… by a fit of positivity today, and I’ve absolutely idea where it came from.
It’s probably something to do with the choice of music. When I make up a playlist of Hawkwind or Help Yourself, Marillion or Alquin it brings back far too many distant memories that I’ve long since consigned to the dustbin of history – or, at least, I thought that I had
And as Gimli said to Legolas in LORD OF THE RINGS
Instead, I’ve been making up a playlist of Tangerine Dream. By an amazing coincidence, Edgar Froese, John Kay of Steppenwolf and my friend Lorna’s mum were in the same refugee column that fled from Tilsit in East Prussia in the winter of 1944/45 before the advancing Red Army.
Lorna’s mum, who was 12 at the time, told some horrific tales of the flight that people would have found hard to believe before the news of the events in Ukraine broke
But I digress … "again" – ed …
Tangerine Dream bring back memories of happier times – the hot summer of 1976 where we lived at an abandoned sand quarry near Congleton and the next couple of years when I was struggling to get myself and my life together again after several years in the Wilderness and ended up going from living in an old van to owning a brand new semi-detached house in the suburbs of Winsford in just 3 years.
Albums like TANGRAM, WHITE EAGLE, FORCE MAJEURE and EXIT with the two magnificent tracks PILOTS OF PURPLE TWILIGHT and CHORONZON that can only ever be played one after the other.
Then there is CYCLONE, the best of all the Tangerine Dream albums with two tracks that have never ever been off my playlist, BENT COLD SIDEWALK, and RISING RUNNER MISSED BY ENDLESS SENDER.
But maybe it isn’t. I found an old elastic knee reinforcement that I used a few years ago and I tried that last night. I’ve been wearing it ever since on my right leg and since then the pain seems to be manageable. Perhaps it’s that which is making me feel better
However, it’s still something of a misery in bed and I was moving around all night trying to find a comfortable position. Not that you would have thought so with the amount of stuff on the dictaphone. Even when I was asleep it must have been quite restless, and there were some strange, very strange comments on the dictaphone, such as “you can tell that I’ve been on this anti-potassium stuff. There’s a radio playing somewhere, there’s a speaking voice that I can hear presenting a radio programme from somewhere. There’s absolutely no radio anywhere near where I am and this time of night no-one would be playing a radio so loud that it would penetrate solid grès de Chaussee solid granite walls 1.20m thick. I’ve no idea what’s happening except that it’s really confusing me”.
And then I awoke (so I said in my sleep) in the middle of a dream. I was in a French class and was late back from a break. Everyone else was there so I had to fight my way through the crowds to a seat at the back. The teacher had given everyone an exercise that they had to write a letter as if they were in the final throes of preparing a music festival when someone had written offering his services as a singer. I had to hunt for the question first – it was on page 80 of our notes so eventually I managed to find it. When I went to begin to write I found that my notebook was completely full. I reached under my desk, went into my backpack, pulled out a scrap pad. The people around me were amazed that I had so much stuff and was so well organised that I even had a spare notepad. I just gave a smile and began to write down the question on the spare notepad so that I’d be ready to answer it and writing it down gives me a little chance to think a little
Talking of surprises, I think that the whole wide world would be surprised at the amount of stuff that that I have. I’m probably sitting on a fortune of stuff that I’ve never had time to deal with. And as for being well-organised, I think that even I would be surprised at that.
They’d … "who?" – ed … been playing in a rock band with Declan McManus of Leek’s sister and somewhere in the middle of the Sunday hall they’d been overcome by something or other. They thought that it was just grief but maybe there was some slight predicament that was needed but it grew worse as the day went on. His leg was positively killing him at night so they arranged for an ambulance to come and collect him and have a look at whatever it was but I don’t know the name of the film now but I remember thinking that it was an excellent film and deserved to be shown on mainstream television.
And apart from the fact that Declan McManus doesn’t play for Leek but for TNS in Wales, you don’t really expect a dream to make sense, do you?
After that we were suddenly in Crewe again. I was sitting rather than going for a walk and suddenly had an appalling fear or suspicion that someone was watching me and I couldn’t shake it out of my mind …fell asleep here…
At a later moment a bunch of crooks had stolen a pile of antiques from a place in South-West London, rather similar to something like one of the Ealing comedies. I was involved merely as a spectator. The retreated to their headquarters with all of their loot. They tried to take taxis in order to disperse but all of the taxis were booked. In the meantime I was ringing a friend of mine in Chester to tell him that I’d left my job there as an underwriting clerk. If he was still looking for a job there was one vacant and he ought to apply. I was greeted to a pile of silence so I said “right, see you there” and hung up. I went back into the room where they were arguing. Eventually one of them grabbed his share of the loot from the table, said “right, I’m going by bus”. Someone else replied “the buses from here don’t go to Finchley Central”. He replied “I don’t care. I can take a bus to the Angel, take a bus to somewhere else and catch a bus there. It’s better than sitting around”. That propelled one or two others to start moving, particularly the fellow who had organised it to suddenly get to grips with what was going on and get a settlement to the airport so that they could fly out of the UK quickly
Did I dictate that I was with Marillion last night? … "No you didn’t" – ed … Things had been slack for them on the music scene and they’d become taxi drivers. Someone had gone up to Fish to tell him that they’d seen a dead body somewhere. He was at the taxi rank picking up a fare so as soon as he dropped off the fare he went with this other person to go to look to see if they could find this body. The rest of his group turned up too to help. Then the alarm went off so I don’t know what happened next
It was a struggle to make it to my feet which is no surprise these days and to give you an idea of what’s going on right now, getting dressed, going into the kitchen, taking my medicine and then coming back in here took me 50 minutes. What kind of state is that to be in?
