Category Archives: guts

Going-away music

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I just found this in my files from when I was recovering from serious illness in late 2016. My tastes haven’t changed much since then. NB I don’t currently plan to go away soon – too much living to do still.

Songs for Bruce’s funeral and/or wake

Links in song-titles are to YouTube videos, just so you know what the songs are. At the actual event, use the original vinyl or CD, not the Youtube versions.

Song Artist Album Why
and other ramblings?
Pigs on the wing (part 1) Pink Floyd Animals Classic intro
Pigs on the wing parts 1 and 2 must begin and end the proceedings.
Advertisement (another intentional irrelevant suicide) Roy Harper Whatever happened to Jugula? Sound effects!
Decades Joy Division Closer This song has always taken me places.
Drugs for everybody Roy Harper The dream society Generosity
Hope Roy Harper Whatever happened to Jugula? Because there has to be some.
The final cut Pink Floyd The final cut One of the ultimate expressions of my paranoia
Don’t use both The final cut and Not now John – both would be too gloomy.
Miss Europa Disco Dancer Manic Street Preachers Know your enemy An alternative to the Dambusters’ March.
Use the Youtube version ONLY IF you show the video.
Not now John Pink Floyd The final cut The other ultimate expression of my paranoia
(If using Not now John, it MUST be the album version, i.e. with swearing.)
Boogeyman Motörhead Rock and roll Gotta have some Motörhead, and this has a brilliant intro by Lemmy
The lord’s prayer Roy Harper Lifemask 20 minutes of Roy’s finest, from a time when he nearly died
Ease PiL Album It just rocks!
You can have it all Kaiser Chiefs Employment Because I won’t need anything anymore
The masses against the classes Manic Street Preachers Forever delayed Class struggle!
Change Lightning Seeds Jollification Happy, skip-along pop
Faster Manic Street Preachers The holy bible An antidote to happy, skip-along pop. Possibly the finest Manics song.
Do NOT use the Chemical Brothers’ remix from Forever Delayed.
It’s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine) REM Document Something more populist and upbeat
Echoes Pink Floyd Meddle Because it’s just brilliant.
If possible, use the version from Live in Pompeii.
Pigs on the wing (part 2) Pink Floyd Animals Classic outro – we’ll look after each other
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What has Bruce been up to this weekend?

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I’m not quite sure why I wanted to record this. Perhaps it’s to assuage some of my guilt at not being in the peoples’ vote/anti-brexit march yesterday. Anyway, this has been a relaxing weekend so far.

My reward for all of this is nut roast with roasted potatoes, onions, sprouts and carrots. You have been warned!

Saturday morning

  • Spinning at LifesCycle. We cheated slightly by travelling by bus, due to the rain. I usually prefer to cycle there and back, as warm-up and cool-down from the lovely madness. (Elly and I are on the front-left bikes of that Facebook video.)

Saturday afternoon

  • much-needed coffee and lunch
  • catching up with personal and family finances, sadly neglected for a couple of weeks due to work-pressures
  • washing our manky spinning gear. That’s the only downside!
  • tidying my desk area after weeks of needing to let rubbish build up

Saturday evening

  • avoiding watching Strictly Come Dancing
  • writing a presentation on a project I’m about to finish, so I can demonstrate the outcomes to a high-powered audience. (I think I should not say what the project is just now, but I will blow my own trumpet as hard as I can when the work goes live.)

Sunday morning

  • proofreading and commenting on a tender written by my ever-wonderful better half.
  • much-needed coffee and lunch

Sunday afternoon

Kozmik

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In a vague tribute to a Janis Joplin album, today could be called I got dem ol’ co-codamol hughies again, mama! In other news, last week I succeeded in copying posts from Just another bipedal sack of DNA and neuroses – because that’s what humans are to this blog.

It’s been interesting – and quite emotional – revisiting the end of a marriage and my career in publishing, various family (mis)fortunes, my time in India and Indonesia, my MSc, the start of my community council work and research career, discovering spinning, and the beginning of my current, very happy marriage. So much of this feels as though it’s permanent, and has been part of me forever – but in reality much is less than 5 years old.

There will be lots of broken links, because some material was hosted on now-dead servers. I’ve tried to resurrect what I can, but if you find any, please let me know.

Anus Horribilis – my Winterval message

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Well, it’s been basically a rubbish year.

We’ve said goodbye to too many people: David Bowie, Alan Rickman, Prince, Muhammad Ali, Anton Yeltsin, Elie Wiesel, Gene Wilder, Leonard Cohen, Robert Vaughn, Fidel Castro, Eric (my cousin’s partner) and John Glenn spring to mind. But the death that has affected me the most is the loss of my father in October. Here’s how it went, according to Facebook: Continue reading →

FODMAP fricassée

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Firstly, I’m much better than I have been. I’m by no means out of the woods but there is very strong light at the end of the kennel. (Thank you Nick Harper!) I’m to be treated as if I have small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO), along with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). (I wish I’d recorded the conversation with the GI specialist – then I might recall the link between these two conditions.) Continue reading →