The random musings of a short man in a big world

Hello dear readers! Long time no speak. You are well I trust? Egads, it’s the tenth of January already. It seems churlish so late on to be wishing the world a happy new year, but I’ve done so anyway, cause that’s the way I roll.

Unless you’ve been on a different planet, you’ll know there’s been some snow around these parts. Apparently it’s global warming’s fault, as per. Nobody’s seen anything like it in their lifetime. It’s a national disaster! Bollocks it is, I vividly remember snow like this in the past, which means it happened within the last twenty years (the first five years of my life having been a tad more hazy). It’s certainly not as bad as this on a regular basis, but it’s hardly unheard of.

To be honest, here in Aberdeen the snow hasn’t been the real issue. Much worse was the council’s lack of foresight of, and reaction to, said weather event. Even before Christmas, my street was akin to an ice-rink, not aided by the distinct lack of gritters out and about. Sure, the main roads were fine, and the busier pedestrian routes had also received a light sprinkling of grit, but it was nowhere near adequate.

The first sign I saw of grit in the street was on the 5th of January. Now, I can’t remember exactly when the snow first appeared it was that far back (I’d guess sometime around December 20th), but that’s certainly not acceptable to this council tax payer.

It’s not like stupidity is uncommon for good old ACC. Just about to go out to public consultation are the plans for Sir Ian Wood’s BIG SHOW OF WEALTH aka the destruction of a popular city centre green space.

Before Sir Ian stuck his oar – and the promise of a meagre fifty million quid, on the proviso ACC match it pound-for-pound – into none of his business, planning permission had been granted for a new arts centre to utilise part of Union Terrace Gardens. The majority of funding for the arts centre was in place even before this, with a chunk coming from the clearly schizophrenic ACC.

Sir Ian couldn’t have that, of course, and decided to offer his £50M towards a plan (his own) to create a Civic Square above the gardens, with no plans to include the arts centre. Said gardens cover 2.5 acres – that’s a lot of concrete to build up to street level, not mention the untold environmental damage of destroying the plant-life and wildlife currently calling the gardens home and the fact that the cost of such folly is now estimated at a minimum of £140M.

That the cash-strapped council didn’t throw the plan out immediately is bad enough, but guess who’s funding the planning process, the public consultation (which again, doesn’t involve the arts centre)etc? Not Ian Wood, that’s for damn sure! Am I the only one spotting the conflict of interest here?

Regardless of whether you think an arts centre in the gardens is a good idea, surely it can’t be right that a green space that is one of the last distinguishing features of Aberdeen City Centre, one that’s been in use since 1879, be replaced with a soulless concrete block? Surely it can’t be right that Sir Ian’s “legacy” to the city that made him should be such a financial burden on the taxpayers of the city? Surely, my friends, this monstrosity must be stopped?

Imagine the furore if an Edinburgh businessman proposed the same thing for Princess St Gardens, or Sir Tom Hunter decided Glasgow Green would be nicer as a shopping centre. It’s time for the people of Aberdeen to kick up a fuss.

Fraser Denholm has summed the situation up much better than I ever could in this blog and an update here.

If you want to get involved, there’s a petition here against Wood’s Folly and a Facebook group here.

So it’s a cold at wet Tuesday morning in the granite city, and here’s me sat on a bus.

One of the most infuriating things about this city, and indeed the surrounding areas, is that the public transport infrastructure pretty much doesn’t exist.

Sure, there’s buses, but neither First in the city nor Stagecoach in the Shire, seem capable of rubbing two brain cells together. Have you ever tried getting to the airport, for example, on public transport? Oh, you can do it alright, but not without a LOT of planning.

And then there’s the more mundane stuff, like getting from my home, in the middle of nowhere, to work in the Largest Suburb in Europe.

An hour and a half, it takes, to make what is a half-hour journey by car. And the Goverment wonder why people don’t use public transport…

Apart from the fact the new Weezer album is bound to reek of awfulness, I do have this to say about it: Fecking ACE cover!

So, my vow of attending less football matches came to fruition, but not in the way I had hoped. After my post about cutting down, I had a pretty nasty illness that led to three weeks off work, and missing friendlies and competitive games. Admittedly, I’d already been to games at Turriff and Inverurie before that, but hey.

Fortunately the illness also came after the London trip… which was now so long agao I can barely remember the highlights. Hmm, let’s see…

On arrival at the super-shiny and super-huge T5, we cleverly bought four tickets for the Heathrow Express. Only to be presented with this when after the third had printed:

Technology fail. After seeking human intervention we were swiftly sorted out and able to continue on our merry way to our cheap hotel 5 minutes from Paddington Station. Handy, and also very cheap. Did the job though!

Nothing much exciting happened on the Friday night, so I’ll skip on to Saturday. When not much happened.

Dave joined our merry crew before we split into two groups – Edd, Dave and myself doing the cool stuff while Gary and his sister Gemma proceeded to get lost lots having no clue how London works. The cool stuff wasn’t particularly cool at all, to be fair. A quick trip down Carnaby Street, a wee wander round some of the touristy stuff, the highlight being walking into Hamleys. I was wearing my ultra-cool Dangermouse t-shirt, and was welcomed by the dude on the door with a cheery “‘ello Dangermouse, good to have you with us!”. Mega.

