It's currently 4.26am, the sun is just about to start rising over Leeds (a quick glance to Google suggests sunrise is at 4.38 today, which is rather splendid) and I'm still awake. Why am I still awake?
To be honest, I'm not quite sure. Well, I am sure...it's because I spent a good chunk of my evening asleep. Despite having done very little during my day, I was feeling incredibly tired and felt like I needed a little nap. Of course, a little nap actually turned into a total of about 2 hours asleep, which really isn't good. I'd done so little yesterday that the highlight was being on Skype to Andrew for about two hours, just following him around in his day. I even got to go in the fridge and the oven. Turns out the light does go off in the fridge when you shut the door. Now that little mystery is solved, the world can sleep easier while I sit up writing this.
But usually when I have a sleep like that during the evening, I don't have too many difficulties getting to sleep at night. Today (I'm going to get really confused as to whether today is today, or if it's yesterday. I suppose I'm still thinking on Wednesday, so today is technically tomorrow. It's all a bit much to understand at 4.30...) is a strange one though. Since waking up, I've felt incredibly active and rather full of energy. Again though, I've not actually done a lot with this time apart from taking down photos and posters from my wall. Then again, I guess there's only so much you can do at 11.30pm when you're in the flat on your own...
I have managed to watch the entire second series of Peep Show though. The early episodes are pretty awesome, and there's some great characters and stories in it. At least one moment in each episode where I had to either pause the episode or go back because I was chucking so hard at something in it. Who could forget Super Hans telling the world that crack really is quite moreish?
Thursday doesn't really need to be a very productive day. Josh is leaving this morning, so I'll be back to being in the flat on my own. I'll just clean up the kitchen and start to throw things out that aren't needed anymore. Suppose I should actually start to pack up myself since I move house at the weekend. Bloody hell...that's a bit scary. It only feels like a short time ago I was writing my first blog entry on here about how my life was in a series of boxes and I was about to move here.
Oh, how times change...much like the seasons, or the rising and falling of the sun. Speaking of which, sunrise is officially two minutes away. I'll go and have a look, see if anything magical or mystical happens. Keep sleeping world, I'll join you eventually.
Don't forget to leave a comment of some sorts at the bottom of this, or on the Facebook page (facebook.com/tkayll) or on my Twitter account (@thomaskayll)
Thursday 30 June 2011
Saturday 25 June 2011
Take a minute and step away from the world.
I'm back, and this time I come with the promise of being more entertaining than a Dean Malenko promo. Yes, I know it's not a 1980s reference, or a Warrior reference, but I'm pretty tired and the only jokes I could think of were to do with Brooklyn Brawler.
I sat down to write this last night (that being Friday) but had absolutely nothing to think of, or nothing that I felt was worth writing about apart from telling you about my day. It was a fun day, but there wasn't a lot to say. I went to Amanda's flat, watched (most of) a film with her and Hessie, ate some pizza and generally messed around watching some old videos and whatnot on the internet. I used to love Weebls Stuff, but haven't really been on it for a while. I'm making up for it now though, so it's all good.
Oh, and it was raining when I came back to my flat, so I got rather wet (plus cargo pants aren't anywhere near as rain-friendly as you might expect). All in all, a very fun day.
However, I've just been out on my bike and suddenly feel like writing. Amazing how that can happen. Maybe it's just the desire and need to get out of the city and completely separate myself from the world for an hour or two, maybe there's something away from all of the cars that gets my creativity flowing...or maybe it's the fact that I spent a large chunk of the journey singing about Magical Trevor.
I highly doubt it was the last one...but stranger things have happened.
Seriously though, it's pretty cool how calm and peaceful the world can be just a few miles away from a relatively busy city. I didn't go maybe more than 10km from my flat (which if you're using old money, is a shade over 6 miles), but after I went under a bridge for the M1, I didn't hear another car until I went back under that bridge on the way back. There was a point where I stopped and watched a family of ducks crossing the canal. Well, I say that...three ducklings were in the middle, the parent was flapping its wings furiously and shooting from side to side, and there were two others who were quite happy sat on the side and not really going anywhere...I think next time I head out that way, I'll take my camera and get some snapshots, even just for my own benefit.
Anyway, I'm back in Leeds, and having just said goodbye to Jess, I'm becoming more aware of the fact that I'm moving out of Clarence Dock in a week and into a house...in the city...surrounded by loads of other houses...and nowhere near the canal. Strange, and this year really has flown by when I think about it. Obviously, things start to get more serious now as results for uni and whatnot now matter and will go towards my final degree. Seems pretty important. Probably because it is.
It's rather scary really.
Still, it's less than two weeks until I'll be at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix which should be several flavours of awesomeness. I also decided to get tickets for the World Series by Renault, which is also at Silverstone, in August. I'm not sure why they do it, but the tickets for that event are free, so I took it upon myself to make that family weekend away of sorts, with Emma being the only exception because she'd only spend the weekend complaining about how it's cars and racing and that Jenson Button isn't there for her to try and kidnap. Plus I could only order a maximum of four tickets. Such is life!
I can hear my stomach growling at me again...I suspect it's time for dinner.
Until next time!
I sat down to write this last night (that being Friday) but had absolutely nothing to think of, or nothing that I felt was worth writing about apart from telling you about my day. It was a fun day, but there wasn't a lot to say. I went to Amanda's flat, watched (most of) a film with her and Hessie, ate some pizza and generally messed around watching some old videos and whatnot on the internet. I used to love Weebls Stuff, but haven't really been on it for a while. I'm making up for it now though, so it's all good.
Oh, and it was raining when I came back to my flat, so I got rather wet (plus cargo pants aren't anywhere near as rain-friendly as you might expect). All in all, a very fun day.
However, I've just been out on my bike and suddenly feel like writing. Amazing how that can happen. Maybe it's just the desire and need to get out of the city and completely separate myself from the world for an hour or two, maybe there's something away from all of the cars that gets my creativity flowing...or maybe it's the fact that I spent a large chunk of the journey singing about Magical Trevor.
