Wed 23rd June @ 16.30

So just to recap. That was about 4.5 hours to do the majority of the journey and a further 6+ to do the last 13 miles.

On with the bags. I do have a pic somewhere of everything I was carrying. I can’t find it at the moment, but will stick it on if I can find it later.
Basically...

· 65l rucksack on my back (clothes & general camping gear)
· Small, day rucksack on my front (all camera gear, batteries, torches etc)
· Over left shoulder is my tent (a 4-man beast)
· Over my left shoulder is an Ikea bag (15 x Strongbow, 1l port, 3l wine)

Very manageable, I thought. The others are looking similar. Jo has probably packed lightest (very sensible).

Off we trek. Cars that we pass are still blaring out the second half of the England game, but our minds are now on other things.
It’s a bit of a walk until we start to see the site proper. The bags are getting heavier. Along the way we see others in similar situations. Trolleys do seem the way forward, but some have gone for very cheap ones. Ones that don’t agree with hard, uneven paths. Broken wheels are a common sight. Wheelbarrows also look to be quite popular.

On we go. Two choices A or D gate. Gate D takes us towards “Camp Triangle”, an area where quite a few people are heading who all follow “Efestivals” website forum. We decide against it. A hunch tells us that the site will be fairly busy and maybe best to go somewhere quieter(!)
Another bit of a trek, keeping with the steady flow, and we’re at gate A. Out with the ticket and it gets checked successfully. On with the wrist band and I squeeze through a turnstile.

We’re officially in!

A 2 minute break is required. The sun is still beating down and I’m regretting quite how much stuff I have. But, off we go again.

The next route that we take is a bit of a blur. In my head, I now know the layout of the site pretty well, but at that time it was not so clear. Basically, we walked round.... a lot.
The bags were getting increasingly heavy. All of us were suffering.
We tried to go into one ground that looked reasonably clear – sorry, disabled only. On to another one that had plenty of room – sorry, family only.
A steepish path leads off to the left. A trickle of people are heading up it, none coming back. This was our choice. This was hard work. Very hard work. No choice but to carry on.
At the top of the hill, we turn right and enter a camping field, a road leads through the middle. The field gently slopes down to the right, gently(!) up to the left. A hundred yards in and we pause for a break. There are no obvious places. I volunteer to leg it up the hill to see if there are any spaces nearer the top. Ditch the bags and up I go. I’m getting closer to the “super-fence”, but the tents are thinning. I think we can squeeze in here. Back down the hill to tell the good news.

One final drag up hill and we can set camp. Not quite as straight forward as we thought, but we do all find room and the tents go up. It’s such a relief to finally sit down on my stool and take it all in.

That is made up of these...

Wed 23rd June @ 10.30

This is also a good moment though. I glance at the car in front of us and realise that it has the official Glasto carparking sticker. Time for ours to go up too. A small, but significant thing that lifts the excitement a notch.

We’re still not quite sure that the queue is going to lead all the way to the site. We’re all sort of hoping that there are some roadworks or something. Time to try and find a local radio station.

Sure enough, 2-3 minutes after tuning into BBC Somerset, we’re faced with the reality of a long wait. We decide to have a bit of a sweepstake on what time we think we’ll be in and pitched. I plump for 12.30, Andy optimistically goes for 11.30 and Jo (the pessimist) opts for 1.30ish.

On we go. Move forward 50-60 yards. Sit still for 10 mins. Repeat, repeat, repeat.
We cling on to any little things we can...

We’re now starting to pass through some villages. Not having been before, I’m impressed by the opportunism of the locals. We pass many people sat out in their garden, boxes full of bottled water and canned drinks all for sale with a modest profit. Not a bad way to spend the afternoon. The local pubs are keen to cash in too. Offering various roadside deals for the weary traveller.

On we go, 25° C, but not disheartened...

