Todays article/post will be on a more personal note; namely the birth of my daughter Elisabeth.
My experiences and emotions of watching my wife go through labour and giving birth seem, in hindsight, a wider range than I have ever experienced. From the aprehanesion on the drive to the hospital, to the calm of just waiting for the on set of labour, to the worrying and feeling helpless as Emma went through the pain of labour and childbirth, to the harrowing fear of the slightest complication and the unbridled joy at holding my baby daughter in my arms and looking into her beautiful blue eyes.
Throuhout the birth we had the best team of midwives and doctors helping us through everystage (including an unexpected moment of full on Exorcist style projectile vomitting - I'm glad I moved out of the way in time!), And provided excellent care for my wife and baby for the first 4 days after the birth.
The one thing I did notice about the whole childbirth thang is the myth that women go through all of the pain and hardship of giving birth... Bollocks. I admit there is a huge amount of pain involved, particularly in the early stages, but after that, my wife was doped up on so much pethadine and gas and air, as well as a local (down there), she barely remembers anything. Now I know I didn't go through the physical pain that Emma did, but the emotions experienced, constant reassurance and helping out with things I have no experience with as a watching husband, meant that I was completely drained at the end of it. Believe me lads, if you're ever watching your child be born, you'll know what I mean, 18 hours of feeling completely out of your depth, and assuring your wife it will be okay, when you have no idea, of what's going on, as well as helping to push, and trying not to shit yourself ( I had a touching cloth moment). The other things you aren't ready for is the blood, particularly when the midwives look worried too, and the damage a babies head can do (to paraphrase one of my favourite Jeff Green sketches "it's like watching your favourite pub burn down... That's no good for anyone now... It's ruined).
Tired beyond endurance, I held my baby in my arms and was never more proud or happy than at any moment in my life. My wife did amazingly well, and has given me the most beautiful baby I have ever seen (but I would say that wouldn't I?)
Laters, Steve.
Monday, November 24, 2008
Obama, cash, and the selective media
Hi everybody, I realise it's been a while (several long months) since my last post. In that time, I've got a new job, survived a canoeing adventure that would have killed lesser men, past the milestone of my 30th birthday, read several books (okay, comics... But they had zombies), and did lots of other things that are too mundane/fodder for another article to print here (actually typing the word 'fodder' has just made me think what a wonderful word it is, and brought back memories of the seminal Amiga classic 'Cannon Fodder'). Anyways, on with this weeks blog (see what I did there, I insinuated that I'd be writing one of these a week... Chances are, I will forget, like that time I forgot to buy toilet paper. The less said about that episode the better, although 'The Times' doesn't flush all that well!). This weeks blog will focus on the US election, or more accurately will focus on the media coverage and reaction to the US election.
Firstly, I would like to congratulate Mr Obama on a very well funded campaign, there won't be much CHANGE after spending almost $300,000 an hour throughout October). This is an astronomical amount, and the spending over October alone by the Obama campaign, was almost what McCain had spent throughout his entire campaign. Again it reiterates the point that the presidency can be bought, although I guarantee that if Obama becomes unpopular with the media, there will be some investigations into where exactly all of this cash came from.
The depressing thing for the American voters is that certain groups behind Obama's funding will be seeking at there own agendas. Two examples of this are the donations made by various unions who will be looking for Obama to repeal the law relating to secret ballots in the workplace (which isn't particularly democratic), and the teaching unions that may want to water down his "real teaching" program as this may affect their pay/results package. This, I feel may be a problem that will have a negative impact on Obama's policy for change.
Unfortunately, the media, in particularly tv and radio news in the UK has stayed away from reporting how these campaigns have been runand funded, and instead relied upon soundbites from both candidates. We seemed to have wall to wall coverage of the election but at no point understood what the candidates were all about, although, it's difficult to see what each candidate was about when one repeated the same message of change over and over again (Obama), while McCain's decended into a farce of smear campaigns and cheap stunts (the whole Palin thing springs to mind).
