones
A bit of a find this lot, I can even forgive them for being South African (It's not my fault, I can blame the Spitting Image song -"Never met a nice South African" for this totally unfair and unjustified statement - sorry Dirk......what can I say,  I'm obviously a product of the songs I listen to...) - I particularly love the shapes that the lead singer Paul Hogson throws while performing.


Paul Hogson - Lead singer
"Bird in Flight"

Looks like he is winging it to me...
Sorry, could not resist...
 I'll get my coat....


"Brighter Side of Hell"
Looks like they have rabbits...I bet they bite....

"Overexposed"

Damn and I thought it was
a good attempt at a silhouette

Rock.Paper.Scissors

I think he's cheating....

Lissie
Great voice but walked a very thin line between proper music and that country rubbish....


Sorry, I forgot that BlackLOG does not
like the country numbers... 
"Why You Runnin'?"

To be brutally honest Lissie it's your hairy
armpits, they aren’t that beautiful.

Paloma I've decided
I would like to opt for the beautiful....  

Yes Kirsty when a singer comes on stage and says
"Howdy y'all"
 there is a pretty good chance that she is an American... 

This is Lissies lead guitarist, although it looks like
he has escaped from the set of 'Beauty and the Beast'

Scouting for Girls
I don't care that they are a bit poppy and uncool, they are great fun to watch....


Roy Stride wants you to give him the clap.....


I think Greg Churchouse  may have
spotted one of those girls....

Paul Weller
We came in part way through his set and so did not get that close to the stage. I'm not convinced by all the accolades that he is getting at the moment, he’s a good song writer and performer but he’s certainly no Millie Vanillie….

He did play the Jam song  "Start" which
 was the highlight of his performance for me.

Stereophonics
The best of times - they were fantastic, the performance of the day 
The worst of times - we had to miss Florence and the Machine  which was on at the same time....

We got caught in the middle of a beer (or possibly worse....) throwing battle. Why do people do this, pay a fortune for a drink then chuck half of it.....at one point Mrs B seemed to become a magnet for incoming missiles. It was at this point we witnessed :-

Two miracles before the inevitable.
One inbound cup was heading straight for Mrs B’s head….Suddenly this hand shot out and grabbed it inches from her petrified little face….didn’t even spill a drop until Mrs B's saviour chucked it back in the direction that it came from (No doubt to land on some other innocent festival goers head)….He got a standing ovation from everyone around.

Seconds later another cup was heading for Mrs B’s head, another guy tried to do the same only he failed to catch it and diverted it onto himself….Where was her faithful husband during this time, he was still laughing his head off at the first attempt on Mrs B’s dryness…

No one attempted to stop the third cup and so Mrs B finally, like a scene out of Final Destination, got the drenching that had been coming her way……

I myself was hit on the nose by something hot, I was about to scream like a little girl, I thought it was a lit cigarette that was attached to my nose. Fortunately before I could embarrass myself I discovered it was a bit of hot chicken – not exactly pleasant but at least I was not going to be scarred for life….For the record, no I didn’t eat it, it looked a bit over done for my taste…..


Kelly Jones
"Something In The Way"

Lucky for Mrs B

"I miss You Now"
It sounds like it was Mr Jones who was
throwing his beer at Mrs B....

"Oi!, Kelly stop it..."
Kings of Leon
For me the disappointment of the day - they may have been the Saturday headline act but their performance just seemed half hearted.... We must have been in the minority though, as we tried to force
our way out the crowd, it seemed to get thicker and thicker and seemed to go on forever....

At one point I got stopped by someone :-
Slightly drunk audience member:  "What's wrong with you, why are you leaving?"
Me :- "To be honest I don't rate them, live"
Slightly drunk audience member:  "So why did you come to see them then?"
Me :- "I like to make my own mind up about things, besides Paloma Faith told me that David Guetta (who was appearing on the other stage at the same time) is rubbish...." 

I think the irony of my statement escaped him but he eventually stumbled out of our way...

"Caleb Followill (vocals, rhythm guitar),
"Sex on Fire"  - "I don't think so,
I thought it was barely smouldering ...."

Nathan Followill (drums, percussion, vocals),
"Wasted Time"
Tell me about it - 20 minuets listening and almost half an
hour trying to fight our way out through the crowd....

