The gaudy seed-bearer strikes again

Not often you get to look at your baby as a bunch of cells, but here we have Grandnegie 2.0 (or Carnage 2.0, whichever you deem more appropriate) as both a wee blastocyst and a more progressive, yet still rather insubstantial 12 week old. Mother and child are in fine fettle (whatever that may be) and father to be is trying not to panic.

Aaaaaaaah panic!

B

Eat this 2010

The year is barely born but we're not going to succumb to subzero temperatures and the January Blues. It takes more than a head cold and unemployment to keep us down, oh yes. To the Russian Bar then in Darkest Dalston, top secret late night techno pit. There's little threat of anyone actually being there to hear us play, but in stark contrast to DJ Sonje's measly two CDs, I have brought enough music to play out the next Millennium. Nervous, Moi? OK yes, I'm a little bruised from the last time I played, over a year ago, when a very drunken man screamed 'what the f**k is this shit' in my face. Who knew the crowd wanted 70's disco rather than modeselektor, who knew? So it is with minor trepidation that I head out with Sonje, not helped at all by her super efficient two CD selection.

True to form tho, there is but a lone table of people in the whole place and a man behind the decks whom we later ascertain is some sort of manager, laying down some ersatz house hell. Our hosts, authentic, real and indeed, genuine DJ chappies Simon n' Matt from We make music, manage to hoof DJ Dire off the decks and Sonje steps up. By this time a small posse of Dalstonites have gathered and golly but I'm actually starting to relax and dare I say it, have fun. Sonje beats the crowdette with some hardy bangers, despite being thrown into the deep end somewhat with having to navigate the technological minefield that is the CDJ 1000. Bolstered with the confidence that only comes from playing in front of friends (and the odd lager) I tag her and take up arms. It is here that a curious thing happens. With the degree of total control the 1000s give you, you really needn't worry about such trivial things as beat matching, they do it all for you. For the first time in years, I can concentrate on the tunes. I'm racking things up well ahead of time, I'm playing things I've never played before - bejabbers, I'm enjoying myself and people are whooping! Granted it's just Margo L whooping, but I care not, a whoop's a whoop. This is the best set I've played possibly ever, and I'm wired to the gills when Matt eventually prises my fingers from the decks and I step down.

Simon and Matt play brilliantly of course and I'm humbled by Simon's mastery of the machinery. That said, I'm really not concerned that I'm not looping madly and filtering and utilising the multiple effects and tricks that the 1000s are capable of. It's about the banging, it always has been.

B

Christmastising - Part 2

Chrissie Day, Callooh, callay! Mr and Mrs. Le Grandbutte have been tasked with preparing the Christmas feast according to some ancient tradition that I dare not question. In an act of low cunning, the ham ladies cook the ham the day before and leave it strategically placed next to the pre-prepared turkey, complete with virtually identical tin foil covering. As it was now about -4 outside, the boot of the Freelander had taken on duties as an outdoor larder and this was where both ham and turkey had been stored. It's -4 then, maybe even less at six in the morning when chrissie cooking began. You're not going to linger are you? You're going to grab the nearest tin foil covered roasting tin and head for the house as quickly as possible. After two hours in what was admittedly a rather luke warm oven, the ham was unceremoniously removed and replaced with the turkey and lunch was back on track.

As Santa ( the real one, not that perverted tramp from the train) had made an appearance the night before (some of my finest work!) the living room was chocka with pressies and our junior citizens were near frenzied with joy. After some hand-to-hand combat, teen queen joined the pressie line and one by one, the youth were led in to fall upon the gleaming boxes with rabid delight. Lunch kicked off at around four, which is pretty standard Christmas Day eating time as far as I'm concerned, and it was indeed, most delicious. That evening we had some remarkably underwhelming fireworks and tried to float a few Chinese lanterns. Not something that should be attempted in either sub-zero temperatures or a heavily wooded area, or both. Having been elected Entertainments Reps, Loved One and I had purchased Britain's Got Talent - the board game, in a moment of desperation. God bless 'em though, the whole family dived in with remarkable enthusiasm and very little discernible talent, and much larffter and bad dancing ensued. (Apologies to Mick Jagger)

Boxing Day saw a select few take to the hills for a brisk walk and a cheeky pint at a handy freehouse that popped up out of nowhere. The entertainments team had managed to convince various naysayers in the crowd that a murder mystery was the way to go for the last evening's frivolity. True to form, all dressed up brilliantly and despite my own secret reservations, the whole thing was thoroughly enjoyable. I may of course have immersed myself a little too deeply in the role of demented Gestapo agent, Otto von Pinkwurst, but you know, you can take the boy out of the theatre etc.

