It’s Broken :-(

My computer is broken. I’m not entirely sure what’s wrong with it……not something very obvious, which makes it hard to fix….but I’m going to have to sort it tomorrow else it’s going to be a major problem getting everything done.

I’m currently using an old laptop which has more faults than the San Fernando valley, including the screen not working, so it’s plugged into my normal monitor. This makes it in no way ‘portable’ or ‘laptop’ despite having wireless internet unfortunately! And the keyboard is really weird so I can’t type properly/fast. The ‘enter’ key is where the ’shift’ key should be, so IM messages are often ending without punctuation, because I press enter and send the message when I mean to press shift & add an exclamation mark!

It’s currently 12:11am on Saturday night and I am listening to ‘Binaural’ by Pearl Jam. Who are one of the best bands ever, even if the majority of uninformed people just think of the ‘Jeremy’ Grunge era when you mention the name. Little do they know what they are missing out on….so many albums full of great songs and a great band who do things in such a cool way….their way, yet still manage to sell a lot of records. Their debut album has sold over 11 million copies now, so I guess when you have that level of success so early on (off the back of a ’scene’) and subsequent albums also sell multimillions you’re entitled to do things exactly how you want. They don’t do anything because they ‘have’ to, or because ‘that’s what everyone does’….they just do it their own way regardless of whether it might alienate people, or not bring them maxiumum exposure/sales. Which is very cool in my opinion. I bet the majority of people you mentioned them too who knew of them back in 1991/2 (and probably own ‘Ten’) would tell you they thought they’d split up years ago! Here in Old Blighty, this isn’t helped by the fact THEY NEVER FRIGGIN TOUR! It’ll be 6 years next summer, so if you’re reading this Mr Vedder & co – get your arses over here soon! Oh and can you try and top the artwork for ‘No Code’ on your next album? I don’t think it’s possible, but you could try!

I don’t care that the UK at large doesn’t realise what it’s missing out on….it’s their own fault, and to be perfectly honest the people who put Crazy Frog, Bob The Builder, Mr Blobby and all that popacademyrivals shit at number one don’t deserve Pearl Jam.

The image of the buildings & birds at the top of my blog is actually taken from an inlay photo from their album ‘Yield’.

/end of elitist music snob rant.

Last night was spent in a couple of local pubs, although not The Flock because at 23:45 on a Friday night they had ‘run out of beer’ and were closing. Ridiculous! Unfortunately the first pub we started in had a limited selection of lager on tap….Stella, or Carling. Two extremes and two ‘flavours’ I try to avoid. I couldn’t possibly bring myself to drink The ‘Ling, so Stella it was. Stella Artois is like a drug. It apparently makes people fight, although it doesn’t have that affect on me. I could have switched flavours later in the night, but I was hooked on Stella for the evening. After some late night Pizza & Playstation I headed home. I awoke at 10am feeling remarkably fine bar the extremely painful cramp that was throbbing in my calf. The Stella had however taken it’s toll on my dreams, which were really weird…a mishmash of fact and reality, awash with frustration (missing trains, losing things, forgetting things, not being able to use my phone propeprly cause the menus were all wrong etc.) and both friends and totally new characters my mind (and the beer) had created! I was quite confused when I woke up and was waiting for a throbbing head. Fortunately, it never came!

Today I hung out with some mates all day in various pubs, watching football and playing bluetooth – lots of new phones around at the moment. Was nice to see people at the weekend as they all normally have girlfriends, fiancees and wives to attend to so weekends can be a drag. One of the few downsides to myself and my friends not working ‘regular’ jobs I suppose….they’re around more in the week than weekends.

We (whenever I say ‘we’ and follow it with talk of DVD watching I am refering to Stat (my brother) and Dicko (my brother from another mother and father) have been watching Euan McGregor’s ‘Long Way Round’ DVD recently which chronicles Euan and his mate Charley’s motorbike trip around the world from London to New York (going East). I’m sure I’ve written about this before, so I won’t go on about it – but it’s really good, well worth seeing. Euan McGregor is a top guy, no superstar bullshit at all – which is nice to see in someone so famous.

I suppose tomorrow will be spent working on fixing the computer so I can use it on Monday….so I’d better go and get some sleep.