A record of the week
It was only ever going to be festival tunes

Paloma Faith - Do You Want The Truth or Something Beautiful

Stereophonics - She's Alright

The Parlotones - Beautiful

Kings of Leon - Sex on Fire

Scouting For Girls - She's So Lovely 

Photo Finish
He was warned to be careful as the Sunflower  shampoo
was a little stronger than his normal brand....

It probably seemed like a good idea at the time....

I wish Kirsty would stop forcing 
her ear onto poor Joe's tongue... 

Proof there is a Loch Ness Monster, only
 it's now living in Chelmsford....

Oh no, mime artists, we better call
in the pest exterminators…

Damn too late they're breeding.....

Looks like they may have turned up at the
wrong event..Guys Wimbledon is in June

Go on take our picture.... 

One of the girls asked me which TV channel it
would be on...Doh, it's not a video camera ....

The Beast shows off his Picture in Picture
functionality. I didn't even know he
 had that feature....

Despite our best efforts Joe and I could not convince
Kirsty that it looked good and she should buy it...

She's not as daft as she looks.... 

Mrs B at the end of a long but
fantastic day.....

And that was just day one, tune in next week for day two, where the weather turns and I have a bit of a run in with the head of security

Thursday 19 August 2010

Jumping on the green bandwagon

Going Green
The BlackLOG household is in the process of going green.  We are looking at investing in solar panels no less. I would like to report it is purely for the good of humanity but that is only part of the story. The truth is it currently makes sound economic sense thanks to the UK government offering huge incentives.....

Guaranteed by the government for the next 25 years, index linked and tax free -
  • 41.3p for every unit of electricity the system generates, even if we use the electricity ourselves - that's like owning a restaurant, cooking all the food and then getting paid to eat it....certainly gets my vote, although I would probably end up using any profit to pay for slimming classes.
  • An additional 3p (possibly more depending on the deal you can make with the power companies) for every unit we don't use and which get exported back to the grid. This bit sounds like a bulimic being paid for all they can eat and then given a little bit extra for anything they return...Yuck...
So it turns out that going green can leave you with a pocket full of pretty green as well. I confidently predict if the government offer a similar scheme for the home production of gas, the sales of baked beans, sprouts and curry will go through the roof....

The only problem is we have to let the next door neighbours know, as the workman might have to get access to their property.  See below "Shed wars" for our past dealings - it does not bode well....

Watch this space to see if the investment proves to be too good to be true....

V2010 count down
Just a few days to go until this year's V music festival and we have the typical weather worries.  While we have been lucky for the past three years as it has stayed mostly dry, this year's forecast is looking a little less than encouraging at the moment. Mrs B's mood is currently looking as dark as the skies above us. I'm in Twubble with a capitol TWU if it turns into a wet weekend.....

The next problem is how to decide on which bands to see when - there are a number of clashes:

Paloma Faith or Gabriella Cilmi
Stereophonics or Florence and the Machine
Kings of Leon or Charlatans
Madness or Amy McDonald
Kate Nash or Eliza Doolittle or Eels
The Doves or Mika
Pixie Lott or Tiffany Page

Oh decisions, decisions

The following bands are must see for me:
Kasabian
The Kooks
Plan B
Shed 7
Scouting for Girls

As in previous years I have created a schedule of who's appearing on what stage and when, which shows any potential clashes and helps with making a choice. Anyone going along to either Weston Park or Hylands Park and who wants a copy, let me know and I will send you the spreadsheets. I can't guarantee that it will be 100% accurate but it won't be far off...

The Beast and probably Mini Beast will be joining us at V so hope to bring some good shots for next week....

History repeats
You can thank Cynical Scribbler for this.  I was over at his place reading his 'Neighbours from hell' blog and was going to share my own story with him. Only, when I tracked it down I found it hilarious.

- Is it bad form to laugh at your own blog?

It's about 3 years old and I suddenly realised that this was originally published at a time when only one man and his dog were reading the blog. (Well the dog was probably not reading it as he appears to have been using it as a toilet, it was a bit soggy. Don't worry I have cleaned it up, disinfected it and remixed it in a new and improved digital format i.e. I copied and pasted it from the original publication and added a sound track on the BlackLOG Jukebox). One thing I can tell you is that I didn't actually have to embellish this very much at all - it's written practically as it happened...

Shed Wars
Our shed building project has been put back after complaints from the neighbours, thankfully not the nice ones but the ones that we have managed 5 conversations with in 10 years. 3 of them have been over the shed and have taken place in the last couple of weeks. (At this rate we will be at Christmas card swapping status by about 2056).

