A Quick Game of 'Arrahs'...

Linda was once a darts champion...
I'm hopeless at darts...
Nevertheless I've developed an interest in televised darts competitions...
Not in the actual games being played you understand, it's the audience that fascinates me...
They seem to be truly bonkers...
The bizarre fancy dress costumes, the hand-written signs and the synchronised jigging about between the games...
I'm watching ITV 4's Players Championship coverage out of the corner of my eye at the moment...
It's got a lot more going for it than watching the tennis robots grand slam final I saw this morning...
Why are we Brits so good at games played in pubs I wonder..?

Grunting And Potato Day...

Friday saw Grunting and Potato Day over at Hooting Yard...
In celebration of this important event in the Hooting Yard calender, I made this movie for those people that might be curious to experience what 'Spem in alium sung, or rather grunted, backwards' might sound like

Interior Design For Sheds No. 1 A Shelf...

I contend that one of the key male rights of passage is the successful erecting of a secure, level shelf...
Trust me young man, this ability will impress females more than that large bore exhaust you put on your mum's Nissan Micra...
(It will also help your chances if you can use a washing machine and prepare some kind of meal that doesn't involve using a telephone...)

During my current 'productive' period I find that my work-shop is getting increasingly cramped and I have to transfer the over-spill into my shed...
This will require a shelf...
I found a couple of tastefully distressed pieces of wood on the beach, rounded up a couple of brackets and set to work...
In the relaxed blink of an eye my goal was achieved..

I then added some bits and bobs...

Job done...

More Useful Signs...

One of my 'treats' is to sit down at my 'Magic Television Internets Device' on a Saturday morning and visit Mr. Webster's Pavilion of Innocent Pasttimes...
It sets up the weekend for me by putting a smile on my face...
In a recent posting he draws attention to an incredibly useful sign that he's developed:

This is a warning sign, for use by British bloggers, to indicate that the contents of a posting might confuse foreign 'Johnnies'...
IMHO the world owes Mr. Webster a round of sustained applause for services to humanity...
Not content with his master stroke, he also designed a special warning sign for my personal use:

The world is now a better place...

Televisual Simulacrumating Device vs. Acorn Electron: Test Transmission...

I have a plan to integrate the T.S.D. with an Acorn Electron computer...
After sorting out various connectors and transformers things look promising, if a little skew-wiff...

I then input the only BASIC programme I can remember:

Then set the mighty brain a task:

So, back to basics then...

Disappointment...

NUNS LOSE STRIPTEASE CLUB BATTLE
Sadly the story didn't live up to the promise of the headline:
The Actual Story

The Sharpsichord...(Up-Dated)

I really wish I could put a picture of this instrument here but I can't find any...
Just an infuriatingly short interview slot on the BBC:
Kent 'sound sculptor' unveils 'sharpsichord'...
Grrrr...
I must know more, I must know more...!
Thanks to 'Nick' I now know more...

Poor Linda...

Poor Linda stabbed herself in the eye with a Pinus Pinea...
We've got to go to the hospital now as I haven't got a suitable Dremel bit for this kind of work...

Useful Signs...

I'm experimenting with Appleworks 6...
I want to make a series of useful signs to attach to various doors we have around the flat...
I favour the 'classic' blue and white enamel type of sign:


Linda prefers a more 'modern' style (Googie):

Relieving The Pressure...

I am eternally grateful to Mr. G. Webster for reminding me of this procedure and suggesting a way it might be achieved...

I used a Dremel to drill a hole in my thumb nail to relieve the pressure build up...
The effects were immediate..!
My thumb doesn't hurt anymore..
Result..!
I may have gone a little to far when I decided to give my thumb nail a 'smiley face'...
I was stopped when Linda shouted that she couldn't get to sleep for the sound of drilling and screaming...
(She'd assumed I was attempting to do my own fillings again..)
All's well that ends well..
Thanks Glyn.

Nearly a 1958 Meccano 0 Outfit...

