The job I couldn't do.

There was a discussion on Facebook earlier today about the 56 year old British woman who was sentenced to death in Bali for drug smuggling. (If you're unaware of the story, it's here)

The original poster was against the death penalty, and took issue with the Balinese authorities saying that her activities were harmful to Bali as a tourist destination.  He thought their use of the death penalty would stop people going.
My response was that I've been to countries that have the death penalty, and would go to others.  As a tourist it doesn't affect me.  I'm not a drug smuggler.
Then the pr0-capital punishment lobby put their side, saying that it cut crime (erm...there's never been ANY data to prove that it is a deterent), and that she deserved it.  Well, that's their opinion and their entitled to it.
Personally I'm against it, as one innocent who gets executed is one too many.  All the apologies and posthumous acquittals in the world won't bring back the innocent people wrongly executed. But I digress.
The question I asked - which as I write this still hasn't been answered by the pro lobby - was this.  Would YOU be prepared to be the executioner.  If there was a vote on capital punishment in the UK tomorrow, and it passed, would you be prepared to carry out the sentences?  If not, then you would effectively be asking someone to do something that you yourself were not prepared to do.  And that, in my opinion, is wrong.

I would not be prepared to do it.  I could not vote in favour for that reason, and the previously stated reason that one innocent wrongly convicted is one too many, and the fact that the taking of a life even if legally sanctioned, is just plain wrong.  It's still murder. (in my opinion.  Yours may differ, and you're entitled to your opinion, and I don't judge)

Bit of a downer of a post, but it's the topic of the day on FB, so here it is.

HMV saved?

So, it looks like HMV will survive in some form.  Hilco have taken it over, paying less that the £175m debt that the company owed.

At least this means there will still be (some) record shops on (some) high streets.  Now if only they would concentrate on music and stop trying to be a combination of a record shop and electrical shop.  If I want cd's and dvds I'll go to HMV, if I want headphones and mp3 players, I'll go to a hi-fi shop, and if I want tablets, I'll go to a computer shop.  Seriously, stick to what you're good at, music.  Leave the computing (tablets) and audio equipment to the shops that specialise in those.  You're supposed to be a record store, not a department store.  Act like it.

Death of the record store

Years ago when I first got into music, in the early 80's, there was a fantstic choice of record shops in Glasgow.  Small independent shops like Echo, 23rd Precinct, Listen, Bruce's, Missing.  There was a great choice about where you could shop, and they all had their own unique identity.

Then the big chains came along, Virgin, HMV and (briefly) Tower.  They piled high and sold cheap (or not so cheap in the case of HMV), and the small independent specialist shops slowly went to the wall.

Now these small shops were staffed by people who loved music and knew their regular customers.  I could walk into a shop, as the staff to recommend something, and walk out with a record by a band I'd never heard of, and 99% of the time, would love it.  That's how I discovered Guns n Roses.  Live Like a Suicide had just come out on import.  £8 for 4 songs?!  That was a hell of a lot in those days, but I took the advice, and didn't look back.

You could also hang out in these shops, and talk to the staff about music.  The big stores weren't like that.

So, we had a city centre with five huge record shops, one Tower, three HMV and two Virgin, and a few second hand record shop that numbered single figures.  (I'm not counting FOPP here as it was taken over by HMV).

First Tower closed.  Now, out of the big three, the staff there were closest to the small indy shop staff.  They knew about and loved music.  They catered for a huge variety of tastes AND knew what they were talking about.  (That's the only shop I've EVER seen a copy of the Jack Officers album.  A spin-off/side project of the Butthole Surfers).

Then it was Virgin, when Richard Branson sold up.  There was a management buyout which resulted in Zavvi, but as a shop, it didn't last long, and went the way of tower.

Now HMV is in dire straits, and although I wasn't a fan of the shop, and only bought from it when there was a sale on, I hope is survives in some form on the high street, because after the big three pretty much killing off the competition, if it goes, there's only about 4 small independent shops left, and three of them are predominantly second hand stores.

