What's the most interesting thing you've done today?

[gary booth]

So they should Des, it's a thing of beauty and not often spotted.

[NormanD]

This morning, while waiting for a bus, I got some self-help advice from Dennis, the local street drinker. 10.00 am, with a can of super cider in hand, he told me that I looked as though I had the world's woes on my shoulders and ought to lighten up. We discussed Kent Walton and tv wrestlers 'til my bus came.

Made my day. Which tells you everything you need to know about the rest of it.

[AndyM]

Norman, there must have been a conversational 'bridge' between the general assessment and the very specific move to Kent Walton et al. Intrigued to know how you got from (a) to (b).

[Gordon Neill]

This morning, while sitting in a bus, I saw a man commuting to work on a....unicycle. I had no can of super cider in my hand. He had no clown's outfit. Tonight, intrigued, I found that there is a thing called the Union of UK Unicyclists, with a website and a forum! http://www.unicycle.org.uk/

[NormanD]

Scenario:

World's woes, etc (as above)

Got a suggestion?

Have a bevvy

I hardly ever drink

Problem in the past?

No, it doesn't agree with me

My ma never touched a drop. Dad was a real boozer.

....and then, and then....talk of Manchester, his hometown. I was struck by how good his teeth were, even yet unstained for a smoker. Were they false? And the next thing, we're on to Mick McManus and Jackie Pallo, who had the cloak, who the mask.

C'mon Andy, these things happen. Whaddya want for nothing - a rubber biscuit?

[Rob Hall]

Wasn't it Kendo nagasaki who had the mask?

[AndyM]

Thanks Norman - you paint an evocative picture. Somewhere lurking in the house I have a copy of Jackie Pallo's "You Grunt, I'll Groan".

And yes, Kendo was masked.

[Des]

Saw the bloke in the white van again this morning - he was playing James Brown at full blast as he waited for the lights to change and he yelled out to me 'MOTOWN!!' referring to my t-shirt. Sadly I was wearing a Womad 2006 t-shirt this time. He's my funk soul brother.

[NormanD]

Further discussion today on Kendo Nagasaki who, my drinking pal maintains, came from Barnsley.

Re. unicycles. I remember one of my brothers once looked out of his front window to see a man (dressed in Victorian costume) ride past on a penny farthing bicycle. For some reason I could not understand, he developed an irrational and immediate dislike of the man, muttering threats about any future sighting.

Yes, we had great fun growing up together.

[Dayna]

I went to the fair and I petted a cute goat who tried eating my shirt. There was a little kid leading a lamb around and trying to set it up, and the lamb reared up and knocked him down, but the judge was really nice. He went over and patted the kid on the back and congratulated him for doing so well.
I was sitting in the barn trying to cool off, since it was close to 90 all day and was able to listen to a guy outside playing a button box. What a funny looking thing that is! It really looks like a bib box.

[Philellinas]

I was innocently walking to work one day about 2-3 years ago when I was nearly run down (on the pavement, naturally) by a unicyclist. He wasn't wearing a clown's outfit and I wasn't laughing. One is all too used to morons on bikes trying to encourage pedestrians to use the road but now one has to have one's eyes peeled for unicycles. One is not amused. This has been my only close encounter with a unicycle so far but I am fairly confident that one of these days I'm going to have a run-in with a nonchalant cyclist.

[Des]

I am fairly confident that one of these days I'm going to have a run-in with a nonchalant cyclist.

I'm always challenging cyclists, Phil, when they are riding on pavements. I NEVER give way to them (they always swerve at the last minute) and I always tell them to get onto the road. For people who professedly care for the environment (and therefore presumably for those who live in it) many cyclists are amazingly selfish, arrogant and inconsiderate.

There are quite a few unicyclists around Bristol.

[NormanD]

....many cyclists are amazingly selfish, arrogant and inconsiderate.

Just like the bloke in the deer stalker on that penny farthing. How dare he upset my brother by riding past his front window.

But not all cyclists are like your description, Des. Look at this film of cyclists in Utrecht at the morning rush hour
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-AbPav5E5M
No lycra in sight, they all stop at the lights and walkers are unmolested.

It gives me hope again.

[jackdaw version]

I was driving very slowly on a dirt road past some horses when Lee Perry's "Roast Fish and Cornbread" came up on the tape with that "Clipity, clopity, clip clop" intro. The horses suddenly looked really interested.

A few days ago I was driving along listening to Lee Dorsey on the tape, not paying much attention to where I was, when I saw that I was on Dorsey Drive!

Whenever I play an artist with "Lee" in his or her name in the car in the future, I expect another Kuu-Kuu* moment. Who knows? Maybe it will involve a bicyclist or unicyclist. I used to know someone who rode a unicycle all the way across the United States. He was a Lutheran minister and looked even more like Jesus than people often think I do.

*Howard, I hope I've spelt and used your expression correctly.

[Alan Balfour]

I don't do interesting things anymore but it would appear I once did. Two nights ago I was hunting down a short lived 1968 blues newsletter named Blues That Is and in the second issue (there were only ever two) I stumbled upon this:

We have received a very lengthy letter from Alan Balfour of Fulham, London. He ends his letter with a list of 1963 & 64 blues entries to the British LP charts. We thought that it deserved extracting and publishing in its own right.:

Jan.2, 1964 "The Blues, Vol.1" (Pye International) reached No.15
Feb.20, 1964 "Folk Festival Of The Blues" (Pye Int.) reached No.16
May.14, 1964 "Out Came The Blues" (Ace Of Hearts) reached No.19
May.28., 1964 "The Blues, Vol.2' (Pye International) reached No.16
Jun.18, 1964 "Down & Out Blues" Sonny Boy Williamson (Pye Int.) reached No.20

In 1963 Chuck Berry had three Pye International albums of 50's material in the U.K. charts, of which "On Stage" (in fact overdubbed studio recordings) stayed in the Top Ten for 6 weeks at one point reaching no. 6 (3rd October).

Howlin' Wolf with "Smokestack Lightnin'" and Slim Harpo with "Scratch My Back" - on Pye International and Stateside respectively - both made the singles top forty during 1964.

The real surprise of the above list – Out Came The Blues – 12 tracks 1930s vintage and one each from 1947 and 1953. Memphis Minnie in UK charts. The mind boggles, does it not?

To answer that, Alan, yes it does! Ed.