Yes, my lovely wife sure knows how to make an aging would-be (some would say “has-been”) rock star happy.

Seriously. I couldn’t have asked for a better birthday treat (at least not one I could write about here ).

My lady and I drove to the city that I’ve fallen in love with all over again, through Hunt’s Cross, which held so many fond childhood memories, past the John Lennon Airport with it’s huge sign aptly subtitled “above us only sky” and on to Speak. To be specific - Speak Hall - set in its beautifully manicured gardens on the banks of the Mersey.

But today we hadn’t come to partake of this magnificent Tudor mansion’s historical charms. We were a mere stone’s throw from the place that was the birth of the Mersey Sound and we were here to take a magical mystery tour to Penny Lane and Strawberry Fields and to the childhood homes of two of the twentieth century’s most prolific songwriters, name of John and Paul.

We needn’t have arrived early - but I’m glad we did. The tours were running late due to technical problems, so we had time for a nosh in Speak Hall’s restaurant. Nothing posh, but bloody good - and precisely what you’d have been eating in Liverpool during olden times.

The main course choices were Scouse Pie and Pan Haggerty. Being veggies we chose the latter and it was the nicest cheese, onion and potato pie I’ve tasted. The Wet Nelly was a new one to me, a citrus sweet northern version of one of the traditional English bread-based puddings. Hmm delicious. And all washed down with a bottle of Curiosity Cola. Give the National Trust their due… when they take you back in time, they do it in style.

Fully sated we boarded the mini bus to John Lennon’s former home, Mendips, on Menlove Avenue, where an extremely knowledgeable custodian gave us a full and frank potted history of when John met Paul, and how they used to practise their faltering early compositions in the tiny front room. The house had been restored to its former glory after being donated to the trust by Yoko Ono in 2003. When it first opened to the public, Paul McCartney had apparently told the custodian they used to practice singing in the front inner porch because of the fantastic acoustics. We each of us today took the opportunity to follow suit.

Did I mention Sir Paul? Next stop was the McCartney’s childhood home, 20 Forthlin Road, a couple of miles away in a less salubrious area of Allerton. And having joked en-route about expecting Sir Paul to have a nice cup of tea ready for us, I alighted from the mini bus to be greeted by… Paul McCartney!

Okay, after rubbing my eyes and taking a long hard look, I realised it wasn’t actually Sir Paul himself - but I tell you, had John Halliday not been gainfully employed as custodian of 20 Forthlin Road, he could make a very good living as a Beatle look-alike. No only that, he had the same mannerisms and even sounded like his multi-millionaire alter ego.

The former factory worker informed me he still couldn’t believe his luck being paid to live the house of his childhood hero and spend his days talking Beatle talk.

The framed photographs taken by Paul’s younger brother Mike McCartney, vouched for the authenticity of the trust’s restoration program.

Jayne even got to sit upon the former Beatle’s throne, having missed the sign for the new visitor’s toilet on the next outhouse along. When she emerged, to the surprise of one elderly lady queueing for the real toilet, Jayne told her she hoped she hadn’t flushed away any historical …erm …deposits, the poor lady couldn’t stop laughing at the thought and almost wet herself on the spot! She was still giggling as we all got back on the mini bus for the return trip.

It was a lovely day. It brought back fond memories of the time I was an Executioner, tinged with a little regret that I never actually met the Beatles when I played the Cavern, the Iron Door and other landmark venues back in the sixties. Although I didn’t appreciate the significance at the time, I am so glad I lived through that area. Jayne, bless her, missed it of course. She was knocking out a beat with a rattle on the side of her pram in Hyton whilst I was a mile or two down the road rattling the Cavern’s foundations with my bass guitar.

Happy days!

The Beatles tours are run from Speak Hall Wednesday to Sunday and Bank Holidays from April to October,
at 10.00, 10.50, 14.30 and 15.20. Please note there is no direct access to these properties by car or foot. You can book tickets via www.nationaltrust.org.uk/beatles or telephone 0151 427 7231.
Prices: Adult £15.00, Child £3.00, NT Member Adult £7.00

It really is a great day out!

I’m not too sure that my lovely wife Jayne would approve but I must admit that under normal circumstances I would quite happily fantasise over the prospect of sharing a sauna with her and Kylie.

Last night was no kinky threesome however. There were at least 18,998 other people crammed in there with us and the “sauna” in question was the much overrated Manchester Evening News Arena.

Sadly, the Kylie X 2008 concert was completely ruined by the venue’s oppressive heat and diabolical sound quality.

Don’t get me wrong, what her lungs produced was pure Kylie - and what they were wrapped in was, of course, as delightful as ever. But oh dear… her much heralded new band sounded like a recently-formed group of teenage wannabes bent on blowing out the windows at their local village hall!

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not averse to loud music per se, but what they delivered last night was a distorted mess that completely drowned out the voice of our diminutive, delectable iconic Aussie heartthrob.

Kylie darling: please sack your sound engineer. We really had no way of telling good your band was through all the distortion

And my message to the MEN Arena: (definitely NOT a darling of mine): Sort out your acoustics …and your air-conditioning …and your seating …and your car parking and…

Better still, knock the whole place down and build a proper arena geared more to customer experience than money-grabbing jam-packing.  And as far as the over-steep upper tiers are concerned, the only customers who might actually enjoy the experience of scaling these would be seasoned rock climbers!

