Birds!

Okay, so anyone who has ever met me has heard my rant on digital photography. My biggest issue is that digital is changing the essential nature of the photo album. There are no bad photographs anymore, no more mistakes (and the mistakes are often the most beautiful images) and very few hardcopy photoalbums. My boy has had his digital camera for about four years and how many times has he printed photographs? Once! Our photoalbum is one sided!

I always said that I'd only get a digital camera once it had something to offer me but until then I was blacklisting them. The day came when I realised that I'd not been shooting any colour images. I put a roll of colour film into my camera and then promptly took it straight back out because I didn't want to miss out on getting an image in black and white.

So I purchased a digital camera to take some colour images. I'm not at all happy with the results however the immediacy of being able to have hard copy images so soon after taking the image is somewhat of a novelty (after having to process film and then print each image).

See, nothing spectacular there. But I'll pay the immediacy for sure.

I have two more things to talk about. One is Lorraine. Had the most fantastic day with her on Saturday (its been so long). We went to West End for tea and cake and then back to her place to meet her family. Now I adore Lorraine and I should be spending this entire blog listing her many virtues however animal nut that I am, I'm going to talk about Spooky. I had heard much about Spooky - grumpy, one eared, biter, former feral, generally not all that nice to be around. Oh how Lorraine lied!

Perhaps the highlight of my day was three german shepherds.

I grew up with german shepherds - two of the best dogs a person could ever hope to share time with. There is something amazing about being able to wrestle a big dog; they are so physical and so demanding. Seeing Freddy, Chinner and Princess brought back so many memories of Sheba and Sasha. I remember that we used to live up in the mountains on 22 acres of land and we had lots of dams. No matter what time of year, every single morning when we let Sheba out of the house she ran straight to the dam for a swim. It could be 5 degrees and she'd run straight to the water. I remember that whenever they had bones Sheba would dutifully bury hers and Sasha would follow closely behind (but not too closely to arouse suspicion) and dig them up.

We are amazingly fortunate to be able to spend part of our lives with these animals. A few years ago all of my childhood pets (Dominique, Sasha, Sheba, Sophie and Goo) grew very old and had to be put down - all within the space of a year. It was a devastating time but also a beautiful one because I was able to get more animals to share my life. We share our lives with our animals for ten, fourteen years. We treat them like kings then they die peacefully and we are able to look after more.

I said in the first paragraph that anyone who knew me knows my rant about digital. Anyone who knows me will also know that it would only take two blogs to do this:

the Alderley crew

I encourage you to visit Tales of Your Local Animal Shelter and the RSPCA.

One last thing! New Showbread album tomorrow. Quite excited.

So seeing the dogs made me think of ten years ago and my dogs, which made me think of Pet Politics by Silver Jews. Thanks to Bradley's Almanac for the live version.

One last image to leave you with. The evil illi.




Silver Jews

Visit Silver Jews at their My Space

Buy Silver Jews at Missing Link

Listen to Silver Jews Pet Politics

Showbread

Visit Showbread at their My Space

Buy Showbread at Missing Link

Listen to Showbread Oh Emetophobia!

Limited Express (Has Gone?)

Limited Express (Have Gone)

First time blogger, long time reader.

It seems rather appropriate to start my first blog by highlighting Limited Express (Has Gone?) for they've made quite an impact in my life over the past month. This is meant musically, physically, emotionally and any other "ally" you can think of. From the first night seeing them play at an art gallery to a packed out crowd the smile did not leave my lips. Nor anyone else's. Tiny, tiny Yukari in her orange dress shreiking around the small area defined as a stage; JJ thrashing around wildly until his glasses were fogged up so much they looked like those comedy glasses that are blacked out with dots for the eyes; Josh on his first tour with the band, clearly overwhelmed with the audience being over the top doey-eyed in love with his new band. Maybe I've been sheltered, maybe I haven't been out religiously every Friday night for the past ten years but I have seen a lot and this was nothing like I have ever, ever seen before.

Long story short, they toured the East coast of Australia with my partner's band. Nine people crammed in a mini-van. Sleeping, eating cheese and mustard sandwhiches and brownies. Playing shows and then jumping straight in the van and moving on to the next show. Perhaps the only time I've ever wished to go on tour (stuck in a van with a touring van full of people with questionable tour hygene has never struck me as being appealing). It went well. I'm very proud.

So they make the trek home, play a show at the Troubador and amaze me again. Absolutely floor me. I'm down the front beside JJ again. I know he's looking over but I don't think he knows the grin that's on my face is one of the biggest grins ever. I have a new camera and LE are the most perfect subject to test it out on.

So anyone actually on the tour would give you the full story. Happily, I had daily updates - so many excited calls and texts!

Visit Limited Express (Has Gone?) at their My Space.

Buy Limited Express (Has Gone?) at JapanFiles

Listen to Limited Express (Has Gone?) Jesus Child