Several miles/hours pass. A couple of lads come running up clutching some sealed envelopes.
“Listen guys, from here it’s a nine hour queue to get in. I’ve got a shortcut that will knock four hours off that. I would normally charge £5 per head, but you look really nice people so I’ll knock a fiver off it and call it £15.”
Nine hours sounds a bloody long time, but I’m very sceptical.
“Thanks a lot lads, but I think we’ll take our chances”
I glance back at Andy and he totally agrees with my decision. The lads give us a wave and on we go.

A little bit further and we reach Glastonbury itself. We creep through the town and there it is... the Tor...


I should mention that something else is going on at this time. It’s the group stages of the World Cup. England have had two pretty poor first games. Today is a must-win game against Slovenia. Kick off is at 15.00 and hence why our guesses at arrival times were so hopeful. Get set up and then head down to the pyramid stage to watch the game on the big screens. That’s now not going to happen, so we tune into 5 Live.
This makes the next 45 minutes pass quite quickly. A big cheer as England go 1-0 up.

A little bit further and we’re there!

Turn off the main road and fairly soon got pulled up at a checkpoint where they’re checking all cars for any glass – a no-no for Glasto, as broken glass is not appreciated by the cows that inhabit the site for the rest of the year.
I open the boot (carefully, to prevent spillage). The steward takes one look at the rammed space and raises his eyebrows. I persuade him that we’re all law-abiding citizens. No glass for us sir. He’s happy to let us on our way.

Parking up now is fairly straight forward. We pull up against a hedge and jump out, excitement building again. The bags get pulled out and we make a really good note of where we actually are – don’t fancy losing the car on Monday morning.

Wed 23rd @ 5.30

Right, where was I?

Ah yes, I just became an DJ's dream interviewee! So, on with the show.

Radio done and about 2 mins later Andy & Jo arrived. I explained all to them and they were a bit gobsmacked - well, as much as you can be at silly-o'clock.

So we have to move luggage across. Myself and Andy agreed to go down in my car, as it's marginally bigger than his. Andy enquires as to how much room we've got. We all seem to have packed fairly heavily, but sensibly i.e. not gone overboard, but allowing for a few eventualities.

I took many, many tips from experts about packing - all good. I will share my wisdom at the end.

We pack A & J's stuff into my, not so tiny, boot and realise that it's a good job that Ben's friend isn't here too, as originally planned.

05.40 and we're off. All good on the road and we start to get to know each other. Typically, we exhibit the normal human behaviour of quite simple questions like, "what do you do?", "got any kids?" etc.

Food is required a few hours in. By memory, we stop just after the M25. Sandwiches go down well. Spirits still very high.

Andy advises a route (against Satnav's instructions) as he has family down that way. All good.

M5 junction 5 arrives. As we approach the sliproad, there are a few cars towards the top of it. Someone says, "Surely that's not the queue to the site.". We all agree that would be silly.

Oh dear. Satnav now says 13 miles to go. More to follow.....

The 6 Music Interview - Wednesday 23rd June @ 05.20

Well, that worked!

So here it is. The interview with Chris from Wednesday morning.

My voice is a bit squeaky, but I was a touch nervous!

Wed 23rd 04.30 - 05.45

So here goes. It’s now Wed 30th June and I’ve officially had two days to recover, but you wouldn’t think so.

Where to begin?

Tuesday evening was spent watching more of the Glasto documentary from the previous weekend. WW disappeared off to bed fairly early, but myself and Ben persevered until close on 10pm when common sense dictated that the best thing to do was to grab some sleep.

4.30am and the alarm went off. Quick shower, a final shave, then came the task of hauling the gear downstairs and into the car. Coffee was on the go, but we had agreed that food could wait until we were on the way.I got myself and Ben’s stuff in the car. By the looks of it, I was taking marginally more than him but then again, he was the one who had to manage on a train.

