The Sheer Adrenaline Rush Of Being ME!

For Instance

Last night I sorted a pile of dried laundry.  I know, I know, settle down and sit down lest you fall over from the excitement of reading these lines.  How can you get more rock 'n' roll than that?  Apart from being Robert Plant or Ozzy Osbourne.    Art!

     Look at them.  Their lifestyle consists of listening to the devil on their right shoulder and ignoring the angel on their left.

     ANYWAY back to me me me.  As you should surely know, I am currently temping at Footasylum in Sandbrook Park, a short bus ride and a moderately long walk from The Mansion.  I shall draw the veil of discretion o'er what the job involves, since one does not simply walk into Mordor - no, sorry, that was "Lord Of The Rings" wasn't it?  One does not simply deliver any great vituperation - not a word you expected to see today - upon one's workplace via social media, as Conrad personally knows two people who were fired for it.  Art!

The venue by day

     The real kicker about working there, apart from the terrible taste that young people have in music, is that when working Saturday or Sunday, the back gate is padlocked shut.  It's eight feet high before any of you come out with smarmy comments about scaling it, with a padlock the size of my fist; no puny lightweight used to secure a traveller's suitcase.  No photographs - Opsec doncha know.

     To get to the back door, since the front entrance is closed, one has to walk around the whole building by the scenic route, which is probably picturesque in dry daylight but considerably less so on a cold, windy, wet, dark night.  Art!

Ignore the arrow!  Ignore the arrow!

     That's SH from above.  Note the dirty grey linear feature going from north-east to south-west - that's the Rochdale Canal.  You see, when the back gate is shut, Your Humble Scribe has to totter his aged way along the canal's towpath to where another path cuts down to the road leading to SH.  This is not a journey he relishes, because it is completely dark with no lighting, no guardrail by the canal's chilly dank waters, is uneven, narrow in parts and liberally coated with rotting veg.  Let me illuminate with a photo I thought to take this evening.  Art!

     This is looking squarely at the canal.  Trust me, doing this also destroyed my night vision.  Also, if one keeps as far from the canal bank as possible, you run into dark, invisible branches and brambles and risk impaling an eyeball.  Footasylum customers, I hope you appreciate my sacrifice.

     Let me add another picture, taken from the bridge over the canal.  Art!

     Bridge and building geolocated for your enlightenment, some of which would be very useful on that towpath.  Ah yes, the sheer adrenaline rush of walking to the office!  Conrad is unsure what made a significant splash this morning as he lurched by and does not feel inclined to enquire further.  Yes, I am a big fat coward, but we knew that already, didn't we?

     I suppose I could cut down on the drama and adrenaline rush by taking a torch along, but that won't generate blog content, will it!

Talking Of Young Folk And Their Terrible Taste In Music

Conrad, with his analytical and logical mind <yeah right dream on! - the horrible truth courtesy Mister Hand> WITH HIS ANALYTICAL AND LOGICAL MIND thanks, has noticed that the ghastly rap music and it's hideous mutant children that get played far too much uses all the same production techniques.  

     Amid the tropes that they abuse, none is more abused than the vocoder.  Art!

     With the old voke, one speaks or sings into the mike, which is then played back after being interleaved with music.  This means that people whose singing could be compared to nails scraped down a blackboard can appear to have actual singing talent.  The thing about the voke is that it's effective when USED SPARINGLY!  Take Pink Floyd; about the only time they used it was for a brief segment on "Dogs".

     Don't worry.  When I take over all rap, grill and drime music will be banned, and there will be an International Inspector Of Vocoders to ensure they remain but lightly used.

     Hist, I am Edna-less at present, probably because I don't have food to hand.  I shall rustle this packet of Sour Cream Flavour Party Mix and see if the little scamp appears.  

"The Sea Of Sand"

The Doctor - and, unknown to him, Sarah - are sneaking around the alien-occupied supply depot at Mersa Martuba.

The jam-jar full of petrol felt childish and silly compared to a dirty great monster like the one in front of her, but Sarah unscrewed the lid and threw most of the contents at the bio-vore, which turned at the sound of the lid grating free.

          Before Sarah could light a match to ignite the petrol, her victim  shrieked repeatedly in fear or pain or both, running blindly into the night and across the beaten route between the mud huts.  A fragment of shell or another  missile hit it in the side and it collapsed instantly, dead or incapacitated.

 Diving into the hole, the Doctor banged his head painfully on the hefty wooden desk positioned only a couple of feet from the entrance.  He froze before making an exclamation of pain and annoyance, hearing a noise outside and recognising the pitch of the footfall.

‘Sarah!’ he said, with quiet anger.

‘Fancy meeting you here!’ whispered the young journalist, sticking her head into the hut, then climbing in.

‘I deliberately came here alone, and you still followed me!’

‘You didn’t say not to come.’  She added a few details about the bio-vore for good measure.

With an exasperated tut, the Doctor turned huffily and began to look in the desk drawers, sliding them out carefully in order to avoid making noise.  Suddenly he turned to Sarah and his eyes twinkled with mischief.

‘Thank you!’ he whispered.

     Well, he can be gracious as well as childish on occasion.

"Who Invented The Fuzz Guitar?"

Wondered Conrad earlier today.  A gent called Glenn Snoddy, and he did it by accident.  He was a sound engineer and studio owner who was recording a C & W session when one of his mixing desks developed a fault, lending a very distinctive fuzzy tone to a country artist.

    'Great!' thought other musicians, who wanted him to record them with this brand-new (1961) guitar effect.  Alas, not possible; his mixing deck up and died on him.

     So!  He sat down and created an effects pedal that replicated the fuzzy tone.  His patent was bought out by Gibson, to disappointing commercial sales.  Until -

     This chap, one Keith Richards, used one on "Satisfaction" and ever since people have been fuzzing it up.

     So now you know.

     

Finally -

Yes, just as I guessed, rustle the snack pack and Lo! Edna doth appear.  I'm being slightly cruel here, I've got no intention of dining on crisps as I have the hulk of an Extra-Large Killer Kebab from Tony's to do justice to, and we'll see whose the worse off after the next ten minutes.  Smart money is on Conrad!