Trip

I'm on a bit of a calculator trip at the moment, mainly the Hewlett Packard 48 series and the RPL language, keeps me happy and it's a cheap hobby. I do like the other machines as well, but, I'm just focused on one series.

Mind you, some of the older HP calcs are selling for obscene money on ebay and if I decided to start collecting them I would have to re-mortgage the house. And I'm sure the guys at the local Cash Converters have gotten wise to the ebay thing as I don't see the calculators there at all any more, just Texas Instrument crap, which strangely enough, quality wise, are actually better than the newer Hewletts being manufactured now.

This new version, the 49G+, is just a big letdown as HP have dropped the good quality keyboard, basically used the same core CPU as the 48G and made algebraic input an option, that IMHO was the beginning of the end when HP started building in algebraic instead of the classic RPN. I also think that HP make much more money on ink cartridges nowadays than they ever did in the calculator market. Ink cartridges are the equivalent of razor blades, sell a printer for eighty bucks then charge fifty bucks each time Joe Public wants an ink cart. Screw Joe.

Still, there are more than enough 48Gs, 48GXs and even the older 48S and 48SX calculators around to see my career or my life out, whichever comes sooner.....

I know, I know, I go on a bit.

Wooden Balls anyone?

I always find it hilarious on TV when someone gets thumped on the coconut, falls off a trampoline or crashes off a roof, well, at the weekend, after getting shit-faced at the company golf day, I lost my balance while wrestling my good friend in his back yard, and bonked my skull on the concrete. It’s a definite problem, being a twelve year old kid trapped in a forty-six year old mans body.

Of course, why we all ended up in his back yard after a long day of drinking is just historical musing, but it gave me another chance to get in his wifes bad books and be banned from family barbecues and parties for another fourteen years.

Well, the shiner has moved on a bit now and spread across the eye and I look like a right ruffian, that's the problem with being a kid, always something hanging over your head, always an incident to shy away from. I'm always surprised, but Karen puts up with me quite well when I act the idiot, normally it's when booze (other than beer or wine) is involved in vast quantities and the little trapped David wants to fight to the surface.

The obvious villian of the piece was my Korean buddy Yong, once again he was tempting us along the golf course with a bottle of Johnny Walker he had in his golf bag, plus many rounds of Woody's which are just alcoholic pop and very dangerous, and of course many of the alchoholic substance my hockey friend calls ‘quiche’ (Coors light, - geddit, real men don’t eat quiche… nah, I don’t geddit at all, I mean, real men don’t wear 'plaid' and certainly don’t drink ‘urine’ which could be good names for a light beer, so let’s just call it Coors light and get on with it) anyway, there was a lot of 'that' as well.

Eventually it was just inevitable that the Weldon wheels would fall off, and by golly they did, fortunately it was mostly after the crowds had dispersed this year, or at least I think so, although it's been rumoured I was trying to drum up support to get the golf organizer bumped off, but that sort of sounds like something I'd do when I was sober....

No harm done however, just a bump on the apple and a black eye.

That’s my Apple however and that's really not funny at all.

The Sweet Spot

It was back in 1971, I was thirteen and a bit, had a brand new orange Raleigh Chopper bike, complete with handlebar tassles and an air horn, had a best mate called Joe Haines and I was in love with a lovely young thing called Yvonne Blakemore. The summer was long and my older brother, Rob, was off with the Prescot road club, cycling time trials around Ormskirk and Kirkby track, cycling across the Mersey every Sunday, breakfasting at two mills, supping beer at the Liverpool arms near Conway Castle and still making it home for Sunday night tea and toast.

My younger brother, Paul, affectionately nicknamed "totty limejuice" by mum (or was it Auntie Alda?) was tracking around the house, most of the time on his potty, dragging his stuffed dog around and making trouble, destroying my Dinky toys and Action men and generally being a regular little toddler.

Mum was working up at the shop on Milton Avenue during the day, making crab apple wine and apple pies at night and enjoying being a mum again, the garden was huge and time consuming, the kids were home and life was good.

Dad was being dad, had fingers in every pie available, taxi cabs, wedding cars and the famous ice cream van. It was the moment when his social life was changing, with Freddy and the Masons, selling tomatoes to the customers and of course, fresh, free range eggs from the chickens at the bottom of the estate.

And grand-dad was also busy in that garden, planting carrots, potatoes, raspberries, building chicken pens, sheds, composters and generally making himself useful in his retirement.

Even our dog, Sooty, the black alsation with the patch of white on his throat was there, his back legs were good, he was getting his "Shapes" every day and his "Pal" mixed with "Spillers" and he was lapping up whatever was left from Mister Whippy’s drip tray every night.

Nobody realised at the time, but coincidently it was the best moment of all our lives.