My Brown Ball - Not For Girls

AKA my new thing

The emailshot arrived in my inbox. I had a look at it and raised one eyebrow, in that James Bond way that you know me so well for.

I clicked on the link and perused the things. The blurb said stuff like:

"A ball for all occasions"

"A seat that will not occupy your whole flat"

"A unique, flexible solution for modern day lounging."

Then, as I looked further, I came across the one that had my name, in invisible ink but there nonetheless, plastered all over it. This one said:

"A combination of a classic old sports car mixed with a WW2 fighter pilots jacket. A popular male choice with its sports car seat interior and beaten up leather looks. Men appreciate the embroidered detailing. The tongue in cheek numbering, and the squeak you hear when you get comfortable in it."

You don't need to be a regular around here to know that the words hit me right where it matters. I was ever so slightly hooked, I chucked the email in my favourites to come back to. It sounded like a plan. You know, avoid that spur of the moment impulse buy thing and look at it again in a week or so to see if it's as attractive then.

Frankly, it I hadn't looked at it again about three minutes later, if I hadn't clicked the "order now" button, it would have been a superb plan, one that probably would have won me awards, Nobel peace prizes and things.

But do I care?

No, because it really is the coolest thing ever.

It starts off as a ball thing, ideal for lounging on as it is, with its WW2 fighter pilot's jacket look, though not real leather, a mild disappointment.













Then you unzip the chap like this:













To reveal this, the sports car seat interior with its tongue in cheek numbering. I remain unconvinced about the numbering, at my age these things can be dangerous, though I like ice cream and love Cadburys chocolate.













Then you plonk your arse on it and wallow in comfort and trendiness. The bottom bit, the bit where the bottom goes, is filled with beans feels just like sitting on a beanbag. The bigger segment of the ball, the part you lean on, is filled with air (pump supplied)and it's true what they say, it really is very comfortable, albeit in a where shall I put my legs sort of way. That's me, with my award winning arms.













Here you see it in situ, in RD Towers. I'm sure you'll agree that the worn brown leather (fake) and the bright red Mustang sports look do fit rather well. I'm keeping it zipped up though and will open it on demand.














I'm mightily pleased with it.

Addicted

I've been listening to this almost non stop for the last few days and had to share it, though it's not the proper video. It's the most impactful song on me for a while. Check out the middle eight from about 3.20.

I'm taking the girls to see them in November and can't wait for that, can't wait for the new album too.

The Kottu Magazine

So Indi's come up with this idea of a print version of Kottu and it's stimulated some discussion and argument, some thinking and creativity. Which is nice. Here's my 0.02 worth.

First let's get the crap out of the way. One bloke has gone off on one about the viability of registering Kottu as a name, about the use of the word and all sorts of intellectual property issues that may or may not arise.

It's just not a debate worth having with respect to the overall idea of Kottu in print. If there are intellectual property issues then the name can be changed to something like "The Sri Lankan Blog roundup" or "Lankan blogs" or anything. I'm no copywriter, but this bit is just not a dealbreaker.

Indi says that there are two key points pertaining to an editorial policy; intellectual respect and selection. These have generated most of the discussion in the comments on his blog post.

As far as the first one, intellectual respect goes, I would be confident in Indi's integrity on this. It would seem reasonable and ethical that permission would have to be granted by the bloggers for our work to be reproduced and, as Indi says, this could be in general or for specific posts. Obviously getting permission each time for each post may be impractical so the far easier option would be for each of us to say yay or nay to being included. Failing that we can always say yes or no. I like to give options.

The Lankan press has had some bad, well, bad press over the issue of blogs and intellectual property in the past and it's a potentially sticky area. While I and I suspect many others would feel confident with someone like Indi in charge of this, there's an intrinsic problem in having confidence in a system because you trust the person and not so much the system. This, I think, would need to be addressed.

I saw a comment in which the writer said that bloggers writing under a pseudonym might be worried about revealing their identity to Indi or the Sunday Leader. I can understand this but feel that anyone really concerned could just decline to be included in the print concept and that would take care of that one. Indi says that identities would have to be revealed and an amount of trust given in order for the writers to be paid. It all makes sense but the possibilities of paying to charity, friends or even not paying, if the blogger was happy with that, all exist.

Some have said that many bloggers would be uncomfortable with the implicit association with the Sunday Leader that publication in print would cause. On the one hand this is entirely valid, particularly for a blogger who might write political posts or anything hard hitting. I think the mention of the Sunday Leader has come about because of Indi's association with it, but the principle would apply to whatever newpaper or publisher that might be involved.

Another side of the coin is that there would surely have to be some editorial influence from the paper or publisher. Reality would dictate that, were the Sunday Leader to be the "parent" and I wrote a post slagging off the Sunday Leader for something, then it would be unlikely to make its way into Kottu Mag.

One of the features many of us like about Kottu is the lack of editorial muscle it exerts. There are a few rules but they're mostly to do with not offending Indi's Grandmother and we're pretty much left to write what we like. Unless his Grandmother publishes newspapers I think Kottu Mag will be a bit more policed.

David Blacker has made what I consider to be one of the most important and relevant points to the viability of Kottu Mag; that with words being on paper rather than on screen, there'll be no links and the thing will lose the dynamism. I suppose this would be why many of us, the bloggers and people who spend so much time sitting at a keyboard, would rarely treat Kottu Mag as a substitute for the computer. We all enjoy the journeys when we click this then that and end up in some random corner of the internet, usually nudey women drum related.

The lack of links would make some blog posts that are positively the dog's bollocks onscreen totally impractical in print. I'm not saying that these are the dog's bs, but my "lately in the Lankanosphere" ones are an example. Excepting the fact that there'd be no reason to put one in a print format that's essentially in itself doing a "lately" thing anyhow, I do know that many like the fact that it's a bit of a roundup, albeit of the posts I like, and that I bung all the links in for people to click on and see what they may have missed. It would be useless in print.

However, if we take the approach that Kottu Mag would be a means of presenting some of our posts to an audience that probably wouldn't be reading us on the net, then surely the end result is a positive one, even without links.

If the concept is viable then that's when we should look at selection. There's been a fair amount of talk about fairness, objectivity and opportunity for all. People are discussing whether the top clicks on Kottu can be taken as an indicator of what's popular and if that should be used to decide what goes in Kottu Mag.

One fellow told us about code or something that can be used to change the top clicks on Kottu and that's something I know nothing about. But I do know that there are perfectly "legal" things we can all do to make our posts clickable. Chuck certain words in your title, write about the flavour of the month and people will click and read. It's not cheating, it's just working a system. The fact is that those posts are the popular ones, for whatever reason.

I say forget about all that, leave fairness out of it. The way forward in this kind of thing is to leave it to a person to decide. He, or she if things are really desperate, chooses what goes in and what doesn't. Then in the longer term, if the readers are unhappy with the choices, the editor should be replaced. This way there's no vague attempt to be portrayed as fair or objective, it's about what a person likes.

My conclusion is that Kottu Mag is a great idea, with caveats. It wouldn't be an alternative to reading the blogs we love on our computers, it would be a means of accessing a wider audience, which most of us want. If we don't, then we'd be able to opt out. I'm slightly apprehensive at the thought of newspaper reading Aunts sitting and flicking through the Sunday paper and reading one of my posts, then realising that I'm RD, but it's also quite exciting.

We'd still have the online Kottu and most of the objections to Kottu Mag are simply dealt with by asking not to be considered for publication.

And I thought of a final irony to this that has made me smile.

For people like me, who live outside of Lanka, we'd be unlikely to read a print version in our home towns, what with having to wait for the post and all. We'd probably log on and look at the net version of Kottu Mag, where we'd see a PDF or something of the print version of our blogs.

That's a bit mad isn't it?

I guarantee most of us would though.

Ego?

Moi?

Happy Birthday To The Don

If there's one blog on the Lankanosphere that can be considered legendary then it's Indi.ca.

And today is its birthday, its sixth birthday. I'm joining the throng of people who'll be wishing Indi.ca a very happy sixth birthday and I shall raise a glass to many more.

For a moment let's forget about Kottu and let's concentrate on Indi.ca. I know that's a bit like asking a fellow to look at Pamela Anderson and forget about Baywatch but just go with me on this. Go with me because I think Indi is quite literally and whatsiscalled, you know, not literally as well, linked with Kottu but his blog is a separate entity.

His blog is just like this one, like any of them listed on Kottu, yet it's easily the most popular one out there in the Lankanosphere. That, in itself, is no mean feat. And Indi does have some mean feet. Here's the evidence to prove it.

There are some blogs that do unique things, that have carved out a niche and sit comfortably in that niche continuing to do revolutionary things at regular intervals. Indi.ca is one. He talks about politics, about his family, his work and his life in general. Then he gives us photographs too.

The beauty about his blog is that he makes the reader feel as if we're walking alongside him through his life. We don't feel as if we're missing out on anything, it's really as if we're there all the time, like that thing about God on the beach and all. Sort of.

It definitely is one of the blogs I admire and respect. There's a handful of them and Indi's is in at about number one.

So many happy returns on this day Mr Ca.

Here's to the next six years and a thank you for the posts so far.

Lately In The Lankanosphere.....

My new tat is almost fully healed. It's not really to do with the Lankanosphere, I just wanted to tell you.