The clock ticked round WW happened to mention that Chris Hawkins had just mentioned on BBC 6 Music that if anyone was going to Glastonbury he’d play them a tune. I asked Ben if he fancied anything, but we were both happy for anything so I sent off a quick text. I fully expected nothing to come of it, I mean let’s face it, over a million people listen to it every week.I went to watch out for Jo & Andy. Soon afterwards, my phone rang – private number.

“Hello”“Hi, is that Tom?”, said a female voice.

I thought it was Jo ringing to say that they were five minutes away or something. “Yes, that’s right”

“Hello, it’s Clare from 6 Music here. We thought it would be great if you were to have a chat with us on air”

Was this real?!?! I didn’t doubt it, but was still a little shocked. We had a bit of a chat and she promised to phone back in 5 mins from the studio. I explained the situation to Ben & WW and rushed through to the lounge. Sure enough, a couple of minutes later my phone rang again, it was Clare. She put me through to Chris and we had a brief chat off air, then as the record finished he introduced me and we had an exchange lasting 2-3 minutes. What a great start to the day!!!

Last night, I managed to find it find it on Listen Again from the Beeb website. Using a bit of technical trickery, I managed to record it and later on today, I shall try and upload it to here as a memento. Watch this space.

At the end, Chris said that I should let him know how we got on, so yesterday I emailed him and sure enough, that got read out on air at about 6.45 this morning. Again, I should be able to grab that and chuck it on here after I’ve posted some pics.

So that’s the first instalment. See you later for the photos!

So here we are. Glasto Eve.
I'm really going to use this blog as a record of the next five days. Obviously, I'm not going to post "live", but I do have a notebook and, most importantly my cameras!

My emotions over this trip have been very variable. They have gone from terror (seriously) to ecstasy and everything in between. Currently, I'm feeling what I have been mostly. A mixture of apprehension, nervousness and excitement.

Apprehension - mostly centres around sleep... or lack of it. I think that as you get older, you need sleep more. Now, I can go without and have done on many occasions, but we're talking five days here! I seem to have lost the ability to lay in these days. So we'll see. Your body is very good at adapting.None of the other things bother me so much. Rubbish toilets? Crowds? Mud? Nah, I'm fine with all of that.

Nervousness - what to expect? I'm going with Ben (Reg's housemate). I sort of know him, but only been out with him a couple of times. Two others - Jo & Andy, are both from Dereham and I have no idea what they are like. It's a car share thing. Still, we're likely to have 6 hours in the car to all get to know each other. Getting there should be fine. Hopefully the queues won't be any where near as bad as last year. I don't mind queuing a bit. A bit of a trek across the fields to get to wherever we decide to camp. I have a massively full big rucksack, a jam-packed small rucksack, a bit tent and an Ikea bag full of cider and port! It weighs quite a bit, but I'll cope. Pics to follow!

Excitement - what can I say? To a lot of people, Glasto is the best thing to happen.... ever. They say it's the best party in the world. You meet strangers who become friends for life. You meet randoms who you share precious moments with. Lots of tears (of joy). 175,000 people all in one place, all desperate to enjoy themselves and have a good time. That, in itself, bodes well. They do say that the weather can make it awful. This year, we're set for wall to wall sunshine. What a 40th it's going to be (and me being 40).

It all begins tonight really. H is bringing Ben back from Peterborough. He got the train down from Lincoln. An early night calls. Had a few late ones lately and suffering.
Tomorrow, up at 4.30am. Andy & Jo get here about 5.20, then we're on the way. Satnav says 4.5 hours. I just hope to get in and set up by about 12. Then it's off down to the pyramid stage to watch England at 15.00. What an atmosphere that's going to be. Apparently, the last time it was the biggest audience to watch the game in one place.

I shall look forward to reporting back here with many photos next week.

Okay. Let's do it!

Fat Bottomed Girls

So I finally got round to it.... biking to work.
I need to do this for several reasons...

• It's a nice thing to do, especially in this fine weather
• It helps keep me fit(ter) and holds the weight at bay
• It save money on fuel and wear & tear
• As I bought this bike through a "cycle-to-work" scheme, I'm supposed to be using it as my primary means of getting to work. Oops.