I've collected quite an amount of old Meccano parts over the last couple of years...
My initial idea was to use them in my on-going projects rather than build the pieces suggested in the instruction leaflets...
I was messing about re-designing the Waving Machine when I found myself wondering 'what would have been in a set the year I was born (1958)..?
It looked like this:


Trust me to be born in a year when Meccano was undergoing a bit of a re-vamp (mainly lightening the colours..)
Having done some internets research (my thanks to Melvyn Wright's site The Meccano Light Red and Green Period) I managed to put together the bulk of the '0' set...


I've 'up-graded' the crank piece to one with a grip..

Missing Parts:
4 x Spring Clips
1 x Original Screwdriver
18 x Cheesehead bolts
2 x 3/8ths Bolts
1x Small Parts Tin
2 x Grey Motor Tyres (mine have black rubber rings fitted)

My plan is to create a 'Deluxe' 1958 Meccano 0 Outfit by re-finishing the parts, replacing the nuts, bolts & washers with brass equivalents and packaging the outfit in a plush lined wooden box C/W instruction pamphlet...
The next stage will be to make up the 0 accessory outfit that upgrades the 0 outfit into a No. 1 set...

I've also noticed I have enough gear parts to make up the Meccano Gears Outfit B...


Good grief...!
I think I've just developed a business plan...

Linda and Magic...

In an attempt to balance the distressing picture of my clouted thumb here's a picture of Linda leading Magic (poor old horse) from the paddock to the stable...

It should be borne in mind that if you try to remove Magic's blanket while she's eating she will kick out with her left hind leg...

Sundry Mortifications No. 9: The Vulgar Tongue...

There are at least three words in the English language that I will only use in circumstances of extreme provocation...
I consider these words to be the 'sharpest tools in the box' and I don't want to blunt them through over use..
When I was young I didn't hear any words stronger than 'bloody' used in every day speech which left me ill prepared for the days I spent working in a factory...
People (regardless of gender) didn't just swear between words, they swore between syllables..!
Because I was a polite young man, my usual response to any given set of profanity laden instructions was to say "I beg your pardon..?'
This lead to another stream of invective the gist of which seemed to be that I was, somehow, being willfully obtuse...
Today I had occasion to unsheathe the sharpest of my sharp weapons...

I had set about splitting some logs using an old axe head and a hammer...
I ended up with a wobbly wedge of wood that I had to steady with my hand...
I raised the hammer high above my head, it glinted briefly in the watery winter sunshine, I then brought it down with all my might directly on to the thumb of my left hand...

That was eight hours ago and it still hasn't stopped bleeding...
Fortunately I still seem to be able to play the banjo...

Hour of Slack: 1240 (feat O.S.M. Cut-up..)

One of my sound collages features in The Church of the Subgenius 'Hour of Slack' (No 1240)...
Listen to it here:
Hour of Slack 1240
I swell with pride...


PRABOB..!

Outa_Spaceman: Being 52: Document 01

Entertaining Myself on My Birthday...

Being 52...

Errrr...?
Now what..?

The Relic (Redux...)

This piece started a very, very long time ago...
I bought an articulated wooden figure with the idea of using it in a stop-frame animation that I haven't got round to making yet...
The figure was packaged in a plastic 'bubble' which, for no apparent reason, I filled with plaster...
I sprayed the resulting figure gold and put it in our garden...
A year later I found the figure in the undergrowth in the condition seen here and decided to put it in a suitable display case...
My first attempt at mounting it was a bit of a disaster...
I cut the sticky back green felt stuff to fit the box exactly, with no over-laps, it then promptly shrank to leave visible gaps all round it...

Today I took the piece down from where it hangs in my lab and had another go at doing it some justice...
I stained the box with a tea/iron acetate mixture and lined the sides with a green and gold patterned wall-paper then fitted a back board covered in red 'velvet'...
When my skill level improves I'm going to make a frame to finish the whole thing off then it's destined to hang in my shed...

Linda's Drawing of a Bee...

Linda sketched a bee using the picture on the lid of her tobacco tin as a model...
I scribbled the yellow bits...

Tattoo Charm Brooch...

