You are allowed to enjoy this…

On Friday, I travelled a great distance to spend over two hours at a bank, signing my life away and laying the final foundation for the future. On Saturday, we drove past our possible new home and future and did another reccy of the area. To the north there are forests similar to our old neighbourhood Epping Forest and we viddied the local houses and residents going about their weekend.
The last time I had been here was in February and since then doubts naturally entered my heart correlating to the passage of time and the process of engaging estate agents, selling properties, engaging solicitors and trying to find the best bank to represent me and my future endeavours. Naturally, doubt does creep in. But seeing the village again allayed my fears. This was the best of the bunch and after over three years of planning, the next phase of my life appears to be happening to plan. Again, I’d love to spill the beans but I am scared I’ll jinx it before completion day. We still need to sell ours and contracts are pending, awaiting searches to be done and contacts to be finalised. It is a tense time.
Thanks to the magic of the InterWebSuperHighway, I can show you where I am hopefully going from and going to via some clever aerial photography…

Here we are…

There we go… (fingers continually crossed)
Meanwhile, it is less than seven weeks until fruit-of-my-lions, blood-of-my-blood, flesh-of-my-flesh hopefully arrives into our world. Recently, I had a dream featuring my late grandfather who ominously warned me not to count my chickens and make too many plans where BabyLockTM is concerned. It was kind of sobering as my grandfather was a man of few words and when he spoke, you listened. But baby continues to wriggle and thrash around inside mum’s belly and has a strict pattern. S/he takes after her/his old man and wakes up in the afternoon and becomes livlier in the evenings. I have noticed that BabyLockTM is quite a Genesis fan as it reacted well to both the band’s performance at Live Earth and the recent Dusseldorf concert DVD that my uncle Don Load gave me. Mind you, I haven’t tried any King Crimson yet. Forget whether it is a boy or a girl, I am hoping for a drummer, probably much to the consternation of the spirit of my grandfather who is probably shaking his head at me, hoping that I’ve not got my hopes up too high.

This is a little backing track I came up with last night. Again, it is just a framework for something. It could be a proper song or I could go and ruin the vibe by attempting to solo all over it. Decisions, decisions, eh?

And so the demo track “Balls” has pupated and turned into the rather ugly butterfly “Stand Up and Be Counted”. I think there might be a lyric in there somewhere, but I present an instrumental cut complete with me putting on my best electric lead guitarist impression. Oh how I wish I could really play. Heigh ho, you make the best with the tools you are given. Alternative title is “Keep the Cat off the Ham”.

One of the staples of my childhood was watching “The Benny Hill Show” on ITV and if you aren’t familiar with that particular show, it always ended in a Keystone Cops-style chase with Benny being pursued by various characters to the inimitable saxophone track. Well the player and composer of that song was a musician called Boots Randolph and he died this week after slipping into a coma. When he was alive, he said that not many people could play his tune and that he was proud that it was his trademark. Well, for some of us it was a cultural watermark and there’s always a wry smile whenever I hear that piece of music.

And here’s evidence that this song can make just about anything funny…