Having had to take a couple of days sick leave this week due to Aggressive Stage Four Man Cold I was a bit worried I wouldn’t make it to see Peter Hook at The Opera House last night, however with a combination of Big Boy Pants and Nuromol I managed to get out to see him again.

I won’t post pictures because it was pretty much a rerun of the concert 2 years ago, same band, same lighting. However I must confess to enjoying the first gig more as he played just the hits, whereas this time the first half was performing one New Order album in full, and not one I’m particularly familiar with. He also didn’t have much interaction with the crowd like last time, nor did he play Blue Monday which, given he played 32 songs over 2.5 hours, could easily have been slotted in for one of the lesser tracks.

Also experienced my biggest annoyance at gigs – a couple sat behind me talking constantly. Who are these sociopaths that spend hundreds of dollars to go to a massively loud, crowded location so they can have a chat?! Dickheads that’s who. I spent the second half of the gig stood at the back where the sound was a little better and could beat the rush out the door.

As per every 80s rock and punk gig I go to there was a group of men “blokes” down the front, all nodding their shiny cueball heads to the music. One old guy was giving it the full Bez treatment, quite impressed he didn’t put his back out.

I’m definitely no longer gig-fit, with sore head and ears the following day. Overall 8/10. Next up Simple Minds & Gary Numan in February.

The Duchess was up for a jacket potato for dinner yesterday but stipulated she didn’t want too large a potato. To ensure we got the portion size correct I did her a line-up to select the perfect size. This worked, though she did spend the evening snacking so I suspect she chose unwisely (Indiana Jones reference).

PS: The pedantic among you may take issue with the relative sizes of options 2 and 3 – I would just suggest that the photo is misleading and that potato 3 was larger in the dimension you couldn’t see in this photo.

PPS: She chose option 2.

Since watching a great film earlier this year about tourettes — I swear, highly recommended — I’ve been interested in the Hull-born actor that played the lead role so convincingly (with a strong Glaswegian accent too).

Now forget Hollywood stars or Oscars, he’s now been given the ultimate honour – he’s had a phone box named after him on Holderness Road. It doesn’t get bigger than that…

This is how The Duchess spends most of the match when Leeds Rhinos are playing, stood up because she knows it’s lucky and will lead to a try. She also gets up close to the TV for a more immersive experience, and provides a secondary commentary on what’s going on, why the ref is wrong and predicting who’s going to score next.

… who this is referring to, right?

To the best Dad a boy could wish for.

One thing I’m trying to keep the commute bearable is catching the train a few days a week, which gives me the time to get stuck into a book – a rare luxury these days!

I’m giving the first Jack Reacher novel a go as Dad and a couple of friends are fans of the series.

Seems decent enough so far, though he does seem to like very short sentences and can’t tell if that’s just his style or whether he’s pandering to a US male audience that perhaps don’t read much. Either way he’s nicely descriptive and pulls you in so I’m on board. And he’s not even hit anybody yet.

Well it’s been 3 weeks already at the new place, and apart from the hassle of having to commute into the office 5 days a week everything is going really well. Once the first 3 months is done I can switch to WFH 3 days a week which will be much more sustainable.

I’ve not met all 54 colleagues yet but up to now it’s an arsehole-free zone, which considering the last place had 11 colleagues and at least one.

Thankfully the mental and physical energy levels have remained high which has enabled me to get my head around the environment and hit the ground running making some changes and suggestions. I even volunteered to arrange a World Cup Sweepstake!

Keeping everything crossed that things stay this pleasant for a while to come! (No doubt this will jinx things and I’ll be posting a rage quit post in a couple of months).

Always love to see some drummers in action, and these young fellas from Tauranga are the business!

It might sound a bit mad being nostalgic for a radio show that ended in 2003, to the point of paying $40 to stalk them online as the DJs involved ramble on about the show. Especially when that rambling was done on a theatre stage on the other side of the World, meaning you have to watch them at 6.30am in the morning.

When those DJs are Mark & Lard though it’s worth the early start. Even though they’re both still on 6Music (for now) on separate shows I still miss their chaotic humour.

What surprised me hearing some of the old sketches was how near the knuckle they were for daytime radio! None of what they played would get on-air these days … and arguably if the bosses had been paying attention they would have been censored back then too!

Great to see they’re still good mates and just as irreverent and subversive in their 60’s as they were back in the 1990’s.