I highly doubt it was the last one...but stranger things have happened.
Seriously though, it's pretty cool how calm and peaceful the world can be just a few miles away from a relatively busy city. I didn't go maybe more than 10km from my flat (which if you're using old money, is a shade over 6 miles), but after I went under a bridge for the M1, I didn't hear another car until I went back under that bridge on the way back. There was a point where I stopped and watched a family of ducks crossing the canal. Well, I say that...three ducklings were in the middle, the parent was flapping its wings furiously and shooting from side to side, and there were two others who were quite happy sat on the side and not really going anywhere...I think next time I head out that way, I'll take my camera and get some snapshots, even just for my own benefit.
Anyway, I'm back in Leeds, and having just said goodbye to Jess, I'm becoming more aware of the fact that I'm moving out of Clarence Dock in a week and into a house...in the city...surrounded by loads of other houses...and nowhere near the canal. Strange, and this year really has flown by when I think about it. Obviously, things start to get more serious now as results for uni and whatnot now matter and will go towards my final degree. Seems pretty important. Probably because it is.
It's rather scary really.
Still, it's less than two weeks until I'll be at Silverstone for the British Grand Prix which should be several flavours of awesomeness. I also decided to get tickets for the World Series by Renault, which is also at Silverstone, in August. I'm not sure why they do it, but the tickets for that event are free, so I took it upon myself to make that family weekend away of sorts, with Emma being the only exception because she'd only spend the weekend complaining about how it's cars and racing and that Jenson Button isn't there for her to try and kidnap. Plus I could only order a maximum of four tickets. Such is life!
I can hear my stomach growling at me again...I suspect it's time for dinner.
Until next time!
Monday 20 June 2011
A smile is all it takes
With more energy and enthusiasm than Ultimate Warrior's entrance, I'm back.
I've decided it'll almost certainly be too hard thinking of a good Ultimate Warrior reference for the start of each blog. I might change it up and reference a different 1980s/1990s wrestler each time for amusement. There's much more mileage in that I think.
Currently, it's Monday evening and I'm sat at home. The key part here is that I'm sat at home. It's quite nice really, I get to sleep in my own bed for a couple of nights before heading off to Leeds for a couple more days. I think the current plan there is to stick around until we move into the house at the start of July and then I'll most likely be home for a good while, heading up to Leeds if there are things going on with drumming or when I just fancy escaping for a couple of days.
We did the Grassington parade on Friday which was a really good event. Despite reading some reports that suggested we'd get rained on (and possibly the event being rained off), we managed to survive with just a bit of drizzle early on, and by the time we got going we were in glorious sunshine. We had a group of four playing, and it was made even more impressive by the fact that one of the members had only been playing for a couple of days and we hadn't all played together until we started. All things considered, we sounded pretty good.
Getting back to Leeds on Friday evening was pretty chilled apart from needed to do a quick house-to-house job to borrow some jump leads after we had a quick problem with the Drum-mobile. Once we got back, there was enough time to get back to the flat, grab my bag and for Rachel to ponder what she wanted to eat on the way home. Couldn't say much about the coach journey...it was about as boring as you'd expect, I listened to some podcasts and drifted in an out of sleep. By the time we got back to Liverpool, it was about 1.20am. The taxi then didn't arrive despite us waiting until 2am before getting bored/cold/tired and jumping in a black cab. So I walked through the front door just over an hour after the coach got to Liverpool.
Africa Oyé was a bloody good day out. To all of those who attended, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. To those who didn't, you missed a very good weekend. If you don't live in the city, I suggest you check out a similar festival in your area (or come to Oyé in 2012!). They're brilliant events and a great chance to check out some of the finest world music there is to offer. I even left the event with a new hat to add to my collection, which is always a good thing.
Beatlife sounded absolutely phenomenal. I think the last gig I did with them could well have been the Lantern Parade last October. I've played since then in a couple of rehearsals, but to be honest, I went in not being completely sure about what was going on. Bit of a strange experience really, but it's pretty nice to know that the rhythms and breaks are stored in the back of my mind somewhere. There were a few points when I was a bit confused with breaks and whatnot, but for me, I just kept smiling and enjoying the experience of playing on stage to a rather large crowd.
The rest of the week is looking pretty good in Liverpool. Tuesday will have a trip to Mello with Smoo for some food and a chatter about the world before going to drumming. Since it's Senna day, I'm off to the cinema with Andrew afterwards to go and see the film once again. No doubt I'll still be completely enthralled by it and just as gripped as I was the first time. Wednesday should feature a bit of mini golf with Crawley and Hamling, who I realised I've only mentioned in my blog once or twice. In 46 entries, that's shameful and I'm very sorry about that. Sorry guys!
Crazy to think that I'm now just over a week and a half from being able to move into the house, which in turn means that it's less than three weeks until the British Grand Prix. I'll be honest, I'm getting more and more excited for it each day...which could explain why I'm downloading the entire 1996 season. Madness!
That's more than enough ramble from me for today really. Enjoy your evening!
I've decided it'll almost certainly be too hard thinking of a good Ultimate Warrior reference for the start of each blog. I might change it up and reference a different 1980s/1990s wrestler each time for amusement. There's much more mileage in that I think.
Currently, it's Monday evening and I'm sat at home. The key part here is that I'm sat at home. It's quite nice really, I get to sleep in my own bed for a couple of nights before heading off to Leeds for a couple more days. I think the current plan there is to stick around until we move into the house at the start of July and then I'll most likely be home for a good while, heading up to Leeds if there are things going on with drumming or when I just fancy escaping for a couple of days.
We did the Grassington parade on Friday which was a really good event. Despite reading some reports that suggested we'd get rained on (and possibly the event being rained off), we managed to survive with just a bit of drizzle early on, and by the time we got going we were in glorious sunshine. We had a group of four playing, and it was made even more impressive by the fact that one of the members had only been playing for a couple of days and we hadn't all played together until we started. All things considered, we sounded pretty good.
