Hehe,

Nowhere near as much as I would like!
Can't persuade to move permanently eiher...

Cheers,

A tough looking group of bikers was riding when they saw a girl about to jump off a bridge, so they stopped.

The leader, a big burly man, gets off his bike and says, "What are you doing?"

"I'm going to commit suicide," she says

While he didn’t want to appear insensitive, he didn't want to miss an opportunity so he asked ...

"Well, before you jump, why don't you give me a kiss?"

So she did ... And it was a long, deep, lingering kiss.

After she'd finished, the biker said, "Wow! That was the best kiss I have ever had! That's a real talent you are wasting.

You could be famous. Why are you committing suicide?"

"My parents don't like me dressing up like a girl...."

I can just envisage Graham in a kilt fondling his bagpipes

Hey, steady on!

What's worse is a comment this morning about bathing in the sink, along the lines of Steptoe (15" water main burst yesterday - fortunately I had filled the kettle the night before, but not able to shower).

Bagpipes - didn't somebody's description of trying to play them include "like strugggling with a demented octopus" , unfortunately I can't remember the rest of the comment.

Cheers,

I heard someone recently ask about bagpipes "How do you know when you've finished learning to play?"

I'm not sure there's an answer.

~iw

I don't think there is one Ian

Back to Scotland - hoping for another run up to the far NW next year...

Cheers,

I spend half my time tuning my pipes (English, medieval), and the other half playing them out of tune...

I've found that Scots just love it when you point out that the English had bagpipes about 400/500 years before they did. They really do! Goes down about as well as the tune I wrote - 'England the Braver....'

Excellent Paul

Reminds me of a piece I heard on Radio 3 before my ears gave out. Can't remember the title as it was Japanese, nor the composer, Japanese again, but it was about learning to play the recorder.

It starts off with seemingly aimless toots, as a kid might make, but all in the score. It then progresses to a basic tune that the player appears to struggle with - and when they finally get it right, you feel a sense of relief. Then from the basic tune, you get more embellishments until frankly, you hear something that is very hard to play and a work of virtuosity. It's an astonishing work, but not something that most listeners would appreciate.

The recorder is something that most folk have heard played by a schoolchild, but few have heard played really well.

The 'fun' instrument now is the Xaphoon - very cheap to buy, very simple, chromatic and sounds like a cross between a clarinet and a saxophone. You tube has clips...