Our first conversation with them set such a high standard that we were unable to repeat the exercise for some three or four years. To be fair it is her not him (Dave) who is the problem. I’m confident that on his own Dave would be a very nice and worthwhile addition to the neighbourhood. We would probably invite him around for BBQ’s and drinks but, attached as he is to Margaret (1), he has more chance of becoming POTUS than getting an invite around to ours.

(1) I think Margaret is her name but as we’ve only been living next door for 10 years, it would be understandable if I’ve got it wrong.

The scene was as follows. It was about ten years ago and we had just moved into our new house. The neighbours moved in a week later so Mrs B and I decided to pop around and introduce ourselves. We knock on the door and waited.  There was a short pause and the door opened a crack, just enough for us to see a couple of eyes peering out at us.

Me & Mrs B – “Hi, we are your next door neighbours and thought it would be nice to introduce ourselves.”

Slight Pause

Margaret – “I think you need to talk to Dave.”

Door slams in our faces – Perhaps she mis-heard us and thought we said that we were mass murderers looking for our next victim or even worse Jehovah’s looking for a chat…..

Mrs B (hair slight array from the force of the door) – “That went well!”

Me – “Yes, nice to know the new neighbours are friendly.”

This was followed by a slow trudge back home, which made Napoleons’ retreat from Moscow look like a picnic in the park. (If anyone happens to run into Tchaikovsky let him know that if he is ever looking to top his 1812 overture he should pop around to ours for tea and I can give him some details of a real war…..)

Now I can’t remember all the conversations we have had over the years. I did manage to borrow a wheelbarrow once, which I suspect will remain the high point of the relationship. When the shed project got underway, I had the courtesy to let them know that we would be putting up a shed and asked permission to go onto their property to fix the guttering. The only comment from Dave at the time was “The guttering had better not overhang our property”. I assured him it wouldn’t.

About six weeks later Mitch (chief architect and builder, when he is not nursing a hangover) and I received a summons to attend a hearing next door. Apparently, they were not happy about the shed. As we entered the house, the lovely Margaret verbally assaulted us with a selection of comments screamed at high volume. I can’t remember them all but the highlights were :-

“You’re just an East End wide boy” - naturally I assumed she was talking to Mitch.

“You don’t care about any one, you just march in and do whatever you want” - Was I suddenly George Bush? Is Michael Moore about to make a documentary about me? I don’t think so…..

- “It looks like something put up after the war, some prefabricated rubbish, you know what I mean, having been dragged up in the East End” - Oh gods, she was talking about me (2) and as for poor Mitch, this was his pride and joy she was dragging through the mud.

(2) While I have to admit to having purchased a house in Leytonstone (3), I was twenty and did not know any better. It hardly constitutes being an East End guttersnipe and I did sell it after a couple of years for a huge profit of about £3.35p. You live and learn…. I quietly put her straight on the East End bit - after all, my sister would never forgive me. She, being the posh one in the family, would never accept being related to a cockney, even a fake one.

(3) How did they know my life history? It turns out that my mother, the traitor (4), had been blabbing and divulging snippets of my life to Dave in cosy little chats over the fence during one of her cat sitting visits…..

(4) Is it ethically wrong to have your own mother shot for consorting with the enemy? I guess I should give her the benefit of the doubt and judge that it was before actual hostilities had been broken out. However I will be closely monitoring her future conduct……

“You think you’re so much better than us” -Well yes, I don’t just scream at people and slam the door in their face. (Although I could certainly learn to make exceptions for certain people in the neighbourhood.…..)

I decided not to react and instead asked her what the problem was: “Dave, tell him” - came the silky and smooth response, that peeled off layers of our facial skin. (Remind me to let Mrs B know that there is no need to invest in expensive exfoliation treatments, when she can just nip next door for a friendly chat with Margaret…..)

Apparently, our shed was blocking their light. Not direct light mind you but reflected light, reflected off our own wall (I feel so betrayed. Imagine finding out that parts of your own home have been consorting with the enemy. I can see that I will have to put our wall "on report" along side my mother).

Putting it all into perspective the shed was no more than a foot above the existing fence. As Mitch and I stood in their kitchen, on a dull day without any lights on, we could clearly see the vitriol being poured on us. I was having trouble keeping a straight face especially when Mitch said that we had no Reference datum to work from. If looks could kill I would have been finishing the shed off on my own.