On the blog side things have been active, but active in a strangely new way. The old regulars are quiet, with just the fewest of exceptions. It's an interesting thing to observe some people come and go with their blogs while others come and stick around. Some don't even come but I haven't seen that many of them.

There have been a couple of interesting Groundviews things. The first was this interview of Tracy Holsinger with Sanjana, her of the theatre and stuff. I found it to be quite informative and entertaining and it makes a change from politics, meccano and other serious stuff normally on Groundviews.

It's not often I rant and rave, yet I feel a need to here. I tried to concentrate on the interview, honestly I tried my damndest, but I failed. Sanjana is a bloke with a brain about thirteen times the size of mine and he knows how to use it. I like him. Obviously he likes me. But those slippers!! Why??

I couldn't concentrate, I struggled to focus and I expected the fashion police to burst in at any moment and cart him off. I've figured out what had happened though. There he was, all smartly dressed and ready for the interview, about to go and sit down when he realised that he'd forgotten his Gucci loafers. In the rush he just had to grab what was around. And what was around was the slippers on his ninety six year old Uncle, there for the day to watch his nephew in action.

Next on Groundviews was this. It's a response to another article about post conflict Colombo society, but it seems to be much ado about nothing, not to be confused with much adoh about nothing. Having perused it with my expert eye I think the original article clearly talks about Colombo's upper eschelons, the moneyed types who eventually get arrested for some fraud then suddenly need medical treatment overseas. It's not about the everyday man or woman at all.

The article on Groundviews says this:

"The author needs to be reminded that next to every man is a woman who is his equal and his strength. Our women underwent immense hardships for Sri Lanka to win this war, but their war has not ended. For once, look up and notice who are organizing the aid drives for IDP’s now, who ensures that the entire family is fed and who will bare the sons that will lead our country into a brighter future."

It's mad and contradictory. Why? Because it's saying that women are the equal of men, that they are as strong. I agree, but then why say that it's their sons who'll lead the country into a brighter future? And, while I'm on a roll, "bare" should have been "bear". So thare. Yes, Girl RD is still around.

The Kottu stats indicate the Thekillromeoproject is the author of this month's most read post. It's about David Blacker wearing womens' clothes I think. I find it a bit hard to make sense of but it's getting hits.

Talking of David Blacker there's also this captivating interview with Dayan Jayatilleka. It's rather good, specifically because the questions are unusual and the answers are interesting. Check it out.

For me food has very much been flavour of the month. I've been watching a programme here called "Rick Stein's Far Eastern Odyssey". You'll be surprised to know that it features Rick Stein, a celebrity chef. Well last week's episode was almost entirely in Lanka. We were shown Galle, Colombo, Geoffrey Dobbs' place and other bits and pieces. It made me pine and has prompted me to look at a few Lankan related foodie blogs.

One of them is this one called mommythecook. It's written by a lady who's Lankan and lives in the US. It's not entirely about Lankan cooking but has a mixture of tales about recipes, food and life in general, all told from the point of view of someone who very obviously has that passion for Sri Lanka.

My other mouthwatering discovery is rice and curry, the blog not the food. It's written by an American Lankan called Skiz or S.H Fernando Jr to give him his proper moniker and it's a little bit special. There are recipes galore, all of Sri Lankan dishes and the photography and the prose are positively eye catching. There's also youtubes of a programme called No Reservations with Anthony Bourdain that our blogger was heavily involved in. Check this link for more.

Both the blogs are currently conspicuous by their absence from the Kottu blog roll, something I think the esteemed janitor might want to change. Incidentally the Kottu blog roll is also conspicuous by its absence from the front page of Kottu as it's now got its own link and page.

Continuing with the food theme Mr S has written this provocative little gem on some of Colombo's street eating joints. I quite like it when he writes about the lighter side of things, it adds a certain amount of shade to his blog that the rest of us are simply less able to do on our own ones.

All of these foodie blogs and posts have reminded me very much of how we diasporic types cling to our food as a means of staying connected to our heritage and country. I guess when you live in Lanka you don't think so much about the food, you just eat it and enjoy. For the rest of us it's a tangible link to Serendib. It's even got me thinking that I might add a food blog section to the links here on LLD.

Excuse the length of this one Missus, I've just noticed that there's a lot more to cover and I've already written a hell of a lot. If you're the type who's going to leave one of those comments about my blog being boring them you might want to do it now, exit and go and play solitaire or something.

I was interested on the link on this mini post by Dominic Sansoni. It leads us to an article in the New York Times lamenting the decline of photojournalism as a business, at least in its known form. I do wonder about this, the way in which modern technology, mobile phone, laptops, the internet and the way we're all so connected so quickly has impacted the professionals who gave us the news in the past.

Photojournalism, if it dies, won't be the last or the first industry to be killed off by technology and progress. Or on the other hand, if it does indeed die, will it be because it failed to change and adapt to the things going on in the world of communication?

Did I mention holidays? They're all at it. DD is off browsing in gun shops, eating burgers and driving on the wrong side of the road, which could easily be a normal day in many less salubrious parts of London but is in fact happening in the grand ole US of A. You can see some of his not quite good enough to become my photo of the moment pictures here.

JapSach has just returned from his little sojourn to Italy and you can see some very beautiful photographs of his adventures here.

Penultimately we come to everyone's favourite Gypsy, that Bohemian one. I'm aware that I go on about her but it's because I think she writes well. Every time she publishes a post I'm one of the many who reads it and thinks. That's a gift, as is one of those things wrapped up in colourful paper on your birthday.

She wrote a little postet about things. In a "you had to be there" way I can only say that you have to read it. It reminded me that the war may be over, but it's not over.

And finally we come to the Lankanosphere's blogger of the moment, Saintfallen. As I write this he's currently occupying three of this week's top ten Kottu posts as well as one of the top five for the month. I won't link to one specific post, just to his blog in general. Go and have a look if you aren't one of his regulars already. It's the variety of his posts and the depth in his blog that grabbed me, there's something fresh about his approach. He reminds me of a much younger Cerno.

Oh, and really finally, the master himself has got a brand spanking new theme, all spangly and glittery. As he says himself, check it out.

That's it from me, I bid you all a fine week out there in Lanka, the US, Australia or wherever you are.

RD

Women And Boxing

As I drove into work yesterday morning I listened with interest to a radio article about womens' boxing. It was there because Olympic chiefs were meeting yesterday to decide on the issue of allowing womens' boxing as part of the 2012 Olympics programme.

Now I'm not really a boxing fan. Fundamentally I feel that a sport with the objective of physically beating seven, or eight shades of crap out of your opponent and winning by being the best one at it is wrong. But, if people want to do it and are willing participants, then I say they should be allowed to. I just don't really want to watch it.

And as far as I'm concerned, if men are allowed to do it in the Olympics then women should be allowed to as well.

It was all so simple in my mind. Men are allowed, so should women be.

Then I heard something that messed up my mindset. It was the fact that one of the reasons cited for womens' boxing not allowed in the Olympics in the past was that, and I quote, hence the quotation marks

"premenstrual women boxers become overly emotional putting them at greater risk of injury."

Well I don't know about greater risk of injury but I know a little bit about premenstrual women. My observations are not that they'd be at greater risk of injury in the least. No way. There can be nothing more scary than the thought of a pre menstrual woman in a boxing ring.

Give me a choice between jumping into a boxing ring and facing a woman in the premenstrual month, for I know that the condition lasts for about a month, or an angry Swan with a hatred of Sri Lankan drummers I know exactly what I'd do.

I'd face neither, I'd bugger off to Odel and buy a shirt or something then hope they'd be gone by the time I returned. Or at least they wouldn't recognise me if I had a different shirt on.

Trust me here. I know about these things.

Deecee, Colombo, Excitement And Time, All In A Quickie

I think the title says it all really. It's a quick post to say some things. Quickly.

The first is a thank you to Dee. She's been reading my blog and has left a whole load of comments on many of my posts, nice ones. I mean nice comments, not necessarily nice posts. I was going to reply to each comment individually but thought a post would be nicer.

Thank you Dee. I actually put quite a lot of time and effort into my forays into the vastness of the Lankanosphere so it means a lot to know that you've read and enjoyed some of them. I'm truly touched by your words.

And then there's Colombo. Well I'm so fucking excited that I have no idea how I'm going to get through the next few weeks. Why? I booked a ticket the other day, a ticket to Serendib, a ticket to Serendib for me, moi, old RD.

So my usual countdown has begun and with my increasing familiarity with Lanka comes not a hint of blaseness, not the slightest bit of indifference nor any touch of nonchalence. Each time I go I get more excited. Even now, as I think of it, those butterflies start to flutter and I can feel my heartrate speed up a tad. I bet my bottom dollar that DD knows exactly how I feel, I bet he's half jealous and half pleased too.

I was thinking about time recently, saying to someone that time never passes as we expect it to, yet we're always surprised by it. What I mean here is that either things happen more quickly than we've imagined or more slowly. We see someone and are amazed that it's two years since we last saw them, saying that it feels like only a few weeks ago.

Or we talk about how the week or month is dragging on and taking much longer than it feels. We never say things like "gosh that week felt exactly like a week" or "yesterday felt just like twenty four hours to me", maybe just because that would be quite boring. Why is this?

