The guy in the music store has known me for many years. He's a nice chap, as far as it a shopkeeper can be. I guess I've spent a fair few quid buying instruments, drumsticks, strings, and several guitars in that period. He is of course, a businessman first, and kept a poker face as I manhandled my ailing keyboard through his doors.

Yes, another technological toy has bit the dust. My long suffering Yamaha keyboard, which must be nearly a quarter century old, a veteran that saw action on the front lines of stage performances, has decided to stop working. Of all the times it could have chosen to break down, it has to be now. How can life get any more painful? No, that's tempting fate isn't it....

The answer was staring me in the face. The salesman sighed and took down a few details in a fruitless quest to get the keyboard repaired, and warned me that if it wasn't an internal battery that needed replacing it's going to be expensive. There are pound signs revolving in his eyesockets as I write.

Noise Schedule For 2009

I understand that the Old College site is to be demolished later this year. Can't wait for that. Explosions, collapses, big cranes swinging back and forth, earthmovers, heavily laden lorries, loud shouts of "Over 'ere, Fred!". Just to get me warmed up, the garage across the yard started this morning with a mechanical rattle, rather like a manic robot woodpecker. Demolishing someones car no doubt. And charging money for the privilege.