In a nutshell that is what the tv (even the bbc coverage on tv seemed dumbed down) reported, we were constantly treated to Sarah Palin saying something stupid in a new outfit, McCain trying very hard to steer his campaign back from the brink of dirty tricks that his advisors had taken him too, and Obama looking presidential, constantly repeating his mantra for change. For all of the fuss over vp running mates, we never saw Joe Biden again after August as Obama walked to victory, and Palin was an unmitigated PR disaster after her initial display.
The one thing that has really wound me up about the media and it's reporting of this election, apart from not reporting anything really, is the harping on about America's first black president (We all know America's first black president was David Palmer in 24). Although I do not want to take anything away from this achievement, Obama never campaigned along racial lines, so why does the media now insist that this is some sort of miracle? Why do they insist that this is the embodiment of Dr King's dream, and that Britain too is in need of a black prime minister? There's a band wagon somewhere, and it's overloaded!
Perhaps in a week or so this will calm down, and we'll all go back to complaining about the economy, the banks and the government. In the meantime, we'll have loads of people putting their two pence into the debate about how Obama's election victory will affect the world and our day to day lives (much like me). For all these people, I have two words for them 'Tony Blair'. He came to power with a colossal victory against an unpopular government on a campaign of change and hope for a nation. As we all know Blair's victory was a disappointment, which in part has left the country in the mess it is in today. Obama would do well to look at the mistakes made by Blair's government and realise that he will use up the goodwill the country has given him if he doesn't act quickly and decisively to put an end to Bush's unpopular policies and deliver the change he promised.
See you further up the road,
Steve - 07 November 2008
Firstly, I would like to congratulate Mr Obama on a very well funded campaign, there won't be much CHANGE after spending almost $300,000 an hour throughout October). This is an astronomical amount, and the spending over October alone by the Obama campaign, was almost what McCain had spent throughout his entire campaign. Again it reiterates the point that the presidency can be bought, although I guarantee that if Obama becomes unpopular with the media, there will be some investigations into where exactly all of this cash came from.
The depressing thing for the American voters is that certain groups behind Obama's funding will be seeking at there own agendas. Two examples of this are the donations made by various unions who will be looking for Obama to repeal the law relating to secret ballots in the workplace (which isn't particularly democratic), and the teaching unions that may want to water down his "real teaching" program as this may affect their pay/results package. This, I feel may be a problem that will have a negative impact on Obama's policy for change.
Unfortunately, the media, in particularly tv and radio news in the UK has stayed away from reporting how these campaigns have been runand funded, and instead relied upon soundbites from both candidates. We seemed to have wall to wall coverage of the election but at no point understood what the candidates were all about, although, it's difficult to see what each candidate was about when one repeated the same message of change over and over again (Obama), while McCain's decended into a farce of smear campaigns and cheap stunts (the whole Palin thing springs to mind).
In a nutshell that is what the tv (even the bbc coverage on tv seemed dumbed down) reported, we were constantly treated to Sarah Palin saying something stupid in a new outfit, McCain trying very hard to steer his campaign back from the brink of dirty tricks that his advisors had taken him too, and Obama looking presidential, constantly repeating his mantra for change. For all of the fuss over vp running mates, we never saw Joe Biden again after August as Obama walked to victory, and Palin was an unmitigated PR disaster after her initial display.
The one thing that has really wound me up about the media and it's reporting of this election, apart from not reporting anything really, is the harping on about America's first black president (We all know America's first black president was David Palmer in 24). Although I do not want to take anything away from this achievement, Obama never campaigned along racial lines, so why does the media now insist that this is some sort of miracle? Why do they insist that this is the embodiment of Dr King's dream, and that Britain too is in need of a black prime minister? There's a band wagon somewhere, and it's overloaded!
