Bearable times move forward

Week started off with the much needed repairing of our pavements which of necessity did place restrictions on going with tape in front of all the houses which now have less twists and turns and much improved grip having tested them making my way out towards the playground.

Much has started to come out such as cherry blossoms, daffidils while towards the woods you can see many birds such as magpies about and if you really lucky the squirrels out exploring. 

Preporations, not least the odd thing for next Wednesday are starting to come together given that with everything that happened last year there was scant interest in marking ones birthday with the house feestooned still with funeral cards and arrangements being made so in a number of ways it was unbirthday with nothing special happening.

While that loss is still keenly felt, all being well something should happen this year and one hopes for another in the 70's Now Yearbooks to announced for end March, early April as that series progresses capturing whole years well.

A few thoughts from last week

Yes it's yet another wet week as I can hear the rain pounding on my bedroom window here as I recover from this cold I got last week.

Now it was dry then so I was able to go out for a fair walk and enjoy being out in the secluded grounds as the bulbs were starting to poke their way through the soil and even saw a squirrel one afternoon going from tree to tree.

Their were shades of the school project in arts and crafts, drawing, colouring and cutting things out to make a Viking Long Boat and some baking too.

There was however one thing that really caught my eye in the rather long games room in the wings of the building that lit up my eyes.

One of my constant sources of entertaiment in the long winter evenings at boarding school stood in the common room  and that was our Subbuteo set that allowed you to play football on a table top between your favourite teams.

As it happened that was just what was set up where I stayed so all those thoughts from just after getting your homework done and spending an hour or so with your mates came back so I just played and played it.

It were magical as you pulled your plays back and turned them to animate the ball as traversed the ground, doing a spot of defending or, better still, scoring a goal and then adjusting the scoreboard at the sides.

Boyhood's good enough to stay in, I say.

Billy Joel issues a New Record!

I've only just arrived late yesterday so there won't be a big post, expect on on the other blog, Monday but coming soon is this single only some seventeen years in the making from the last time Billy issued anything and having heard this on Boom Radio I ordered this.

This is a very limited edition vinyl single - I prefer them to single downloads - issued on February 2nd.

There's a signed insert and a number allocated to your own copy where it'll stay in my collection of records.

The off edition

 I'm getting ready to go away for a few days so apart from the usual thing around packing ones bags, check lists, take outs as you find there's no room for some cherished thing and sorting one's transport out there's the stuff you don't see.

That includes taking care of the blogs while I'm away by setting up posts to auto publish although they might be a odd gap around Wednesday before picking up from where I left things.

It'll be a very little affair although there's a few things I'm doing which require a bit of responsibility on my part like a quiz and the odd chore that makes all of this possible.

It's been ages since I had a table light like this and to be honest I'd just love one.

Before I forget it was announced earlier in the week we lost the actor Ian Lavender who was born in south Birmingham aged 77.

He stared in many shows and tv series most notably in the WW2 "home guard" situation comedy Dad's Army as Private Pike, the young and at times immature member of the platoon we all loved watching as boys.

Toodle pips.

Inspiration along the way

Just working on this while spinning a record 

Well it is a fresh month which brings with it fresh challenges and experiences such as being away late  next week where there will tea parties, games and catching up with things from late last year if we're not defeated by the weather.

It may well be more like that if some of the forecasters are right but so long as trains run you can always find ways of having fun even in snow.

The week end leads into the first anniversary of Mum's death last year and all the changes that have come with it and I'm bound to add challenges too but Winnie is onto something with some great advice as we can't bend the day ahead or change how the day before was  but we can find what is good in the space between.

The start point of the current stereo

Rolling back the years as I've been playing a couple of records that took me back to when the forerunner of the present stereo system came in ending the classic tubed equipment made its way to the original shed in 1989.

Reasons included limited use with inputs that didn't work well with modern sources requiring many boxes and input expanders to get somewhere plus at least one needed some serous work in its control unit with component failures and the like.

This, the Rotel RA313 circa 1978 was found at a Ham Radio rally on a bring and buy stereo in good condition with the original manual that I thought would do the trick.

Apart from having inputs for my record deck with its Stanton 500EE moving magnet cartridge and tuner, there was The Great Aux which I could easily use with my first cd player a small Toshiba.

I also was running a cassette deck and Tandberg series 6 open reel deck and this had built in switching for both including copying both ways without having to unplug things.

One of first jobs was playing my cds of Now 15 and 15 blasting out Queen's I Want It All and Neneh Cherry's Kisses On The Wind and playing I Want That Man by Deborah Harry from vinyl single and frequent playing of Belinda Carlisle's Runaway Horses album.

It sounded great and was a whole lot more fun to just listen to things aided when I eventually got the matching Tuner for Radios 1,2 and 3 in stereo as by that point Radio One had gone to full time stereo rather than fading low fi medium wave only the summer before.

And the records played were the lp versions of those cds that rounded off my Now lp collection ready for the release of Now Yearbook 1990 next month on vinyl that had so many of my favourites of that year.

While the present system has better sounding sources I remain intrigued just how it might of handled them although like my current amplifier the record input was a bit noisy and had I of kept it I might of bypassed it with an external unit.

Shini is the Blue Peter 43rd presenter!

 

It has been announced who the 43rd Blue Peter presenter will be.

Shini Muthukrishnan, pictured left, aged 22 from Stafford, will go live for her first show on CBBC at 17:00 GMT on Friday.

She will co-host the world’s longest-running children’s TV programme alongside Abby Cook, Joel Mawhinney and BP pet, Henry the dog.

Blue Peter will be the first TV presenting role for Ms Muthukrishnan whose lockdown videos on TikTok celebrated her British, Indian and Malaysian heritage.

Ms Muthukrishnan, who played badminton for Staffordshire county, recently graduated from King's College London where she studied philosophy, politics and economics.

She said: “Being part of the Blue Peter team is such a surreal and exciting feeling.

“I have really fond memories of Blue Peter. As a kid, I looked up to Helen Skelton, she seemed fearless on screen. She took on incredible challenges with such a headstrong attitude that made me think 'I can be fearless too'.”

Her first challenge will involve taking part in aircraft aerobatics while also on the live show, she will also be attempting to bathe Henry the dog and cook up a tasty treat.

Blue Peter editor Ellen Evans asked about her qualities said "Shini is an exciting new talent, who impressed us with her adventurous spirit, sense of humour, determination and aspiration to have a positive impact on kids’ lives.”

As a Staffordshire resident and West Midlander, I'm delighted.