Before I start, I got the rest of my Japan pictures off the camera. Here are a few. That boot contained 2.8 litres of beer.

Last weekend I went to the End of the Road festival, which is pretty much unique among UK festivals, as far as I can tell, in that it's intended for people who actually like music. At any given time 83% of whom are wearing a checked shirt.

Four of us went - Andy, Severine and I, who left London bright and early on Friday morning, and Ciaran, who was driving up separately for complicated reasons, who spent the morning scrabbling around his flat looking for his ticket (which he found as we went past Romford). The weather was incredible and we drove along listening to the sample CD that you get with each ticket order. A lot of things sounded quite promising, and almost nothing got skipped, though I thought The Acorn sounded like a bunch of hippies and resolved not to watch them.

We stopped at Fleet services where I slightly appalled the others by Paying My Respects To The Colonel (it was 11 in the morning for God's sake - perfectly acceptable) and were held up in traffic near stonehenge (I took a picture, but it won't come off my camera), but other than that the journey was without any delays, and somehow the two cars arrived within about 10 minutes of each other. Andy, Severine and I left all our stuff in the boot to join the wristband queue because it was nearly time for Mumford and Sons but Ciaran, even though I told him to do the same, brought some bags, so decided to go and get the tent and put it up while we watched the band.

Mumford and Sons are another act I had put in the Laura Marling/Noah and the Whale painful posh mediocrity bin, and to be fair, I'm not about to listen to the album, but they were really good fun live - excellent banjo (albeit with horrible shorts), nice upright bass, spot on harmonies. Which all made it even more satisfying when about half an hour in I got a text from Ciaran that read, simply, "still pitching the shitter".

After we all pitched in to pitch the shitter, and the trusty green tent that's served me well since Glastonbury in 1998 for Severine, we headed back in (having missed Loney Dear, who were apparently amazing - missed them in Gothenburg too. Ho hum) to see David Thomas Broughton, who was the one track that got skipped on the sampler CD (it was really long), but I'd read good things about in the programme both this year and last. And was foolish enough to take them with only a small pinch of salt - it was probably the worst thing I've seen at a "proper" music event in the last five years. Well, since whenever it was Julian Cope was at the Folk Festival. And I didn't dislike him nearly as much as Andy did. Annoyingly studied Yorkshire accent, terrible, really long songs (two lots of minus 10 for use of the words progeny and piffle), loop pedal, ridiculous silk scarf, shockingly (for a pro) out of time bass player, pretty disgusting mid-song hands-free banana eating. It was baffling that anyone was clapping - I can only assume the people that were had read good things too and didn't want to appear not cool enough to like it. Ciaran invoked the "give everyone three songs" rule, but the relief was palpable when we got to go for a walk through the woods instead.

They had quite a lot of the now traditional kerazy festival art, my favourite bit was the living room made out of turf

There was a more conventional living room set up too with a piano in that you could go and play, and a sports area with table tennis, table football, skittles and various other games. Nice touch, but the queues were too long to get on any of the good things whenever we were there.

Shearwater were next up on the main stage, and I was looking forward to them, having been blown away last year. I loved every minute of it, though as with last year I can't remember anything much about individual songs - it was more about the dynamics and atmosphere, and the theatrical nature of the singer. And the smiling bass player, and the coolest drummer/clarinet player in the world. 

I like him even more now I've found out he's called Thor. I've tried to listen to the albums, but they're not as intense and I didn't really like them that much. I can't recommend the band highly enough live though. I also ended up with Thor's drum stick - he threw it, the guy in front of us plucked it skilfully out of the air, I went "aww" and he said "I don't actually want it, here you go".

Next we went to the Tipi Tent (the smallest stage) to see The Low Anthem, because I thought they'd work well at close quarters. Unfortunately the tent was right by another, much louder stage, and you couldn't really hear what was going on. That, coupled with them running 15 minutes late (I think due to the guys at the tent being a bit rubbish rather than the band being fussy) made the whole thing a bit frustrating. I'm not really sure what to make of The Low Anthem anyway - I can't figure out if the songs come from the heart or it's just some kind of art project - they sound like they should have been written 50 years ago. On the other hand there are a couple of properly beautiful ones among the hackneyed Dylan rip-offs, and the girl who seems to play everything has leapt right to the top of my People I'd Marry In A Second Without Even Getting To Know Them At All list.