“I’m not talking to you!!”  - Margaret screeched in that friendly tone of hers, somehow managing to increase the decibels and menace in her voice to even more breathtaking levels. Perhaps someone should notify the Guinness book of records.

The next request was to lower the shed. Why did we need it so high? Apparently, her cousin had a shed that he "happily" ducked to get into and if it was good enough for him, surely it was good enough for us. Mitch and I retreated from the onslaught before we collapsed laughing.

Who would have thought that these would
turn out to be the foundations for a War?
I returned later on a solo suicide mission and offered to put up some wood facing on the side of the shed to match the fence, this was surprisingly well received and I almost got away without further abuse. Unfortunately, Margaret then asked me if the water butt was going to be returned to the back of the shed. This was a bit confusing as there never had been a water butt there.

It suddenly dawned on me she meant the compost bin......I made the mistake of telling her this.

I thought my ear drums were going to burst as her shrieks reached new highs that even dogs would have had difficulty picking up.

I tried to explain that the compost bin had been there for over eight years and had never caused her any trouble, but by this time she was heading for meltdown, all she could do was babble about snakes living in compost bins. Apparently, she was not just afraid of snakes but allergic to them to boot.

Once Dave had managed to cool her down, risking life and limbs as he manually untwisted her undergarments, Margaret demanded to know if I was intending to keep anything dangerous in there.

I assured her that Mrs B had been banned from taking unsupervised trips to the shed.

Margaret was clearly not amused; although I’m sure I saw a slight smirk break across Dave’s face.

I was very tempted to put a note through their letterbox asking if anyone has seen my pet Boa Constrictor which had escaped, while Mrs B was more for the direct approach and wanted to put some grass snakes in her garden, especially when she heard that Margaret had called our fat cat fat. The damned cheek of the woman, as if her own daughters don’t strain the scales and shop in the over-sized section for the less than petite.

Wrap up – what has happened since
Shortly after these events, Mitch emigrated to Canada. Although he has never admitted it, I firmly believe that his shed building pride took a severe battering during the war. To date he has never designed or built another shed.

Dave never even made the short list for POTUS. I believe the thought of having Margaret as First Lady was too much even for the American public.

Please note that no snakes were actually harmed during the creation of this Blog, although McG may have eaten a couple of earthworms during the foundation-digging phase of the project.

And finally, no peace treaty has ever been signed, so officially the shed war continues…….


Mitch and I prepare an assault ladder to take
 on the dastardly Margaret, turns out we would have
 been better off using ear muffs.


McG not as innocent as he looks.
"Hmmm, earth worms...."

Let me know if you have a problem with publishing old Blogs, I probably won't listen to you but I will respect your opinion in the morning as I ignore you and rush out the door...

A record of the week
Almost appropriate music to accompany this week's BlackLOG

It's not easy being green - Kermit the Frog (who would have thought Kermie was the original saviour of our planet)
Pretty green - The Jam
I saved the world today - Eurythmics (You can thank me later....)
History repeats - Propellerheads featuring Shirley Bassey
Neighbours theme tune -  (Don't worry I only put in the short version)

Photo finish
More cat photo's and some shots from my sister's rain affected summer party.........

When whitegoods turn bad.

One of our Govinder cat mugs got
mugged by our dishwasher.
Heartbreaking as the range is
no longer available.

Bad dishwasher you are on
your final warning....

The Girls at my sisters summer ‘pass me a jumper and rain
coat’ party. Note that there are no group picture of the men
as the girls were too busy grabbing the limelight.....

Big Sis with her friend Debbie, no one warned me that she
used to be a professional photographer…..

I should have guessed when she went on about the quality
of light and composition. I’m just a snapper so that
conversation went over my head. I could tell The Beast was
interested though as his dials pricked up when she was talking
 about it.

Big sis's new man Paul, relagated to photo duties

Inappropriate conversation

Big Sis – “You’re hot!”

Me – “Thanks”
Big Sis – “No, I mean your bodies hot”
Me – “Again thanks, a little inappropriate but thanks”
Sister – “Stupid boy, I'm talking about your temperature…”
McG - "Oh the shame...."

Mrs B - "I thought your Sis said it was a summer party"

One of Lisa's Scarlet's false Eyelashes attacked me
and forced me to do a Charlie Chaplin impression.

