I WAKE up around 9am after a good night’s sleep and feel a lot better. Not 100% but a hell of a lot better.
We have a long lie and I try and tackle some of the outstanding emails and stuff that I missed out yesterday then we get up and have a light brunch. Don’t wanna push things!
Betty has ordered us a load of firewood which arrives – I’m not in any condition to shift/stack it today so I cover it with a tarpaulin and will hopefully tackle it in the next day or so.
In the studio I start the paperwork and registration for the tracks on the new album while Margaret tries to finalise all the ticket deals and stuff for the November shows.
We don’t want a late night and I light some charcoal and grill some burgers…and then it happens again. Spewfest number two 🙁
I’m getting quite distressed and we’re concerned that I’m having a second bout of this right on the back of Friday/Saturday’s episode. Margaret calls NHS24 around 10.30pm and is told a doctor will be with us within a couple of hours.
I’m spewing every fifteen minutes and am getting a bit delirious by the time Margaret comes to bed at 2.30am having given up trying to stay up for the doc….
Two first prizes at the flower show! Shame I was floored with a sickness bug and couldn’t get along 🙁
OOOFFFT…carrying on from last night…been sick constantly. Not in great shape.
Margaret calls Duncan and Irene to apologise that we won’t be able to join them this evening..really disappointed as it looked to be a grand evening and we’d been looking forward to it.
Glad I took my flower show entries along last night as I’m in no fit state to do anything this morning. The judging is done before the official opening at 2pm and Margaret goes along.
I’m now ‘only’ being sick every 45-60 minutes and managing to doze a little between bouts. Margaret comes back with the news that i won first prize in both categories I entered…but I’m not really very lucid and for the time being couldn’t care less.
By 9pm I’ve not been sick for nearly two hours, but have a temperature and feeling terrible. A rehydration drink and two paracetamol help a little and I drift off to sleep soon after…
WITH the artwork for the album and pre-cursor single all done first job of the day is to sort the metadata and upload the files for the single – Meet Me in the City – to my digital distributor.
Once done, I concentrate on sorting out the mastering for the rest of the album. I need to get to masters – one with for CD and one for online/streaming. if the levels are too high for the streaming masters, the services will bring the levels down and their algorithim is not great for the quality of the streamed tracks. CD, on the other hand, can handle much less headroom.
Our local flower show is tomorrow and a big event in the community calendar. As well as flowers and veg, there are categories for photographs, and crafts so i make a leather keyring and then decide I also wanna enter a couple of photos. They need printed so they fit within the specified size guidelines, mounted and captioned.
There’ was no time for a walk earlier, so once my entries are ready i take a walk to the village hall and drop them off…then we visit Betty and Joe for a wee catch up before dinner.
back home I make a green curry which we enjoy…but not long after eating I start to feel a bit dodgy. Uh-oh. Here we go again. The sickness strikes and I throw up every fifteen minutes or so…that, along with hot and cold sweats doesn’t make for a great night…
AFTER going through all the album tracks and deciding on an order we agree that Meet me in the City should be the pre-album digital single.
In the studio I carry on with the pre-mastering work and then set up some selfies based on rough artwork ideas I pulled together last week.
I set up flashes, lights, ‘proper’ camera and take some images. They’re OK but I wonder how my iPhone might fare. This is totally crazy, but I get better results form the the phone than i do with the SLR camera and prime glass!
Next job is to knock up artwork for both the album and single. I quite like the results.
The album project plan is updated with the single release schedule and I also add in the tour stuff as I propose to do pre-order tour shirts and special shirt/ticket bundles. be nice if folks can get the shirts in advance of the shows.
The day is done and we get ready to go to my pal’s son’s wedding reception over in Luss. We have a grand time… 🙂
WE HEAD into Glasgow first thing and Margaret drops me at the station in Milngavie.
I’ve an appointment at the eye hospital but it;s not for a couple of hours so I get off the train at Hyndland, go for a coffee and do some work. There’s no food (other than cakes) at Peckham’s as the chef isn’t in ’til later. I finish my coffee and go up to Epicure which, although is meant to open at 9am (it’s 9.30am now) and the doors open there’s no sign of any staff or people!
There’s an nice wee cafe along the road and I have a roll and sausage and a coffee there then take a walk to Gartnavel for my appointment.