We were heading to Explosions in the Sky next, but ran into the guys from The Pony Collaboration on the way, who said that The Week That Was, who were playing on the stage that ruined the Tipi Tent, were brilliant, and it was their last ever gig, so we went to check them out instead. I thought they were good - certainly original, but I think I should probably have gone to Explosions in the Sky.

After that we went to the Big Top stage to catch the end of Herman Dune, who I've not seen since whenever they played at The Portland last. One of the brothers (the weirder one) seems to have left and I think they've got a bit poppier because of it, but not too much poppier, and they're still brilliant, which made me very happy.

To round the night off we watched a bit of comedy (mostly pretty average, but Josie Long has leapt to maybe 3rd place in my People I'd Marry In A Second Without Even Getting To Know Them At All list, and Robin Ince was a cut above) and a bit of Ohbijou (who were good - we caught a bit of them on the way to Mumford and Sons too) in the Tipi Tent before I came over all tired suddenly and went back to the tent.

I have to go and watch Reaper now, then go to bed. More soon...

It's been a sporty couple of days. Watching, not playing obviously. On Friday I got to go to The Oval to watch England play Australia, which was a lot of fun (though, top Oval tips - don't get the chicken samosas from the Best Indian Food Ever In The History Of The World stall - the pastry is way too thick and dry - also, they close the bars for 30 minutes at random intervals, and nobody knows why...). It went down to the last ball, which is all you can ask for really (other than an England win). Cricketers seem to be very tall. And can throw cricket balls very hard. I didn't really understand why Strauss decided to bowl first when he knew it was a day/night game and the ball seems to be much harder to see under floodlights, but I'm not an international cricketer. The weather just about held, despite the fact I took my magic rain generating sunglasses. I wanted to get a copy of the Times on the way to read if I got bored, but there weren't any shops, and then there was a stall giving them out as soon as we got in. I do use up my luck on the silliest things.

Then yesterday, I went to watch a more eventful than usual Cambridge United match. About half an hour in Cambridge had a vaguely promising attack, everyone clapped a bit, and then the Red Arrows did a flypast. I wondered what would happen if Cambridge actually scored. The answer turned out to be that they'd score another 6, equalling their biggest ever victory. The Arrows flew past again later, but not in such good formation. Cambridge have scored a total of 10 and conceded 0 in the last two games I've seen. Seems like they're using my luck up as well.

I've realised that I'm not going to have time to write about Japan in as much detail as I'd like because stuff is happening faster than I can keep up with (I'm going away again next weekend), so here are a few highlights (in no particular order).

Riding the bullet train. They really are amazing things - the 575 miles from Tokyo to Osaka takes a little over 2 1/2 hours, and even though you're going nearly 200 mph it's unbelievably smooth - almost silent. And I thought the trains in Germany were good. The scenery is pretty nice too.

I also liked the fact that the train we were on was called the Super Express.

Baseball in Osaka. Osaka is an even stranger place than Tokyo - it feels darker, like a science fiction film. On the second night we were walking along and a 30 or 40 strong motorcycle gang roared past. They went past again about half an hour later. I thought it was quite sweet. We were mostly there to go to a baseball game at the Osaka Dome, which is pretty funky looking from the outside.

And pretty impressive on the inside

The Hiroshima Toyo Carp were playing the Hanshin Tigers. The Carp are, apparently, the worst baseball team in Japan and have a really rubbish name, so obviously they are now the baseball team that I support. Within about 15 minutes of us getting in there Dan had spilled his beer on the old people in the row in front. They made a big show of being annoyed, but I'm pretty sure, what with them being old, having something to complain about made their night. Especially having foreigners to complain about. Luckily there are very nice people who'll come and give you more beer without you even having to leave your seat.

All the home players (Hanshin is a bit of Osaka) had entrance music, which was the only real way of distinguishing them from where we were. The only one I really remember had "It's My Life" by Bon Jovi. I wish he'd been playing for the Carp - he'd have been my new favourite baseball player. I'd have found out his name and everything. I think I could get quite into baseball if they had it here. I'll definitely try and watch a game if I end up in America again, though I'm not sure they have such fun music playing the whole time:

To round off a really good evening, the Carp won 9-0!