That's things covered for now, hence the "quickie" thing in the title.

Did I mention I was excited?

My Animals And Other Family

As I settle into life in RD Towers I'm slowly getting used to something I hadn't anticipated; animals.

This life, this bang right on the river life, as least when combined with the somewhat oxymoronic heat of a British summer, is chock full of riverside nature. Most of it is good, all of it is interesting and some is a downright pain in the arse.

The window in my sitting room is about ten feet away from the water of the Thames, a little marina that runs at ninety degrees off the river. It's open and boats are moored in it, for a price, and all manner of river life swim, float and fly in. At first I struggled with it all. I just wasn't used to being woken up in the middle of the night by the squawking of ducks playing or the gaggle of a gaggle of geese.

These things are loud, there's a little black duck looking thing that appears to be the most vocal of them all. Amila would know what it was instantly, the long Latin name and all. To me they're just black ducks, ones that make very loud noises and look small. At first I'd hear the big and piercing noise and stare out trying to trace the owner of it. I'd focus on finding a Swan sized thing, perhaps a Pteradactyl or a Goose, all of which I see regularly there.

I was lying about seeing one of those birds regularly. Can you guess which one it is children? Though, I must confess that I'm seriously proud of the fact that I spelt it correctly first time, a quick google proved my guess to be correct, which I hadn't expected.

Swans are mean mothers aren't they? There are lots of the chaps in the vicinity and they scare me in a rather elegant way, maybe how Uma Thurman would if she turned up with a gun. There's nothing cuddly, cute or warm about a Swan. They just look elegant, dangerous and businesslike, with a strong neck that Michael Schumacher dreams of, just not as long.

David Blacker probably kills a Swan and eats it for breakfast with pol sambol before setting off to work and beating up Jean Claude Van Damme, Vin Diesel and Van Heusen on his way. I'm not hard like that and I look at the average Swan, not that any of them are average, and shiver girly style before making a face and running away.

The other evening, and I swear to you that this is true, I was sitting and flicking through the crap TV channels when I saw a Swan swim past my window. No big deal at all, they wander in the marina all the time. Then I saw another one. Then I saw another. I could go on here with a bit of copy and pasting but I won't, you get the gist. They kept coming, so many that I leapt up and scarpered to the window to get a proper look.

There were twenty five of them, I counted. They just swam in, looked around a bit, presumably for food, then the front fellow turned round and they all followed him out. I was amazed and startled. I wasn't aware that Swans travelled around in fleets or herds or whatever the collective term is for a start. C told me that it's a wedge of Swans but that's when they're flying. On top of that I was flabbergasted at the amount of the white beasts in this group and the way they appeared to exhibit a follow the leader mentality.

It's a frequent occurrence to hear flapping and slapping noises and see a Goose or two doing a crash landing thing outside my window. It has to be said that Geese just aren't good at landing, they're the bird equivalent of one of those holidaymaker videos of a plane coming into land at an unspecified airport in an unspecified country. They flap madly and then bounce along the water before coming to rest.

I've yet to witness it but I bet some of these Geese misjudge things and hit poles and things, perhaps other Eastern Europeans too. Once they come to rest they're the epitome of elegance and look as if calmness is their middle name. They also provide the best fat for making roast potatoes according to Nigella and Delia, which might explain their nervous landings.

At first I'd wake up a few times in the night disturbed by the sounds of birds fighting outside my bedroom window. I mentioned this to the aforementioned Blacker the other day and he said that he's often had the same thing happen to him. Turns out his birds don't have wings and are fighting over him, my ones are scrapping over food and well, whatever birds fight about.

These days I sometimes get woken by the noises but I reckon it's only the more violent ones. It's becoming the new backdrop to my nights though.

And there's the Spiders. Now I'm not the homophobic type, but I'm also no big spider fan. I avoid them yet don't have a huge fear of them, they just exist. But, in RD Towers, they exist as if they're going out of fashion. It must be to do with the river. It's not a musty old building by any means. All is clean, newish and tidy inside, but it's some sort of Spider haven. Not a day goes by when I don't walk through a web and then spend ages trying to get it out of my hair.

Every few days I can be seen hoovering the ceiling, the window frames and any other random place that gets Spiderised. I'll tell you what, if I could be a superhero I would not choose Spiderman, even if I got to wear the outfit.

Overall, Spiders excepted, I'm getting used to and fond of all this river life and birdlife. It's fun and engaging and new.

But I won't be going vegetarian tomorrow.

The Perfect Day With The Girls

'tis rare for me to come out with a good idea. I'm quite proud of the idea I had about Cerno's coffee table, the one about making a coffee table out of coffee table books, and my invention of the wheel was quite good too. But, all in all, I can't make any claims to fame as an ideas person.

The other day though I came up with one. During the divorce me and my ex came to an informal agreement about the arrangements for the summer holiday spell. It involves her taking them away one year and me doing the same the next year. Last year was my turn and I brought them to Lanka. It was fun, challenging, brilliant and tough, but time is a wonderful healer and I know that those were relatively early days.

This year they go away with their mother and I carry on with my normal life. My idea the other day, which might sound like nothing to you, was to take a day off work, take them out and do something that we'd all enjoy. After some negotiation we settled on going to Thorpe Park, a local amusement park, for the day. I use the work "local" there in an entirely subjective way. To you, who more than likely lives in Sri Lanka, it's not local.

My suggestion was initially met with apprehension, as I had been afraid of. I was unsure if thirteen and fifteen year old girls would be up for an amusement park with their Dad. K had been there and had a fantastic time only a few weeks ago, but that was with her friends. A is more into being cool these days, if being cool involves lounging around and watching TV, then telling all your friends on Facebook about what you've just been watching.

This scepticism and reluctance was something I dealt with rather niftily by offering up my counter plan to take them shopping in central London. They were keen on the idea and things were promising. Then, a day or two before the day I received a phone call.

"Dad, we were thinking."

"Ok K" I said guardedly.

"Well we'd actually quite like to go to Thorpe Park on Wednesday, we think it could be fun."

"Ok" I said again, as it's one of my favourite words and it seemed to suit.

And two days later, feeling like an outtake from the Inbetweeners, we were heading off to Thorpe Park. We'd agreed on a pick up time of 8.30 AM as it's summer holiday and we thought the place might be packed. So of course I got to their house at about 8.10 AM. I sometimes wish I could do something about my slightly obsessive earliness, then at other times figure that, at forty three, it's good to just accept some things about myself and go with my flow. The only time I'm late is if there's a song and a drumkit involved and I'm supposed to play.

There we were in the car. There was me, A, K and their seventeen year old cousin B, who was passing through London for a day. I was pleased to see her as it had been a year, perhaps more.

This is one of the things about divorce that many don't realise. Over the years you build relationships with your in laws, sometimes fellows even get to like them. B is a kid who I've known since the day she was born and I'm told that she looks upon me as a father figure, her own father being someone she has more or less no contact with.

I'm flattered and uncomfortable about this father figure business. You know enough about me and my life to understand that even my own kids don't think of me as a father figure (I am joking there, I think!) so for someone else to is a bit weird. But it's strange as B lives way out of London and the indisputable fact is that I have no real relationship to her by blood and now there's no connection even by marriage.

I hope it doesn't happen as I'm fond of her but, in the back of my mind, is the thought that the bond we have will fade with time and circumstance.

I digress.

Our journey was quick and accompanied by a car load of excitement and lots of Black Eyed Peas songs played really loudly. In particular the new one "I got a feeling" was on our playlist. All four of us love it and we sang, out of tune but not out of time, as I'm fussy about these things, to our hearts' content. We arrived, parked and got out of the car. The weather, at 9.00 AM, was warm and humid with that feeling that the day had nothing but more of the same to come. Things were looking good.

Even at that time in the morning there were hundreds of people there already, all queuing up ready for the place to open at 9.30 AM. I was a bit disappointed as I'd hoped we would be the only people in the world who'd come up with the cunning plan to get there early. It wasn't to be and I prepared myself to join the throng and queue up for hours on each ride.

Once we got in things looked different. The seemingly massive crowd got swallowed up by the vastness of the park within seconds and we found ourselves wandering around freely and effortlessly. I'd bought these fastrack tickets that enabled us to bypass queues on busy rides but they were hardly necessary as the queues were only a few minutes long on everything.

And we went on everything. We screamed and laughed our way through every single ride in town. A, K and B knew all the names for the rides and exactly what they were. I was clueless. I couldn't recall if Stealth was the one that made my stomach churn or my head spin dizzily, I couldn't remember if Collossus was the one that had ten 360 twists in a row or if it was the one that I saw Wembley stadium from.

All I knew was that I got to a point at which I was just laughing uncontrollably on every ride. I laughed with happiness, I laughed with fear and I laughed with joy, the joy of watching my daughters laughing and being joyful. We'd cracked jokes beforehand about divorced Dads and bonding, A had put up a jokey message on her FB about it. All of a sudden we really were doing it, kind of like the boiling frog, except it was fun.

It wasn't two kids, a late teenager and an adult out doing something, it was four kids having unadulterated fun. We got soaked on a water thing, we went from 0-80 mph in less than two seconds on another one and we dropped down what felt like a liftshaft in the dark. Then, we stuffed our faces with KFC for lunch and went and did it all again.