Getting back to Leeds on Friday evening was pretty chilled apart from needed to do a quick house-to-house job to borrow some jump leads after we had a quick problem with the Drum-mobile. Once we got back, there was enough time to get back to the flat, grab my bag and for Rachel to ponder what she wanted to eat on the way home. Couldn't say much about the coach journey...it was about as boring as you'd expect, I listened to some podcasts and drifted in an out of sleep. By the time we got back to Liverpool, it was about 1.20am. The taxi then didn't arrive despite us waiting until 2am before getting bored/cold/tired and jumping in a black cab. So I walked through the front door just over an hour after the coach got to Liverpool.
Africa Oyé was a bloody good day out. To all of those who attended, I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. To those who didn't, you missed a very good weekend. If you don't live in the city, I suggest you check out a similar festival in your area (or come to Oyé in 2012!). They're brilliant events and a great chance to check out some of the finest world music there is to offer. I even left the event with a new hat to add to my collection, which is always a good thing.
Beatlife sounded absolutely phenomenal. I think the last gig I did with them could well have been the Lantern Parade last October. I've played since then in a couple of rehearsals, but to be honest, I went in not being completely sure about what was going on. Bit of a strange experience really, but it's pretty nice to know that the rhythms and breaks are stored in the back of my mind somewhere. There were a few points when I was a bit confused with breaks and whatnot, but for me, I just kept smiling and enjoying the experience of playing on stage to a rather large crowd.
The rest of the week is looking pretty good in Liverpool. Tuesday will have a trip to Mello with Smoo for some food and a chatter about the world before going to drumming. Since it's Senna day, I'm off to the cinema with Andrew afterwards to go and see the film once again. No doubt I'll still be completely enthralled by it and just as gripped as I was the first time. Wednesday should feature a bit of mini golf with Crawley and Hamling, who I realised I've only mentioned in my blog once or twice. In 46 entries, that's shameful and I'm very sorry about that. Sorry guys!
Crazy to think that I'm now just over a week and a half from being able to move into the house, which in turn means that it's less than three weeks until the British Grand Prix. I'll be honest, I'm getting more and more excited for it each day...which could explain why I'm downloading the entire 1996 season. Madness!
That's more than enough ramble from me for today really. Enjoy your evening!
Thursday 16 June 2011
Keep on keeping busy
Since I last wrote, I've been pretty busy. Without a doubt, that's a good thing because it means that any fears I had of being sat around the flat with nothing to do all day have been squashed quicker than a 1980s jobber staring at Ultimate Warrior.
I had a trip to Sheffield to go and visit Sophie and her flat. I somehow managed to persuade Sophie to get Twitter (you can follow her @Sophiem72) despite her insistence that I'm nothing more than a media whore thanks to Facebook, Twitter, a blog and ideas of starting a podcast. I might have a very rough version of that recorded next week, but we'll see how things go really. Highlights of the trip included getting lost at the train station and being unable to find Beth and her car, which was even more tricky since we had no means of contacting each other. We went and saw a band which was rather good, and they had a song about wanting to play in a lady garden.
I have no idea what that is. I imagine it's a place filled with women drinking tea, making Victoria sponge cake and playing croquet or something. *innocence*
Sophie talks in her sleep, which is awesome and provided me with hilarity through the night. I don't sleep that well anyway, and at Sophie's I was struggling to get more than two hours at a time before waking up and dozing off again. During one of those intervals though, she mumbled something which sounded completely incoherent to me (and seemingly her) before sitting up and proclaiming that what she'd said made no sense and she should shut up. Unsurprisingly, she's got no recollection of that. I used to talk in my sleep, but then again, I used to get up and walk around the house when I was asleep in my younger days too...
The weekend was very good...I went off to Hebden Bridge for the Handmade Parade which goes on each year. Surprised some Beatlifers with my appearance and got to play photographer for the day! Felt really strange being there but not playing to be honest, but it's always good to see how things sound from the other side. I took a load of photos and captured some video footage as well, all of which you can find on my Facebook page.
The weather was a bit suspicious in parts, but the rain held off and sunshine ultimately won the day and helped bring the crowds out. Again, maybe it's just me being on the other side and watching, but the parade seemed a bit bigger and better than in previous years. They've all been pretty good though, and that's why the Hebden Bridge parade is one of my favourite events of the year.
This coming weekend (18/19 June) is Africa Oye in Sefton Park, Liverpool. The organisers won the battle to keep this event free, and it's one of the biggest free festivals in the UK (if not Europe) so come on down, keep those fingers crossed for sunshine and enjoy some fabulous music. I'm coming home for this, so say hello if you get the chance!
Yesterday, I made the trip to Grassington for a workshop with Honeydrum ahead of a parade there on Friday evening. Grassington is about an hour away from Leeds up in the Dales, and it's a nice little town. The workshop was with maybe 40 children, and they seem nice, but children being children, they don't really have a great attention span. It was hard work, but I definitely learnt something about running a workshop with young children and how you need to be straight on it and just go. Like I say, I'm back up there tomorrow for this parade, and then I'll *hopefully* be getting a coach back to Liverpool which will mean I arrive back home at about 1am, so I can fall asleep in my own bed in the early hours of the morning. It's going to be tight, but fingers crossed I get back in time!!
I've finished my bread and jam (what a life of luxury) and my cup of tea, which is currently Earl Grey, so I shall call it a day there. I'll probably write something early next week (maybe Sunday if I'm up for it) about Oye and Grassington.
Keep smiling people.
I had a trip to Sheffield to go and visit Sophie and her flat. I somehow managed to persuade Sophie to get Twitter (you can follow her @Sophiem72) despite her insistence that I'm nothing more than a media whore thanks to Facebook, Twitter, a blog and ideas of starting a podcast. I might have a very rough version of that recorded next week, but we'll see how things go really. Highlights of the trip included getting lost at the train station and being unable to find Beth and her car, which was even more tricky since we had no means of contacting each other. We went and saw a band which was rather good, and they had a song about wanting to play in a lady garden.
