Then and the art of a really quick walkthrough

The sun was shining. Birds were flying. Smell of cut grass. Decided to go to post office. And take some photos on the way.

Then on the way to the PO randomly decided to check out the train station next to the picnic area. It was deserted and I got scared to step onto the platform because there was a sign which said "200 pound fine for trespassing."

Then I carried onto the post office, did my dirty deeds and came back via the public bridleway.

And then there were these cows just standing there waiting for their photo to be taken. While I was taking their photos like this train drove in on the railway tracks which have always been deserted. I got all excited and followed the tracks to the station. Took only two photos of the train cos' I was out of camera space but not before being given a warning about a 200 pound fine for walking on the tracks. I was like sorry.

Then the train was leaving and this little school girl of maybe eight years looked out and screamed "You're a trainspotter, aren't you? I hate trainspotters!" I'd seen the movie Trainspotting and had no idea what she meant. But I came back and totally googled the term. It's like these people who love trains and engines. Like in that Station Agent movie. That little girl thought I'm a trainspotter! Rad.

Then I totally blogged it all.

Award winning sky 

Half Naked 

Treerailed 

Flowered yet deserted station 

Don't mess with these guys 

Smokin' although Mr. Engine driver doesn't like me 

Hogwarts Express 

Another Rainy Day - Part 1 

Another Rainy Day - Part 2 

Musical Journey

I had been looking forward to this trip. The last time I had been to my uncle's friend house was almost 10 years back. He had an amazing music system - a 5.1 surround (which at that time really wasn't common at all). The demonstration had blown me away. I couldn't wait to check out his new system!

First, we had lunch at a nice sausage pub - I finally got to taste wild boar (in a sausage format though) and was really happy cos' I'd always wondered what it was like - had watched Obelix and Asterix gorging on it for many years. In sausage form it tasted swell, by Toutatis!

Mr. H has above a 1000 CDs which are arranged alphabetically. A lot of progressive rock, folk rock, weird rock, unclassifiable music and more groups than you can point a finger at.

As soon as you enter the room you're overpowered by the presence of two speakers. The way the new system works is the CD goes into the CD transport which passes on the unadulterated digital content to the preamp which passes it onto the amp which passes it to the huge (see the How High? pic to understand height - I'm 6'1" and those things reach almost my shoulder) and incredibly modified speakers outfitted with super tweeters. All the components are connected with high quality cables. There are two chairs in the room - if you sit on these all the other room noise cancels out and you get pure unadulterated music. What's the cost of this new setup? Around £40,000. No, I haven't added a zero by mistake. It's crazy.

It sounds great. But I could never spend that much! For example, I had carried the New Radicals CD with me and as soon as "You get what you give" started playing - I immediately heard sounds I had never heard before (guitars in the background, clean drum hits, great bass reproduction - what not). It's quite a ear opener. If you listen to MP3s on this system you can make out the limitations of the format...

Mr. H took me through a whirlwind tour of some of his CDs. It felt like being in a musical education class. I think we sat for atleast 9 hours straight in that room listening to music ranging from Jade Warrior, Nektar, Manfred Mann, Uriah Heep to James Blunt. By the end of it my head was caving in. Seriously. Too much information. :)

I fell in love with that room. Later at night I listened to some of my mp3s, then watched Steve Vai's Live at Astoria performance after Mr. H had hooked up his portable DVD player to the system. Finally, I lay down listening to Porcupine Tree's "In Absentia" and fell asleep at around 4:45 a.m. on the carpet. 5:30 a.m. I woke up and went up to the guest bedroom. I really wish there had been a bed in the music room itself! :)

Finally, what's the photo of the of that strange pink thingy, you ask? Well, you put it on top of the CD player - play your CD for 5 seconds and it gets chipped. By chipped I mean - the sound quality becomes better. No physical contact with the actual CD itself - it's like some sort of talisman. WHAT?! Well, Mr. H swears it does change the sound quality significantly, other professionals who've checked it out agree as well.. and I don't know what to believe.. Mr. H chipped one of my CDs and I thought it sounded better the next time around but it could have been my mind playing tricks on me.. and heck, with a system like his.. he doesn't need a chip! That chip thingy costs around 30 quid and "chips" around 34 CDs before it stops working. It's a kind of magic? :)

One of my best weekends in the UK. I could have spent a year in that room and still not have gotten through everything.. :) Thank you Mr. and Mrs. H.. Photos below..

The great sausage pub 

The great lunch at the great sausage pub 

So that's what a 1000 CDs looks like 

Radio, Pre-Amp, CD Transport (BL to TR) 

2 speakers, an amp and a black cat. 

How high? 

Vai via the PDVD player... 

Mysterious chip 

The Return 

- Separator -

Just to separate two disconnected sets of photos.. :)

Beginning from the end of the walk 

A nice day for horses 

Sky Powered 

Rail Revisited 

Coincidence #1

That's it. I've decided. If any of those events which we brush off as "mere coincidence" occurs with me there will be a post. I've had maybe a few insane ones in my life so far, out of which I remember *none* right now. But back home on my computer, resides a little file which contains a few which I considered worthy enough to note down.

Enough chatter. Onto coincidence #1. Which happened 15 minutes before this post.

So I'm checking out this guy's files on a p2p client. He's got quite a few songs by someone called Jack Johnson. I have no idea who Jack Johnson is.

For some reason I start thinking about so many people listening to such a variety of music. My memory went back maybe two years while I was chatting with someone on MSN and had asked what music she listened to. She had given me a band name whom I had never heard of and I had downloaded a few songs by them.

But for the world of me, I cannot recall what the name of the group is. Except for the word Sauce.

I type this out in my p2p client search. The first result is:

G Love and Special Sauce & Jack Johnson - Rodeo Clowns

That *was* the band. Two years back. G Love and Special Sauce. Coupled with the guy I had never heard of 20 minutes back - Jack Johnson.

Looking up on the net -
'It was G. Love who gave surfer Jack Johnson his first big break by including a version of Johnson’s "Rodeo Clowns" on Philadelphonic (1999).'

Coincidence #1 has been noted.

What is a Jammi? How do you define Jammi?

So your bottle of Jam is over and yet simultaneously it's not. There are still pieces of jam sticking around inside but scraping them with a spoon is painful cos' they're like really sticky. What to do?

Don't worry. This is where Jammi comes in.

You need:
1. A sufficient quantity of milk
2. The Jam Bottle
3. Spoon

Pour 1 into 2. Stir with 3. This will make the sticky jam pieces less stickier and now you can scrape out as much as your sweet heart desires.

I have provided the following two figures to make making your own Jammi easier.

Jammi - Milk your jam for all it's worth!

Fig 1 - In the Mix 

Fig 2 - Yummy Thing goes to my Tummy 

When I have nothing to click, I just look out the window