Afterwards we returned to RD Towers and chilled and recovered. We were all knackered and I was surprised at just how tiring all the rides actually were. I guess it's the adrenalin flow and the tension that runs through you for a minute as you grip the seat and harness with everything you've got.

Then I took them out for dinner at the local noodle bar. It was food that was much needed and was wolfed down with gusto, not to be confused with pesto.

We watched Midsomer Murders, I guessed who the murderer was and then I dropped them all home.

I slept like a baby that night. Or perhaps a log, I never really understand the difference.

I felt so pleased that the day had gone brilliantly, enjoyed by all.

Every once in a while I come up with a great idea.

Cool.

One True Cool Lady Divine

With a sad tear rolling out of one eye and a happy tear rolling out of the other one it's time to bid farewell to Ian S and say hello to Lady Divine, well to their blogs at least.

I must admit to having a soft spot for the good Mr S. He was one of the very first people to read my blog, his was one of the first I read and life has evolved in such a way that I find myself with connections to him that are too unlikely to be found in fiction. It's more proof to me that, in the life of a Sri Lankan, six degrees of separation is merely a furrowed brow inducing concept that happens to other people in far off countries.

But the facts are there for all to see. His blog hasn't been updated for over four months and a dead link in the rapidly evolving world of hyperlinks and can actually be a negative to one's own blog. He's out, he's gone, white suit and all. A return to posting will see him back in the hallowed wall of links on LLD.

And you know what they say; as one door closes another one closes. So I'm pleased to welcome a new link to these parts. I'm embarrassed to say that this blog is one I've been reading for a long long time and have never linked to. More than anything it will make my life easier. There'll be no more scrolling through Kottu wondering why it isn't there until I remember that it has an "a" at the beginning so it's filed in the A section.

David Blacker once described my blog as a "pimped up diary", a label that I like and feel quite chuffed with. Some write blogs to do good, some to change the world, or maybe their island. Some write to write, coming out with poetry and prose, rhyme and oh I wish I could have thought of something to rhyme with "rhyme" there. I write, if one can label it as such, just to empty my head, to chuck out some of the many thoughts, questions and ruminations that go on there. I tell you the reader about things that have been going on in my life, as do many of us.

And Lady Divine, who many know anyway, does similar, but with a degree of honesty and openness that I find unusual. When I say "unusual" I mean it in a nice way, not in the way that Dinidu's habit of cracking eggshells between his arse cheeks is unusual. Lady Divine's blog is a definite heart on sleeve blog, not so much a pimped up diary as a totally open and reveal her soul diary.

This could all be a front, though I suspect not. It might just be the case that behind closed doors our LD is a mentalist with a thirst for blood and a hunger for flesh. Or worse, a Lankan MP maybe. It is very unlikely and it's her honesty that makes her blog appeal to so many people and readers. It's the sense of openness that makes so many want to follow her triumphs, her disasters and her interractions as we sporadically accompany her through her days.

Just in case you're one of the few that haven't read her blog I'd recommend it. You can click on the brand new link on the left if you want, as long as I remember to do it.

Happy Monday all.

One Of The Nicest Things About Me!

It's not often you'll hear me getting all slushy and romantic here at LLD. I feel that, at 43, I'm a bit past all that. Not past it in relation to how I act, I'm alright on the romantic side I think, but I'm not going to get all bloggy about it. I'm not going to pen love poems and share little stories with you about walking along beaches and holding hands with C.

Nor will I suddenly start bunging in words from Bryan Adams songs as if they're just nice songs and not to do with the things going on in my mind. Or Milli Vanilli songs at that.

But, I will tell you this story.

There I was, chatting to C on the phone, something we do a lot of, mostly because she's in Singapore and I'm here, here being London. The conversation drifted effortlessly towards an Any Winehouse song, as they do. I sung the drum part to the song.

You'll know the one, it's that incredibly funky one, I forget the name but the groove goes like this:

doom dar ger doom doom dah
doom dar ger doom doom dah
doom dar ger doom doom dah
doom dar ger doom dah dah

meet me down here... blah blah

That one. Well I hummed the groove for a bit and C said to me, all romantically, as much as she ever does.

"Do you know, that's one of the nicest things about you? It's one of the first things I noticed in you."

"What is? " I said, kind of knowing but afraid that I was correct.

"The fact that you can sing drum noises well."

I had hoped for more. There's my business acumen, my fabulous sense of humour, there's my incredible good looks and my passion for many things. She could have chosen my sharp mind, my natural sense of style, my ability to remember which Indian restaurant serves which good dishes or my chicken curry. Perhaps the way I love my family and friends.

She could even have mentioned my really special skill, one that even you don't know about, my ability to drink water from a bottle, tilt my head back and then get the water to dribble out of both corners of my mouth simultaneously, with equal force. It's taken me some time to perfect it and it's something women don't fully appreciate.

But no.

One of the nicest things is my ability to sing drum sounds.

Pah, was all I could say really. Who said romance was dead?

I retired.

Hurt.

Ba doom tish.

There Are Three Kinds Of People

Those who can count to three and those who can't.

Ha! Sorry, just my little Poya day joke, I hope Poya day jokes aren't banned these days.

I was thinking about charity the other day and did decide that there are three types of people;

There are those who just don't do anything for charity, those who do things for charity and talk about it and then those who do things for charity and don't talk about it.

The first group isn't an issue for me. I figure that people have reasons, ranging from outright selfishness to lack of resources, that it's up to them and their conscience.

The second and third groups are the ones that create some of the old RD mental turmoil. Is it too simplistic to say that the people who do charity work and keep quiet about it are the "better" people, whatever "better" actually means?

Perhaps it's just my own values and judgement that are coming into the fray but I can't help the feeling that the person who wants to do good for others and then can walk away happily without telling anyone is the truly great person.

But, if they tell no one there's the danger that they'll be seen as a group one person, someone who does nothing for good causes. Maybe that doesn't matter to a truly content person.

Some people, I'm sure you know many of them, are outrightly and blatantly driven by recognition as their main motivator. You know the type, the ones who'll always want to be the star, who have to be the loudest, the tallest, the most talked about in the room. They'll do one good deed and tell a thousand people about it. They're driven by the need to be recognised and powered by the recognition they get.

We're all motivated by recognition, just in varying degrees. I love the feeling of finishing a gig and getting some recognition from people, some applause and pats on the back, a bit of praise and admiration. I don't thing that recognition is number one in my motivators though, responsibility is.

Those people who do charitable acts and keep it quiet are my real heroes. Well I suppose my actual heroes are the ones who mention things to a few people, preferably me being one of them. Those that make a big song and dance about things I can't be that bothered with.

The fact remains that, whether they make a song and a dance or keep totally quiet, they still do their bit for charity. So that's good then.

Isn't it?

What about you? Would/could you do things for good causes and not tell a soul?

The honest truth is that I think I'd struggle, but can exist happily with only telling a few.

The Latest In My Life

The tattoo's itching like fuckery at the moment. It's also interesting to observe as it heals and meanders along the road towards smoothness.

The lumpiness has gone and the lines are more defined. The scabbing's beginning and I'd like nothing better than a good old scratch. Note to self, don't wear a nice crispy white polo shirt when there's a likelihood that I'll get tattoo goo on it during the day.

Tomorrow (Weds) I'm taking the girls off on a day out, along with their cousin who I'm told looks upon me as a father figure. Which is nice.

We're going to Thorpe Park. I'm excited, possibly more so than A and K. K's been busily planning which rides we're going to go on and in what order. It's quite the precision operation and I'll be picking them up at 9 AM ready for the big adventure.

I'm seriously looking forward to a bit of high octane rollercoastering. A, in her too cool for school fifteen year old way put this up as her Facebook status:

"I'm going to Thorpe Park tomorrow with my Dad. I think there'll be bonding...."

Too bloody right there will. It's my summer holiday with them.

The band has broken up for the summer. We had our last gig last week until we reconvene in September. The gig was quite high profile, with people like Mike Gatting and Chris Tarrant there and we kicked some arse and I grooved like the funky brown machine that I'd like to be.

It's nice to have a break and yet I miss the playing at the same time. Funny that isn't it? Lots of practice is in my plan. I'd get so much done if I didn't do quite so much planning though.

We've got a list of homework songs for the summer, new ones to learn and try out when we get back together. What do you think?

1. Learn to Fly - The Foos
2. Handbags and Gladrags - Stereophonics etc
3. Heroes - David Bowie
4. I'm on Fire - Kasabian
5. Stay with me - Small Faces
6. Just - Radiohead.

I'm particularly eager about 1, 3, 5 and 6. And 4 actually. There's also talk of Mr Brightside. I'm not so keen but seems that the rest of the world loves it.

In the car these days is the new Black Eye Peas offering. It's getting almost constant play and I reckon I might get bored of it very soon. In fact, I've got a feeling.

The asparagus phase has passed, quite literally, and I'm now on a pasta fad. Cooking up the stuff, with any chili based sauce is becoming quite the thing round RD Towers.

Talking of RD Towers I'm getting a hell of a lot of flies and things on the ceiling there. I think it's to do with the river and the summer, though why these things believe we have a summer here is beyond me. Twice recently I've caught myself hoovering the ceiling, very Lionel Ritchie but with an electrical appliance rather than a dance type move.

That's about it really.