The fact of the matter is, it's not just down to motivation - or lack of. I do have meetings away from site fairly frequently so I need to tie this in with a pool/hire car. Also if I'm on duty, time would be too tight. All that said, I would like to be able to cycle in at least twice per week.

Anyway, yesterday. All geared up (no pun intended). I do enjoy the ride in. At 7am, it's still nice and cool and the country is a lovely place to be at that time. Wildlife is aplenty and I still feel pretty fresh. As usual, I push myself along at cracking pace and was feeling it by the end. I do have a tendency to do this - in all sports like this. If I know I'm doing, say 7.5 miles, I will push myself to match that distance. I CANNOT take it easy, and this is annoying at times.

So, a good journey in. Going home was, as you'd expect, much warmer. I thought it would be harder but I really enjoyed it. There is a particular hill (yes, in Norfolk) that is painful, last night was fine. I put it down to the clipless pedals, but that's probably psychological.

Roll on next week. I'm looking at Tuesday and Thursday.

Demon Days

A quick bit of feedback on that last post - clipless pedals.
I did actually manage to give them a bit of a test (once) before the actual sponsored ride (Sun 16th). A bit of a change for the ride this time as it was from Sandringham. As it turned out, this was probably a better venue. There was definitely an increase in participants.
Ideal conditions - slightly cool. I set off steadily, pacing myself despite being hassled from Barbara & Natasha. As usual, the first hill sorted out a few people. I kep to my usual pace and ploughed along. A good halfway point is the drinks station. I never usually stop here, as I have drinks onboard and prefer to go right through. Immediately after this point are a couple of demon climbs. I went to shift gears partway up one, and my gears were playing up. I desparately tried to get it sorted without losing too much momentum and then it happened...... broken chain! Damnation.
Nothing for it but to turn round and freewheel back to the drinks station.
I was totally gutted, not just because personal pride made me want to complete the whole thing, but there was also a lot of sponsorship money riding(!) on me completing the course. Lots of people were stopped at the drinks station, and I stayed there for a good 20 mins. Zoe & Steve turned up. Steve looked a little worse for wear as he had a bad back. I think we both had the same idea at the same time - use Steve's bike!!!
So this is what I did. It was a lot heavier than mine, I was wearing cleats, the seat was at a ridiculously low height, but hey.... it was a bike!
Sure enough I got round. Pride was spared and, more importantly, all monies were honoured. I'm not totally sure how much was raised in my name, but BS are kind enough to double it.

Photos can be seen HERE. Note - none of me. I really don't like any of the publicity side of things and tend to load up my bike and head home as soon as I've finished the course.

Bring on next year - another year older!

Here's a quick one from last night. It was one of those "see the shot, grab the camera" moments.
I've recently got a new lens. It's a Canon EOS 50mm/f1.8 so opens right up. Ideal for those slightly duller days. I specifically got it for Glasto, so hoping that it provides some good images.
With it being a fixed focal length it also give much crisper images.

So here's the result. Stopped right down to f/1.8 at 1/50.

Hello, on a wet Saturday!
Having treated myself to some bike shoes and some clipless pedals, I did intend to get out on the bike today. Unfortunately the weather is conspiring against me. The nearest I got was to get all togged up, get the bike out and practice fitting and taking foot out. I'm told that it's often the case that people new to clipless pedals end up falling over, as they can't get their foot out in time. Seems straight forward (famous last words!). Anyway, common sense prevailed and I decided not to get a soaking.

Right photos.
One of the techniques that I've always been a fan of is "colour popping". What this entails is having a black & white image, but just having a selection of it in colour. It takes a decent photo to actually achieve a really good look for this, but I've been practicing on some regular ones...

Before...


After...

I think it really helps in making the subject stand out.