I want to be able to walk into town and browse record shops.  I do buy downloads, but I also buy cd's.  I want to have a choice about where to buy.  Yes, I use Amazon, but I want to shop there because I WANT to not because I HAVE to, which, is the way it looks like things are going.

Nerdgasm. AKA game shopping

I do online surveys that pay me (eventually) in Amazon vouchers.  This is a good thing.  In the past I've used them for cd's/dvd's and ebooks, but just recently I picked up Munchkin Deluxe. Wooohooo!
It's got the original Munchkin plus Munchkin 2, and a cool board laid out like a dungeon, and some figures to  use on it, to keep track of what levels the players are on.

In other game related stuff, I just bought a Lonely Planet guide to Jordan.
How is this games related I hear you ask?
Let me tell you.

I bought it in Waterstones, which gave me the last stamp I needed on my collector card, to get a £10 gift card.  So..........I got Zombie Dice.

Result.

Now all I need to do is get some lucky people and arrange a games night.

New Year and all that

Well, despite a run in with the lurgi, I've survived Christmas and New Year.
The work Christmas do, was terrible.  The food was pretty rubbish.  Out of all the choices, I seem to have lucked out.  The started of duck spring rolls was nice enough, but could have come from Farmfoods or Iceland.  The steak I had was decent enough, but again I lucked out, as I take my steak medium, and there was no choice about how you could get it prepared other than medium or order something else.  Not good.  When it came to desserts, I went for cheesecake, which I always do if it's an option.  Just as well, as the chocolate fudge cake others got must have been lying out for a while, as it had started to dry up.

I didn't hang about for the disco, instead I went for a wander and caught up with a couple of friends for a drink.

Onto the holidays themselves, and there was eating and drinking and visiting friends, and playing boardgames.  We also managed to work through the entire season 1 of Game of Thrones, which was excellent.

I rounded off the holidays by going to see the Hobbit, which was rather good, even it if has been padded out with some bits from other Tolkien books.  I mean it's a short book, and they're stretching it out to a trilogy!  Not that I'm complaining.  More escapist time in Middle Earth for me, so that's all to the good.

And now, sad to say, I haven't won the lottery, so it's back to work.

It's that time of year again

It's the work Christmas do, and we're off to Mansion House in town.  So, it being the Crimbo do, it's also the time of year when I pull the finger out a bit a dress like slightly less of a slob than usual.
Recently I bought a new made to measure kilt, so without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, I present the Morrison Hunting tartan.  (it's a bit dark unfortunately)

Levellers/Citizen Fish

Went to see the Levellers last night.  They were supported by a band I'd heard of, but never heard, who came highly recommended by one of my friends, Citizen Fish.  In case you don't know, they're an anarcho-punk ska band, featuring some members of Subhumans.  This was the first time I'd seen or even heard them, and I really hope it's not the last, as they're really fun live.

On to the Levellers, and what can I say other than superb.  What a gig. I don't think there was anything I'd have liked to have heard that they didn't play, and during the last encore - The Recruiting Segeant - they got 5 local musicians up on stage to play with them.  I'd seen them asking for people who wanted to play to get in touch, on the website, so I knew it was coming.  Must have been a brilliant experience.

Citizen Fish 

Levellers

Levellers

Bit of a theme

Yesterday, K was pretty sick, so the plans to go out were scrapped in favour of lounging about in front of the tv watching movies.

At one point, she fell asleep, and I stuck on Ip Man, but she woke up part way through it, and asked if we could watch it later, as she liked the look of it, but couldn't concentrate on the subtitles.  That's a result, as I've been raving about this movie, but she never fancied it, so hasn't seen it yet.

So what did we watch?  Well, before she woke up, I watched Avengers Assemble, which is just awesome.  I even liked Thor in it, which surprised me, as I wasn't too taken with the Thor movie.  Loved Downey as Iron Man again.  He's just brilliant in that role.

