Some people disappoint me

I was in a chip shop last night. Don't judge me. It was late and I was hungry. If it helps, after putting my boys to bed, I'd just driven to Wolverhampton and back to pick up a Xmas present for them. So there.
Anyway. For whatever reason. I was in a chip shop last night. Another chap was ahead of me. Behind the counter, two mid 30s chaps were serving and a lady in her 50s was mopping. The chap ahead of me was maybe in his forties. He didn't seem to be drunk, which might arguably partially excuse, or at least explain, what followed.
He called over to the lady mopping:
"Hey! Hey! You can come and do mine when you've finished if you like"
My first thought was this: what a monumental twat. Quickly followed by: surely he didn't think that was so funny that it was actually worth saying out loud.
The lady immediately finished her mopping and went out back.
Customer to man serving: "I don't think she heard me"
Really? No, because obviously she'd still be mopping if she had, having pissed herself laughing. This man actually thought this was a good joke.
Even worse was to follow.
When she came back in, he did the joke again, in case she hadn't heard it
"I said, you can come and do mine if you like, when you've finished"
He made her, made her acknowledge his big hilarious joke. Honestly. All true. I despair of humanity.

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Ooh! Have we got a video?...

... as Neil used to say on an episode of the Young Ones


Got The Gun on YouTube

Yes! We've got a video!
I've been playing, boys and girls, and we have a fairly patchy, poorly synched video
I quite like it
Hope you do too

So far, just comments that it's badly synched and needs more of this

Half speed guitar smash on Youtube

One of the many things I love about that clip is PC
PC is not a big fan of the Who, or of guitar smashing bands in general
I had given no indication I was going to do that, and only decided myself at about 1.04 to 1.06
when I saw that the headstock had cracked away from the neck
But he knew
Deep in his drummerly heart he knew
Knew the etiquette of smashing the cymbals to add effect to the guitar smash
Without a moment's hesitation, purely instinctive joining in
I love PC
(and the other 2 as well)

9/10/12 Acoustic Club, Bulls Head, Moseley

Dear Diary

Today's gig was not me at my best.

Played a new venue to me, with a new promoter to me. Rachel the promoter was lovely - warm, chatty and welcoming. Nice, relaxed atmosphere generated. Not a huge crowd. Peaked at maybe 15, but I refined it to about 3 by the end (last bus, lift home is leaving etc). Distilled and purified, as usual. All of this absolutely fine.

But I disappointed myself. I've not got over the bronchial infection I had a month or so ago, and it's getting worse if anything. Couple of violent coughing fits while singing (and subsequent big headache from brain rupture. Or something.), sweat stinging my eyes so tears ran down my face, and my left hand cramped up for about ten minutes. I backed off vocally several times rather than sing with the passion and strength which has been steadily improving over the last couple of years of solo gigs. By and large, I quite enjoy what my voice can (usually) do now.

Pleased nobody came to see this one. To be fair, nobody there knew my songs, so they won't have known when I ducked out of some vocal bits. I probably covered it up pretty well. Except when I forgot the next chord in Behind Blue Eyes, on John Entwistle's birthday. Hopefully I didn't fail too badly, but I was unsatisfied with myself. No gigs booked until this infection is clear!

Set list:
Sunsets and lovers
Sleep like a baby
There's only you
Love will tear us apart (joy division)
Big brown eyes
Behind blue eyes (the who)
Say goodbye/sparks (extra who section to give my voice a rest)
Let it go, Jackie
Cold all alone

Next one will be better!


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Endoscopy

I don't like things being shoved down my throat which choke me. Call me Mr Picky. Today's endoscopy was supposed to have me sedated so almost asleep, and my throat numbed so I couldn't feel the camera go down.

I fought back apparently ( I was sedated a bit ). Three times I pulled the camera out of my throat, and I also ripped the canula out of the vein in my hand and made a slight mess. I would say not sedated enough there. So they abandoned it.

Not allowed to drive, climb ladders, operate machines or sign legal documents for tomorrow. So no work then. Didn't even get the camera past the back of my throat.