I wait for a good two hours before I’m seen but it’s worth it – the consultant is happy there’s no activity in my eyes despite having been off the steroid for three or four months. After 17 years on them I’m finally getting a break!
It’s a good hour or so walk to. Costco where i have a chicken sandwich and wait for Margaret. After a quick run round Tesco we head for home then get ready for a community trust meeting. After a year off I’ve been re-instated as communications consultant.
MARGARET’S birthday! She loves her handbag and the wee earrings I made for her 🙂
We’re going to a wedding on Thursday and I’m making some personalised gifts for the couple….I get busy with some designs.
Next stop is the studio where I start pre-mastering on the tracks for the new album including an attempt at working out a song order.
A break to make a pizza for lunch then I get back to it. While things are processing I take some selfies to use as placeholders for artwork ideas.
By late afternoon I have a bunch of tracks in a possible order in my phone and head out for a walk up the lochside to listen.
We’ve been invited to dinner at Betty and Joe’s with Betty’s sister, niece and grand-niece – Margaret’s made a pavlova and meets me there. We have a lovely evening 🙂
A quick look behind the scenes at the making of my forthcoming new album…
IT’S Margaret’s birthday tomorrow and although I have a present sorted I still need to make a card and a wee extra surprise.
First, the card…some design, some cutting, some sticking and, after a couple of epic fails, I finally get it right.
For the wee extra I want to make some heart-shaped stud earrings with a black acrylic edge and red, sparkly-finished wood centres. The design part is easy but working out the kerf – ie: the amount of wood and/or acrylic eaten away by the ‘cut’ is more challenging and I end up with a pile of broken acrylic ‘outsides’ where I’ve tried to snap in a centre that’s a baw-hair too big. I eventually get them done and am really pleased with the result.
After a quick pizza for lunch I start editing some of the video clips from recording tracks for the new album at home and mixing at Chem19 Studios with Paul Savage. I’ll use it in tonight’s livestream into my Wildcats Facebook group then make it public later in the week.
Suddenly the day is done and I’ve not even managed out for a walk – mind you, it’s been pretty grey and wet out there today!
There’s just time to plan the Wildcats’ livestream before an evening Zoom session with one of my guitar students..then it’s straight into the livestream….
NO LONG lies when the kids are here! Freya and Aaron come into our room around 7.30am and jump all over us….
Margaret gets up and sorts them some breakfast…Mikey can’t handle it and takes a fuck-off pill and the rest of us slowly come to and gather round the table for breakfast once the kids ahve been fed and are playign outside.
We take the kids a walk along to the old pier and on to Manse bay where they play at the water’s edge, jumping over waves and having fun.
Back home, Margaret’s got mac’n’cheese ready for the kids and soup and bread for the rest of us.
Matty and Les head off…Matty’ll drop Les off in Stirling for the train back to Edinburgh – then Catriona, Will and kids hit the road.
I make a batch of green curry paste and then some ‘quick’pizza dough for tonight then start trying to build some kind of trellis for the butternut squash plants. The midges get the better of us before we finish tho’.
MARGARET makes breakfast for Les and I – Matty just has cornflakes and is heading out for a run.
All the lids and grandkids are coming this afternoon for the night and there’s a lot of food prep to be done. I marinade chicken for the grill while Les and Margaret prepare roast veg and pre-cook some pork belly slices.
We’re good to go when Mikey arrives followed by Catriona, Will and the kids…then Matty gets back from his run.
We have a great afternoon, evening and night of chat, grub, drinks….a grand double birthday celebration for Margaret and I.
WE’RE up at a decent time to get our asses to Chem19 in Blantyre for day two of mixing the new album.
Margaret didn’t come to bed ’til 3.30am and is a bit worse for wear so I do the driving.
Paul is ready and waiting and both his dad Jim and wife Emma are kicking about, so it’s nice to catch up with them.
There’s eight songs still to be mixed. We only did three yesterday, but they were the most work-intensive. We make good progress and stop for lunch…steak in pepper sauce form the nearby cafe. Friday ‘s menu is always our favourite and is just as good as it has been on our previous visits. We’ve not been here since 2017!
By the end of the day we’re done…all tracks mixed and in the bag. Delighted.
Matty rocks up not long after we’re home and I cook the pinchitos outside on the grill…big ‘family day’ tomorrow… 🙂