After Avengers, and the Ip Man false start, it was Kill Bill Vol 2, followed by Killing Zoe, and to top it all off, I recorded Kill List on the pvr.  If you've never seen Kill List, it's a rather brilliant and rather brutal movie, starring Michael Smiley who played tyres in Spaced.  Let me say, this ain't no comedy people, so if you're going to watch it, buckle up, as there may be some turbulence.

Synchronicity

After last weekend's karate course taught by Kato Sensei from Japan, the Japanese theme continued back in the real world, when I went into one of the Wetherspoons pubs last week.  They've got a beer festival on at the moment, with a rather fine rotating selection of real ales, and on this visit, there was a pale ale from Japan - Minagof.  Obviously, the universe had meant for this beer to be in the this pub just after I'd been to a karate weekend, so, it would have been (a) rude, and (b) tempting fate if I didn't try a pint.  So, try a pint is just what I did, and you know, it was damn good.

I've been back in and sampled another couple of ales, but the Minagof hasn't been on since that first time I went in.

It was fate I tell you, fate!

(*update 06/11/12 - I was in another Wetherspoons last night, and noticed that although the beer is brewed by a Japanese company, it is in fact brewed in Guam and not Japan.  Regardless, it's a nice pint)

Thoughts on last weekend's karate course

The karate course last weekend in Largs went really well.  It was taught by 77 year old aikido master, Kato Sensei, so it was a bit different to what we usually practice.  We started on the Friday at lunchtime, and finished Sunday lunchtime, with 5 practices spread over the three days.

Prior to the course, I'd seen a clip on youtube of him doing a demonstration in a park in Paris, and to be honest, it looked.....rehearsed.  Boy was I in for a shock!  After starting out with being shown how to fall safely, we were into the first lesson.  It very quickly became obvious that the only reason the video looked staged, was because the people he was doing the techniques on knew how to fall/roll to avoid injury, and if you didn't, well you would soon know about it.  Basically, falling/rolling was the only way to make the pain stop!  It's incredible.  There's minimal movement from the person being attacked, but it can cause an incredible amount of pain.  We realised in a matter of minutes, that this stuff not only works, but is really effective.

There were some techniques, where we practiced with weapons (jo and bokken), then, without the weapons, but keeping the movements the same as we had when holding the weapons.  It was a really effective way of learning where to position hands, and what steps and body movements we were to do.

All in all it was a fantastic weekend in the company of a great bunch of people from all over the country, and an opportunity to learn from a master.

Mouse Wars

So, Disney has bought Star Wars and there's going to be (at least) another movie.  Now I'm a huge fan of the original trilogy.  So big a fan that I refused to buy the trilogy on dvd until there was a set with the pre special editions of the films (I think the added cgi sticks out like the proverbial sore thumb).
As for the prequels, well, they were decent enough.  Phantom Menace was a bit meh, but as they went on, they got better.  Mainly because the successive films has less of that floppy eared pain the arse Jar Jar Binks.  Now PM could have been good as well, except for the really irritating creation that was Jar Jar.  I mean, lets face it.  His reason for existing was to sell more action figures*

So, over to Disney.  Will they screw up?  I don't know.  I hope not, and I doubt they will.  I mean let's face it, how could they possibly come up with anything more cringeworthy than JJ Binks?  Just as long as they don't dumb it down to the level of a kiddie movie, they should be fine.

(*the only reason I can think of that anyone would buy a Jar Jar figure, is so they could ritualistically burn it.  Which would ironically possibly result in them becoming scarce, and hence highly collectable)

Looking forward to the weekend

I've got a karate course to go to in Largs this weekend.  Kicks off at 4.00pm on Friday, so I'll be heading down on the 12:45 train, to get there in plenty of time.  Before that however, I've got a float booked for first thing in the morning, so I should be really chilled and calm for the start of the course.  No doubt, my calm will be over within about half an hour of the course starting :-)

There's two practices on the Friday, four on the Saturday (followed by a celebration meal) and two on the Sunday morning.  It all winds up about lunchtime on Sunday, when I'll head into Largs for a curry.  I've taken the Monday off work to recover.

