Mini-update time:

• Ibiza: Steph and I have booked our flights back to 'beefa for the 2nd August. We're outta here, baby!
• DJing: new mixer arrived today. Nothing spectacular at all - just a (very) cheap 'n cheerful Behringer mixer (with an instruction manual featuring a late-80's photo of the German chap who runs the company complete with a very shiny comb-over, saying "Hi, I'm so-and-so and I'd like to thank you for buying my mixer", etc etc etc). Fun times.
• New website: Greyhead.co.uk has its own hosting, courtesy of the amazingly Clive at Meteoric. You want super-fast, reliable web hosting with a personal touch? Go speak to Clive, and tell him Bob sent you... I'm currently tweaking a Wordpress installation and working out how to get it to automagically generate podcasts. Wee!
  
• Mixes and podcasts: to kick off the new website, mixer, Final Scratch's resurrection (I finally got it working again on the Mac - woo), and my impending trip to Ibiza, I'm going to knock together a few mixes and podcast them from the new site. If you fancy some free tuneage, I'll stick a big "get the Greyhead house music podcast here" link in the side-bar of the blog once I've figured out how to use the incredibly good Podcast Maker from Lemonzdream.com
• Photos: the Nikon D50 is lovely - very fast, very easy to use, and produces great photos. What more could you ask for? :o)

Sadly (for my colleagues) I'm back to work next Monday - boo. Still, it's only 2 1/2 more weeks left before Ibiza - yey!

One tune which will definitely be leaving an indelible imprint on the memories of clubbers in Ibiza this year will be Paul Keeley's "Homecoming". The tune's floaty synths coupled with the chugging bassline will have no trouble getting even the most laid-back clubbers to work up a sweat, and I promise you'll remember exactly where you were when you first heard it played out.

I can't remember whether I heard this at Space or in Paul Van Dyk's amazing Cream Amnesia set, or if I imagined it and actually heard it somewhere else, but I don't care - this is an absolute builder :o)

£1.99 at Beatport now :o) (out on Anjunabeats)

One thing in Ibiza last week which reminded me how fascinating clubbers can be is how people respond to randoms approaching them in nightclubs. Take, for example, the responses when a girl is approached by a guy - in this case, "the guy" in question was none other than myself, a messy, grinning, glowstick-wielding mess:

The Spanish

• Me: "Hellooooo!"
• Her: "Hi! :)"
• Me: "Paul Van Dyk is a legend!"
• Her: "Yeah! What's your name?"
• (Conversation ensues)

The French

• Me: "Hi! What's your name?"
• Her: "Hello! I'm Corinne. What's your name?"
• Me: "I'm Alex. This night is f***ing amazing!" (Ok, so I'm embarrassingly enthusiastic about good tunes)
• Her: "Yeah!"
• (Conversation ensues)

The English

• Me: "Hi!"
• Her: "I have a boyfriend" (cue frosty, evil glare)
• Me: "Ooooooooooookayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy...."
  

Have I missed something here? Or are some people seriously this enamoured with themselves?

Very odd... ;o)

(p.s. I'm thinking that option 2 is the best plan at the moment...)

Greetings from sunny... err... Portsmouth. I'm back in the UK and, no, I didn't decide to stay out in Ibiza for ever and ever and ever and... Well, you get the idea. Photos 'n vids coming shortly ;o)

So I'm now faced with something of a dilemma. I finish my term in office in Portsmouth at the end of July and, as things stand at the moment, I don't have any commitments, or a new job to go to... In fact, I've got a pretty clean slate to begin with, so I could do with some ideas on what to do next.

So far, these are the main options...

1. Do the whole Trainspotting thing. No, I don't mean developing a heroin habit and living in a council block in Glasgow - I mean the whole "choose life" thing - move to London, look for whatever job I can get (preferably one where I can pay off my ever-mounting pile of debts). Pros: regular employment, salary, possibly interesting positions related to my degree and experience. Cons: become a wage slave, trade in my freedom of choice and the chance to live somewhere more interesting than London for financial commitment and a career (not necessarily a bad thing though)...
   
   
2. ... Go back to Ibiza, try to get a job - any job - and live below the poverty line. Pros: live in the party capital of the world with several thousand other bods, in a great atmosphere, and have a lot of fun. Cons: being poor, my sketchy knowledge of the Spanish language, the possibility it could all go horribly wrong...
   
   
3. ... Do something else, somewhere else. Start sending my CV all over the world, trying to find a job based around my qualifications. Pros: could end up somewhere really interesting, and could end up being paid very well. Cons: could end up somewhere really rubbish, and could end up having to sell a kidney/limb/my body to be repatriated.

Right now I'm thinking 2 or 3 instead of 1 (which will no doubt upset Ma 'n Pa who are still awaiting the repayment of the £thousands they lent me to get through Uni, not to mention all my other debtors).

I guess the first thing I ought to do is update my CV - it hasn't been updated since 2002...

Answers on the back of a £20 please ;o)  /al 

I've just started reading Alex Scarrow's "Last Light", a work of fiction* which looks at what might happen to the UK if the country's oil supplies - the majority of which are imported - were suddenly halted. The process from normality to a complete breakdown of the country - the "we're only three meals from civil war" theory I guess - takes less than a week.

* I say "fiction*", but BBC News is running the latest updates on the oil tankers' strike behind me. While I'm gullible enough to believe more than I should in a work of fiction, the vast majority of the book's story is based on fact, and the oil tankers' strike is predicted to last four days, so I can't help wondering if Scarrow's postulated figure of one week will turn out to have a degree of accuracy...?

Still, not to panic, buuuuut.... This afternoon, between my flat and North End - about 2 miles at a push - I saw no less than 9 marked police cars and riot vans, as well as an unmarked vehicle in Fratton High Street which would usually be more commonly seen stalking the motorways, and all except two of which were engaged in some kind of stop-and-search.

So. If, as the newsreaders tell us, there's nothing to panic about, and everything's going to be "Alright", why does this sudden increase in the number of officers on the streets make me feel wary?

On the plus side, if my evil and cunning plans work out, I'll be off to Ibiza tomorrow for a few days' break. By the time I come back, no doubt the country will have either descended into complete civil unrest... Actually, hang on, how would that be any different to a normal day in Portsmouth...? ;o)

Have fun, take care, yada yada. And go buy the book (but only so I don't feel like the only numpty in the country reading it).

/al :o)