I have no idea what that is. I imagine it's a place filled with women drinking tea, making Victoria sponge cake and playing croquet or something. *innocence*
Sophie talks in her sleep, which is awesome and provided me with hilarity through the night. I don't sleep that well anyway, and at Sophie's I was struggling to get more than two hours at a time before waking up and dozing off again. During one of those intervals though, she mumbled something which sounded completely incoherent to me (and seemingly her) before sitting up and proclaiming that what she'd said made no sense and she should shut up. Unsurprisingly, she's got no recollection of that. I used to talk in my sleep, but then again, I used to get up and walk around the house when I was asleep in my younger days too...
The weekend was very good...I went off to Hebden Bridge for the Handmade Parade which goes on each year. Surprised some Beatlifers with my appearance and got to play photographer for the day! Felt really strange being there but not playing to be honest, but it's always good to see how things sound from the other side. I took a load of photos and captured some video footage as well, all of which you can find on my Facebook page.
The weather was a bit suspicious in parts, but the rain held off and sunshine ultimately won the day and helped bring the crowds out. Again, maybe it's just me being on the other side and watching, but the parade seemed a bit bigger and better than in previous years. They've all been pretty good though, and that's why the Hebden Bridge parade is one of my favourite events of the year.
This coming weekend (18/19 June) is Africa Oye in Sefton Park, Liverpool. The organisers won the battle to keep this event free, and it's one of the biggest free festivals in the UK (if not Europe) so come on down, keep those fingers crossed for sunshine and enjoy some fabulous music. I'm coming home for this, so say hello if you get the chance!
Yesterday, I made the trip to Grassington for a workshop with Honeydrum ahead of a parade there on Friday evening. Grassington is about an hour away from Leeds up in the Dales, and it's a nice little town. The workshop was with maybe 40 children, and they seem nice, but children being children, they don't really have a great attention span. It was hard work, but I definitely learnt something about running a workshop with young children and how you need to be straight on it and just go. Like I say, I'm back up there tomorrow for this parade, and then I'll *hopefully* be getting a coach back to Liverpool which will mean I arrive back home at about 1am, so I can fall asleep in my own bed in the early hours of the morning. It's going to be tight, but fingers crossed I get back in time!!
I've finished my bread and jam (what a life of luxury) and my cup of tea, which is currently Earl Grey, so I shall call it a day there. I'll probably write something early next week (maybe Sunday if I'm up for it) about Oye and Grassington.
Keep smiling people.
Tuesday 7 June 2011
Senna
This is completely different from any other blog I've written. I wasn't sure whether I wanted this posted on here. So much so, I took a completely different approach to writing it. I sat down and wrote it last night, saved it and closed it. This morning, I came back to it and had another read through it, made some little changes and added one or two other things that I'd missed out. It's something that means a lot to me, and though I don't think there's anything deeply personal in there, this piece means more to me than almost every other thing I've written on here since I started the blog.
Here we go...
On Monday evening, I went to watch Senna. It’s a film I’ve been waiting for ever since it was first announced back in...ooh, 2009? It might have been a year earlier than that, but that’s around the time that I first remember there being something about a potential. Then last July, Top Gear did a fantastic piece on Senna to celebrate the fact that he would have been 50 years old.
I said back then that it was the finest piece of television Top Gear have produced, and is probably one of the best things that the BBC have done. Top Gear might be a bit silly at times, and they might joke around and act like buffoons, but this showed that a serious piece of television could still be done. It had interviews with people and clips of Ayrton at his finest, and it celebrated the man’s life. If you haven’t seen that, I highly recommend tracking it down. It’s on YouTube and it’s pretty easy to find.
Then the film came along and gave it some stiff competition. When I first saw the trailer, I thought “Wow..that looks absolutely fantastic.”
I’ll be honest, I’ve probably watched that trailer at least a dozen times. Finding out bits about the film, how it was entirely made up of archive footage and how Ayrton Senna tells the story himself from interviews and audio clips, seemed absolutely fascinating. Having seen the film now, I can give an honest and truthful opinion on it. I think it’s fantastic and is easily the greatest sporting documentary ever made. Really though, that can’t be hard when you’re making a film about one of the greatest sportsmen, or at the very least Formula One drivers, to ever live.
For me, it was so powerful that I made the walk home from the cinema teary-eyed. I didn’t listen to my iPod, I just wanted to be alone with my thoughts and contemplate the life of Ayrton Senna.
The strange thing though, is that I have no memories of Senna. I was born in 1991, the year he won his final World Championship and my first ever race was the 1995 Canadian Grand Prix. I could tell you all sorts of things about that race. Jean Alesi won for Ferrari, his one and only F1 victory, and his Ferrari carried the number 27, the same number Gilles Villeneuve raced under while driving for Ferrari. The Canadian track was named after the great Villeneuve...it’s the sort of magical thing you just couldn’t make up. It was enough to have me hooked.
Anyway, that was 1995. Ayrton Senna died on May 1st 1994, a year before my first ever race. So like I say, I have no memories of Senna. Every single thing I’ve seen of him, I’ve seen second-hand, whether it was through VHS, DVDs, television programmes or in recent years, the internet. That last thing has been so crucial for me. Though I’ve been an F1 fan for 15 years or so, I was aware of past drivers, but hadn’t ever seen many races. With YouTube, I’ve seen clips of all of the “great” moments in F1, and now thanks to streaming websites, I’ve found several channels that stream F1 races from years gone by. Through these, I’ve educated myself about things like the turbo era in the 1980s, the rise and fall of Lotus (and in recent years, Williams) and, of course, the Senna/Prost rivalry.
One of my earliest exposures to Senna was “Murray’s Magic Moments”, a VHS of Murray Walker’s favourite moments from F1. One of those clips was a segment from the 1984 Monaco Grand Prix, when Senna was driving for Toleman in the infancy of his career. He put in an astonishing drive and very nearly won the race in torrential conditions, and probably would have done so had the race continued for another handful of laps. Seeing Senna dance the Toleman around those narrow twisty streets fascinated me, and I was amazed to see how he was able to drag a midfield car right to the front of the race, overtaking cars with sheer will and determination almost to the point where it looked like he was in a completely different formula.
