Panther is back! About 15 minutes ago I heard his signature "thump" on the dining-room windowsill as he jumped down from the neighbours' wall. Once I'd opened the window he was straight into the utility room and ate solidly for about five minutes.
God knows where he's been (probably stuck in a shed or garage for a few days - he's lost a bit of weight) but that's not important now because he's back!
And a good thing too, because I was getting lonely looking at the photo...(sniff)
Regards,
djp
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Wednesday, February 06, 2008
Aber, wo ist Panther?
I came back from a business trip in the UK on Saturday. The family (both human and feline) was intact and well.
Saturday, Younger Daughter put out both cats as per normal. Sunday morning, no sign of Panther, our magnificent black (neutered) male. No sign all day Sunday. No sign all day Monday. Or Tuesday. Or this morning.
He has been known to stray a bit in the past, and he does seem to have a rather wide territory. So maybe nothing is amiss. But maybe there is...:-( Hopefully he will turn up soon and all will be forgotten.
Anyway, here's the most recent photo I have of him.
Regards,
djp
Saturday, February 02, 2008
My Top 10 iPod tracks - 02/02/2008
- (-) - Burst Me Stitches (PC Mix) - Daniel Prendiville (honestly, no fix involved, much...)
- (1) - Hello? Is This Thing On? - !!!
- (-) - Sam's Town - The Killers
- (-) - Moon (John Peel Session) - Microdisney
- (7) - Mixed Bizness - Beck
- (10) - Child In Time (Live) - Deep Purple
- (2) - Not Behind The Fighter Jet - Guided By Voices
- (3) - Moanin' The Blues - Hank Williams
- (-) - Where White Boys Dance - The Killers
- (-) - Who Brought The Tootskie? - MJB
Regards,
djp
Sunday, January 27, 2008
Critter Cadaver No.2 - Dead Robin
Today's offering is a dead robin found across the road from Kelly's old shop on Gortlandroe.
Anyone familiar with my musical meanderings will recall that I have a particular affinity for robins. If you're not on first-name terms with my back catalogue, you can click on this here link here...
Regards,
djp
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Critter Cadaver No. 1 update
As you can see, ol' Ratty Rat is more or less in the same position as when I encountered him first a week ago.
He's looking a little the worse for wear now. Obviously, some live critters have been nosing around the cadaver, like a bunch of four-legged amateur forensic pathologists. And yet no human has done the decent thing and chucked the poor bugger over the fence to moulder away in peace.
Me? Volunteer? How little you know me...:-)
Regards,
djp
Thursday, January 24, 2008
Y'wha?
Tesco, for its sins, is regularly involved in product recalls.
Most of the recalls I've seen have been in relation to electrical products. Some items of clothing perhaps.
But the most recent recall caught my eye - it was for a line of navy blue mugs. And the problem that was identified was that the mugs were inclined to crack when filled with boiling water.
I think that bears repeating - the mugs were inclined to crack when filled with boiling water.
I've been using mugs for most of my 45 years now, and practically every mug I've ever used has been subjected to the trauma of being filled with boiling water. None, to the best of my recollection, has ever cracked when filled with boiling water. None.
What is the world coming to when you can't trust a mug not to show signs of ceramic fatigue when they are subjected to what one can safely describe as standard wear and tear? For mugs.
Society is crumbling around our ears, mes braves...:-)
Regards,
djp
Most of the recalls I've seen have been in relation to electrical products. Some items of clothing perhaps.
But the most recent recall caught my eye - it was for a line of navy blue mugs. And the problem that was identified was that the mugs were inclined to crack when filled with boiling water.
I think that bears repeating - the mugs were inclined to crack when filled with boiling water.
I've been using mugs for most of my 45 years now, and practically every mug I've ever used has been subjected to the trauma of being filled with boiling water. None, to the best of my recollection, has ever cracked when filled with boiling water. None.
What is the world coming to when you can't trust a mug not to show signs of ceramic fatigue when they are subjected to what one can safely describe as standard wear and tear? For mugs.
Society is crumbling around our ears, mes braves...:-)
Regards,
djp
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Critter Cadaver No. 1 - Dead Rat
Encountered this chappie on my walk on the Nenagh Peripherique yesterday. He's some monster, isn't he? I've never been that up close and...er...personal with a rat that size before. On a walk this morning on the same route he was still there - no-one had made the effort to move it off the path.
I come across quite a number of critter cadavers on my reasonably-regular walks, so much so that I'm inclined to put together an occasional series of blog postings on the subject. Stay tuned, cadaver fans.
Oh, and apologies for the poor quality of the photograph. This was taken on my cheap-and-cheerful Motorola phone. Steps have been taken to improve matters in that regard, so watch this space.