The other real highlight of Osaka, other than some really odd bars was this 173m high tower that you can get on the roof of. There are some slightly terrifying escalators that take you up the last little bit, suspended 150m off the ground.

It had some great views.

Kyoto is definitely one of the more lovely places I've been, or will go. It used to be the capital of Japan until they moved it to Tokyo in the 19th Century (I don't know if it's a coincidence that their names are so similar, presumably not), and is littered with temples and shrines, and surrounded by mountains. This one said it was built originally by a daughter to house a picture of her dad, and is the largest wooden structure in the world. It is pretty big.

We caught the subway up into the hills a bit, where we found this graveyard,

before going on a scenic walk that took in a few temples, a park, and a street of tourist traps

Culminating in this temple complex, further up yet another hill.

Even further up the hill are some shrines dedicated to people looking for love, and two stones that you have to walk between with your eyes closed to test the strength of your current relationship - if you make it from one to the other then things are going well. Obviously I didn't bother, but Dan had a go, and made it. Sort of. There were lucky charms you could buy (for all kinds of things - exams, good health, safe return from skydiving expeditions). I decided it could do no harm and was going to get one of these,

but the place that sold them had shut in between us going in and coming out, which speaks volumes. There were bits of wood that you could write prayers on and the head monk would see to it that they were answered on the first day of the next month - I found it kind of moving how many there were.

There were some more amazing views on the way down

Kagaya. The single weirdest bar I've ever been to I think. It's a small basement room run by a guy who takes your drinks order and then makes you choose a country to have them served in the style of. We chose France, and he came out in a beret and cravat with a small easel and did a cariacature of me. It looks quite like me, except I look happy. Unfortunately I've lost the cable that allows me to get pictures off my camera so you can't see it. Nor can you see the Spanish style drinks service, which was a daily special, and involved a rubber bull's head and some castanets. Nor can you see my special treat after everyone else had gone, which was him dressing up as a frog, then yelling my name into a small robot frog, which then ran forward repeating it. I found this all really funny until he told me, with a weird loneliness in his eyes, that he'd been doing it for 21 years.

Here is a short list of things that surprised me about Japan

1) The getting the letters l and r confused thing actually extends to writing - my favourite was "robby" on the floor list of a hotel.
2) They drive on the left. I assumed that we were the only proper country that drives on the left.
3) They really don't like foreigners much - people got off subway carriages when they saw us and moved along to the next. Though that does happen to me a bit everywhere I go.
4) There were hardly any English people there - almost all of the western people we saw were Spanish or German

Here are some miscellaneous pictures.

If only we could have found 2 girls to pose with that last one...

Been back for a few days now, and I finally feel ok. I started feeling ill on Tuesday and spent the last night of the holiday, and most of the time since, shivering, sweating, trying to be asleep, having weird hallucinations about building shrines, listening to TalkSport go on and on about Eduardo diving, and coughing up an entire rainbow of phlegm. Well, not the blues onwards I guess, but it's still been quite impressive. It got so I could tell what colour it would be by what it felt like in my mouth. I wonder if that's a skill that will be useful in the future.

So, on my second day there we went to this big old shrine called Senso-Ji near the capsule hotel,

then had some pretty nice ramen and incredibly nice gyoza (way better than I've ever had here, and it was just some cheap little chain place) before finding a cool Japanese style(ish) hotel in Ueno.

I'm not sure how traditional the doors were

We then had our first of many, many games of this drum thing, which knackers my arms. Though Guitar Hero knackers my arms - I just get too tense I think.

Then we went to Sunshine City (everything there is something town, or something city or something world - maybe something land), a shopping mall place with a big tower (Sunshine 60, because it has 60 floors and in Sunshine City) and a planetarium and aquarium that we went to.