There's just no pleasing some people...
I bought Linda some earrings that had jolly nautical tattoo style charms on them...
Linda said that because the bit that went through her ear wasn't gold or silver it would make her ears go 'funny..'
No problem, I'll make them into a brooch...
Although Linda likes the brooch in concept, she doesn't like the nappy-pin I attached the charms to...
Good heavens! Did Punk Rock die for nothing..?

A Complicated Diagram...

It is essential, at the start of each new project, to produce a 'complicated diagram'...
Close examination will reveal what I'm about to build...
(Or, at least, considering building..)

A Swan with the head of A.S. Byatt...

To understand the significance of this, what I now suspect might be some kind of fake, picture, you will need to follow this 'Quite Extraordinary' tread to Hooting Yard...

The Smiling Cat's Temple of Bones...

The Smiling Cat luxuriated in his new Temple of Bones...

The Evil Skull and his cronies were furious...

...and I've run out of glue...

Let's Talk Basic...

I know Viv Stanshall was a genius but, Roger Ruskin Spear makes robots and you can't get cooler than that...

This Gluing Business Is Getting Out Of Hand...

I don't really like using bits of dead animals in my pieces but I was given a fox skull by Alan (from the band Cotillion) who said, 'here, you can have this and put it in that room where you keep all that weird stuff you make...'
I then saw the site Crappy Taxidermy and....
I replaced the skull's missing teeth with nails and fitted glass marbles in it's empty eye sockets...
Whilst cleaning out our stove's ash pan, I found an old hinge that had become suitable 'distressed' and fitted the whole assembly to it...
As a final touch I glued, what I believe to be a bird's skull, on to it...
I'm going to attach it to my shed and give it a coat of natural yoghourt to encourage 'growth' to form on it...
Linda doesn't like it at all...

Sundry Mortifications No. 8: What Has Been Seen Can No Longer Be Un-Seen...

Two girls, some bellows and a tuba...

Gluing Rocks Together...

I don't know what on earth possessed me to start gluing rocks together at 00:30 today...
This involved five interesting rocks I found on the beach, a piece of crystal and a piece of amber...
Linda, who's doing some hyperbolic crocheting that involves a LOT of swearing, says she doesn't know which of my phases she prefers...
The down swing when I sit motionless for days brooding or the up swing when I dash about like a 'greyhound with a red hot poker up it's arse'...
I think I'll just nip out and glue some animal bones to my shed...
Where's my head-torch...?

Cotillion's Album...

I've just put the finishing touches to Cotillion's first album 'Along The Road'...
I swore, many years ago, that I'd never get involved in music production ever again...
I became exasperated by mediocre guitarists with egos the size of planets, singers who hated that sound of their own voices, drummers that couldn't keep time (even against click tracks) and introverted bass guitarists who wanted to do take after take after take after take only to decide that the first take was the best...
All that coupled with what ever 'refreshments' they'd taken to release their 'creativity' and the assumption that their ground-breaking album could be recorded and mixed in four hours you may understand why I turned my back on the whole sorry enterprise...
However...
I've always wanted to have a go at recording a group using just one strategically placed microphone the way it was done in the early days of sound recording...
Cotillion have been together for years and know their material inside out, they know that it's the song that's important and, while not being 'virtuosos', know how to blend their sound in service of the song...
They're a joy to work with...
The album was recorded at their country cottage hideaway with them huddled around the mic in front room and me at the controls in the kitchen. There's been a few overdubs the most significant being a double bass added to 3 of the tracks...
The album is coming out in February and a follow up (a concept album based around Sussex folk songs and poetry) is being put together as I type...
I can't wait to get started...

Porridge...

Porridge has to be one of winter's great compensations...
Half a cup of porridge oats, half a cup of water, half a cup of milk, a pinch of salt, stir constantly over a low heat using a wooden spoon, transfer to bowl, add golden syrup, eat...

Sheds. A Poem By Outa_Spaceman...