He spent his career doing that, dancing the car around the circuit, especially during qualifying. Whenever he went on a hot lap to get pole position, the world stopped. He’d throw the car into corners at speeds that other drivers could only dream of doing, and he’d know that the car would stick. Even seeing this back now on YouTube with slightly grainy footage from the onboard camera amazes me. Seeing him constantly working the wheel, always making tiny adjustments, and of course, these were the days of manual gearboxes, so he’d often be driving with one hand.
Of course, there are other moments like qualifying in Monaco in 1988, when he was almost 2 seconds quicker than Alain Prost in an identical car, his drive through the field in Japan later that year to clinch his first world title and the battles that raged between himself and Prost through the next few years, all climaxing in amazing fashion at Sukuka, with 1989 and 1990 ending in crashes. There are other fantastic pieces of driving like Donington Park 1993 when Senna, in an underachieving McLaren produced one of his best drives to win in mixed conditions. That first lap is probably the most played piece of footage from the 1993 season...and rightly so.
Senna’s death was tragic and ripped the heart out of Formula One. The sporting world was robbed of the chance to see Senna performing at the best of his ability in a Williams, and the potential of a Senna/Schumacher feud (which would have undoubtedly been brilliant viewing), while Brazil was robbed of a hero. However, from his death, new rules were introduced. To Senna, safety was paramount. We saw this through his career when there were huge accidents, such as Martin Donnelly in Jerez 1990 and Erik Comas in Spa 1992. With Comas, Senna pulled over during the practice session, abandoned his car and ran to the aid of Comas, who had passed out in his car. Who knows, without Senna’s intervention, Comas could have been seriously injured.
There’s a fantastic clip in the film where he argues with the FISA president about safety after having an accident at a previous race and show just how much safety meant to him. And of course, after his death, the safety of cars was improved significantly...so much so that there hasn’t been a death in Formula One since that day.
Like many others, I believe that had he not been killed, Senna would have won the World Championship in 1994...and probably would have done so again in 1995 and 1996. He was a man who had great faith and religion, and believed that God would do the right thing. Senna said this numerous times through his career. I’m trying my best to avoid spoilers in the film, but on the day of his death, unsure of whether he’ll race, Senna opened his Bible and turned to a passage that said on that day, God would reward him with the greatest gift of all, Himself. It might just be me, but that freaks me out. That’s legitimately scary stuff for me...and hearing it from his sister in that film caused a few tears to appear.
What does Senna mean to me then? He was a fantastic racing driver, the facts show that: 41 victories, 65 pole positions and 3 world titles. He was a brilliant person, a hero and inspirational figure to Brazilians at a time when the country needed it most. Michael Schumacher might be my hero, but if I’d been born 10 years earlier, it would have been Senna without a second thought. There are other greats like Fangio and Clark, but footage of races from then is so hard to come by, so my perception of them is based purely on pictures, stories and articles I’ve read.
With Senna though, I’ve seen plenty of races from his career. I’ve seen him race to the point of exhaustion and collapsing in Brazil in 1991, I’ve seen him win world titles and I’ve seen his fatal accident. There’s a train of thought that suggests that people who die while young leave a glowing reputation, and their star burns brighter for it...we’ve seen it with musicians like Jimi Hendrix Kurt Cobain. For me though, that doesn’t apply to Senna. Even if he were still alive, his career would be looked back on with astonishment, with joy and with celebration.
So...back to my question, what does Senna mean to me? It’s subject to argument from many, but this is my own opinion and view. And to me, Ayrton Senna is the greatest Formula One driver of all time. Senna said that he loved karting because it was “pure driving, real racing and that made me happy”. Watching Senna, I can say the same thing about him.
Here we go...
On Monday evening, I went to watch Senna. It’s a film I’ve been waiting for ever since it was first announced back in...ooh, 2009? It might have been a year earlier than that, but that’s around the time that I first remember there being something about a potential. Then last July, Top Gear did a fantastic piece on Senna to celebrate the fact that he would have been 50 years old.
I said back then that it was the finest piece of television Top Gear have produced, and is probably one of the best things that the BBC have done. Top Gear might be a bit silly at times, and they might joke around and act like buffoons, but this showed that a serious piece of television could still be done. It had interviews with people and clips of Ayrton at his finest, and it celebrated the man’s life. If you haven’t seen that, I highly recommend tracking it down. It’s on YouTube and it’s pretty easy to find.
Then the film came along and gave it some stiff competition. When I first saw the trailer, I thought “Wow..that looks absolutely fantastic.”
I’ll be honest, I’ve probably watched that trailer at least a dozen times. Finding out bits about the film, how it was entirely made up of archive footage and how Ayrton Senna tells the story himself from interviews and audio clips, seemed absolutely fascinating. Having seen the film now, I can give an honest and truthful opinion on it. I think it’s fantastic and is easily the greatest sporting documentary ever made. Really though, that can’t be hard when you’re making a film about one of the greatest sportsmen, or at the very least Formula One drivers, to ever live.
For me, it was so powerful that I made the walk home from the cinema teary-eyed. I didn’t listen to my iPod, I just wanted to be alone with my thoughts and contemplate the life of Ayrton Senna.
The strange thing though, is that I have no memories of Senna. I was born in 1991, the year he won his final World Championship and my first ever race was the 1995 Canadian Grand Prix. I could tell you all sorts of things about that race. Jean Alesi won for Ferrari, his one and only F1 victory, and his Ferrari carried the number 27, the same number Gilles Villeneuve raced under while driving for Ferrari. The Canadian track was named after the great Villeneuve...it’s the sort of magical thing you just couldn’t make up. It was enough to have me hooked.
Anyway, that was 1995. Ayrton Senna died on May 1st 1994, a year before my first ever race. So like I say, I have no memories of Senna. Every single thing I’ve seen of him, I’ve seen second-hand, whether it was through VHS, DVDs, television programmes or in recent years, the internet. That last thing has been so crucial for me. Though I’ve been an F1 fan for 15 years or so, I was aware of past drivers, but hadn’t ever seen many races. With YouTube, I’ve seen clips of all of the “great” moments in F1, and now thanks to streaming websites, I’ve found several channels that stream F1 races from years gone by. Through these, I’ve educated myself about things like the turbo era in the 1980s, the rise and fall of Lotus (and in recent years, Williams) and, of course, the Senna/Prost rivalry.
