...Kings X have always rocked, I just forgot.

Around 1989 maybe 1990, I saw Kings X at Milton Keynes on the "Gretchen....." tour and it was absolutely incredible. Throughout the years I've always bought their albums and seen them live until around 2 years ago and I almost stopped going to gigs totally.
I hadn't listened to Kings X for a little while. I had certain tracks on my phone but I am busy loading it up with various songs and dug out their "Please come home....Mr Bulbous" CD. I had always considered it one of their weaker albums but on listening to it again I suddenly realise that Kings X have always rocked, I just forgot.
This is what they do best, harmonies, great musicians, can all sing, write great songs and are an awesome live band. This is called "Move me" and they really do:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=43KfWDaI4wQ

PS. Just found my 2002 album by an Aussie band called Rollerball. If you like your rock with that dirty '70's vibe, this track slays:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OoG7xKHlgdI

.....that they are special is beyond doubt.....

I will make this post short and let the pictures do the talking. In a simple few words, I went to see the Red Arrows for the first time since I was a child. This was between Olympics and they were incredible and I found it very moving. It takes 1,500 flight hours and at least one combat tour before a pilot can even consider trying out for the Red Arrows. Two pilots were killed in August and November last year. I was attending the White Horse County Show in Wiltshire, a fraction over a year since the death of "Red 4".
The Red Arrows are a flight of 9 but in commemoration to their fallen comrades, they flew as 7 on this day. In the pictures you will a few shots of them flying with white smoke and the outermost pilots are trailing red smoke in their honour.
Words cannot express my pride in the dedication and skill of these pilots, that they are special is beyond doubt but the fact that they still have the power to take your breath away is incredible, that and the fact that they silenced a 16 year old teenage girl for the duration of their show, a testament to their skill if ever there was one!

Just to answer one question that you will be about to ask: How did you get such close shots?
Well it was like this.................

Yep, they made it too easy for me. On with the show.

 

The Red Arrows, yet another reason to be proud of Britain. I promise not to leave it so long next time.

Car had trouble starting and didn't quit smoking...

I bade farewell to my car last Friday. I am not a car fanatic by any stretch of the imagination, usually going for practical and comfortable cars and my last vehicle was a Vauxhall Zafira. It wasn't fast but it was extremely comfortable and spacious and I adored it.
I had run it into the ground, owning it for close to 10 years and it had some mechanical faults that meant it was beyond economic repair. Mind you at 217,000 miles, it had done its fair share of travelling.
It had been as far North as Aberdeen, on several occasions. Newcastle a couple of times, Cumbria a few more times, North, Mid and South Wales a few times, East Anglia a couple of times, Kent and Sussex region a few times, Somerset and Devon a few times and Dorset numerous times but Car had never been to Cornwall.
I used to visit Cornwall regularly but haven't been down there in 10 years and I found it a little sad that Car had visited so much of the UK with me, it has travelled as far North, East and West of the UK as I ever have been, but not as far South. It has been a good companion, safe and dependable and very easy to drive.
Last Friday I drove Car down to the canal and sat there with a coffee and had a cigar. It was cold but sunny, very fresh feeling, my favourite kind of day. It is stupid to get so attached to a piece of machinery but it is the distance that we had both travelled together, the shared experiences. Getting towed out of a field by a tractor in thick mud, having to pack the tyres with mud and stone when I got stuck in snow, watching the other cars slide down a hill and getting up it first time, driving back from Hebden Bridge with hardly any brakes and metal to metal grating all the way home. Then the more euphoric first views of Cumbria or first trip to Dorset or revisiting childhood memories like Kenilworth Castle and Stonehenge, it becomes more than metal as driving is the ultimate freedom and by default the car becomes an extension of you.
I am now in a faster car that my wife has called Jack, although it being a French car, I am sure it is a Jacques (with a silent "Pah!". It is very pretty and has lots of lights, lots of automated things, 6 gears and white dials. Everyone seems to love it and I can't find fault with it except that it's not Car. Car had trouble starting and didn't quit smoking last year, infact Car woke up to a cloud of black smoke every morning. Car sounded like a tractor and steered like one too. Car had decided that it needed new tyres every 6 weeks and was eagerly waiting for a new steering rack, track rod ends, clutch and many, many engine parts.
This is simply my fond farewell to my favouritest car ever, OV51WBP, bye Car.