The planetarium was good, though I fell asleep a few times, and the commentary was a very shrill Japanese lady, despite claiming in the credits to have been Liam Neeson. The aquarium was even better - it was more of a zoo and aquarium than an aquarium - they had these things, which Dan maintains were capybara, but I'm really not so sure - seemed a bit spindly and small to me

as welll as guinea pigs, armadillos, pelicans, a couple of lemurs, and some sealions who did a show. I'm sure I must have seen a sealion show before but I don't clearly remember. They're quite clever

The aquarium was odd - all dark, but everyone was given a torch to shine at the animals. I wonder if they minded. I think it would irritate me. They had seahorses. I'm sure I must have seen seahorses before but I don't clearly remember. They were as big as my mental image of them, even though I'm sure someone had told me they were tiny

These chaps were glowing red all on their own

None of my other photos really came out because it was too dark.

After that we went out for a bit in Asakusa then Ueno.

The next day I undertook my main mission for the holiday, having a McDonalds. That takes the number of countries I've had McDonalds in to 15 I think, if you separate out the UK (Australia, America, Canada, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Holland, Ireland, Japan, Morroco, Spain, Scotland, Sweden, Wales) then we went for a walk in Ueno Park, which is very pretty, but it was really incredibly hot.

Thankfully they have people selling snowcones which they make by chipping flakes off a huge block of ice.

There was a massive lake with millions of carp and terrapins, and the occasional duck, as well as swan pedaloes (we nearly got one, but it was too hot). Carp are weird looking, and, for fish, seem to spend a lot of time out of the water.

Then we got this crazy looking river bus to Odaiba

which is a bit of reclaimed land attached to the main bit of Tokyo with a big bridge.

They have a Statue of Liberty,

and a copy of that big arch in Paris

We wandered round for a bit then my guide book told us to go in this ridiculous shopping mall that looked like a warehouse from the outside, but inside turned out to be a copy of an ancient Italian town, complete with statues and fountains, and pizza restaurants (with plastic model pizzas). I laughed for quite a long time. What made them do it? Who had the idea? And then why call it "Venusfort"?

Out the other side of Venusfort, through a car showroom, was a massive Hello Kitty big wheel - so we had a go on that.

Then we had some more arcade fun (I very, very nearly dislocated my shoulder trying to hit a baseball, Dan had a go on a dog walking game, we did some more drumming) before I dragged Dan off to see the full size gundam that they've put in the park. We couldn't get round the front of it, and my photo didn't come out cos it was night and too far away, but it was pretty big. You wouldn't want to meet one down a (big) dark alley.

When we got back to Ueno we went for yakiniku (you grill your own food on a barbecue in the middle of your table) which was one of the best meals of the week, but ordering plates of raw meat was a bit weird. You'd think the plastic models that they have outside would show what it looked like cooked.

I'm in Tokyo in one of those places where you rent out a small booth containing a dvd player, a massive tv (which you can rotate with a remote control!) and a box of wet wipes. And in this case a computer with internet access at 1 in the morning because I need to upload my photos if I'm to take any more. There's some pretty weird stuff advertised on the wall... I've been having an incredible time and I thought I may as well write something while I'm waiting for the upload to happen. It may be the most technologically advanced country in the world, but the internet is not as good as in Sweden. And the keyboards are really annoying - keep switching to Japanese with the slightest of excuses.

It seems an awfully long time ago now, but I got to the airport in plenty of time because my flight was at 7 and I was ready and excited by about 2. The flight over wasn't too bad, except that the in-flight entertainment system broke for 8 hours of it so I only got to watch 17 Again and half of Star Trek (not that impressed), but I was sat next to a guy from about 15 miles from Cambridge who kept me entertained with tall tales of travelling the world and owning half of Hertfordshire.

I got the train to the centre of Tokyo without too much trouble, and then eventually managed to meet up with Dan (who'd been here 2 weeks already), with more phonecalls than necessary due to me not seeing a massive green sign directing me to where he was. I got my first taste of the subway here, we had a beer and some little kebab things (some of them turned out to be chicken cartilage, but I actually thought they were all quite nice), we got a couple of energy drinks (I'd been up for a long time and was feeling a bit spaced out - I still am to be honest) and we checked into a capsule hotel - essentially a morgue like arrangement of little sleeping pods. Here's mine:

Here's the view from the roof, where there was a really nice looking bath/sauna that I was too scared to use properly due to the nudity being not only public as far as the hotel was concerned, but the room having a massive window and being clearly visible from the road below.