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More pancreas, with added gall bladder and music

Just realised I haven't blogged for a while. On checking, I see it's been 7 or 8 months now. In last week's episode, our hero was in hospital with pancreatitis. On Tuesday (2/10/12) someone wants to shove a camera down my throat, beyond my stomach, and get a better look at my gall bladder. I've had a camera down my throat before, to the top of the stomach, and it's one of the most unpleasant things that's ever happened to me. I have not been looking forward to it. This time I will be heavily sedated.
Hopefully it will have worn off by the following evening, when I'm due to play Acoustic Brew at Katie Fitzgerald's in Stourbridge. Planning a mellowed set and I may even sit down. On the 9th I'm playing the Bulls Head in Moseley.
Even had some Boomshadow activity recently, when we were kindly lent a studio for the day. Just a few overdubs to go and we'll have a five track EP.
Thanks for reading

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And so the decline begins .......

I am currently in the shiny new QE hospital in Birmingham. I felt a bit gippy about 4 on Sunday afternoon (29th January). By 6, when we sat down at cafe soya after the Chinese New Year celebrations, my stomach was bloated and I had stabbing pains at the top of my pregnancy bump-shaped belly. I didn't eat much, which is almost a criminal thing to do to a cafe soya meal!

I started vomiting about midnight, and since it seemed like something to do, my body decided to carry on doing it until about 6 or 7am on Monday morning (30th). Then it appears to have got bored and stopped.

I was left with massive abdominal pains, which I attributed to having maybe pulled muscles while vomiting. Appendicitis was suggested, though the pain was more on the left than the right (where the appendix is) so not that. Eventually conceding that this was too much pain for a normal upset stomach or food poisoning, I rang my GP at 11. They helpfully offered me their first available appointment on the 15th. A&E seemed a better option. I could hardly uncurl to walk, and barely speak, so Dad drove me in. I was seen pretty quickly.

Got kept in for observation, and a lengthy series of tests began, along with morphine (because whatever the cause, it certainly hurt) and lots of antibiotics ( because whatever lump of flesh turned out to be infected, some of me was definitely infected)

On day 2 of a lengthy series of progressive tests gradually ruling things out, I was diagnosed with idiopathic pancreatitis. Most common in the over 70s (I deny this!), alcoholics (practically teetotal) or as a knock on effect of gall stones (couldn't find any, and my cholesterol is normal, surprisingly). I haven't had a scorpion bite, or any of the other causes, so basically it's idiopathic - a medical term, meaning, from the Latin "hey, sometimes shit just happens".

I was 2 days on morphine (so now I can cross heroin off the try-before-you-die list), and now on day 4 in here.

And there's bad news. Pancreatitis, like appendicitis, can be fatal. That's not the problem. Like that, it's an organ which is a kind of cul-de-sac piece of thing which is attached to the digestive system.

Pancreas is a two-for-one bargain. It acts as a gland into the blood stream and regulates blood sugar, thanks to its early warning system of knowing what's about to enter the bloodstream as it dips a finger and tastes what's going past in the big tube, just after the stomach. That could have been the bad news. Part of my pancreas got so inflamed and squished, it went necrotic (it got deaded), but not enough that it seems to have left me with any diabetes.

Secondly, it spits out digestive enzymes into the gut at the top of the small intestines, just after the stomach has finished. These enzymes are fat-digesters. And they have a sick note. For 3 months. February, March and April could see local businesses (chip shops) under threat as their takings plummet. And after that, I've got to eat sensibly, and not descend into mindless chip-focussed hedonism. No more binge chipping. No more celibacy and chips and rock&roll.

At a funeral for an alcoholic wife beater, a womaniser who couldn't be trusted, or a prick who died jumping off a building for kicks, the eulogies will be heavy on the phrase "he loved life" or maybe "he lived his life to the full".

A fat bastard like me dies (even if it isn't directly bloody related!) and fingers point, and people mutter. "Hardly surprising, really. Just greedy. Couldn't control himself."

People have been very quick to blame my diet already, and while it's part of the solution, it was not a part of the cause.

And I am weak. I have a weakness for food. There are worse things in the world.

So here's the thing. If you were considering giving lectures (first time or continuation) on this being my own fault or on various themes encompassing dietary causes, what I need to do and should have done ages ago, overdue lifestyle changes, any kind of moral or social judgments, then fuck off. I don't care how convinced you are that you are right, it's not helpful, and nothing will lead to a return to glorious chip-based hedonism faster than this. I am nothing if not self-destructive and wilfully stubborn. Don't try and make me, I will resist.

Quite simple really. The hard bit will be me on a low fat diet until 1st May. That's where I'm going to need help. If you take the fat away, what can I eat that isn't sawdust or shrubbery? Rather than "stick", how do you make carrot an appealing prospect for a meal?

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