Thursday, February 24, 2005
What's It Like To Be A Skateboard Punk Rocker?
Complete the following well known phrase:
“We all live in a yellow _______”
You’re mission, should you choose to accept it and you’re prepared to risk looking like a bit of a tosser, is to find somebody who doesn’t know the answer.
Because everybody’s a Beatles buff, aren’t they? We all know the hits even if we weren‘t around at the time - I popped out just just as The Fabs were popping in to record Sgt. Pepper - and we all know little bits of Beatles trivia. Where does it come from? I think it’s a kind of folk memory. We are born knowing that Stu Sutcliffe was the first Beatle to pop his clogs, that Stu’s girlfriend Astrid invented the Mop Top, and that manager Brian Epstein had a bit of a thing for John Lennon. Aren’t we?
Well, that’s what I thought until this week. Two of my team - and more importantly, my two new blog characters - were discussing The Beatles.
“Oh yeah, I’m a big Beatles fan,” said Zippee. “I’ve got the Red and the Blue albums. I’m looking at getting The White Album as well.”
It became apparent he didn’t realise these were compilation albums released after the group split. He thought they were albums they’d released during their career and he needed the white one to round things off. Aww, bless. I suddenly felt a little bit older.
I bit my lip for fear of sounding like a condescending old twat, which I guess I am anyway, but it struck me as strange that there were people in the music saturated Western world who didn’t know their Beatles basics. It’s like not knowing that the sun sets in the west, or that BBC radio announcers always dress in evening wear.
Anyway. It’s been a shit week. If Monday was a breeze and a bit of a laugh, the rest of the week has been a Force 10 gale - all buffeting and throwing up overboard and not much fun at all. A week which no amount of lovely stationary could make alright.
I’ve seen goalposts moved forward, job specifications changed on a whim, and deadlines crossed out and re-redrawn and re-drawn again.
Joking aside, I want to do this well. I don't want the whole thing falling apart on my watch, thanks very much. When it became apparent there was no way I’d meet a deadline for a particular project, I acquired three loan signings from Neil’s team until the pressure’s off. They’re students on work experience and are bright as buttons and cute to match.
I don’t think I can cope with three new characters, so I’m going to apply a bit of my usual blogger's license - exaggerate here, caricature there, mess about with time frames when it suits me - and amalgamate them into two. So introducing Ash and Zippee: they wear hooded tops, spend their lunch hours circling the car park on their skateboards, and try to cultivate a look that suggests they may have just mugged your granny. But they learn at incredible speed, brighten the place up no end and frankly they’ve been a bit of a godsend.
Stella sent me a text today saying “I’m on holiday. You’re not. Don’t forget to do eveyone's timesheets. It's important.”
Bugger.
“We all live in a yellow _______”
You’re mission, should you choose to accept it and you’re prepared to risk looking like a bit of a tosser, is to find somebody who doesn’t know the answer.
Because everybody’s a Beatles buff, aren’t they? We all know the hits even if we weren‘t around at the time - I popped out just just as The Fabs were popping in to record Sgt. Pepper - and we all know little bits of Beatles trivia. Where does it come from? I think it’s a kind of folk memory. We are born knowing that Stu Sutcliffe was the first Beatle to pop his clogs, that Stu’s girlfriend Astrid invented the Mop Top, and that manager Brian Epstein had a bit of a thing for John Lennon. Aren’t we?
Well, that’s what I thought until this week. Two of my team - and more importantly, my two new blog characters - were discussing The Beatles.
“Oh yeah, I’m a big Beatles fan,” said Zippee. “I’ve got the Red and the Blue albums. I’m looking at getting The White Album as well.”
It became apparent he didn’t realise these were compilation albums released after the group split. He thought they were albums they’d released during their career and he needed the white one to round things off. Aww, bless. I suddenly felt a little bit older.
I bit my lip for fear of sounding like a condescending old twat, which I guess I am anyway, but it struck me as strange that there were people in the music saturated Western world who didn’t know their Beatles basics. It’s like not knowing that the sun sets in the west, or that BBC radio announcers always dress in evening wear.
Anyway. It’s been a shit week. If Monday was a breeze and a bit of a laugh, the rest of the week has been a Force 10 gale - all buffeting and throwing up overboard and not much fun at all. A week which no amount of lovely stationary could make alright.
I’ve seen goalposts moved forward, job specifications changed on a whim, and deadlines crossed out and re-redrawn and re-drawn again.
Joking aside, I want to do this well. I don't want the whole thing falling apart on my watch, thanks very much. When it became apparent there was no way I’d meet a deadline for a particular project, I acquired three loan signings from Neil’s team until the pressure’s off. They’re students on work experience and are bright as buttons and cute to match.
I don’t think I can cope with three new characters, so I’m going to apply a bit of my usual blogger's license - exaggerate here, caricature there, mess about with time frames when it suits me - and amalgamate them into two. So introducing Ash and Zippee: they wear hooded tops, spend their lunch hours circling the car park on their skateboards, and try to cultivate a look that suggests they may have just mugged your granny. But they learn at incredible speed, brighten the place up no end and frankly they’ve been a bit of a godsend.
Stella sent me a text today saying “I’m on holiday. You’re not. Don’t forget to do eveyone's timesheets. It's important.”
Bugger.

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