I have also invested in a Wacom graphics tablet. It's taking some getting used to, but even with my feeble attempts I can see how it is much more useful than a mouse.

Right, back to the practicing...

Angry Birds

A quick update from work. Will make a decided effort to bring everything up to date on here now, but in the meantime, grab another photo.
This on is of Downham's bypass, and was taken quite soon after I got the camera. Got to love light trails using a long exposure.
About 18 months on though, I may go and try again knowing a lot more about firstly taking the shot, and secondly, post shot production.

Well, as you might have seen, I've started updating my blog again - at long last!
I've gotten into digital photography in the last year and so I think that this is an ideal opportunity to show off some of my stuff.
Give me a shout if you're on here and like it.

Laters....

240410_0064, originally uploaded by Jack-Attack.

Ely

240410_0063, originally uploaded by Jack-Attack.

The Girl With The Sun In Her Hair

I was a little premature wasn't I?
However, all it took was a gentle prod in the right direction (thanks Gordon).
The scarey thing it that I know that at least one person reads this. Oh the pressure to write womething actually interesting!

Right. Onwards.
Lots been going on and I really don't know what to tell you and what not to.
Here's a scarey thought. B2 went for her first job interview yesterday. She finds out if she's got the job at about 10.30 this morning. I await a text with my fingers crossed.

Today I'm heading across to Naaaaarch (Norwich) we have an afternoon of meeting followed by a pleasant evening of food and fine wine. Tomorrow we will be heading here though.
I've actually organised it and I'm still not totally sure what we're actually doing!
This will be the third time that I've been. It is good fun. I suspect that the weather won't be quite as good as the last time though. I've just checked and it's showers forecast. Eeek!

Easter at the weekend, isn't it? We have been trying to decide what to do. We would like to go out somewhere, but there doesn't seem to be anything on. What's that all about?
Sure, if we wanted to go on an Easter Egg Hunt or some such, that's not a problem. But what about a good old country fair or something? Not a chance. H has said that a Wii tournament might be in order. I suspect she may be right.

Right. That's your lot for now.

TNT

Good morning!

New beginnings and all that.
Time to kickstart this again I think.
Watch this space....

Just Get Yourself High

Maybe it's time for a bit of chat about JOTE.
JOTE? Indeed!
Some of you will know immediately of what I talk, but for those who don't, I shall explain.
Jewel
Of
The
East
AKA - our lovely town, Downham Market.

A bit of background. I've mentioned Facebook on here a few times already. Well the whole JOTE thing spawned from that.
On Facebook, there are groups that people make up on every single subject that you care to mention. Often these are humorous and pretty informal. JOTE was started as an affectionate look at Downham Market and the group has grown..... and grown. Currently, there are about 325 members of the group and this grows at the rate of 1 or 2 every couple of days. I read today that Facebook has 100,000 people join up every day. Pretty amazing that, isn't it.
Anyway, I discovered JOTE fairly early on in it's life and joined up. It was started by a top bloke called Lee Cooper. Fairly soon, we got nattering on and realised that we have quite a bit in common and the same (warped) sense of humour. Unbelievably though in my ten years of living in Downham and using the same watering hole (from here on in to be known as our Spiritual Home) we have never met. This was soon put right a few weeks ago.
So myself and Mr C have become good buddies and I don't think a weekend has gone by, of late, where we haven't shared at least one pint!
But there are other key members too, to name but some, there are the Soehnle brothers. Three great guys, who I knew of before and had a passing nod, but never sat down and chatted with, again since put right. Hayley gets a mention here too as she is a regular at our Annual General Meetings (these seem to occur monthly!). There are quite a few others who should get a mention, but maybe another time, as this is beginning to sound like a who's who of regular drinkers in Downham.