One of my earliest exposures to Senna was “Murray’s Magic Moments”, a VHS of Murray Walker’s favourite moments from F1. One of those clips was a segment from the 1984 Monaco Grand Prix, when Senna was driving for Toleman in the infancy of his career. He put in an astonishing drive and very nearly won the race in torrential conditions, and probably would have done so had the race continued for another handful of laps. Seeing Senna dance the Toleman around those narrow twisty streets fascinated me, and I was amazed to see how he was able to drag a midfield car right to the front of the race, overtaking cars with sheer will and determination almost to the point where it looked like he was in a completely different formula.
He spent his career doing that, dancing the car around the circuit, especially during qualifying. Whenever he went on a hot lap to get pole position, the world stopped. He’d throw the car into corners at speeds that other drivers could only dream of doing, and he’d know that the car would stick. Even seeing this back now on YouTube with slightly grainy footage from the onboard camera amazes me. Seeing him constantly working the wheel, always making tiny adjustments, and of course, these were the days of manual gearboxes, so he’d often be driving with one hand.
Of course, there are other moments like qualifying in Monaco in 1988, when he was almost 2 seconds quicker than Alain Prost in an identical car, his drive through the field in Japan later that year to clinch his first world title and the battles that raged between himself and Prost through the next few years, all climaxing in amazing fashion at Sukuka, with 1989 and 1990 ending in crashes. There are other fantastic pieces of driving like Donington Park 1993 when Senna, in an underachieving McLaren produced one of his best drives to win in mixed conditions. That first lap is probably the most played piece of footage from the 1993 season...and rightly so.
Senna’s death was tragic and ripped the heart out of Formula One. The sporting world was robbed of the chance to see Senna performing at the best of his ability in a Williams, and the potential of a Senna/Schumacher feud (which would have undoubtedly been brilliant viewing), while Brazil was robbed of a hero. However, from his death, new rules were introduced. To Senna, safety was paramount. We saw this through his career when there were huge accidents, such as Martin Donnelly in Jerez 1990 and Erik Comas in Spa 1992. With Comas, Senna pulled over during the practice session, abandoned his car and ran to the aid of Comas, who had passed out in his car. Who knows, without Senna’s intervention, Comas could have been seriously injured.
There’s a fantastic clip in the film where he argues with the FISA president about safety after having an accident at a previous race and show just how much safety meant to him. And of course, after his death, the safety of cars was improved significantly...so much so that there hasn’t been a death in Formula One since that day.
Like many others, I believe that had he not been killed, Senna would have won the World Championship in 1994...and probably would have done so again in 1995 and 1996. He was a man who had great faith and religion, and believed that God would do the right thing. Senna said this numerous times through his career. I’m trying my best to avoid spoilers in the film, but on the day of his death, unsure of whether he’ll race, Senna opened his Bible and turned to a passage that said on that day, God would reward him with the greatest gift of all, Himself. It might just be me, but that freaks me out. That’s legitimately scary stuff for me...and hearing it from his sister in that film caused a few tears to appear.
What does Senna mean to me then? He was a fantastic racing driver, the facts show that: 41 victories, 65 pole positions and 3 world titles. He was a brilliant person, a hero and inspirational figure to Brazilians at a time when the country needed it most. Michael Schumacher might be my hero, but if I’d been born 10 years earlier, it would have been Senna without a second thought. There are other greats like Fangio and Clark, but footage of races from then is so hard to come by, so my perception of them is based purely on pictures, stories and articles I’ve read.
With Senna though, I’ve seen plenty of races from his career. I’ve seen him race to the point of exhaustion and collapsing in Brazil in 1991, I’ve seen him win world titles and I’ve seen his fatal accident. There’s a train of thought that suggests that people who die while young leave a glowing reputation, and their star burns brighter for it...we’ve seen it with musicians like Jimi Hendrix Kurt Cobain. For me though, that doesn’t apply to Senna. Even if he were still alive, his career would be looked back on with astonishment, with joy and with celebration.
So...back to my question, what does Senna mean to me? It’s subject to argument from many, but this is my own opinion and view. And to me, Ayrton Senna is the greatest Formula One driver of all time. Senna said that he loved karting because it was “pure driving, real racing and that made me happy”. Watching Senna, I can say the same thing about him.
Saturday 4 June 2011
Part 2: Congas, Cricket and Comedy
As promised, this is part two of my entry from last night...which in reality is just a continuation of what I was aiming to try and write last night before I got tired.
Since I got back to Leeds on Tuesday, I've been running around doing various things. To be completely honest though, pretty much everything has been Honeydrum related. Over the past few days, I've had a couple of conga sessions...and I think I'm starting to get somewhere with it. At the moment, I'm not in a state of doing loads of things with it,, and to be honest, for a while I need to focus on getting technique right. Once I get the technique into my playing and I get used to making the different sounds on the conga, I'll hopefully start to progress. With the technique in place, I need to start to get the feel of the rhythms at the same time. I think if I get that, then in a couple of months time, I'll be somewhere where I can start looking to more complex stuff.
Aside from the congas, I've been sorting out some bits for next year within the committee. The budget plan was a bit of a marathon to complete as we were going off last year's plan which was essentially some educated guesses from Alic Ja. Turns out they were pretty accurate though, especially in terms of where we'd end up financially at the end of the year! Plans for next year aren't amazingly ambitious, but they're definitely realistic and I reckon that if we can achieve them, it'll set HD1C up really well for the next few years, especially in terms of a solid core membership of players.