Perhaps in a week or so this will calm down, and we'll all go back to complaining about the economy, the banks and the government. In the meantime, we'll have loads of people putting their two pence into the debate about how Obama's election victory will affect the world and our day to day lives (much like me). For all these people, I have two words for them 'Tony Blair'. He came to power with a colossal victory against an unpopular government on a campaign of change and hope for a nation. As we all know Blair's victory was a disappointment, which in part has left the country in the mess it is in today. Obama would do well to look at the mistakes made by Blair's government and realise that he will use up the goodwill the country has given him if he doesn't act quickly and decisively to put an end to Bush's unpopular policies and deliver the change he promised.
See you further up the road,
Steve - 07 November 2008
Thursday, March 13, 2008
SXSW - Day One
We arrived in Austin today after an uneventful drive from Fort Worth, noticing the urban sprall, and for all you planners, the lack of any advertising regs (40' illuminated flagpole signs and a proliferation of neon not seen anywhere else on earth).
Austin, to quote American's 'is, like, awesome!' I don't think I have eve been in a more relaxed and funky city. Again like Fort worth, trees line every street, sidewalks are wide, and people are very friendly. The culture however, is very different, being a college town, the population is a lot more liberal and younger.
After registering at sxsw (and picking up the biggest bag of swag, ie 10% good stuff and 8 kilos of junk!) We went to go and see the first of our band choices of the evening (unfortunately, we have yet to buy a new camera, so no pictures).
• Kate Tucker and the sons of sweden ***1/2 LINK are a pretty good band, if a little melancholy for my liking. We were expecting to see St Bernadette, however there was a last minute switch, and I was not disappointed. The gig was at Wave, which is a pretty cool bar on 6th street, done out like a surfer's bar.
• Moke ****1/2 LINK Are suprisingly from holland, although the singer is from Belfast (and has a similar vocal style to the late Jim Morrisson). They had the entire place rocking, and put on a great set. These guys deserve to hit it big, although the guitarist is decidedly average, from a distance though he looks like a weathered Jamie Doran! Bourbon Rocks patio is a great venue, with an outside bar. I met two sxsw veterans (this is their 15th year), who gave me some great tips.
• Delorean ***** LINK Were awesome. For those who haven't heard of them, they combine excellent guitar work with their own blend of spanish dance music. The gig was at Maggie Mae's rooftop, and I was sure that with the combination of excess bass and a crowd of 300 jumping fans that the roof was going to come off! How these guys aren't huge across Europe is baffling.
• Von Bondies **** LINK At 11pm we were off to Emo's for the biggest gig of the night. The buzz about the Von Bondies was huge when we arrived that afternoon, and they were one of the bands I wanted to see. Unfortunately by the time we got there, the venue was full, even our badges, which got us to the front of the queue were no help here. Luckily, the venue was partially outside, so we could still see and hear. The band was great, and a drunken girl, fell over the kerb and hit her head on a tree, which was so funny, it almost made up for the lack of beer.
• Suffrajett ****1/2 LINK At 12am, we are at a venue called 'The Blind Pig' to see the above band. We had a choice to see the Black Angels, but these guys won out, and we were pleased. The bass player was the best I have ever seen, and I got a couple of plectrums from him. The only negative point about the gig was that the singer decided to shout 'suffrajett don't forget' between each song (as though it was the greatest slogan of all time). I hope to pick up the album soon, oh and as a point of useless trivia, the drummer is formerly of the legendary Psychadelic Furs!
• TAB The Band **1/2 LINK This was a band I had high hopes for, unfortunately, where all of the above bands had checked their sound levels before playing, these guys seemed to be after sheer power, which imho negatively affected the performance. I still liked the band and their style of rock music (very Rolling Stones). I think with a bit more polish, these guys could do well indeed. Congrats to the drummer who managed to play half of the finale with 1 stick.
At the end of the night, we had to get a shuttle bus back to the hotel (6 miles away from downtown). Bit of a pain, but there you go.
Laters,
Steve.