Do you like sheds..?
I like sheds...
I don't like people who don't like sheds...
I keep things in my shed...
I keep things I don't want anybody to see in my shed...
Once a man, a policeman, came to my house...
He wanted to look in my shed...
I had to throw his radio into the sea...
It kept talking and talking and talking...
It wanted to know where he was...
He's happy now...
In my shed...

The Cardboard Hand of Wilson...

I have, to my eternal shame, always had an interest in conspiracy 'theories'...
I find them quite amusing...
The only one I nearly subscribe to is the shooting of RFK...
I really don't believe the human race is capable of the level of organisation required (believe me, I've sat on committees) but I do like good stories which is what I think conspiracy theories really are...

During my search for good stories, delving into the worlds of Magick, Chaos Magick, Free Masonry, Catnarok and other related esoterica, several names have cropped up again and again the most notable being those of Robert Anton Wilson and Aleister Crowley...
I'm not particularly interested in Mr. Crowley and his Golden Dawn/OTO/AA hoo haa but Robert Anton Wilson is a different matter altogether...
I found myself wading through the Illuminatus! Trilogy and the The Historical Illuminatus Chronicles all of which had me in stitches...

I made 'The Cardboard Hand of Wilson' (though it should really be called The Cardboard Hand of Shea/Wilson I suppose) to honour the hours of amusement he has provided me with...

(BTW I'm sort of swaying toward Anonymity at the moment but I can't get a Guy Fawkes mask for love nor money...)

I Remember When There Was No Snow...

I was out collecting winter fuel about three hours before the white chaos descended...
The wood is now under an impenetrable coating of ice and snow so I've had to resort to burning Linda's clothes...

Sundry Mortifications No. 7 Depression and it's consequences...

On coming out of the tunnel I instantly went to the barbers and said 'cut it all off..!'
The barber said 'thank you God...!'
Two older gentlemen, who'd just been shorn, decided to stay and watch...
I do my best to provide entertainment you understand..

Bob's Bongo Fury...

By way of ingratiating myself with my chosen saviour I've created this short movie:

Musical News...

Can't wait for this one to hit iTunes..!

Sanctified Pignose....

I gave my soul (well, $30 actually) to J.R. 'Bob' Dobbs and became an ordained minister in the Church of the Subgenius a couple of years ago and, although I find alt.slack a confusing and disturbing place to visit, I now have more 'slack' than I know what to do with and a large Dobbshead decal...

It seemed like a good plan to bring Bob's beneficent influence to bear on my musical endeavours....
Since applying the decal I have become an internationally acclaimed musical artiste similar in stature to the likes of Bono, Yoko and Eno...
Errrr...
That last bit's not strictly true but it's bound to happen in the next couple of weeks...

Astonishing Evidence...

I was waiting at a level crossing in Chichester...
I thought "I'll take a picture of the train as it passes"...
Who knew that Southern Trains move so fast they actually bend...?!!

Sundry Mortifications No. 6 Vinyl...

I took the bag of rubbish that accumulated over the Xmas period to the local amenity facility hub..
I noticed the corner of a turn-table poking out from under a box in the boot of a car next to me...
I've been on the look out for record player to enable me to transform what remains of my record collection into something I can use on my iPod...
The owner was more than happy for me to take it away telling me that he'd only used it a couple of times before putting it in the loft 20 years ago...
It's a Toshiba SM 2900 Stereo Music Centre...
I tossed the speakers and linked it up to my custom built cabinet...
The most difficult decision I faced was which of my precious collection I was going to spin first. I picked five possibles then closed my eyes, sort of shuffled them, dropped one on the floor and found I'd selected "Rock and Roll with the Modern Lovers" by Jonathan Richmond and The Modern Lovers...
Groovy...
On starting the deck a low 'rumble' came out of the speakers then, on adjusting the volume knob, a horrible crackling. Needle in the groove and...
Let's just say the results were somewhat disappointing and my search for a decent record player continues...
I'll have to keep the music centre for the time being just to play the Modern Lovers album which instantly became Linda's favourite music and has been playing constantly ever since (except when I got to play "The Best of Scott Walker"). To be honest I'm a bit sick of it...