As well as that, I've had some communication with the university, which has been useful in seeing how it works as a giant system really. We've started to make some links with a couple of people who will be useful for the society within the next year, and really, this sort of thing can only serve to help us get more established within the union. There was a training day on Thursday where we got some fairly useful tips on a couple of things, so I now feel relatively confident about being able to do some things like putting on a Give it a Go session and making it successful. I've even had my first interaction with the cash office, so it's definitely been productive. Quickly totting up a guess on hours, I'd say that since Tuesday, I've probably had about 15 hours dedicated to Honeydrum...which is a fair amount, and it's definitely kept me from boredom. That was what I was dreading most about summer...boredom. If I was just sat around in my room watching DVDs and browsing Twitter and Facebook for things to amuse me, I'd get bored so quickly and start to hate myself. If things carry on this way, I'll be keeping busy...especially once I get the bike back up and running.
So in that respect, life is going pretty well. I was down at Headingley...well, yesterday now to see the Twenty20 match between Yorkshire and Warwickshire. A good game, but I suspect I'm something of a bad omen for the White Rose. Whenever I've been to one of their games, they've lost. Just as well I've got a ticket for the Lancashire game in a few weeks. Coincidentally, Lancashire have never lost a game when I've attended (whether it's one day of a county match which they've gone on to win or a CB40 game). We'll see if that trend continues.
I've had some ridiculously funky dreams lately...one or two of you will know about these, so to everyone else, it might seem like a gigantic riddle. For that, I can only really apologise. But last Thursday and Thursday just gone, I had two connected dreams. Maybe my sub-conscious has made me the star in a series that will play out in my mind across a couple of Thursdays, maybe there'll be a primetime nap special over the weekend...but they're good. Apart from being slightly obscure, they are bringing a smile to my face because good things are happening in these dreams. If I felt more confident in myself, perhaps these things could actually leave the realm of dreams and become reality. That's something I probably need to work on myself...in fact, I definitely need to work on that.
As a final note, I'm currently watching Series 4 of That Mitchell and Webb Look. I honestly don't remember a lot about this series the first time around, but I've really enjoyed it so far. Sketch comedy is still managing to put out the goods...which also reminds me that I need to invest in a boxset of Fry and Laurie. Saying that, they've just closed an episode with a rather depressing sketch about an old and demented Sherlock Holmes which wasn't really funny at all. I don't know whether that was the point...and I'm quite confused by it.
There's a lot of good comedy in the world, and if you like stand-up comedy, there's a lot of good UK talent around that aren't in the mainstream. Stretch further afield to the USA where I've found myself watching a bit more comedy as a result of podcasts from the excellent Deathsquad network (check them on iTunes or on deathsquad.tv) and discovering a couple more comedians over there. Like I say, good comedy is out there and stand-up is continuing to succeed, and long may it continue to do so!
Since I got back to Leeds on Tuesday, I've been running around doing various things. To be completely honest though, pretty much everything has been Honeydrum related. Over the past few days, I've had a couple of conga sessions...and I think I'm starting to get somewhere with it. At the moment, I'm not in a state of doing loads of things with it,, and to be honest, for a while I need to focus on getting technique right. Once I get the technique into my playing and I get used to making the different sounds on the conga, I'll hopefully start to progress. With the technique in place, I need to start to get the feel of the rhythms at the same time. I think if I get that, then in a couple of months time, I'll be somewhere where I can start looking to more complex stuff.
Aside from the congas, I've been sorting out some bits for next year within the committee. The budget plan was a bit of a marathon to complete as we were going off last year's plan which was essentially some educated guesses from Alic Ja. Turns out they were pretty accurate though, especially in terms of where we'd end up financially at the end of the year! Plans for next year aren't amazingly ambitious, but they're definitely realistic and I reckon that if we can achieve them, it'll set HD1C up really well for the next few years, especially in terms of a solid core membership of players.
As well as that, I've had some communication with the university, which has been useful in seeing how it works as a giant system really. We've started to make some links with a couple of people who will be useful for the society within the next year, and really, this sort of thing can only serve to help us get more established within the union. There was a training day on Thursday where we got some fairly useful tips on a couple of things, so I now feel relatively confident about being able to do some things like putting on a Give it a Go session and making it successful. I've even had my first interaction with the cash office, so it's definitely been productive. Quickly totting up a guess on hours, I'd say that since Tuesday, I've probably had about 15 hours dedicated to Honeydrum...which is a fair amount, and it's definitely kept me from boredom. That was what I was dreading most about summer...boredom. If I was just sat around in my room watching DVDs and browsing Twitter and Facebook for things to amuse me, I'd get bored so quickly and start to hate myself. If things carry on this way, I'll be keeping busy...especially once I get the bike back up and running.
So in that respect, life is going pretty well. I was down at Headingley...well, yesterday now to see the Twenty20 match between Yorkshire and Warwickshire. A good game, but I suspect I'm something of a bad omen for the White Rose. Whenever I've been to one of their games, they've lost. Just as well I've got a ticket for the Lancashire game in a few weeks. Coincidentally, Lancashire have never lost a game when I've attended (whether it's one day of a county match which they've gone on to win or a CB40 game). We'll see if that trend continues.
I've had some ridiculously funky dreams lately...one or two of you will know about these, so to everyone else, it might seem like a gigantic riddle. For that, I can only really apologise. But last Thursday and Thursday just gone, I had two connected dreams. Maybe my sub-conscious has made me the star in a series that will play out in my mind across a couple of Thursdays, maybe there'll be a primetime nap special over the weekend...but they're good. Apart from being slightly obscure, they are bringing a smile to my face because good things are happening in these dreams. If I felt more confident in myself, perhaps these things could actually leave the realm of dreams and become reality. That's something I probably need to work on myself...in fact, I definitely need to work on that.
As a final note, I'm currently watching Series 4 of That Mitchell and Webb Look. I honestly don't remember a lot about this series the first time around, but I've really enjoyed it so far. Sketch comedy is still managing to put out the goods...which also reminds me that I need to invest in a boxset of Fry and Laurie. Saying that, they've just closed an episode with a rather depressing sketch about an old and demented Sherlock Holmes which wasn't really funny at all. I don't know whether that was the point...and I'm quite confused by it.