Regards,
djp
Friday, January 11, 2008
Top Of The World
Sad to hear that Edmund Hillary died, at the age of 88. He had a surprisingly long life, considering that he peaked so early...
Regards,
djp
Regards,
djp
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Cello-fain
Anyone who's been reading this blog with any degree of regularity will realise that, despite my natural sense of financial rectitude, I am occasionally prone to the odd outbreak of bizarre fiscal immoderacy (is that a word?). In other words, every now and then I spend a shitload of money on something that I cannot justify to those near and dear to me.
You might well remember, for example, my experience with Ebay and the iPods going back a few months.
It's not that I'm naturally extravagant. It's just that, from time to time, I get this urge to spend some money on something that I don't really need, but that, on the spur of the moment, I feel will enhance my life immeasurably. This doesn't happen too often, but when it does, it tends to upset the delicate balance of my life for a few days, after which things progress exactly as they had theretofore, except I've now got yet another item to clutter up my already cluttered-up existence.
Mc.Carneys is a shop in Nenagh which specialises in rather fine pieces of furniture and (occasionally) musical instruments. They have a reputation for sourcing good secondhand pianos, for instance. We've bought some nice pieces of furniture there over the years. And yes, that's where we bought our piano back in the dim-and-distant. I must admit, however, that I haven't gone into the shop for a few years.
Another feature of the shop is the fine window displays, which never fail to delight and to tempt one with beautiful items of furniture, crockery and the devil knows what.
Last week, I was passing the shop when my eye was caught by, of all things, a cello. A cello. For something like €250. I've no idea whether it was a full-size cello or a student model, or whether it was in good nick or riddled with woodworm. It didn't really mater - its very presence in Mc. Carneys' window was enough to send me off on a riff.
Being a bass player, there is a natural attraction for me to the cello. It's not as big, unwieldy and expensive as a double bass, but being a bowed, unfretted instrument it would present a serious challenge to my severely-limited musical abilities, but one which the eternal optimist in me would not be able to resist. Some day, if you buy me enough Bacardi and Coke, I'll tell you the sad and sorry tale of the time I bought a fretless Fender Jazz Bass (OK, it wasn't a bowed instrument but it was definitely fretless).
Knowing my pre-existing proclivity for buying musical instruments that I can't actually play (like a 12-string acoustic guitar, a lap steel guitar and a mandolin), I knew that if I didn't walk past that window very quickly, I'd have some explaining to do to the long-suffering Mrs. P. ("you bought a WHAT?"). Even my impending 45th. birthday would not justify buying a damn cello. And then I'd have to get it re-strung for a lefty. Is that possible? So many reasons not to buy.
That was last week...
...today, I was "working" at home when, for no reason I can fathom, I got the notion to head down to see if the cello was still in Mc. Carneys' window. And if it was there, shur maybe I'd have a good look at it. What harm could it do, for God's sake? And even if I did decide to buy, €250 would hardly breach the family's finances that much, would it?
So downtown I went. And having stopped off to drop a pair of trousers at the dry cleaners (I wasn't wearing them when I dropped them, so no sniggering at the back), I wandered over to Mc. Carneys. No sign of it in the window. Then I entered the shop and had a quick recce. No sign of it anywhere. A wave of relief washed over me - I wouldn't have to get the cello re-strung at God knows what cost. I wouldn't have to sneak it into the house away from the prying eyes of my bemused neighbours and then have to explain to Mrs. P and the young'uns why the hell a middle-aged man had gone and bought a cello (other than the fact that I am middle-aged and it is a cello - I mean come on...). And I would have had to be upfront about the purchase since I've now officially run out of hiding places to stash musical instruments that no-one knows I've bought. So, counting my blessings, I left Mc. Carneys - without a cello but with my bank balance intact.
And yet... I couldn't shake the thought of how cool it would have been to segue from "Anyone who's been reading this blog...cluttered-up existence" to "And so I bought a cello."
Regards,
djp
You might well remember, for example, my experience with Ebay and the iPods going back a few months.
It's not that I'm naturally extravagant. It's just that, from time to time, I get this urge to spend some money on something that I don't really need, but that, on the spur of the moment, I feel will enhance my life immeasurably. This doesn't happen too often, but when it does, it tends to upset the delicate balance of my life for a few days, after which things progress exactly as they had theretofore, except I've now got yet another item to clutter up my already cluttered-up existence.
Mc.Carneys is a shop in Nenagh which specialises in rather fine pieces of furniture and (occasionally) musical instruments. They have a reputation for sourcing good secondhand pianos, for instance. We've bought some nice pieces of furniture there over the years. And yes, that's where we bought our piano back in the dim-and-distant. I must admit, however, that I haven't gone into the shop for a few years.
