I grew up in a coal mining town in Yorkshire. Descendant of a long line of coal miners. In 1979 / 80 or thereabouts, I would have been playing Subbuteo on my Mum’s kitchen table with my friend, Andrew Spence. He’d always be Barnsley, I’d always be Leeds. At the side of the pitch on a chair, I’d have a cassette player set up where I would force Andrew to listen to my taste in music. Around that time it would be Sad Cafe’s “Facades” album. He didn’t rate it. That year he got me into John Foxx, Gary Numan, David Bowie. I got him into precisely nothing. Last time, I was in Barnsley, I called in on him as a a surprise. I looked through his cd racks. I spotted “Aja” by Steely Dan which was one of the albums I would have recommended back in the day. He just said he’d got it because he’d read about it in the music press but he couldn’t see what all the fuss was about.
Twilight Dawning Baseball Awards 2010 Season
Before we turn our attention to 2011 Spring Training…….
Twilight Dawning Baseball Awards
In 2008 and 2009, we did something fun called the “Twilight Dawning Baseball Awards”. Once again we’re going to repeat it
The Yankees – October and Post Season 2010 – Part 2 – The Pitchers
When the only bright light in your starting rotation during the last weeks of the season and the playoffs is Andy Pettitte and then Andy Pettitte decides to retire then it is hard to be optimistic:
The Yankees – October and Post Season 2010 – Part 1 – The Batters
The post-season and the end of the season were a grim time for New York Yankees fans. First of all some dubious decisions from Joe Girardi saw us blow the American League East title and left us qualifying by Spring Training and then a great series against Minnesota in the ALDS (3-0) was eclipsed by a 4 games to 2 defeat against Texas in the American League Championship Series. Here’s how the batters performed over the last few games of the regular season and those two contrasting post-season series:
Baseball – Rounding up last season
Somewhere along the line life became too busy and my opportunities for posting here became too infrequent. Consequently, I never got to post last season’s Yankees October and post-season reports here (and I’m secretly glad that some of you noticed) and didn’t get to award my TWiD player of the season prizes. Over the next few days I am definitely going to rectify that before posting about Spring Training and the 2011 season.
A Rose By Any Other Name……….
We packed up our tour bus and we toured the local schools. Having stolen the name “The Shakespearience” from a long-forgotten tourist project in Stratford-Upon-Avon, I produced a two-hour presentation of the highlights of “Romeo and Juliet”, “Merchant of Venice” and “Macbeth”, complete with narration to explain the full story. Largely directed by Richard Evans but with input from the whole acting company, we produced a truly collaborative venture which we performed to audiences aged from 9-15. Our largest round of applause (and standing ovation) came from a crowd of 220 fifteen year olds so we must have done something right.
Darren doffs another hat
It seems like only the other day that I was talking about the variety of roles that life throws up for me and here comes another unusual experience.
What’s a Shuttle worth?
John Shuttleworth
Ambassador’s Theatre
London
November 2010
And December Gave Birth to a Boxset………..
I have a fairly varied professional life. I get to write, I get to work in the music industry, I get to front a charity and help people who are in need. Each day can be different.