I've finally discovered

why we pay through the arse for cable TV. It's so I can watch back to back repeats of Doctor Who on UK TV Gold. The new series - nicely done, with some amusing nods to perhaps the typical Dr. Who enthusiast (the internet conspiracy geek and his wife's reaction: "A she? A girl is interested in the Doctor?") - pales in comparison to the manic glint in Tom Baker's staring eye and the cardboard sets.

Happy days. Happy day, anyway, until I had to come in to work.

The rest of the week was fairly standard. TM got together for a practice at Urban Studios in the depths of Bridgeton, Martin managing to refrain from shouting "Go Celtic," at the top of his lungs and hence sparing us from a chibbing. We've shifted to 9pm-12 practices during the week and to be honest they're a bit frustrating. We all seem to be permanently knackered. Granted, Doug was under the weather and fuelled by a combination of tranquilisers and cough medicine, and we all seemed to be nursing colds or other general maladies, but it was a bit frustrating to know that we usually can play so much better.

Still, we've got exactly a month until we play in the Subway and I'm sure we'll tighten up (ooh) long before then. Better start saving for the £3 entry fee now, folks.

TM rides again:

Andy's booked us a gig at the Cowgate Subway (aka the Scrubway) on the 28^th of April. Apparently we'll appear on the upcoming events poster for April along with Proxy. Entry - yes, the Subway actually charges to let you in - will be £3, of which £0 goes to either band. Oh yes: from a notional minus £100 for the first gig (fortunately avoided because you lot drank a staggering amount), we progress to not actually owing money afterwards.

In other news, it was a fairly busy week - various European acquaintances visited, necessitating a few trips to the boozer; TM reconvened for our second post-/pre-gig rehearsal, and Kate and I played badminton (4-1 to me, so partial redress for my total hyoomiliation at the pool table a couple of weeks back) and then had a rather spiffy meal at the Tapas Tree.

Saturday night was a bit good as well: Hannah, Waxy and Neil's mum (first of our mums I've met who like Led Zeppelin) came through from the dark of the West and Neil furnished us with a most impressive meal. The wine flowed, '70s rock boomed from the stereo and we called each other cocks. I say "we" and "each other" but actually I mean "they" and "me". Ah well - it's a privilege to be called a cock by such illustrious company.

Polyester,

or whatever it is that my charity shop '80s suit is cast from, is impervious to smoke, booze and creases. This is my experience from Vegas on Saturday, where we 'danced' (in fact, whenever I use the word 'dance' in relation to myself, I trust that you'll mentally place inverted commas around it) ourselves silly in honour of Luc and Marie's visit from Luxembourg.

Muscles that I did not know I possessed are stiff even today. Despite Jez's observation that dancing all night tends to limit the available drinking time, I still woke up with a diabolical hangover, leaden limbs and gummy eyes. Which was nice.

Slow week thus far...

Tiny Monkey had our first practice after an unplanned 5-week hiatus on Wednesday. We still rock. In fact, the nature of our rockingness has matured with respect to some of the songs, and I feel we approach them with a healthier perspective - as opposed to the previous "Christ, not this one again" perspective - than we have done for a while. The grand old man of our set, All I Want To Do Is Rock, sounded particularly fine.

In fact, so giddy are we still over the success of TM's first gig, plans are afoot to have another one sometime around the 20th of April, this time with Andy's band Proxy. Let me tell you, dear reader, the issue of who gets to headline is a thorny one. I have a cunning plan: they headline, because they're better than us.

Just back from the Alps -

Tignes, to be precise. "Le plus bel espace de ski du monde," goes its catchy slogan. In reality, it should be "Le fucking plus froid espace de ski du monde," but aside from the face-killing cold, it is actually a reasonable ski area. The various villages that make up Tignes are '60s ugly and the landscape, being above the tree line, is rather lunar at times, but at least the snow was good and the runs were okay.

Bizarrely I don't have much to say about the boarding itself - all my gear worked as it should (in fact I think this is the first year that I didn't 'have' to buy anything extra. Er, apart from a beanie, but that's just nitpicking) but my boarding wasn't great. Last year, having been training for the 10K, I was in reasonable shape but this year I just didn't have the same energy. Annoying, especially when coupled with my right foot's new and exciting tendency to go to sleep and/or become unreasonably painful after only a run or two. In the end I managed to improve my carving ability from non-existent to unreliably moderate, but in general I think I was a little uninspiring in terms of mad boarding skillz.

Also I managed to lose three (3) gloves. One and a half full pairs. Incredible.

The apres-board was slightly more consistent. We defrosted frozen beers in a bidet, drank beaucoup de la Kro, ate a cow's worth of barely-cooked meat and 'danced' - or at least I did, while Andy quietly threw up in a corner - in a typically dire ski resort club. Mission accomplished.