What can I say, this is an unfortunate juxtaposition, I really
was doing a Charlie Chaplin impression…While the girls
were doing impressions of planes taking off over Windsor.

This is just the sort of thing that the ‘News of the World’
gets hold of, takes out of context and the next thing you 
know you find yourself starring in a right wing, royal* lesbian
orgy expose, spread over 10 pages, with a follow up promised
for next week highlighting inappropriate conversations with
your sister.

*Note this was in Winsor; it doesn’t take much
for a Red Top journalist to make 4 +4 = 69.

I want Robert Pattinson to play me in the big screen
adaptation. He might be a rubbish actor but since I’m a
rubbish  writer I could do with some gullible fans who can’t
 tell the difference between good and bad. The BlackLOG
viewed  figures would go through the roof….

McG an avid News of the World
reader - "That's it I'm off - No
publicity, I don't even know
these people except when they
are feeding me"

My Sis's cat Fluffy - not a great name for a butch male...
To make matters worse for him I think he might 
be using Lisa's Scarlet's false eyelashes.... 

Wednesday 11 August 2010

Battle for power

We recently changed our power suppliers and in the process I broke one of my cardinal rules - not to purchase anything that is cold called over the phone. What can I say? I had been thinking of changing and so was caught in a moment of weakness.


British Gas’s Market Tracker rate sounded like a brilliant deal. The telemarketer made promises that it was guaranteed to be one of the most competitive rates on the market. What they failed to mention was it was competitive against standard rates only - which aren’t actually very competitive at all. If I use an online tariff I can save around £500 a year. I wrote British Gas a polite but slightly snotty email threatening to leave them less than a week after joining. The “bugger off early £60 fee” for not being prepared to be swindled any longer is hardly a deal breaker, so we save £440 pounds a year not £500….let me think carefully about that…..This could be a shorter relationship than a Britney Spears marriage. As you read this I’m currently arranging an energy annulment.

Bless them, for the privilege of paying £500 more than the most competitive rate, British Gas sent a free gadget to help us save energy, which sounds nice of them but somehow surprise, surprise this cost saving device actually helps them make even more money out of us….This is because the device they sent us plugs into the grid (where they get their profit from) and shows you how much energy you are using. Rather cunningly it is not even possible to tell how much it costs to run the device itself because in order to work out how much energy the device is using you have to unplug it, only as soon as you do, the device’s display goes blank (it could mean that 95% of all our current energy costs are down to the device). In addition, despite the claims that it helps you reduce energy use, far from running around the house turning things off, I found myself running around the house turning things on, just to see how much they cost to run. I even rummaged through drawers and cupboards to dig out some old electrical items that have long since been discarded but not yet been dumped, on the basis that one day they might come in useful. Guess what Mrs B? That day has arrived! The electrical items formed part of a huge social experiment to see just how high I could raise the energy use bar. Apologies to anyone in the local area who may have experienced power outages during much of last week, normal service will resume as soon as our finances struggle to recover…I do hope they don’t send these devices to hospitals, you can imagine the scandal as the NHS tries to explain why they went around turning off all the life support systems…

"The energy savings were impressive although we do agree  the human cost might be a little unpalatable to some of our patients, especially the ex ones....." 

Probably best not to unplug life support
system, fridges, freezers and Mrs B's hair
straightners and hair dryer....

Some vaguely interesting results
For the record, if you wish to bankrupt yourself the best way is to just keep boiling the kettle. On a cost per second basis it is more expensive than running a high use heroin addict….

Next time you are around someone’s house that you don’t like, just keep switching on their kettle - they will be in debtor’s prison before they can say “What the Dickens is going on?”

The toaster is not far behind the kettle in power consumption – who would have thought having a cup of tea and slice of toast would turn out to be such an expensive option?

The big TV uses hardly any power consumption at all, but that might be because I kept getting distracted with the big picture and so did not actually get around to checking the power read out for it

Dimmer switches – sometimes, but not always, use more power when they are dimmed…. I should know by their very name that they were never going to be that bright but that has to be the most ridiculous result since David took out Goliath….

This little wonder device also let us know that while we were asleep last Friday night we used more energy than a family of five is expected to use for a week….WTF?….

“Mischief - stop boiling that damn kettle”

“McG, step away from the toaster, it’s off limits as is the Microwave….”

“What’s that McG? It wasn’t you guys? You think it was the chairman of British Gas….How would you know? Oh, it takes a fat cat to know a fat cat… fair enough…."

