Another five days has passed since the last update so I guess it’s time for a round-up of the past five days. I managed to sort out my mobile phone problems, it’s seems that 3G was the cause of the problems. I disabled it on the off chance as I was at a loss as to why it wasn’t working and it suddenly started working fine. No idea why it suddenly stopped working in the first place as it had worked flawlessly for almost nine months. Guess that’s modern technology for you, the more complicated you make something, the more likely it is to go wrong! The sound-system in the Voodoo Lounge is back to it’s best which means that I can achieve the sound I want from the system, it’s so nice to be able to feel the kick drum and it makes general music sound so much better as well and of course it means the system is happier in general as it’s only ticking over to get a decent club level. It’s not having the power that’s important, it’s having the overhead to cope with spikes in sound and unexpected volumes. If the system is running at 100% then when spikes happen it’s likely to lead to damage to the speakers and/or amps. So I am much happier now and starting to enjoy engineering again! Alternation was busy again last week, so we may have brought a reprieve for the night, but since no-one has said anything to me I have no idea of what’s happening with the closure threat situation. I have done loads to promote the night at my own cost, ink cartridges aren’t cheap and I have gone through four cartridges in the past three weeks printing flyers and posters. The night is getting better week on week thanks to Mike who has been flyering for me outside gigs and in town! I have been thinking that if Wednesday’s close that I am going to give up on sound engineering and get a day job as losing 200 pounds income is a lot of money to miss out on each month. But that all depends on whether a job opportunity for Erin works out as she would need to be in bed much earlier to start work at 6 o’clock in the morning. So I would want a job where I can maximise my time with Erin and a day job would allow me to do that easier! Last night was very annoying as it was supposed to be a Voodoo promotion, but instead it turned out to be a independent promotion which was never indicated to the venue before the night so they got the venue for free as it was too late to pull the gig. Then at the end of the night I went to sort out my fee for working which was £60, for the first six hours I charge a flat rate or £50, then £10 per hour after that. The promoter told me that they had only put £30 back for me as that’s what Phil told them and he swears he never told them that! So I gave up my Sunday evening with Erin for 30 quid, that’s not even minimum wage, that’s only £4.29 per hour. I just took the money and left feeling rather annoyed, my ears were ringing because I had just engineered six bands and made considerably less than minimum wage to my annoyance!
There was mixed fortunes in sport over the weekend for my interests. Plymouth Argyle were beaten 2 – 1 by Portsmouth in the FA Cup 4th round but The Pilgrims drew first blood with new signing Chris Clark driving home David Norris’ deflected shot on the 5th minute. Plymouth were in the lead for almost 30 minutes and the Argyle travelling support couldn’t be blamed for thinking that Plymouth could pull off the win against the Premiership team. But Lassana Diarra deflated the Argyle supporters with an unstoppable long range effort to which Luke McCormick had no answer. Niko Kranjcar only had to tap in Glen Johnson’s pass to his feet from close range to put the home team into the lead. Plymouth kept on plugging away peppering the Portsmouth goal and forced some excellent saves from former England stopper David James. Plymouth will feeling rightly annoyed with the referee after Sylvain Distin clearly handled in the box but the referee saw nothing and waved play on. Liverpool had much lesser opposition at Anfield beating 6th tier Havant & Waterlooville 5 – 2 but had to come from behind twice to claim the victory. Frankly this isn’t exactly what is expected from a team flying high in the Premiership when playing a team five leagues lower than them. Liverpool have had the luck of the draw again drawing Championship side Barnsley at Anfield in the 5th round of the cup while Manchester United face Arsenal at Old Trafford!