Ooh, ooh! We also managed to stumble upon the Dons pub, the Rob Roy, purely by chance thanks to my navigational skills. Win. I was, though, disappointed to find it dead both times we were in. Even at 10pm on a Saturday night. Boo.

What else happened? Not a whole lot. Sunday saw us head back towards central Lahndahn Town to partake in some food/shopping antics, and for me to Geek out over the musical heritage. Yes, I do have a photo of Wardour Street made famous by The Jam’s “A-Bomb on Wardour Street”. A photo of the street from the What’s The Story album cover was also taken. Oh yes.

Then there was the gig. That Wembley’s a bit impressive is it not?! We timed it perfectly to see Kasabian who were excellent. Oasis were… Oasis. I’ve seen them 13 times now so there were no surprises. It was certainly better than the Murrayfield shambles though. Getting back to Paddington was easier than anticipated as well. Bonus.

So, that was London. Then followed a few days of work before three weeks of bed. Not particularly nice, though I’d recommend it to anyone who needs to lose some weight.

Thankfully, I recovered in time to go on a three-day course, which I passed, and then have another busy weekend. One of the few football matches I’ve made it to away to Alloa, followed by comedy in Glasgow and thrills ‘n’ spills at Knockhill. Yay!

The football was poor, but the meal and comedy at Jongleurs were of acceptable standard. Dave also enjoyed, but his girlfriend, Gemma (not Gary’s sister!), didn’t seem too impressed. Too many wanking jokes I think. Stayed at their place on the Saturday night, then Dave and myself headed through to Knockhill where we were impressed to see local boy Gordon Shedden come second in the first BTCC race. Mon the Scots.

Keeping the theme going, Aberdeen’s very own Glynn Geddie manged to win his class and finish second overall in the Porsche Carrera Cup race that followed. Sadly the later races weren’t so successful with Sheds and another local boy, Jonny Adam, having various issues. Jonny’s fire extinguisher randomly deciding to cover him in foam was quite amusing though, even if it did put him out of race three.

More recently, on Saturday night no less, I went to the theatre. Yes! A theatre! I’m officially cultured! Edd and I made a late decision to see Quadrophenia, and despite being sat way up in “Ye Gads!” it was found to be thoroughly enjoyable. The band were rather good too, although the bass solo in My Generation completely failed to impress me. I’m just picky, though.

Hmm, this was a bit longer than intended, but I think that’s all the excitement for the moment. Apart from the motor, but we’ve already covered that. I’m currently trying to come up with a name for it. Ritchie is the best (read: only) suggestion so far, but I’m not keen.

Another busy weekend looms. No football for me, as I’m off to New Deer for the Wizard Festival, where I’ll see my good friends Proud Mary. Nice one.

If you know me, you’ll likely know that I can’t drive. It’s not through any deliberate act, I took lessons then ran out of cash, went to uni and just never picked it up again.

I may well be forced to pick it up again, given I done bought this:

Whoops!

Is it that time already? Peterhead’s pre-season programme of friendlies against stupid clubs from all over the north of Scotland begins on Tuesday night, and yet we’ve barely got a squad of players, and last season has barely even finished.

Indeed, given the Confederations Cup and European U21 Championships have been on this summer, you and I, the general public, have done without for a whole fortnight.

I’m the first to admit that for far too long I’ve allowed football to dominate but even I’m starting to grow wearisome of wall-to-wall football, televised or otherwise.

Admittedly, I’ve not made the best use of the summer break – I managed Rock Ness, and the following midweek travelled down to Edinburgh to see Oasis, but my spare time has mostly been wasted. That in itself isn’t a bad thing.

During the season I can easily see myself getting up at 7.30 in the morning to travel to an away game, and not return home until after 9 or even 10 at night, so the option of doing nothing is very welcome.

It’s not even that it’s a Saturday wasted. Getting up so early means my Friday night can be a washout, and I’m often home too late to bother about doing anything on the Saturday either.

My attitude is starting to alter in this regard though: I’m off down to London next weekend, and in August I’m planning at least a weekend in Fife for the BTCC at Knockhill, and one or both of Wizard or Belladrum. Whether I do two or all three, I’m going to be missing matches, and that represents a massive change.

It really is just becoming far too much to fit in football for 45 weeks of the year while retaining other interests and trying to have an active social life. Oh, and a full-time job of course. The time’s come to allow those other interests a chance to take hold, and allow myself some semblance of a “normal” life.

For those that don’t know, I do a bit of journalism on the side, so it may be that I continue to go to Peterhead’s home matches and make myself available for Highland League games (or even games down in Angus and Tayside for a change of scenery) to give myself a bit more freedom at weekends.

We’ll see how I feel once the action begins, I guess.

Hello, I am Nev, and this is the iamnev.co.uk blog, where I, Nev, will randomly muse. Cool or what?!

Ooh, and now I can update from t’iPhone app!