Wishing you all a joyful Poya day.

RD

Photo Of The Moment

I've been gazing at this picture intermittently for some weeks now, ever since Mr Posingis chucked it up on his blog.

There are several reasons why it takes my breath away in quite spectacular style.

The first is that it evokes feelings and stirs my senses. I can smell the air, I can hear the noises, the animal sounds, the cricket type hissing and the vague and distant occasional car horn or diesel rumble.

It makes me think of stopping for lunch in another half hour or so and having the rice and curry buffet at a rest house.

I've always wanted, yet never managed, to take a picture that has hills and that gradual shading that turns one colour into an infinite number of tones. This picture must contain just about every shade of black and white possible.

The sheer scale and depth of the image is crucial in its success as a photograph and Sebastian has added the tree in the foreground to emphasise the feeling of grandness to the landscape. Without that tree the picture would be very different, maybe even average. God, they say, is in the details, something I agreed with on Sunday as I looked at the subtle green stitching on my new brown belt.

But rationalising and using logic, analysing and considering the "rules" of photography are all well and good, perhaps correct and maybe incorrect.

The most important thing is that this picture makes me feel excited, it gives me that real butterfly feeling in my stomach. That's when I know it's a little piece of magical imagery.

What I Did Last Week

It's a Monday morning and the only sensible thing is to start by apologising for revealing a tad of RD flesh at this stage of the day and week, even a wrist. So I'm sorry, particularly if it's put you off your breakfast.

There it is. I've pontificated long enough, but tat two has been chosen and installed and I'm particularly pleased with it. There's no deep significance to it, no meaning at all. It's not an ancient family symbol or a way of expressing my passion for Lanka or drumming in a language that many wouldn't understand, all of which are things I considered.

It's just a design that I liked, which is probably a good way of choosing. The second choice, the only other viable option was the Chinese character for drum. I spent many minutes looking at it and contemplating, in the end deciding that Chinese characters are a bit too high fashion, that in years to come they'll look as if I had something done that was all the rage at the time. This one also matches tat one, hopefully not so much that I'm doing the bodily art equivalent of wearing jeans with a matching denim jacket.

I went for dinner at the 'rents' place on Friday night and I must admit I was amused and slightly surprised by their reaction. My Mum took a look at it and her instant reaction was a grimace and an "uurgh" as if she was watching one of those emails fellows send round, the ones that are fundamentally vile but you feel compelled to watch again and again.

Then her interest got the better of her and she looked at it in detail and asked questions about it, how it takes to heal, how it felt and so on.

My Dad was just funny. He took one look at it, said "chee" and made a face as if I'd just been found guilty of attempting to assassinate Barack Obama while wearing a T shirt saying that I was doing it on behalf of my family on my Dad's side. Yes, it was a "chee" with a particularly hard ch to it.

Later on over dinner I laughed. They've got a couple of guests staying there, pretty much compulsory for Sri Lankan parents I know. I was showing the tattoo to the guests, not by choice but because my Mum had done the Lankan mother thing of telling them about it and making me show them.

One half of the two guests said that he'd quite like to get one and casually asked my Dad if he had any.

"No" came the reply.

"I don't believe in them."

"They do exist you know Dad" was my all too clever retort.

"They're not like UFOs or ghosts."

He scowled at me, in that way that I try to scowl at the girls but can never quite manage.

I shut up.

The parents bit was easy.

I've yet to tell the girls and A quite seriously told me that she might not talk to me ever again if I was to get a second one done.

We'll see on Wednesday.

Have a splendid week all.

Tat Two - Vut Too Doo?

I've ponced about with the idea before but the decision is made now and there's no going back. Unless I change my mind.

The decision is to get a tat on the inside of my right wrist. All I have to do now is figure out exactly what I want done.

This right wrist is the perfect position for what I want and I'm amazed that I hadn't thought of it before as a potential site. The one I already have, at the top of my left arm, I'm totally pleased with. Yet it doesn't really come out to play and get seen unless I'm swimming, bathing or having sex.

And let's face it, I bathe on my own, I swim like a brick and sex can be scarce in this life. On top of that I'm not a sleeveless T shirt kind of chap, even when on the drums in a dodgy pub. So I wanted a new location that gave a bit more public viewing but could still be hidden and kept away from people in a business environment.

The right wrist has the clever benefit of being able to be hidden by a sleeve as well as revealed by a T shirt. I can't believe no one's ever thought of it before.

So to the design. I posted some time ago about this and still would like to come up with something Sri Lankan, but it's proving a hard task, all about balance and taste. You see, if I were to get a Lankanish thing, then I wouldn't want it to be corny, I wouldn't want a Lankan to see it and roll their eyes and think "what a twat", any more than they normally would I mean.

Images of Kandyan drums and drummers are ideas that I've more or less rejected. Getting a tattoo artist here to do something like a Kandyan drummer may well end up with something that resembles a picture of a fat bird in a skirt with an oil drum around her waist. No disrespect to the inkers here but most of them won't know exactly how it should look and I've struggled to find enough pictures or diagrams on the net.

The option of waiting until the next time I hit Serendib is there, just not a favourable one because of impatience.

I toyed with the idea of having an outline map of the island but figured that, to the average Suddha, it would just look like an insignificant squiggle. Lions and flags were considered and turned down for potentially having too many extreme connotations.

I've also pondered on the possibility of getting a copy of one of the Sigiriya frescos but it's fraught with risk. Get it done badly and people would just think it was a picture of that long haired bloke at House Of Fashions. The only good thing that could come from that would be a bit of discount but it would take years to even get back the cost of the tat, so that's a no go.

A nice one of Naz Sansoni was also considered, then rejected because of a technicality, well Dom. Then, while thinking of other well known Lankans, of course Indi made an appearance. I reckon I might be the first person to have an Indi tattoo and could start a trend, perhaps with Kottu.org or Indi.ca just underneath.

But then I realised that Indi, good guy and all round hero anyway, does not possess a face I'd like to wake up and find staring at me in the middle of the night. I'm sure there are women who would love the thought, I'm just not one of them.

The Gyppo was also rejected. A pretty face and all, but huge big feet. That's why she never falls over you know and can swim really fast.

The initials of the girls, as well as Chinese characters are out. When I say Chinese characters I'm talking about letters, not Cato from the Pink Panther. The girls are fundamentally against the idea anyhow, with A saying that she'll probably hate me if I do it, so getting their initials would probably be rubbing ink in the wound.

So the search is on in earnest. I'm out and about visiting tattoo parlours looking for the one. Searching on the net for a tattoo is a bit like describing a colour to a blind person. It's only going to give me the very vaguest of ideas about what it will look like on me and it's next to impossible when I'm so hazy about what I want. Googling Lanka and drums just comes up with some idiot's blog.

Vut too doo?

Quite literally.

Pre Gig Thinking Aloud

You'll be reading this on Wednesday morning and everything I've written will be all in the past, but I think you're bright enough to figure things out.

Come, sit with me and I'll talk you through my mind. Here we are. It's a Tuesday morning, it's 9.56 and tonight's a gig night. I'm going through my usual schedule for a weeknight gig. It's one of bananas, deodorant, water and nerves, not necessarily in that order, and some banging under my desk.

The bananas and water are my new friends in the battle against drummer's cramp. It's a battle that me, the bananas and the water are winning though increasing age might be creeping up on the blindside for a surprise attack. I read somewhere recently that a top level drummer is as fit as a professional footballer and uses up as much energy in a gig as a player uses in a match.

Well I think it's safe to say that I'm nowhere up to David Beckham's level of fitness. For starters I've only got the one tattoo and then I'm not a professional drummer out on tour doing a gig a night. Nevertheless it's hard work to drum my way through about twenty five kicking songs with only a ten or fifteen minute break and a singer who thinks that drummers shouldn't be allowed to grab some water between songs.

In recent gigs I've found this awkward and was gettting a bit, well a lot of cramp in a multitude of RD limbs. The show must go on and the more keen drummer watchers would have witnessed my trying to play I Predict a Riot while fighting cramp in my right calf as well as my right hand and wrist. It wasn't the most confortable of situations and some googling has led me to the discovery that lots of water and bananas can help prevent the crampy stuff.

So these days my pre gig routine consists of eating King Louie sized helpings of bananas with simply lashings of mineral water. That's rock 'n' roll for you. It's rock 'n' roll when you're in a covers band that plays for fun and you've got work the next morning and the girls that evening.

It's also our last gig of the season. After a busy time in recent weeks this is our last one until we reconvene after the summer. It reminds me of something I read in a book, where the chap muses on how he never realised, whilst having sex for the very last time before sufferring from impotence, that it was actually going to be his last time.

For all I know it could be the band's very last gig. We have no more booked, though I'm sure we will have soon, and who knows what might happen. There could be musical differences, a nasty gardening accident, a banana overdose or any number of things that might split us up in the meantime. Or impotence.

My god, what if I never have sex again as well?

The deodorant is a bit of the pre gig routine also. Leaving straight from work means that a burst is essential. I've got myself these new Lynx bullet things, tiny cans of deodorant about three inches long that you can carry around for emergencies. Apparently I'm going to smell of rare leathers and be irresistible to women. I hope the rare leather isn't like the chamois in my Dad's garage.