Really looking forward to it.

Winter? Bring it on

I've been having a look back at older posts from earlier this year, and have realised that all the walking we did were in what should have been the winter, and that they pretty much ground to a halt when the feeble excuse for a summer kicked in and brought the torrential rain with it.

So, with that in mind, I'm waiting eagerly for the clocks to go back, heralding the end of British Summer Time, so that the weather will dramatically improve with the onset of winter, and hopefully, we can get out walking again.  ( I realise this is in fact nonsense, as there's no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing).

Culture clash

It's weird.  You'd think the culture clash would have been going from here to India, and don't get me wrong, initially there was a certain amount of "we're not in Kansas anymore", but strangely, I feel more out of place now that we're back.

I usually get a dose of post-holiday blues, but this is different.  Since getting back, and apathy and lethargy had kicked in.  I don't know, I just want to be somewhere else. (So does K).

The fact that it's *just* October, and the shops are already touting Christmas doesn't help.  In fact it's depressing.  Seriously, there's Guy Fawks and Halloween to get out the way first, but no, once again we're being bombarded with "buy buy buy", and "it's only 10 weeks to Christmas you know".

Bah humbug.

There can be only one

Well, that's the kilt tried on and it's s great fit. Now all I need is a ceilidh.

Old hippies

Had a surprising discussion with a pensioner on Saturday, when he remarked that I had a "Cool Morrison t-shirt" ( I was wearing my Doors shirt).  He went on to tell me that he doesn't drink or smoke (this while holding the skinniest looking roll up I've ever seen), that he loves The Doors, and Hawkwind, and goes to small festivals all around the country.  He likes ones that only attract about 600 people, and especially likes psychedelic festivals, where, he "takes an eccy and gets into the music".

He's obviously not a believer in growing old gracefully !

Kilt ready

Got a call from the kilt shop, my kilt is ready, so I've got an appointment to go in an try it on, on Tuesday after work.

Other than that, not much to post.

Culture shock

So, I've been back from India for just over a week, and it's......weird.  I think I'd started to become
used to being in India, and I loved it.  I could easily have gone native (especially in Varkhala).  Now I'm back in Glasgow, and instead of temples and friendly people, it's grumpy Weegies, and the temples are shopping malls where the only thing worshipped is money and possessions.

I really think downsizing and not being materialistic, would be easy if I was living somewhere like India, but here you're surrounded by advertising and incentives to buy buy buy, and like the sheep we are, that's exactly what we do.

Ah well, one lottery win, and I really an out of here (providing the win is big enough to drop out)

It's Friday

So, when I finish work, I'm off to meet Pete for a couple of beers, but before that, I've got to go in to the kilt shop for a fitting for the kilt I've ordered.  Apparently it's going to take around an hour.
This is the first I'll have seen it since getting measured up for it way back in August, so I don't know if it's finished and they just want to check it fits right, or if it's partially done and they want to check sizes.

Ooh the excitement :-)

Home again home again

So we're back from India.  I was going to blog about the trip, and set up a seperate blog to do just that, which can be viewed here.  The only problem was, that the hotels used dongles to connect to their wifi, and having a linux netbook with me meant incompatability.

SO, what I'm doing is updating it on a daily basis, now that I'm back, so you can follow my travels while pretending I'm still away.

Something I've noticed since I got back is that there's a couple of friends, who I may have to either stop following, or block of FB.  They've not done anything to me, it's just that their posts are exclusively about the Independance issue.  It's not even original posts that could generate a discussion, it's simply links to articles, and they're prolific, and it's filling up my feed.  I don't need it.  I've made up my mind (pro fyi) but I respect other peoples opinions and know they may differ, and that's fine.  I'm not filling up their feeds, and I don't want them to fill up mine either.  At least, not with an endless stream of links.  (I actually visited her feed just to see if she ever posts anything other than links, and she hasn't for about 4 months.  It's getting tiring).