Guitars and Life

Well there was a gig that had it all!  First a delayed start as there was a fox that needed to be extracted from the auditorium. Then hardly any change from a 3 hour set! Three drum solos, the new album played in it's entirety (about a third of the set!), use of two drum kits in one song, great string ensemble through the new album, fantastic light and video show, and the rest! Ok I am a Rush fan, possibly a fanatic,  so biased but this is near the top of my best gigs ever, did I mention the best indoor pyrotechnics I've ever seen? No? See there was so much to say. Honestly just amazing! The highlights were The Garden, The Wreckers both off Clockwork Angels then Spirit Of The Radio as well to end the main set. Still on a high 2 days later! :-)

I was about to blog about how I've been feeling the last couple of weeks and then thought - you know what you've said this before, and indeed I have .  So one of the advantages of a blog, diary or journal is that you can look back see patterns.  Clearly I have this pattern of a bit of a "low time" after my AA birthday, it is I presume the build up to that day then is passing and of course nothing really being any different just another day sober, which is itself always a minor miracle for someone like me in all honesty. Also it has been all a bit stressed in the house with Mrs F's Mum in hospital - she is making good progress, there is talk of her moving to a rehabilitation specialist place, a friend who knows this stuff well highly recommends it, so we hope that will be good and she'll get more mobile soon.  My wife posted a ghastly picture of her knee wound on Facebook last night - I'll spare you that it was horrible! Additionally the build-up to Son...

Son-of-Furtheron returned from his Arctic adventure yesterday.  Mrs F and I headed up to Heathrow to pick him up, arriving in reasonable time, good job too as his flight actually landed 20 mins early.  Still we had time for a coffee waiting for his flight to land, taxi and bags to be delivered. We stood at the end of the "funnel" at T3 arrivals, there is a bit with barriers that people come through which is a bit funnel shaped.  Standing there as the automatic doors flip open you can see some of those coming through.  Mrs F suddenly shouted "There he is" and ran forward so that she almost lept on him as he came through the door.  All good stuff.  He looks really well, the beard is impressive although he had trimmed it up a bit but he did have a look of the intrepid explorer... well a bit ;-) Lovely to have him home safe and sound.  He immediately was saying how warm it is;  it really isn't for late May is it?  However if for the...

Well I obviously am! Yes somehow unbelievably it is 9 years since I took my last alcoholic drink.  If you want a brief summary of my drinking career read My Drinking Story .  Friday 14th May 2004 - I remember it well!  I was already in the pub, well it was a Friday and it was after noon after all, when Mrs F text me about something we'd been waiting on. "Tonight we can celebrate" said the text.  Of course my stupid brain looked at that and did the usual flip and a voice, one of my voices, said "But frankly your life is still shite pal. What a loser!".   That was it I went on one of my many regular drinking binges.  (There is a whole book worth of stuff around why I did that, about my lack of self-worth, my need for external gratification and acknowledgements but coupled with an internal knowledge that they were not enough anyway.  If you can't love yourself as you are you'll never be happy even if you win the biggest lottery win in the world!) I go...

First some bad news. Mrs F's mum had a fall in the local shopping centre on Thursday and has broken her arm, shoulder and knee! She doesn't do it by halves does she. It is Sunday morning and she is in surgery now on at least the shoulder the knee may need an op too. The rehab etc will be a long time and issue given she lives in house so bathroom etc all upstairs. Anyhow some good news. I have been accepted onto a counselling course starting in Sept. This is the new direction I am planning to go in. At the end of this month I'm going to reduce to 2 days a week at the uni. So one day at the course centre then look for some voluntary work to start with where I can hopefully look to apply the new skills I'll be learning. I went to an open day at the centre yesterday and met some current students all of which confirmed to me that I am making the right decision on course and centre.

Well I am feeling better thankfully.  Still have an annoying cough from time to time but on the mend.  Soon back to work.  However now I'm not just lying on the sofa watching snooker or my DVD collection of Ewan McGregor's various motorcycle journey's I've been learning a couple of pieces and getting to enjoy my new Vintage Gordon Giltrap VE2000GG Deluxe. The Deluxe edition of this model features like the cheaper model a shaped based on one of Gordon's most iconic custom guitars made by Rob Armstrong many moons ago and has a mahogany neck and a solid cedar top.  The difference lies in that this model has a solid rosewood back and laminate rosewood sides - the cheaper one is laminate back and sides in mahogany (don't scoff at laminate the original was laminate as Rob believes it adds strength without reducing tone!).  The fingerboard on this is a lovely piece of ebony, becoming rarer and rarer on guitars these days with the issues surrounding the reduction of e...

So yesterday morning I thought I was getting over the flu.  After a walk to the shops and back I wasn't so sure, honestly only about a mile round trip but I was so out of breath and then in the evening was unable to get off the couch at all. I went to the doctors this morning to be told "this is proper flu" and then after he listen to my chest "Hmm - bad chest infection".   So I'm on antibiotics and signed off work until the 12th!  I haven't been this ill in ages.  I hope it will now start to get better - also I need to learn to give it time and not rush it like I did yesterday.