Nerves are a bit alien to me. I get nervous and a bit apprehensive but have never been one of those puking up round the back of the stage sort of chaps. Once we've set up and soundchecked my nerves tend to be the impatient type. I hate the waiting, the standing around, the having a drink and a bite and chatting. I love the banter side of it, just wish that the clock could be fast forwarded and we could get on and play.

I'll often be found sitting quietly and practicing on a pad, doing paradiddles and single stroke rolls, the drummer's equivalent of keeping the oil in the engine. Under my desk I have two bass drum practice pedals and the girls in my office are used to the sound of bass drum patterns wafting out of my office. At least that's what they think.

My mind, in its drifting state, wanders over to the subject of all these trolls around the Lankanosphere. What do I think of them? Some of them are genuinely funny, some are merely vicious and some are cruel. One or two are funny, vicious and cruel in a hit or miss type of way. I suppose the fact that I get quite a lot of "attention" is a symptom of LLD being quite popular.

The truth is that sometimes these comments annoy me, a troll feeding line if ever I wrote one, but only in a slightly puzzled way. This was never meant to be a serious blog tackling serious issues. It's always been the pimped up diary chronicling the quite normal events of my day to day life. When I get criticism for writing boring stuff I genuinely get bewildered.

On one hand it can't be that boring as, let's face it, I get a reasonable amount of hits. On the other hand it's bound to be boring to some but I've never claimed that I'm trying to write the blog equivalent of an action packed H(B)ollywood film. Surely complaining about my blog being boring is like ordering beef at a restaurant and then complaining that it doesn't taste like fish?

I think I'll leave you on that note, for fear of putting too many people to sleep. It's almost two hours since I started writing this, though I've been doing plenty of other things as well, and the car has to be packed with drums and other things need to be done.

It's been a bit of a stream of consciousness thing, I wonder if I should make it a tag. Nope, it's a thought but probably not a good one.

Ooooh, I'm all excited about tonight now. And I've eaten two bananas.

Laters

RD

Automatics And Blue Lights, Snails And Germans

I've been spending recent days driving in unusual cars. When I say unusual I mean unusual to me, not that they've got seven wheels or engines powered by string hoppers or something. Actually, if I did have a car that ran on string hoppers I'd never get out of my parking space at RD Towers anyway.

As I mentioned in another installment the Satnav on the RD chariot decided to go to the place where Satnavs go to die and required a new DVD drive in order to come back to life. I assume it already knew how to get to that place or it may have got lost as it wasn't working.

The car, after several shenanigans and several hundred spondulicks, was returned to me. I was pleased yet disappointed with the expense. I was pleased that it was fixed, pleased that my software had been upgraded, though the only major difference I could see was that the graphics were in a slightly brighter tone, and pleased that I had the car back with working satnav.

I was also pleased that I thought of and got to use the word "spondulicks" in a post, though that came later. I've never used it in writing before and may start to use it more.

Now I'm by no means a petrolhead yet I do like cars, it's probably accurate to say that my knowledge of them is slightly above average for a bloke. I know my BHP from my MPH, my torque from my talk and my cylinders from my cup holders. I like to drive with a bit of ooomph and speed but my idea of car maintenance is checking the oil level with the iDrive and putting water in the windscreen washer tank when it's needed.

I like cars, I know a bit about them, that's it really. For me they're more than a method of getting from A to B, or C even, if that's what takes your fancy.

So the RD chariot has a rather powerful 3.0 litre fuel injected straight six engine, one of those sporty interiors and of course a stereo that goes up to eleven. I like it and I use it.

Imagine my pissed offishness then when, thirty six hours after getting it back, it decides to laugh in my face. Again.

There I was, driving to work. I put my foot down as I came off this roundabout, in the place where I almost always do it. I got up to about 60 in second gear, as I always do. The rev counter was just about hitting the red line, as it always does. I went to change into third. Nothing happened, as it never does.

If I was one of the type who drive a really old car, maybe one as ancient as five years old, then I would have thought my clutch cable had snapped, that was how it felt. I'm knowledgeable enough to know that these beasts don't have clutch cables, it's all done by magic and German technology. Yes, I'm pretty advanced with the old mechanics and I knew immediately that something was seriously wrong with the hydronautics.

I cruised to a halt then managed to limp into work in second gear, then had that sick feeling as I watched the car dispatched on the back of a tow truck back to the dealership. I've had better mornings, if the truth is what you desire.

I was carless and annoyed but a phone call to the 'rents took care of the first part. Within a few hours I was driving back to my office in my Mum's VW Polo. It's got a 1.4 litre engine, an automatic gearbox and a cushion on the driver's seat. It's even got a cassette player, which kind of freaked me out a bit. It's four cars ago that I last had a cassette player.

But the relevant thing was that it was driveable, a fact that I was grateful for, something my expensive piece of German er technology wasn't. Frankly I'd rather be in a car with a cassette player that moved than be in one with a CD player that didn't.

A 1.4 litre engine isn't the most powerful thing in the world. It may be good for the environment, it may burn less fuel and run more economically than a camel in a water factory, but let's face it, it's hardly going to be Benjamin Button's or Jensen Interceptor's choice of engine in the next Grand Prix. On top of that this one is an automatic. Can you believe it?

I don't know about you but for the life of me I just can't get to grips with automatic gearboxes, though some would say, particularly after reading this post, that I struggle with manuals too. To be a passenger in an automatic car when driven by me must feel like travelling in a kangaroo. I can't get the hang of the braking and the accelerating, though I'm proficient on the steering side of things.

Every journey I went on was a series of leaping and bounding from one stoppage to the next. Each little touch on the brake pedal resulted in either a sharp emergency stop type stop, as if the driving examiner had just slammed his notepad on my dashboard, or nothing whatsoever, no slowing of the car and no decrease in revs. Which of course meant that I'd have to do an emergency stop in a couple of seconds' time anyhow.

Then pulling away from the stoppage invariably involved putting my foot flat to the floor and feeling as if the accelerator had stopped working, only to realise that there was some vague forward movement, just slower than nature had intended. I imagine that the engine compartment in these Polos contains a treadmill contraption that's actually powered by a team of geriatric snails, all of whom are on a hunger strike and going a bit slower than normal.

I got through things eventually. I must apologise if you were stuck behind me in the last few days. I bet it was frustrating for you and I can offer no excuses.

The silver lining?

These VW Polos, they've got blue lights on the dashboard. Each time I turned on the lights the whole fascia glowed with this very lovely shade of blue. It was most relaxing and eye catching.

Very groovy I must say.

Drummer In Action

Morning all.

Here's my new favourite picture of an unknown drummer in action.

Good looking bloke eh?

The Blonde In The Lift

Well, you know me, you know that I'm partial to a blonde. Give me Britney over J Lo, give me Rachel over Monica, the blonde one in Abba over the redhead, as long as he shaved his beard off. But, it can't be easy being a blonde and I sometimes feel sorry for them, no more so than the other night when I got home.

I was unloading my car of drum kit as we drummers so often have to do. RD Towers is one of those apartment blocks in which you only occasionally get to meet the neighbours, everyone keeps themselves to themselves but are also quite friendly and jolly when we meet, even if I am one of those darkies. It's all very British, but pleasant.

And you know what a bass drum looks like right? It's round, it's drum shaped and big. There are few things in life that look like a bass drum, even when it's in a case, a bass drum shaped case.

There I was, dragging the bass out of my car when another car pulled up next to me. We have allocated spaces in the RD Towers underground car park and it seems that the modus operandi is to wave at each other and be friendly, just not too friendly. This car pulled up and a blonde woman, probably a bit younger than me, though most people I see are these days, got out and said hello.

She asked if I'd moved into my flat number, which I of course had, and introduced herself. I reciprocated and put down the drum in order to shake her hand. Who said drummers weren't polite? She seemed nice enough but had one of those squeeky voices, the kind that you get on blondes on reality TV programmes, the kind that suggest that the owner has such a voice because the sound echoes around an empty head before it leaves the mouth.

We got into the lift together. There was me, the blonde, my bass drum and an elderly looking woman who had got out of the blonde's car with her and I assumed to be her mother. She had that motherly look about her and didn't say much. It was a bit cramped but of course these things are relative. If it was a Sri Lankan bus if would have been more or less empty and I would have wondered what the mirrors were doing on the walls, why it had buttons that went from one to four.

As we went up in the lift there was a second or so of silence and then blondie came out with it

"So what's that you got there then?" she squeeked.

I looked at her with a squinty thinking expression. Was she quite smart and having a joke? Was she a few steps ahead of the game? Maybe underneath the bimbo look there lurked a keen and agile mind. But she gave little away.

"Eh?" I replied with all the charm and eloquence of Bertie Wooster being caught stealing something by Aunt Agatha.

"What's that there?" she pointed to my bass drum and it became obvious that she really didn't know.

Fifty three possible witty answers flashed through my mind. Responses like saying it was a huge can of baked beans to a small child that I like to carry around in a circular case were considered and rejected. I was in a lift, there wasn't much space and she was a neighbour of mine. On top of that she clearly wouldn't have understood the sarcastic reply, her mother might have beat me up and, as I say to K so often, it's not a joke if you're the only one laughing. And I would have been.

"Oh it's a bass drum." I said, then explained about being a drummer, gig etc, you know the stuff. I hoped the many mirrors in the lift hadn't revealed the roll of my eyes as I answered.