This was written on my Nokia N810. For more information go to http://www.nseries.com/index.html
Austin, to quote American's 'is, like, awesome!' I don't think I have eve been in a more relaxed and funky city. Again like Fort worth, trees line every street, sidewalks are wide, and people are very friendly. The culture however, is very different, being a college town, the population is a lot more liberal and younger.
After registering at sxsw (and picking up the biggest bag of swag, ie 10% good stuff and 8 kilos of junk!) We went to go and see the first of our band choices of the evening (unfortunately, we have yet to buy a new camera, so no pictures).
• Kate Tucker and the sons of sweden ***1/2 LINK are a pretty good band, if a little melancholy for my liking. We were expecting to see St Bernadette, however there was a last minute switch, and I was not disappointed. The gig was at Wave, which is a pretty cool bar on 6th street, done out like a surfer's bar.
• Moke ****1/2 LINK Are suprisingly from holland, although the singer is from Belfast (and has a similar vocal style to the late Jim Morrisson). They had the entire place rocking, and put on a great set. These guys deserve to hit it big, although the guitarist is decidedly average, from a distance though he looks like a weathered Jamie Doran! Bourbon Rocks patio is a great venue, with an outside bar. I met two sxsw veterans (this is their 15th year), who gave me some great tips.
• Delorean ***** LINK Were awesome. For those who haven't heard of them, they combine excellent guitar work with their own blend of spanish dance music. The gig was at Maggie Mae's rooftop, and I was sure that with the combination of excess bass and a crowd of 300 jumping fans that the roof was going to come off! How these guys aren't huge across Europe is baffling.
• Von Bondies **** LINK At 11pm we were off to Emo's for the biggest gig of the night. The buzz about the Von Bondies was huge when we arrived that afternoon, and they were one of the bands I wanted to see. Unfortunately by the time we got there, the venue was full, even our badges, which got us to the front of the queue were no help here. Luckily, the venue was partially outside, so we could still see and hear. The band was great, and a drunken girl, fell over the kerb and hit her head on a tree, which was so funny, it almost made up for the lack of beer.
• Suffrajett ****1/2 LINK At 12am, we are at a venue called 'The Blind Pig' to see the above band. We had a choice to see the Black Angels, but these guys won out, and we were pleased. The bass player was the best I have ever seen, and I got a couple of plectrums from him. The only negative point about the gig was that the singer decided to shout 'suffrajett don't forget' between each song (as though it was the greatest slogan of all time). I hope to pick up the album soon, oh and as a point of useless trivia, the drummer is formerly of the legendary Psychadelic Furs!
• TAB The Band **1/2 LINK This was a band I had high hopes for, unfortunately, where all of the above bands had checked their sound levels before playing, these guys seemed to be after sheer power, which imho negatively affected the performance. I still liked the band and their style of rock music (very Rolling Stones). I think with a bit more polish, these guys could do well indeed. Congrats to the drummer who managed to play half of the finale with 1 stick.
At the end of the night, we had to get a shuttle bus back to the hotel (6 miles away from downtown). Bit of a pain, but there you go.
Laters,
Steve.
This was written on my Nokia N810. For more information go to http://www.nseries.com/index.html
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Cow town, Butch Cassidy and the greatest steak in the world
Well, we've left Dallas, and I think I've seen most of what 'big D' has to offer, so on to fortworth, where the fog has lifted and the sun is shining at a lovely 75°F. Fortworth is completely different than Dallas but is part of the same Metroplex, it combines steel and glass skyscrapers with 3-storey historical buildings, converted salloons and banks now form a very beautiful entertainment and business district called sundance square (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid frequented Fort Worth regularly). Trees wrapped in fairy lights line each wide paved streets. Both pedestrian and automobile live in harmony, it's laid back, friendly and definitely cowboy Texas.
A short bus ride out of downtown sends you to the historic stockyards where Texas cattle drives started on their route to the north. It's a fascinating place rich with history and cowboy culture. Again we hit a bar (can anyone see a pattern emerging here), a proper saloon with all of the walls and ceilings covered in cowboy hats... Oh, and beer is $2 a bottle, so we sat back and watched a proper country battle of the bands... And I'm still not a big fan...
