At Home with John and Debbie

We’ve just come back from visiting Chris and Rae in Blackwood, where
they had a delightfully horrific Halloween party. Horrific, that is,
apart from the hot dog outfit. Photos.

A big “well done” to JV and Suzanne for their engagement. You’re both
winners.

I’m taking the week off work to use up holiday. Phoenix reads this, so I’m
sure she’d be disappointed if I didn’t note that she came to visit and we
had lunch in town — yummy Five Rivers buffet.

Some might describe the knuckle-draggers of Kenilworth as an easy target.
With Steve and Ev’s help, we took them on at pub quizzery, and won.

Expenditure: several rounds. Income: a bottle of cheap white wine. Profit: um… I’ll get back to you on that one.

I’ve been a bit weepy on and off for the last 24 hours. Now it transpires
that come the end of June — ticket allocation willing — then I’m liable
to get a little tired and emotional every time I visit the erstwhile “New Stage”.

It’ll be nice though, and that stage needed a better name.

I just heard the very sad news about John Peel’s death. I’m actually close
to tears.

Update: It’s beginning to sink in. Quite aside from the condolences to his
family, what the hell are we going to do? Who’s waiting in the wings
to introduce us to interesting new music?

Chris McG: you’re no John Peel, but I might [...]

I just noticed that Julian Cope set the questions for the Guardian
prize quiz
this week.

I don’t know any of the answers, though Google probably does.

One reason not to have kids, is to avoid the prospect of a screeching
four year old in your living room. Odd then, that this afternoon it
sounded as if we had just that - albeit a reasonably talented four year
old, accompanied by a harp.

It turns out that not only is
Joanna Newsom
a full grown woman, but that [...]

Some more things floated past.

Pressure Chief is album of the week, and warrants a review on CD-Wow.
See, Cake are mainstream. Now, how about a tour incorporating more than one UK city?