Some people eh? How on earth can blondes have more fun?

That's my story about the girl in the lift. I'm sure someone else told one once...

Merry weekend all.

The Addictive Personality?

I was cruising back to RD Towers the other night and listening to a phone in type radio show that I often choose.

One of the topics was alcoholism and several people were ringing in to talk about their experiences with it and of it. I found myself feeling sad, happy, grumpy, dopey and sneezy. Then I realised that I wasn't actually Snow White in a porn setting and was just sad and happy.

The stories were like that, yet I skilfully retained my outward composure and calmness whilst driving. I didn't want the public outside my window to witness the spectacle of a crying or laughing me.

Many of the callers mentioned the fact that they thought they had an "addictive" personality and that that was why they had become alcoholics. I found this to be highly interesting on several levels.

The first one is that I've always wondered if there is actually such a thing as an "addictive personality". Is it just another way of labelling someone who has a low amount of willpower, a person who's easily led perhaps?

I smoked from the time I was fifteen years old to a few years ago. I "gave up" now and then, but always restarted. Until last time. I stopped by using the Allen Carr method and I now know that, even if I do start again, I'll stop again. It sounds a bit mad but my mindset has totally shifted. I don't smoke. Full stop, but the full stop was before.

I'm not one of these people who struggles to get through each hour, day, week and month without a smoke. I just don't do it and there's no big battle of willpower that goes on, nor was there from the moment I stopped.

The thing is, when I did smoke, I was one of those confirmed smokers. I could never have been one of those people that many smokers envy, the dreaded social smoker, the type who can go out and have a few drinks, smoke a few cigarettes then go home and not smoke until the next occasion.

I was a dedicated thirty a day smoker, a wake up and have a fag (in english), a have one as the last thing at night type of fellow. People used to say that I was a bloke who looked as if I enjoyed each cigarette, by and large I did. Then I started to hate it, then I stopped.

My point in saying this is that I thought I had an addictive personality yet I stopped smoking without going through the whole battle of willpower that so many do. One of the principles of the Allen Carr stop smoking method is that willpower isn't involved. As soon as it was removed from my situation, as soon as I thought I didn't have to face this ongoing turmoil I was okay.

Also I've noticed that many people, and I reluctantly include myself in this group, choose to label themselves as addictive personalities. It's become a sort of badge of honour that we talk of as if it's bad, but the reality is we love it and subtly boast about it.

"Ooh I shouldn't. I've got a bit of an addictive personality you know"

It's become like saying you're a bit edgy, a bit of a loose cannon, not to be confused with a loose canon, one of those priests who puts it about a bit. To have an addictive personality equates to glamour, the rock 'n' roll lifestyle, people like Slash and Keith Moon. It never conjures up images of sad alcoholics living a lonely life and dying.

It's second only to people saying that they're a bit OCD about something. That's all the rage these days isn't it? The average bloke who likes Chinese food will describe himself as "a bit OCD about Chinese food" instead of just saying he likes the stuff. And also, while I'm on a roll here, it's actually more of a trait in women than with men isn't it?

Lastly this addictive personality thing interests me as, of course, I think I've got one, yet I remain unsure if they really exist. One of the things the chap on the radio said last night is that most people, when giving up one addiction, will switch to something else. In effect what he said was that addictive personalities are a fact and, for that type of person, they'll always be addicted to something, be it gambling, smoking, drinking or cheese.

I wonder.

I'm currently going through a serious asparagus phase. In fact I think I'm a bit OCD about it.

What sayeth thou?

Dogs - Intelligent Companions Or Stupid Animals?

It's important that I set my stall out nice and early here; I'm not a dog lover, I'm not really a pet lover of any sort. I tolerate them, I love elephants and leopards and I particularly like chicken, not the skin though, except KFC skin, that's tasty.

But I also don't hate dogs, contrary to popular opinion, I'm just in that indifferent camp.

I look at canines, I observe their and their owner's (or should that be the other way round) behaviour and figure that these four legged furry things have some fine and admirable qualities.

They're usually fine, faithful and loyal companions, except when they sometimes turn on and kill or maim their owner or a child of course. They not called man's best friend without good reason and there appears to be no other animal that can demonstrate the loyalty and sense of duty that a dog will.

But, as nice, devoted and trainable as they are, I firmly believe that dogs, as animals go, rank quite highly up on the animals that are stupid chart. I got into a discussion about this with a friend the other day and she said that I was judging dogs as being lesser than other animals and that was wrong.

Well I'm not. I see it as a passing comment, a criticism and an observation. In the same vein as if I mention that you've got black hair or wear glasses. It's a fact, though you might choose to argue with me, not something that makes a dog a "worse" animal than another. But, they're thick, they're stupid and still many people love their canine to bits.

Some people cite a dog's ability to be trained to do simple tasks, sitting, fetching and rolling over and having their bollocks stroked as examples of their supreme intelligence. No, I say. The fact that just about any dog will run the length of a football pitch to retrieve a mouldy foul smelling stick, that the average fellow can be trained to sit in just about any situation on hearing the command just proves that they're not up there in the gifted league.

Would you or I, after training, respond to these commands by sitting down, then running off feeling quite happy because we've been rewarded with a biscuit, a crappy tasting one at that? No way, because we're intelligent, though I'll do most things if there was a pile of white string hoppers at the end of the rainbow.

Cats, which many people dislike as pets, are quite boring and uninteresting compared to dogs. Well I reckon that's because they're far more intelligent. Try to teach a cat to sit and it will just look at you with that "oh fuck off tosspot" look. They don't need to be taken outside to do their ablutions because they can figure things out for themselves. They can find their way back home whereas the average dog couldn't find its way to out of a wet paper bag.

They (cats) can also jump down from very high places, a feat that must be admired by anyone. Can you imagine a dog attempting to jump form a height of ten or twelve feet down onto a smallish ledge. It would end in tears, broken limbs and that whinging sound dogs make.

It is clear that there are differences in intelligence between the various dog breeds, but fundamentally they're all still down there in the lower ranks. Some dog loving types will say that these Police and Narcotic seeking dogs are examples of high intelligence. I say that the fact dogs can be trained to hunt round a house to find drugs or bombs is proof of their dimness. Any animal with a modicum of intelligence would just adopt a cat like reaction to these situations and stroll off to sleep or relax.

Sheepdogs though must possess a reasonably high level of IQ, or DIQ as it should be called. The way that they can actually round up a herd of sheep and apparently do some thinking must indicate more than an animal merely responding in Pavlovian fashion to commands.

And it does seem to me that a dog lover will rarely admit that dogs are fundamentally a bit slow on the uptake, as if it is a "bad" thing, as if it says something about the intelligence of the owner as well.

I've come to the conclusion that it's the sheer stupidity of dogs that makes them such great animals to have as pets. It's their trainability, their faithfulness and companionship that make them man's best friend.

It's their stupidity that makes them like that in the first place.

And any animal that can lick its own balls has got to get some admiration hasn't it?

What do you think?

One Small Step For A Sri Lankan....

Wasn't what was said.

The actual words were

"One small step for man but one giant step for mankind."

It was exactly forty years ago yesterday that so famous phrase was utterred by Louis Armstrong as he and Buzz Lightyear landed on the moon. Naturally they did it at night time, when the moon was out.

I heard that Lankan astronauts attempted the same feat several times but, on arrival in the vicinity, they saw the full moon, declared a Poya day and promptly went home and travelled down south for the long weekend.

But, if it had been a Sri Lankan astronaut to get to the moon first, what do you think he would have said?

Prizes for the funniest as always.

Answers on a comment please.

Only Slightly Funny

Cerno's Cernometer, Cars and Carbs

The master's post here got me thinking. One of the things I thought about was whether his thing in his car that tells him what speed he's driving at should actually be called a "Cernometer". I chuckled inwardly and quietly to myself at that one, I must tell you.

The other thing was about Sri Lankans and carbohydrates, rice in particular. We love 'em don't we. Give any of us a plate of something centred around rice or noodly things and our eyes light up and our tongues hang out like one of those boys at Majestic City when they see a female under twenty five.

Here in England some people, when confronted with anything like an Indian restaurant menu or a situation in which they need to eat Asian food, will actually opt for more curry than rice, sometimes these Suddas will even NOT have rice. Honestly I've seen this happen and it never ceases to astound me. We eat rice and curry, they eat curry and rice, maybe just curry.

I've been to restaurants with friends and they've tried to order one portion of rice to share. With me??!! At this point I have to put my foot down. A rice portion in an Indian restaurant here usually contains about a third of the amount of rice in the average Lankan bath packet. You can see my quandary and occasionally I even have to order an additional portion just for myself.

We love rice and we're proud of it.

But, as with many things, a Sri Lankan's love of rice, his eagerness for string hoppers, hoppers and his cravings for Kottu (except NB who hates kottu of course) come at a price.

Rice, as well as other carb based foods, absorb moisture and water once eaten. That's why we eat rice until we're full and then, an hour or so later, feel more uncomfortable and even more full, though we thought we were full to the brim earlier. That rice absorbs all the moisture in our stomachs, it's like the silica gel of the food world, and expands in our stomach.