The final act of the day was to head to a restaurant called 'The Chop House'... My god, Texans sure know how to cook a steak, a beutiful rib (on the bone) steak cooked to perfection. I have never in all of my life (a lot of steak) tasted a better piece of meat. It was a pricey meal £30 a head inc. wine, but so worth it.
I am sad to leave fort worth and it's lovely food... But excited by the approaching SXSW festival and what Austin has to offer.
Laters,
Steve.
A short bus ride out of downtown sends you to the historic stockyards where Texas cattle drives started on their route to the north. It's a fascinating place rich with history and cowboy culture. Again we hit a bar (can anyone see a pattern emerging here), a proper saloon with all of the walls and ceilings covered in cowboy hats... Oh, and beer is $2 a bottle, so we sat back and watched a proper country battle of the bands... And I'm still not a big fan...
The final act of the day was to head to a restaurant called 'The Chop House'... My god, Texans sure know how to cook a steak, a beutiful rib (on the bone) steak cooked to perfection. I have never in all of my life (a lot of steak) tasted a better piece of meat. It was a pricey meal £30 a head inc. wine, but so worth it.
I am sad to leave fort worth and it's lovely food... But excited by the approaching SXSW festival and what Austin has to offer.
Laters,
Steve.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Fog, public transport and the fun of shopping
Today I awoke to a foggy dallas, the skyscrapers cut in half by the swirling mist. Although the temperature has dropped, it's still warmer than telford, and there are still no chavs in sight. As it's Monday, the city has come back to life, yet even with a limited mass transit system, and 99% of workers commuting, there are no nose to tail traffic jams. I think this is due to having high capacity roads, lots of them, people obeying traffic laws and the complete lack of roundabouts. Well that's my opinion anyway.
As the weather is poor today, we dedcided to travel to one of Dallas's many out of town malls using the new electric tram system. It's clean, efficient, with covered stations playing classical music, which seems to annoy most of the low income/unemployed black and hispanic travellers whom seem to make up 90% of all customers. Unlike the UK, the public transport system, this embraces new technology (lpg powered buses) and is subsidised greatly by the government. I suppose you'd have to when petrol is $3.00 a gallon (less than 40p a litre)!
Anyway the mall was pretty crap, although it was easily twice the size of the bullring and it had an apple store. We spent the rest of the afternoon looking around Dallas exploring the cultural district and looking around, before travelling uptown to have a walk about and find a bar serving the largest plate of nachos you have ever seen (there must have been half a pound of cheese on the plate!), All washed down with several beers.
Tomorrow we move to Fort Worth... cow town
As the weather is poor today, we dedcided to travel to one of Dallas's many out of town malls using the new electric tram system. It's clean, efficient, with covered stations playing classical music, which seems to annoy most of the low income/unemployed black and hispanic travellers whom seem to make up 90% of all customers. Unlike the UK, the public transport system, this embraces new technology (lpg powered buses) and is subsidised greatly by the government. I suppose you'd have to when petrol is $3.00 a gallon (less than 40p a litre)!
Anyway the mall was pretty crap, although it was easily twice the size of the bullring and it had an apple store. We spent the rest of the afternoon looking around Dallas exploring the cultural district and looking around, before travelling uptown to have a walk about and find a bar serving the largest plate of nachos you have ever seen (there must have been half a pound of cheese on the plate!), All washed down with several beers.
Tomorrow we move to Fort Worth... cow town
Sunday, March 9, 2008
JFK, BBQ, and homeless zombies
Dallas, city of oil, banks and presidential assassinations. Steel and glass towers rise high into the sky, housing thousands of workers between monday and friday. Unfortunately today is saturday, which means that downtown is deserted. I fight the urge to shout 'hello!' Like Cilian Murphy in 28 days later. However the fear of zombies and tramps offering directions and their opinions on the JFK assassination, for a fee of course... To be fair, they print their own magazine and most of the stuff they say is pretty much rant free.