So there you have it, Chrissie 09. Many thanks must go to KG and JG senior for their near mythical spreadsheet skills, DG for his outstanding role as Head of Cheese and to everyone else for cooking and drinking and larffing it up good. Happy New Year to all!

B

Christmastising Part 1

It seems like a dim distant memory now, but Christmas did actually take place, and I was actually there. As mentioned before, the so-called festive season occupies its own unique niche in the time/space continuum; managing to simultaneously be interminably plodding and over in a flash.

Our arrival in Derbyshire and Turpins Cottage was relatively painless thanks to the marvel of GPS and clear roads. While a lot of snow had fallen, this was hardly the arctic blizzard predicted by the met office doomsayers, who said we wouldn't get two metres past our front door. The Le Grandbutte Massive were almost in full effect but for lower middle sibling and family. After tottering up some lethal snowbound stairs, we were welcomed into the bosom of the hearth and fed a sumptuous ahem, Chinese takeaway. Our ground floor room was a double-edged sword; far from the madding crowd and with its own en-suite ablutions, but with only a wall of glass between us and the increasingly frigid night air. Sleeping in your dressing gown and scarf might seem fun if you're five years old but loses its appeal when one hits forty. We survived the night but had no choice but to procure a heater if we were to make it through the next five days with all our extremities intact.

With the arrival of lower middle son the next morning our party was complete - 11 adults, check. 1 teen, moody, check. 3 kinders, off their heads with excitement, check. 3 infants, cute, check, and one jaunty Labrador - Christmas could officially begin. Actually, with the arrival of Sainburys, Christmas could officially begin, bringing as they did most of the food and booze right to our door. As we were first up for cooking duties, we had armed ourselves the week before with smoked keilbasa and cannellini beans to create our state of the art Polish Sausage stew, famous throughout the, er, room. No mean feat cooking for the ravenous hordes, though fortunately the three under twos weren't exactly sausage fans and left us enough for seconds.

Day three was one of those days that slipped in time.I recall very tasty spag bog for dinner and that's about it. Some went walking, some went sledging, some went shopping, some had another Boddingtons, perhaps that some was me.

Day four and Chrissie Eve huzzah! As one of our junior members was fixated with trains, the entire clan had been booked aboard the Santa Express, leaving from the appropriately named station of Butterley. The Thomas rip-off you see above was our iron steed, and despite some blind leading the blind navigation, we managed to make it in time...for the session after the one we were booked for. No matter, we're here now, let's not hurl abuse at DG for his inability to read a very large sign that the rest of us saw, all aboard, let the magic begin! Hmmm, someone appeared to have left the magic at home as we clambered onto this dilapidated throwback to a bygone era and made our way to the front carriage. (by the bar, naturally) The old girl wheezed into life and crawled out of the station as we sipped our complimentary Baileys dinkies and gummed our complementary Iceland mince pies. Never mind, soon we'd be flying down the tracks, marvelling at the glorious winter wonderland flashing past our windows, reveling in the glory of this noble engine's steam powered majes... oh, we appear to have stopped about 2 minutes outside the station, curious. After some furtive banging and clanging, we saw Thomas chuffing past us in the other direction and came to the sad conclusion that this was the sum total of the Santa Express. A plod four hundred metres out of one end of the station, an uncoupling, recoupling, then a short run out the other end of the station, woo and indeed, hoo. Neeeeverrrr mindddd, there was still a visit to Santa, hurrah, huzzah! OK kids, are you ready to see Santa? Here he is!! Yes, he smells a little like Old Speckled Hen, chip fat and the bitter stench of despair, but it's Santa! I say Santa, shouldn't you have the wee kiddie on your knee and not his Mother? Steady on Santa old boy, that's my wife. Oi Santa, do you want a punch in the..gerrorf...oof.. get himm...ouch...smack.

After a jolly visit with Santa on his marvelous express, we head back through the snow for Chrissie eve, delicious Beef Casserole and a rousing game of trivial pursuit. This game dwells in that same slow, terminally dull part of time/space In fact, it rules it with a leaden, ponderous fist. After three years in the Trivialpersuitosphere, we eventually escape and hit the fridge, our brains numb with trivia. To be continued...

I'll give you ho ho ho

I'm afraid. Christmas lists and mails are flying thick and fast and the gorge-fest that is The Season to be Jolly (tm) rapidly approaches. In-depth discussions clog my gmail, about cheese and beer and breakfast and who's cooking what on which night. Don't get me wrong, I'm all for planning ahead, especially when you're dealing with a multiplicity of mouths to feed and childers to entertain. It's just that it all happens so quickly this Christmas thing and then before you know it you're staring into the frozen abyss of January, the ghostly taste of brandy butter lingering on your tongue.