Then, after a lifetime of this continual behaviour, we end up looking like we're fourteen months pregnant and chaps like Cerno write posts about it. Sadly exercise alone doesn't change things. I'm told it's a mixture of diet and exercise that gets rid of the pregnant look. I'm also told that in some countries it's all the rage.

I went to see Bruno the other night, the film that they're all raving about. It was hilarious in a cover your face and hide in shame sort of way. One of the scenes involved a severely depressed Bruno committing "carbicide". He told us that, prior to that moment, he hadn't touched a carb for fifteen years.

At that point I thought to myself that he would have been no good as a Sri Lankan man then.

Pah!

Happy Monday all.

Connections - Real Or Imaginary?

You know when you read a book and you feel as if it's going to change your life?

Well that's what I'm doing at the moment. This one is by Edward de Bono, a fellow who is probably best described by someone other than me. In the wikipedia entry he's described as a

"physician, author, inventor and consultant."

I'm sure it's accurate but I think of him as a highly bright person, probably from eating a lot of fish, who teaches and writes about good thinking, creativity and using one's intelligence. He introduced the term "lateral thinking" and also the six thinking hats method which you may have heard of. He didn't invent lateral thinking of course, that was Newton, who also invented gravity.

I like his work and the book I'm methodically working my way through is called "I am right, you are wrong." though I'm unsure if it features the comma that I've thrown in there.

If I were an academic sort of chap I'd speed my way through books like this with the ease of a tri shaw driver weaving his way through Galle Road at about 2.15 in the afternoon. I'm not, though I know it will surprise you, so instead I plough through each of his books with the speed and sense of relaxation only normally seen in white tourists attempting to eat with their fingers for the very first time.

Yes, reading one of his books for me gives me the literary equivalent of food up to my elbow and mess all over the tablecloth. There's no way I can take it all in if there's a TV on in the background, Guns 'n' Roses blasting out or A + K having a fight about who sat there first.

This book demands my total concentration at all times, any mind wandering results in a total lack of comprehension. However, providing I manage it, which often means reading a page several times, I learn. And I learn big time. And I like that. And I must not start sentences with and.

I won't bore you with details of what I've learned but each short section in this book invariably sets of an army of lightbulbs in my head. As I read something there are pinging noises and explosions going on as I feel stuff realigning and huge big chunks of knowledge being deposited in the RD head.

The one thing I want to share with you is about connections, how we approach them, see them and often look for them. It made me think, perhaps you'll do likewise.

I used to have the occasional bad driving day, one of those days when it would seem like all the bad drivers were out on the road, as if there was a meeting of the bad drivers' club and they were all on the way and somehow had erroneously thought my car was the one leading the way.

It would always start with someone pulling out in front of me in the morning. By the end of that day I'd have had about three or four similar incidents and would get home wondering what was in the air that day. Then there'd be about five months until another day would have the same kind of incidents.

Or do you ever find yourself looking at a crowd, perhaps at a match or if you're watching one on TV. When you aren't thinking about it the crowd appears as a totally random mix of differently dressed people. If however, you decide to count the number of people wearing red shirts, they spring out towards you and you begin to see red shirts all over the show. It appears as if almost everyone's wearing the things.

The other day, as I was doing my morning commute, one without the mad drivers around, for some reason I started to think about Paris. In fact, as I write about this I've realised it was because I was talking with Ozcuz the previous night about Barack Obama and how I'd seen him in Paris. I drove into work and merrily day dreamed of the joys of Paris, the delights of the French experience and the rest of it.

Fast forward by an hour and I was sitting at my desk staring at a friend's pictures on Facebook, pictures she had uploaded of, yes you've guessed it, Paris. She'd only uploaded them the previous night and I felt as if Paris and me were going through a connected phase, which is probably how the boyfriend felt when him and Ms Hilton were making THAT video.

All these kind of things happen to all of us and we all think that there's a connection going on, that there's something in the air, or that the universe is speaking to us. It may well be the case.

Or, as de Bono theorises, it may be our mind playing tricks on us. He tells us, well he told me and the other people who've read the book and I'm telling you, that the mind actively seeks connections, that it has a need to join things up and find patterns, even when they don't actually exist.

So if I start the day with an idiot pulling out in front of me, my mind becomes attuned to more of these incidents through the rest of the day, whereas on other days I'm occupied with my usual mind tremors and ruminations.

If we look at a large crowd but decide to pick out the people wearing red shirts then our mind gets into that gear and the red shirted people jump out at us.

If, by coincidence in fact, I have a passing thought about Paris and the look at some photographs of the city a little while later then my mind seeks out a connection and concludes that there is one, probably making it all the more likely that the next time I see a Renault I'll figure that Paris is calling me and I should jump on the next plane there.

When you think about it that is what happens isn't it?

It's not that these connection really exist, it's just that our minds, for whatever reason, look for them and find them.

Next time you catch yourself thinking you're receiving messages telling you a place is calling you, that everyone's in a bad mood or all the cars are blue today, take a step back and question if it's your mind making connections that don't exist. It seems to be for me.

Just thought I'd share that with you.

Good weekend all.

RD

SatNav Love

If you're a person of a certain age or above then you'll have definitely seen this happen. It's when technology develops and you look around and observe things that are totally taken for granted now, yet you remember them in the very original and basic form, all those years ago when they were first around.

DD feels like that when he looks at cars. Sadly I get it when I look at mobile phones. Hand on heart dear readers I can recall when they were first around and took up the space usually reserved for a drummer on stage. Chaps would carry them around to show how important they were and a few lucky but less important ones had car phones. Then, us normal people would buy stick on fake aerials to chuck on our car so that people would think we had a car phone. They cost more than a mobile does now.

Most of these inventions stemmed from early episodes of Star Trek anyway. Being an inventor these days must be quite easy, all you have to do is watch what James Tiberius and the crew were using and then make the thing in real life. Piece of piss really.

Satnav is one of these things. I've seen it get invented, get introduced, become cheap and accessible to most and now it's more or less an essential. It won't be that long before every single new car sold has satnav as standard. Correct me if I'm wrong but I believe you guys don't have it in Lanka yet. I'm not clear if that's because the mapping of roads isn't sufficient yet or if it's because of other factors but would very much like to know.

It's brilliant, I tell you. I'm old enough to have done my time with paper maps and that so old fashioned thing of driving while trying to map read, of stopping to ask for directions and getting lost. These days I get in my car, type the address into my Satnav and follow the instructions, either on screen or by listening to the rather asexual sounding woman.

The only negative to it that is that it's hard to get an overall picture of the route you're going to take, if it's a longish journey. That may be something that's changed in newer types and it's not a major thing. I often do a quick map finding thing online if it matters that much, then use the satnav once I'm on route. One can feel a bit helpless just driving and following the turn left at the end of this road instructions without knowign roughly where you're going.

My car, like many in London, is a map free zone. Never do I fret about the route or about getting lost. We have the technology. Or so we thought.

Until last Sunday.

I had a couple of old and great friends with me. It was a quick visit, typically Sri Lankan actually. A phone call to say they were here, can they come and see me. I replied in the affirmative and before we knew it they were with me. A drink, a look at RD Towers, a walk and then a short drive to go and see the 'rents before dropping them back to where they were staying. No problems.

I knew the area they were staying in, knew how to head in that direction but had no local knowledge, not the faintest. We left the parents' house, I asked the address and turned on the satnav to whack it in.

"Please insert DVD" the text said on screen.

My mind, the sharp, quick analytical one that you know I have, jumped ahead several steps, two to be precise. I pressed eject and poked the DVD back in, the same message came up. I tried again, I guess it's the equivalent of shouting at someone who doesn't speak your language to get them to understand. You won't be surprised to hear that still nothing happened.

We drove in the rough direction and I wondered what on earth to do. After some thinking I figured that pulling over and turning the ignition off, waiting a few minutes and trying again might solve things, the ctrl alt del of the car world. That didn't work either.

It became evident that my satnav was well and truly bollocksed. If it was working the woman would have said

"find your own way there, I'm broken"

Though she would have said it in German

"Guten tag, wo ist der rathaus bitte?" I think is the translation. That may be ever so slightly incorrect.

Some phone calls and my vague awareness of how to get us in the general direction ensured a smooth and relatively trouble free journey. It was a rare thing to have to find our own way there, but actually quite easy.

Coming back was different. I was on my own and thought I could go the easier way. It would have been easier I'm sure, if I'd have known it. I ended up going about eighteen sides of a nineteen sided figure, it may even have been nineteen. All I know is that it took me about forty five minutes to get back to where I would have been anyway had I not tried to be smart.

I'm ashamed to say it, but I got lost. As any woman knows we're programmed in such a way that we MUST never ever ask for directions. And being lost without satnav, without even a map in my boot was actually unnerving. Thankfully there was no woman next to me, at least I'm able to keep these things to myself.

It was like being stranded in the Wanni, or being left in Block 2 in Yala suddenly and there's no tracker to be seen. That's what Weybridge is like, real deepest Surrey and perhaps a good twenty minutes from my home. It was frightening, with a capital fright.

The BMW place tells me that the drive might need replacing and I'm waiting to hear how many millions of the Queen's pounds this will cost. It's not good news and I find myself wondering if this technology is worth the cost after all.

Yeaaahhhh. Of course it is.

Isn't it? Maybe I'll just get a map and chuck it in the boot for emergencies.