There's a lot of good comedy in the world, and if you like stand-up comedy, there's a lot of good UK talent around that aren't in the mainstream. Stretch further afield to the USA where I've found myself watching a bit more comedy as a result of podcasts from the excellent Deathsquad network (check them on iTunes or on deathsquad.tv) and discovering a couple more comedians over there. Like I say, good comedy is out there and stand-up is continuing to succeed, and long may it continue to do so!
Friday 3 June 2011
A tale of two entries: Part 1
Another week has passed, and it's been a pretty good week to be honest. I was home Thursday-Tuesday which was really good as I got some time to relax and recharge the batteries a bit after some exams and to unwind a bit at what is essentially the end of the academic year.
On Friday and Saturday, I went off to Ellesmere Port to go and see some 1PW shows with Andrew. If you have no interest in reading about this, I'm sorry...it's pretty late and I'm just writing. Skip down a couple of paragraphs. I'll do a line break so you can pick it up again.
Pretty good stuff, and considering the amount of problems that were circulating with them having failed to bring a load of the advertised names and then visa issues for others, it was good. Just goes to show that you don't need to rely on international names as there is plenty of fantastic talent in the UK.
Friday was a bit dead in terms of crowd to be honest. I don't want this entry to turn into a full wrestling entry, but for the sake of it, in 2005-2007 or so, 1PW had a pretty loyal fanbase. And they were loyal. I remember being at the King of Europe event where a fight nearly broke out because a group of them were getting overly passionate about what they were seeing. But now, after a couple of changes of owner and a lack of trust in the fans, that fanbase is pretty much gone. What they've now got is crowds that aren't really there for the company, but for the in-ring action...and at points it seemed like there was just polite applause after spots.
Saturday picked up a bit, but the crowd must have been a disappointment. I was expecting a bigger layout in the building, but there must have been no more than 275 people in that building...and considering that was the "supershow" with big names, it's not great news. But I got to meet a couple of the UK guys and have a chat with them, so that was good. Very cool guys and hopefully I bump into them again in the future.
------------------------
I also got a chance to catch up with Sophie, which involved drinking rather large amounts of tea over the span of about 2 hours. As always, good to just sit down and chat and go on about everything and nothing at the same time. There was nothing amazingly unusual that came up in the conversation, it was just a lot of rambling and talking about random stuff. We briefly discussed me going up to Sheffield to visit her and her flatmate. From what I've heard, I've got a mini fan club in Sheffield, which is pretty awesome. So fingers crossed I'll be back up there in the next week or two.
So I don't really know when I'll next be back in Liverpool, but I need to head back sometime soon because there are some people that I haven't seen for quite a while, and I do miss them. It's just a case of missing opportunities and whatnot, and so there are people like Foy who I don't think I've seen for quite a while.
Currently, it's just after 1.30am, and I'm starting to feel sleepy. My sleep pattern has been thrown a little bit in the last few days, but I'll be back tomorrow or Saturday with Part 2 of my tale to share what's been happening in my life since I got back to Leeds on Tuesday. Put it this way, I've not really stopped since I stepped off the coach! I've found that my viewing numbers are pretty dependent on what time of day I post the blog, so I'll probably plug this tomorrow as well with the next entry, see if I can boost the numbers on it a little bit. Don't forget to share it with anyone else who might like it though! I'm getting readers from a couple of countries according to my stats, so let's see how far we can go!
On Friday and Saturday, I went off to Ellesmere Port to go and see some 1PW shows with Andrew. If you have no interest in reading about this, I'm sorry...it's pretty late and I'm just writing. Skip down a couple of paragraphs. I'll do a line break so you can pick it up again.
Pretty good stuff, and considering the amount of problems that were circulating with them having failed to bring a load of the advertised names and then visa issues for others, it was good. Just goes to show that you don't need to rely on international names as there is plenty of fantastic talent in the UK.
Friday was a bit dead in terms of crowd to be honest. I don't want this entry to turn into a full wrestling entry, but for the sake of it, in 2005-2007 or so, 1PW had a pretty loyal fanbase. And they were loyal. I remember being at the King of Europe event where a fight nearly broke out because a group of them were getting overly passionate about what they were seeing. But now, after a couple of changes of owner and a lack of trust in the fans, that fanbase is pretty much gone. What they've now got is crowds that aren't really there for the company, but for the in-ring action...and at points it seemed like there was just polite applause after spots.
Saturday picked up a bit, but the crowd must have been a disappointment. I was expecting a bigger layout in the building, but there must have been no more than 275 people in that building...and considering that was the "supershow" with big names, it's not great news. But I got to meet a couple of the UK guys and have a chat with them, so that was good. Very cool guys and hopefully I bump into them again in the future.
------------------------
I also got a chance to catch up with Sophie, which involved drinking rather large amounts of tea over the span of about 2 hours. As always, good to just sit down and chat and go on about everything and nothing at the same time. There was nothing amazingly unusual that came up in the conversation, it was just a lot of rambling and talking about random stuff. We briefly discussed me going up to Sheffield to visit her and her flatmate. From what I've heard, I've got a mini fan club in Sheffield, which is pretty awesome. So fingers crossed I'll be back up there in the next week or two.
So I don't really know when I'll next be back in Liverpool, but I need to head back sometime soon because there are some people that I haven't seen for quite a while, and I do miss them. It's just a case of missing opportunities and whatnot, and so there are people like Foy who I don't think I've seen for quite a while.
Currently, it's just after 1.30am, and I'm starting to feel sleepy. My sleep pattern has been thrown a little bit in the last few days, but I'll be back tomorrow or Saturday with Part 2 of my tale to share what's been happening in my life since I got back to Leeds on Tuesday. Put it this way, I've not really stopped since I stepped off the coach! I've found that my viewing numbers are pretty dependent on what time of day I post the blog, so I'll probably plug this tomorrow as well with the next entry, see if I can boost the numbers on it a little bit. Don't forget to share it with anyone else who might like it though! I'm getting readers from a couple of countries according to my stats, so let's see how far we can go!
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