Not sure if this is an unshaven chairman
of British Gas or McG....?

"Oi, Chairman of British Gas sod off and leave our electric switches alone and please don’t send us a gas monitor as we are still dealing with the additional cost of having the electric one….."

The main culprit for the overnight abuse appears to be our bathroom radiators which are both on electric thermostats, to dry our towels in the summer when the central heating is off. They currently make a sound like a couple of kettles going off, this is apparently called ketteling and I believe is caused by a faulty thermostat. This is an apt name as they not only sound like a kettle they hungrily use power in the same way as well, only don’t expect to get a cup of tea at the end of it….

The array of different rates on offers is simply staggering. I just wish they would be a bit more honest with the names and restrict them to something like the following:

• The ‘This sounds like a great rate but isn’t’ rate

• The ‘Just hand over your house and savings now’ rate

• The ‘daylight robbery’ rate (which can be used in conjunction with the ‘Great night swindle’ rate for extra unsavings)

• The ‘thanks for paying for our chairman’s holiday home’ rate

• The ‘We are not going to stop at the shirt off your back’ rate…

• The ‘Ok we have your grandmother and your left kidney, what do you want to lose next?’ rate

The price comparison sites can be equally confusing. Plugging in the Kilo Watts gives one result but when you use the equivalent cost they come up with totaly different results. All I know is that I shall be enforcing my no cold call rule far more rigorously in the future even if they offer a superior rip-off package with a dozen free gadgets that cost you a small fortune to run.

Camera Obscura
Our friend Lisa purchased a new SD card for her camera last week. Her old card was full and rather than just down load the pictures (she had lost the lead from the camera to PC) she opted for purchasing a new larger capacity SD card so that she could take loads of pictures at Phil and Christian’s wedding. I had got a phone call from Lisa while we were on the way to the venue (please note the correct venue on the correct day), saying her camera was broken could she borrow Mini Beast. Not a problem other than we would not be arriving until after the ceremony (we were evening guests only). As we drove along I worked out Lisa’s problem, her camera obviously did not take the new High Capacity SD cards and despite taking the camera into her nearest branch of Dixons (that was never going to end well) and requesting a card suitable for the camera they managed to sell her the wrong card. I had instructed her to return the HC card and get her money back……This week I got a phone call from her :-

Lisa :- "Guess what, I’ve got a new camera"

Me :- "So the old camera was broken after all?"

Lisa :- "No………….. but my HC card fits the new camera!"

Me :- "So the numb nuts who sold you the wrong card now gets a camera sale out of his error….I see."

Lisa :- "but it’s much smaller and does exactly the same as my old camera only in 10 Mega pixels, twice as many as the old one."
(I didn’t have the heart to ask her what she thought the Mega pixels would do for her)

Me :- "Lisa, you realise it’s like when they upgrade phones, you get two new functions that you hardly need and they strip out 10 of your favourite ones "

Lisa :- "Did I say it was really small?"

Me :- "Yes, you did. I’m sure it will be fine. You better keep the old one for a while though, because you got some brilliant results out of it and I don’t want you to be disappointed."

Lisa :- "Really, really small"


Lisa with her old camera not
exactly over sized. I'm Looking
foward to seeing how small 
the new one is.....
I hope Lisa doesn’t get her new camera too close to The Beast, he doesn’t like small camera’s….I think it’s a bit like male lions when they take over a pride they kill all the offspring of the old king……Mini Beast only survived because we wrapped it in The Beast’s old case and kept them apart for three months. Even now you get the feeling The Beast only just about tolerates Mini Beast and I certainly would not trust them on their own together….

Mad Blog Tuesday
Not sure what happened on Tuesday but the BlackLOG got more hits on that day then it would normally get in two weeks. None of the new visitors left a message so I have no clue as to what happened. They can’t all have accidently stumbled onto the blog can they….? I don’t suppose they will come back but you never know, I’m just happy for the boost in figures, even if it does turn out to be a one off….

A record of the week
Appropriate music to accompany this week BlackLOG



Power to the people - John Lennon
My Camera Never Lies - Bucks Fizz
I want You Back - K.T.Tunstall

Photo finish
Not much in the way of photo's this week, just been playing around with the macro lens


Mischief, keeping an eye on things

McG - "I want my dinner and I want it now..."

Van Gough, eat your heart out.... 

Hope to see you next week