Issues and Things: Jumblethoughts

I have been dodging Big Issue sellers; I always buy one but for the last two weeks the sellers in Barnet have become so assertive that they call across the street or come running up. I haven't always got 2 quid to give them and it's quite embarrassing sometimes. I know these are desperate times for all of us and I even paid the guy when it was the David Cameron issue but didn't take one (whose silly idea was that to put turnip-face in charge for a week?). What stopped me (it's only temporary, I promise) was the same seller standing in two different places and selling me the same issue twice. Grr!
After the mid-week crash in mood, things have looked up. I went to John Lewis (the Church of the Moneyed Middle Classes!) to buy McMum some fancy shower gel for her birthday, and the shop assistant at the till told me she liked my style! I thought I had been stumping about like a sad and bedraggled frump, so naturally I was delighted, especially since I was entirely dressed from Charity Shops; I told her that I was dressed in second-hand clothes.
'Vintage', she corrected me.
I have now officially re-branded myself as a vintage lecturer, songwriter and artist, 'cos it sounds good!
This morning I sent 14 CDs to Miguel in Madrid. I hope they (a) get there and (b) aren't smashed to bits if/when they do. I am still reeling form the loss of a £50 dress that I sold on eBay and that never arrived. A book that I'd ordered from Amazon never turned up either and I became convinced that there is a light-fingered post-person somewhere  in the area. What can you do? Write a song about it? Ha ha! Say your prayers when you post it and be glad you won a tenner on the lottery last week (I did! How exciting!).
And Andy Cairns has sent a DVD of Helen and the Horns (and I think The Daintees?) at the Jazz Cafe. Thank you Andy, I shall watch it tomorrow and listen to your music too.
Right  now, it's the housework to the soundtrack of the 'Complicated Music' playlist I made yesterday. I have just started properly listening to music again. being a music lecturer is similar to being an A&R person at a record company, I think: you listen to music, music, music all the time, often not what you have chosen. But somewhere in between creating playlists for students to listen to and discovering the lost Michael Garrick track, I've fallen in love with recorded music again.
Strangely, a perfect recall of the original BBC session of Galilee has kicked in; the bass line has changed considerably and also some of the lyrics. I am tempted to reconstruct a cover version using the original double bass line and lyrics to see what happens.
Oh Norma Winstone, please read this and send me a recording of the original session!
Finally, I think I am almost ready to start recording another album. Tomorrow I will rehears some new songs and try them out at the Sheffield gig (Greystones, supporting The Daintees on Tuesday).
Phew! Slippers on, hoover out, dust in eyes: housework time.