First thing was to check the mails and messages and then to transcribe the dictaphone notes. And then afterwards, seeing as I was in a malicious mood I rang up the garage to find out why they hadn’t been for Caliburn.
After the usual excuses they’ll be here for him on the 8th of February to take him for his annual controle technique.
And that’s a shame because just when I was getting myself under control and feeling as if I might manage a trip around the block, I have this really bad fall that knocks the stuffing out of me and sets me back.
While I was now in something of an aggressive mood, I rang up the supermarket to complain about why one of the products that i’d ordered and they’d delivered yesterday was damaged. I sent them a photo by e-mail and they agreed.
The result is that I’ve had the purchase price credited back to my account and I can keep the product. They were really quite nice and helpful too which made a lovely change.
Next task was to go one better than David Crosby, presumably because I hadn’t had the flu for Christmas and was not feeling under par. It’s been a while and it was growing quite long – at least, for how I like it these days – but now it’s all short and bristly thanks to the sheep-shearer in the bathroom cupboard.
Strangely enough, sitting on the chair in the bathroom after I’d finished, I crashed out for 5 minutes. While I was away with the fairies there was something going on in my subconscious about two cats having a playfight and someone picking up one of them.
Of course, that made me wish that the tenant in my apartment downstairs would hurry up and find somewhere else to live so that I can move downstairs and have a moggy adopt me. Only 16 more months until the lease ends but I can do with her clearing off a long time before that. The way that I feel right now, I’ll be finished off a long time before the lease is.
Once I’d returned to the Land of the Living I loaded the washing machine and gave the clothes a whizz around while I went to eat some fruit. Only apples and clementines – I don’t like the pears that they have and they had run out of the Eco bananas at the delivery site.
There was even some time to play the guitar – the first time for several weeks. But how sad is it that I can no longer stand up to do it and sing? I’m really surprised that I kept my good humour.
Once I’d hung up the washing to dry I went to sit down. I reckon that I’d done enough today. I really don’t know what had come over me with all of this effort, as Monica Lewinsky one famously said.
After my hot chocolate and Christmas cake (there’s not much of that left now) I carried on with the radio programme and wrote a few notes for some of the tracks that will be figuring in the programme. Just a few to dictate now and it will be finished and I can go back to my usual routine and record it on Saturday night.
In the meantime I’ve been giving my “Hawkfest” and “Isle of Wight 1968” programmes some thought, about who will feature and so on.
The Hawkfest isn’t too difficult. Back in the good old days of the anarchy of what was loosely called “Usenet” down in the bowels of the internet quite a comprehensive list of the first Hawkfest performers was “published” and I tracked a few down, even someone who lived in Congleton who had been up on the stage performing, but the first Isle of Wight is not so easy. There was a big pile of extremely obscure groups who played there, including one that at one time had had on bass guitar Lewis Collins, later actor in The Professionals.
Even finding their names wasn’t easy, and tracking down any of their work will be much harder than that.
As for tea, I changed my mind about what to have.
During the course of the day my mind had gone from gravy to cheese sauce and I don’t know why, but nevertheless I steamed some vegetables in my microwave vegetable steamer and cooked some falafel in a nice thick cheese sauce which I poured (well, it was too thick to pour, but you get the meaning) over the top. And it was just as delicious as I expected.
So right now I’m going to go to bed. And hope that I awaken in the same positive mind tomorrow.
First task (and straight away too) is to bake my bread for the weekend. That’s important and it needs to be done early ready for my mid-morning cheese on toast.
My bread rolls were a success so I might do that again, but this time hope that the bread rises more than it did last time. I really don’t understand why my bread doesn’t rise like it ought to.
It reminds me of the time that I went to the doctors to ask for certain “help, advice and assistance” about my meeting with a certain young lady of my acquaintance in April a couple of years ago and who has figured in these pages on occasions too numerous to count, especially during the night.
He took one look at my “problem” and said "I’ll give you the number of a spiritualist whom I know"
"Why’s that?" I asked.
"I’m a doctor" he replied. "It’s my job to heal the sick. It’s his job to raise the dead."