Perhaps it's the cold and the dark nights that seem to dramatically accelerate the hours (duh William, ya think?) but Christmas in Africa seemed to drag on interminably. The day itself lasted forever. Up with the larks, or in our case, hoopoes, tapping away frantically (no Spencer, not that sort of tapping away) at the dead elms lining our property. (dutch elm disease, tis a bitch) We'd stretch our toes down to the ends of our beds to provoke a delicious rustling from the sack/pillow case of wonderful things nestled there. From that point on it was impossible to sleep. We'd drag on our Sunday finery and make the obligatory trip to our local church to drone some ghastly hymns and shake sweaty paws. In the space of minutes the thermometer would rise dramatically, hats would wilt, ties loosen and all would eye the door with the sort of fervor our Rev could only dream of. Eventually it was off with the nylon trousers/school shirt combo and on with the boxers and the new Willie Worm t-shirt santa/mater had scored me. Foodandpresentsandfoodandmadgameofcricketonthelawn before an afternoon lull to regain our strength. Hopeless really as it is now 40 degrees C and all have been felled by a mighty fist of heat. Time is molasses as the children gather at the shallow end of the pool, cramming watermelon and mangoes into the last available crevices in their bodies and praying for hot fat beads of rain to end their suffering.

Naturally I am expecting something similar in Fumbuckshire or wherever we are gathering (where are we gathering?) except for the bit about heat and perhaps, watermelons. As entertainment rep, I'll be taking my duties very seriously, so all aboard the er fun bus, Chrissie is upon us.

B

Roboten feel no pian

Soon they will rise, soon. In the meantime I will have to make my own banana loaf.

I lack coordination. I can walk and tie my shoelaces and navigate the mean streets of Londres with the best of them, but lose concentration for a second...

I walk into things all the time; door frames have a mysterious magnetic pull and once I've actually made it through, the door-handle will inevitably catch on my shirt and wrench me backwards. I hit my head on cupboards, cut myself, burn myself, crunch my elbows into mantelpieces and stab my eyes with teaspoons. The kitchen is a deathtrap for me and baking, my new temporary hobby, is a sad lesson in self-harm every time I reach for the Hummingbird.

While being blessed with my Father's genetic GPS which allows me to navigate the most confusing city and find my way back to my hotel with nary a glance of the map, I seem incapable of being able to read a recipe. I'm not sure why I equate these two things, I just don't want people to get the impression I'm a complete moron. A work in progress perhaps. My first foray into baking was my Mother's lemon drizzle cake recipe, written out for me on a scrubby piece of paper. Granted I misread 3oz of orange juice as 30, but what idiot would think the sloppy mess I'd dutifully poured into a cake tin was in any way the right consistency for producing a delightful sponge. The resulting lemon tart was perfectly edible though, but had seeped out of the cake tin and all over the baking tins in the draw below the oven. I'd regard this as a failure.

Undaunted I took to the aforementioned Hummingbird bakery book and attempted a banana loaf. I dropped boiling butter on the floor, flicked a muddy arc of batter across the kitchen wall and broke one of the unbreakable measuring spoons. Still, I was fairly pleased with the mush I put in the oven, despite having the niggling feeling it still wasn't quite the right density. This feeling turned to certainty when I noticed a bowl full of flour still sitting on the work surface. So let's be clear about this, I'm baking here, and I forgot to add flour.

The bananas are ripening, I've acquired a bigger mixing bowl, the signs are good. Hold off on that robot Loved One, I think I've got this cake thing beat. (ahem)

B

Stadtkind

Berlin greets me with a cold wet smack in the face as I head down towards the U-Bahn and Rathaus Neukölln (or Rat-house Newcolon as I like to think of it), location of Cruiser's new flat. This town oozes coolness and kultcha from every pore. Walls and doorways are splattered with street art and stickers promoting a hundred different parties, exhibitions and groovy happenings. There are ramshackle bars on every corner; scaffy, makeshift holes-in-the-wall with minimal decoration and minimal beats scratching out of some crappy sound system in the corner. Cruiser and I attempt a quiet first evening by going on a crawl of these local sprechen, erm, easies. Alas, Berlin has chosen to not only ignore the smoking ban, but carry on as if it were never implemented in the first place. By bar 3 I've got that old familiar carcinogenic reek about me and our quiet evening is rapidly spiraling down the neck of a never-ending bottle of beer.