So moving on. I'm typing this on a newly revitalised laptop! Last Sunday morning, H mentioned that she thought that she's broken it. I had a look and the hard drive was making a strange clicking sound and it wouldn't boot up. Ooops.
A bit of diagnostics by me and I declared that it was bust! After a little searching on t'interweb, I found out that this was a not uncommon fault on the first batch of Macbooks. Considering that this is the very first problem that I've had with either Mac, I'm still pretty damn satisfied with Apple products.
Fortunately, it was the laptop though. We have a general move towards keeping all of our stuff on the main machine (that I back up fairly often). So I didn't have to go through a recovery process. All photos and music was on the main machine, and all documents are stored to a web-based area, so nothing to worry about.
I quickly sourced a supplier and chose a 160GB new hard drive (twice as big as the original). It arrived within 4 days and last Friday, I fitted it and was able to reinstall all of the applications we originally had on here. No problems, no issues, nothing lost. Smug? Well, maybe a little.

Smells Like Teen Spirit

A classic track indeed.

Anyway, last weekend saw the first gig in a run. Erasure at the UEA.
We were quite up for this. I'd been speaking to others and they said that the gig was likely to have a fair gay turn out. So this is what we were expecting.
We turned up in good time and joined the back of a queue. On getting in we grabbed a drink and found a good vantage point. More and more people were flocking and and we had the usual bunch of idiots deciding that they had the right to be at the front, so pushed past everyone else.
By the time that the support band came on, it was pretty full. Certainly fuller than the last time I was there for a Rakes gig. Onetwo were the support act, made up of one half of OMD along with the lead singer of Propaganda and a third member. They were pretty good.
Unfortunately, by the end of their set, H was suffering somewhat from the heat and crowdiness of it all, so we headed for some air and some space.
After Erasure came on, the place was even busier. We secured a vantage point where we could see, just about, but were surrounded by idiots. Instead of gay guys having a fun time, it seemed to be predominantly overweight, drunk, middle-aged women, all shouting and generally being brash (maybe I'm getting old!) It put a bit of a damper on things. Even though the boy's performance was good. The night wasn't enjoyable and we left early.

Bring on The Cribs - 7th Oct.

Discopolis

Okay, back to the usual method of blog titles it is.

Firstly a bit of a note to do with what is where.
This place will still be used as my general ramblings and will include photos from various sources. The Jack-Attack homepage has been down-sized for now. Finally, my .Mac pages are where you'll find all our family and personal photos.
Facebook has all the local and fun pic on it.
Clear? Good.

Going back to last weekend...
On 3rd September 1987 I started my first full time job. This has turned out to be my only full time job. A fact I'm quite pleased and proud of. Long may it continue - well, not that long actually. Early retirement and a hefty pension would be nice. I suspect that the sugar industry has some recovery to go through before we reach that point though.
Where was I? Oh yeah, September. Well those of you with a reasonable maths education will appreciate that this means I've been with my current employer for some 20 years.
I decided that this occasion couldn't pass without without some form of celebration.
When I was taken on, it was as part of a group called BS03. There were eighteen of us in total from all twelve factories (only four left now!). After a couple of days at the factory (mine was Bardney near Lincoln), we all got shipped to a residential college called Eaton Hall, near Retford. We then began a course of 40 weeks, going home at weekends. I have to say that these were some of the most enjoyable days of my life. I think I can say the same for the other guys on the course too.

Here's a photo of us back in the day! No prizes for guessing which one's me. Remember that this was the 80's! Seated in the middle are "Uncle Ted" and Pete Whinfield who were our main tutors on the course.



Now is not the time to go on about a lot of the things that occurred during these times, but there are many stories!
Anyway, I took it upon myself to organise a reunion. Not the easiest of tasks as seven of the guys are no longer with the company.
But I managed to get in touch with all but one. Eleven of us got together around lunchtime at Go Ape in Thetford Forest. Much fun was had (photos on Facebook), then in the evening we popped across to Sprowston Manor hotel near Norwich for a few drinks(!) and a nice meal. It was fantastic seeing everyone again and I have never spent so long reminiscing in my life!
Here's a pic of the nine of us at the hotel...