The MEN should take a lead from Liverpool’s excellent new Echo Arena and Glasgow’s equally brilliant SECC.

Biggest doesn’t necessarily mean Best!

EDIT: check out the comments…

Everybody seems to be sixty these days!

Hah! ten years ago, I recall saying the same thing about people being fifty. That’s the way it goes, I suppose. You buy a Volkswagen and everybody seems to be driving one!

Anyway, my mate Patrick earned his bus pass and B&Q discount card this weekend. He’d had fifty guests at his fiftieth and was going to attempt to gather sixty for this do, then seventy in ten years time, and so on. Until, that is, I reminded him of the principles of the inverse square law!

All in all, we had a great day at the Faleur’s. Great company. Lovely food. and the weather even gave us a break just long enough to enjoy the magnificent buffet lunch in the garden.

Photoshop came to the rescue as far as his birthday card was concerned (out with last week’s sexagenarian and in with this week’s) and for his birthday present we went to Zimmers R Us. No-one, but no-one should ever expect a “normal” birthday present from the Birchalls!

Thanks for a great day Patrick & Liz. We’re off now to spend the evening with a forty year old who’s very close to my heart - name of Kylie

PS: Did I mention that Patrick is a pretty mean photographer? Check out his website

Oooooh! Spooooky!!

Bringing up the LL15 1BE location on Multi Map reveals that we are being watched!

The aerial image (courtesy of Microsoft Earth) shows the car park and roundabout top right, with Market Street running down to centre bottom.

Our studio is marked with the red arrow - and there, centre left, just next door to the Ambulance Station in School Lane, is a chisel-featured bloke keeping a beady eye on us!

My mate Mike is sixty today! ~~ “HAPPY BIRTHDAY MIKE”!

As another poor photographer, he’ll understand that I couldn’t afford to buy him a card. In any case, they simply don’t do one that says: “Congratulations - you can now get an extra 10% at B&Q” !!

I knew I had a shot of him taken at my daughter’s wedding last year - so it was into Photoshop’s Extract filter to remove all evidence of the camera and tripod he was operating and of course, the background.

My own B&Q discount card (yes yes, I’m ancient too!) was scanned and added to the picture. Luckily, only a little bit of pixel pushing was required to make it look like he was actually gripping the card, and little drop-shadow under the hand for added realism.

Rather than drive to our nearest B&Q, a Google Image Search turned up a suitable new background.  Originally used to promote a new B&Q store, the shot was too sharp.   So I duplicated the layer and applied a decent amount of  Gaussian blur.  Then a layer mask was added and filled with a black to white gradient to blend the sharp image with the blurred version to realistically impart the shallow depth of focus you would expect in this type of scene.  Little touches like this all help to avoid the “cardboard cut-out” effect when replacing a background.

The “eye candy” picture is a publicity shot of American actress Molly Simm sitting in a rusty old wheelbarrow. Someone had made this into a mock B&Q advert, which has been kicking around the Internet for the past year or so.

A little added wording and “voila” - the card was complete. All in less than an hour.

Hmmm…. Come to think of it: That was an hour of “work” time, so all in all, it turned out to be quite an expensive Birthday card!

I hope the old fart appreciates it!

…has officially been awarded my “Best Blog Title” award 2008!

The Blog’s Dollocks is well worth a visit too, as it’s all about a not-too-bad football team!

Dring, dring…

“Hi Dad it’s Isaac…”

It’s nice, isn’t it, that they make the time to keep in touch,  Especially when they are all the way upstairs in the attic bedroom!

“I’ve sold the Iceman on eBay. Can you pop it in the post for me?”

Hmm. Why do I get the feeling this bad back is being milked for all it’s worth.

“No Dad… I told them it would be posted out today.”

In fairness, he has been bed ridden for the best part of three days. So I fell for it - despite the fact the chiropractor said he really should get up and moving around to supple up the muscles prior to his appointment on Monday.

For the benefit of the uninitiated, the Iceman is a six stringed axe-like instrument of doom (well, heavy metal at least), so “popping it into the post” was going to be more than just a quick lick-and-stick. One hour, yards of bubble-wrap, three disassembled then reconstructed cardboard boxes, and a disobedient stanley knife later and the Ibanez Iceman was on its way to its new owner. And I - having missed my footing on the post office steps - was limping my way back down Market Street with a dodgy back!

I wonder if I could get away with retiring to my bed to take advantage of room service and get everyone running around for me?

Yea right!

Now I’d better think about starting again!

Don’t you just love embarrassing your children!

I mean, it’s payback time for all the times they embarrassed you as they were growing up. 

Jordan has long since refused to go shopping with us, for fear we might do a ‘Lou and Andy’.  How soon they forget the times they used to run around the supermarket swopping price labels on the goods and dropping packets of condoms in elderly ladies’ shopping trolleys.

So it seemed appropriate that on Jordan’s18th birthday we create a suitable card - with his parents taking the role of the Little Britain characters.

And just to prove we don’t really  look like Lou and Andy, here’s a shot of us enjoying pre dinner birthday drinks at The Wynnstay.

Oh dear!  On second thoughts, I’d better change that to:  at least Jayne doesn’t really look like one of the Little Britain crew.

“…I don’t like it!”