Dawn breaks around 11 and despite some healthy muesli action and a hearty interface of apple, carrot and ginger, an air of fragility pervades our brains. We make a half-hearted attempt at shopping, but as a whole new brace of adventures stretch ahead of us tonight we opt for a strategic nap instead. Fortunately Berlin only comes alive around twelve at night, so we have time to recover, eat a crap burger and hang in a gay co-operative for a glass of cidre, before it's off to the Nightmare Party. This gig takes place in what was once a youth indoctrination centre, a venue which seems to have happily swapped one form of brainwashing for another. There's a DJ in every corner and the place gradually fills with louche kinders embracing the Halloween vibe in a variety of blood soaked costumes. I'm sure I saw a Zombie Nazi from Dead Snow and there's quite a heartening air of indifference the kids show towards this whole period of their history. They've moved on even if no one else has.

Much banging takes place and I'm pleasantly surprised by how good I feel come six o'clock, having abstained from drinking the whole night. It's crazy I know, but you can actually go out and not drink, who would have thort it?

Saturday evening we devote to the Illustrative 09, an exhibition of the finest graphics and illustration Berlin has to offer. I'll post a flickr link of this exhibition shortly. Another cool venue and the usual hit and miss of design; some pieces were brilliant, others looked like poor course work from some third year art class. We headed back home to cook a jolly dinner for Heinz 57 and Clarabow and managed to hit the sack before one, making the ghastly pain of rising at six to get to the airport a little more bearable.

Those of you in London on Sunday may have noticed it was quite windy. Now imagine being in a weenie Easyjet airplane attempting to land at Gatwick. We are thrown about violently as the pilot is forced to do an emergency abort of his first approach. He comes in slower the second time, but the entire craft is yawing and bouncing from side to side and there is much weeping and lamentation from all. We finally break cloud cover and appear to be approaching the runway sideways. The lamentation level increases dramatically. The pilot wrenches us around at the last minute and we skip and slide to an eventual juddering stop. A brief silence ensues before everyone bursts into relieved applause. Without a doubt the most disturbing air experience I've ever had.

Muchos gracias to the Cruiser, your hospitality knows no bounds. London, it's good to be back (in one piece).

B

Green Day

Taking a turn around Tony's Tent, or, as it is now known, the O2 Arena, one is reminded yet again of the ginormous waste of money and effort this big top acid trip represents. That it has become the weekend venue of choice for marauding bands of East End slappahs bent on alcoholic annihilation, seems only fitting. Especially when you consider the idea for building it could only have been conceived at the end of a particularly ruinous and depraved New Labour drinkathon.

No matter. We are here now, T Psych and I, to immerse ourselves in the three chord clatter of California punk puppies, Green Day. By puppies of course, I mean grizzled hounds. Perhaps out of denial of my own advancing years, it hadn't really dawned on me how long this band has actually been around. Frontman Billie Joe Armstrong soon puts me straight as he dashes across the stage like a demented Emo Pixie yelling,

'We've been doing this for fucking twenty years now, and this shit never grows old.'

Ye Gods, twenty years! I fumble for my fisherman's friends and turn down my hearing aid as the first single off the new album that sounds like the last single off the previous album, jangles into life. Bless his skull n' cross-bone socks though, Billie Joe sure knows how to please his demographic. He's constantly pulling up kohl eyed kiddies from the front row, taking pictures of them, encouraging them to stage dive and generally treating the whole thing like the end of season talent show at Butlins. He even comes over all lay preacher at one point, demanding children be brought before him so he can lay hands on them in some profound metaphorical way that possibly related to the song he was singing, but utterly went over my head and probably those of a number of slightly disturbed parents too.

In a final act of tweenie fan heaven, he calls on any young drummers, guitarists and bass players to show themselves, then selects three budding musos to take over from Tre Cool, Mike Dirnt and the other dude playing guitar whose name eludes me. Never has a child been so gifted from on high as BJ sing along over their brave efforts and every adult in the room go' Ah bless.'

T Psych has staggered back with four more pints thank G and we are able to reinforce ourselves for the inevitable encore. Or encores I should say, as the greedy buggers have the cheek to go off and on twice. This is a stoning offense in my book, but Lo, all is forgiven as BJ take to his acoustic and do a soopa medley of 'Time of your life/ When September ends', reducing all to blubbering wrecks, tho perhaps that was my distended bladder placing pressure on my eyeballs.

We're finally allowed to leave the building after being told we are a much better audience than any American one, which seems a tad of a betrayal but never mind. A cheeky beer/depissing in one of the many faceless drink o' mats residing under this tatty canvas, then it's the last tube home for us.

Ta muchly to T Psych for his great generosity and ebullient company, perhaps just the one bottle of Sake next time, we have been doing this shit for twenty years after all.

B