Eventually, we found the west end area filled with bars and we were sorted for the evening. I didn''t even mind paying $10 for a bunch of roses for Emma.
The following morning we were off to Dealey plaza to the 6th floor museum, and saw how Oswald was framed for killing Kennedy. It was a great museum with real indepth information on the life and death of JFK. After we headed to a bbq restaurant for some amazing texas food. Brisket slowly smoked for 2 days and then served with bbq sauce is surely the food of the gods. Finishing the day drinking some cold beers watching girls getting wet... In the rain (behave you lot)closed out a great sunday.
Oh, and Oswald didn't do it.
Eventually, we found the west end area filled with bars and we were sorted for the evening. I didn''t even mind paying $10 for a bunch of roses for Emma.
The following morning we were off to Dealey plaza to the 6th floor museum, and saw how Oswald was framed for killing Kennedy. It was a great museum with real indepth information on the life and death of JFK. After we headed to a bbq restaurant for some amazing texas food. Brisket slowly smoked for 2 days and then served with bbq sauce is surely the food of the gods. Finishing the day drinking some cold beers watching girls getting wet... In the rain (behave you lot)closed out a great sunday.
Oh, and Oswald didn't do it.
Saturday, March 8, 2008
40,000 feet above Greenland
Hi all, sorry for the delay in posting but I've been without a computer for a week or so. So here goes my first blog entry.
I've just finished watching the Coen brothers magnum opus 'No country for old men'. It would have been better without the crappy ba standard headphones, or the stupid woman who kept moving her seat. Still though it was a very atmospheric movie, Javier Bardem is perhaps the scariest man in movie history and who would have thought Josh (the elder goonie brother) Brolin could pull off a performance like that? Anyways, I digress; looking out the window at the arctic wastes and frozen mountains of greenland it's hard to believe the global warming excuses for tax increases. It's a beautiful looking land, and will be better once the snow all melts and the bears are gone (no camouflage without snow you pesky bastards).
We're currently 40,000 ft up. Emma's watching some bad sitcom and by the look of it, could have eaten another piece of carrot cake, while I'm looking out the window contemplating the cold, and the fa cup shocks of the day (go on barnsley!), while reading the new Stuart Maconie book.
As we fly south across Canada, over the great lakes (which are bloody huge!), and then over Milwaukee, I realise that it's still winter, everything is still frozen, and it's much further south than Telford. I think this is why the Americans don't make a fuss about global warming, it doesn't affect them, much like we didn't bother when scandinavia was complaining in the nineties.
Still, if the government spent a tenth of the money it makes from petrol tax, we would have solved global warming by now.
Laters,
Me.
I've just finished watching the Coen brothers magnum opus 'No country for old men'. It would have been better without the crappy ba standard headphones, or the stupid woman who kept moving her seat. Still though it was a very atmospheric movie, Javier Bardem is perhaps the scariest man in movie history and who would have thought Josh (the elder goonie brother) Brolin could pull off a performance like that? Anyways, I digress; looking out the window at the arctic wastes and frozen mountains of greenland it's hard to believe the global warming excuses for tax increases. It's a beautiful looking land, and will be better once the snow all melts and the bears are gone (no camouflage without snow you pesky bastards).
We're currently 40,000 ft up. Emma's watching some bad sitcom and by the look of it, could have eaten another piece of carrot cake, while I'm looking out the window contemplating the cold, and the fa cup shocks of the day (go on barnsley!), while reading the new Stuart Maconie book.
As we fly south across Canada, over the great lakes (which are bloody huge!), and then over Milwaukee, I realise that it's still winter, everything is still frozen, and it's much further south than Telford. I think this is why the Americans don't make a fuss about global warming, it doesn't affect them, much like we didn't bother when scandinavia was complaining in the nineties.
Still, if the government spent a tenth of the money it makes from petrol tax, we would have solved global warming by now.
Laters,
Me.
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