Another feature of the shop is the fine window displays, which never fail to delight and to tempt one with beautiful items of furniture, crockery and the devil knows what.
Last week, I was passing the shop when my eye was caught by, of all things, a cello. A cello. For something like €250. I've no idea whether it was a full-size cello or a student model, or whether it was in good nick or riddled with woodworm. It didn't really mater - its very presence in Mc. Carneys' window was enough to send me off on a riff.
Being a bass player, there is a natural attraction for me to the cello. It's not as big, unwieldy and expensive as a double bass, but being a bowed, unfretted instrument it would present a serious challenge to my severely-limited musical abilities, but one which the eternal optimist in me would not be able to resist. Some day, if you buy me enough Bacardi and Coke, I'll tell you the sad and sorry tale of the time I bought a fretless Fender Jazz Bass (OK, it wasn't a bowed instrument but it was definitely fretless).
Knowing my pre-existing proclivity for buying musical instruments that I can't actually play (like a 12-string acoustic guitar, a lap steel guitar and a mandolin), I knew that if I didn't walk past that window very quickly, I'd have some explaining to do to the long-suffering Mrs. P. ("you bought a WHAT?"). Even my impending 45th. birthday would not justify buying a damn cello. And then I'd have to get it re-strung for a lefty. Is that possible? So many reasons not to buy.
That was last week...
...today, I was "working" at home when, for no reason I can fathom, I got the notion to head down to see if the cello was still in Mc. Carneys' window. And if it was there, shur maybe I'd have a good look at it. What harm could it do, for God's sake? And even if I did decide to buy, €250 would hardly breach the family's finances that much, would it?
So downtown I went. And having stopped off to drop a pair of trousers at the dry cleaners (I wasn't wearing them when I dropped them, so no sniggering at the back), I wandered over to Mc. Carneys. No sign of it in the window. Then I entered the shop and had a quick recce. No sign of it anywhere. A wave of relief washed over me - I wouldn't have to get the cello re-strung at God knows what cost. I wouldn't have to sneak it into the house away from the prying eyes of my bemused neighbours and then have to explain to Mrs. P and the young'uns why the hell a middle-aged man had gone and bought a cello (other than the fact that I am middle-aged and it is a cello - I mean come on...). And I would have had to be upfront about the purchase since I've now officially run out of hiding places to stash musical instruments that no-one knows I've bought. So, counting my blessings, I left Mc. Carneys - without a cello but with my bank balance intact.
And yet... I couldn't shake the thought of how cool it would have been to segue from "Anyone who's been reading this blog...cluttered-up existence" to "And so I bought a cello."
Regards,
djp
Tuesday, January 01, 2008
Some New Year's resolutions
- To eat sushi for the first time
- To get to see Arsenal play at least once this year
- To visit a country I've never been to before (this one is looking good...)
- To start cycling again as soon as the weather improves (this one is not looking good...)
- To generally get the oul' bod a bit more together
- To move house
- To either change my car or keep it for longer
- To have a better year at work than I had last year (which wasn't bad, but had its "moments")
- To see friends more
- To stop wrecking me own head
That'll do for starters...
Regards,
djp
My Top 10 iPod tunes - 01/01/2008
- (1) - Hello? Is This Thing On? - !!!
- (-) - Not Behind The Fighter Jet - Guided By Voices
- (4) - Moanin' The Blues - Hank Williams
- (-) - Le Printemps - Natacha Atlas
- (-) - The Tourist - Radiohead
- (2) - Teddy Picker - Arctic Monkeys
- (3) - Mixed Bizness - Beck
- (-) - Manchester (demo) - Brendan James
- (-) - (White Man) In Hammersmith Palais - The Clash
- (-) - Child In Time (live) - Deep Purple
Regards (and Happy New Year...)
djp
Sunday, December 30, 2007
Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Dead Pop Heroes No. 5
This just in on Joe Dolan. Scarily, Joe's Wikipedia entry was updated within hours of the ann0uncement.
Regards,
djp
Regards,
djp
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Tuesday, December 18, 2007
Saturday, December 15, 2007
Friday, December 14, 2007
Thursday, December 13, 2007
(B)eMusic
Being the cheapskate bastard that I am, I usually check out eMusic on a daily basis for their free daily download. I will generally download anything other than R&B/urban/hip-hop. A guy has to have some standards after all...
However, today I noticed that the free download track had already been made available for free some weeks ago. You'd think with all the music on the internet nowadays that it would be impossible for eMusic to repeat themselves. This is obviously not the case.
Yours (B)eMused,
djp
However, today I noticed that the free download track had already been made available for free some weeks ago. You'd think with all the music on the internet nowadays that it would be impossible for eMusic to repeat themselves. This is obviously not the case.
Yours (B)eMused,
djp
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