Then we heading out to Shinjuku (a bit like Soho in London) to be amazed at the buildings and atmosphere, and try to get used to the way that the Japanese speak in really high pitched voices 

And be hassled by people trying to sell us girls at every single zebra crossing. The best conversation went, roughly,

"hey you ok?"
"yes thanks"
"you want anything?"
"no thanks"
"service?"
"sorry?"
"sex service?"
"no thanks"
"French girls, 2000 yen"
"no thanks"
"we let you take pictures"

right...

We went back to the hotel after that, because the subway was going to finish, stopping off only to get some pretty nice late night grub.

Wow, my photos have pretty much uploaded, it's effing late, and we have a seriously big list of things we still need to do in the next 2 days, so I'm going to head back to the hotel. Check them out here if you're interested. Here's a sneak preview

Actually I might wait here until The Ashes are over. "Hey where were you when England won the Ashes in 2009?" "Yeah, sat in a wipe clean booth, trying not to look at an ad for a Japanese travel vagina"

6 reasons that Sweden is great:

1-60-70% of the women there would win a "best looking individual in Britain" competition hands down, and it seems like some of them will even act as if they think I'm a real person 
2-the beer seems to give you much less of a hangover than it does here
3-the broadband is incredible
4-they have blackjack in the pubs
5-you appear to be able to sport a non-ironic moustache without fear of reprisals
6-there are lots of amusingly named sweets

I don't really have time to do Way Out West justice I don't think, but I'll give it a go. I got up nice and early on Friday morning, and took full advantage of the breakfast buffet at the hotel for the last time (though I didn't have the caviar - seriously, caviar for breakfast?) then Gary and I wandered over to the festival site for about midday, where we found Chris and went to the tent stage (there are 3 stages, two "main" ones and one smaller one in a tent for quieter stuff). Here are Chris and Gary sitting in the gorgeous sunshine we got on the first day. 

First band up were Vivan Girls, who somehow managed to be really charming, despite not being able to play their instruments, or sing, or write songs. They did manage to swap drummers at one stage without missing a beat (or losing the rhythm any more than either drummer lost the rhythm anyway) which was pretty cool. Also the singer was being all rock and roll and hitting her guitar with a tambourine. VERY VERY carefully. Really sweet.

Bon Iver were up second, confusingly, seeing as they're presumably much more popular than most of the rest of the acts who were on in the tent and, not confusingly, the place was absolutely rammed. I made the mistake of staying in the beer area (there are designated beer areas that you can't take alcohol outside of, intended to make people drink less, but having the effect of people watching less music) rather than going to the front when I had the chance and that, combined with it being early in the day meant that I didn't enjoy it as much as any of the other times I've seen them. They were still great though - Blood Bank and Wolves in particular.

Band of Horses were on one of the main stages next, and seem to have learnt to play live since I saw them at Koko last year. Absolutely brilliant - one of the highlights of the whole thing. I think the singer changing from wearing a trucker's hat to a cowboy hat might have been what did it. That, and having the sound so you can hear something other than a big booming bass. Saying all that, I missed the end to go and watch Florence and the Machine, which was ok... She has an amazing voice (and distractingly long legs) but it's all a bit stage school, and neither the band or the songs are great. Kate Bush has a lot to answer for, even if you forgive her for her records.

I wandered over to the main stage after about half an hour to watch the end of Robyn, who wasn't really great, but her set did feature both Dr Alban and the first recorded sighting of a keytar for over 15 years.

The real highlight of the day for me was Wilco. I've always thought the albums were ok but not brilliant, but live they have such a great sound, and Jeff Tweedy is a surprisingly funny guy. Their guitarist is pretty bloody annoying though - way too much widdling when everyone in the crowd (and probably the band) would be happier with an extra song in the set... Specifically "Kamera" but "I am trying to break your heart" was probably as good as it would have been.

You'd think these guys would have just bought tickets - it's not like the thing was sold out:

We listened to most of Anthony and the Johnsons from one of the beer areas, and it sounded pretty tedious to be honest. I popped out to catch a couple of songs, but didn't much like them, and I found his weirdness between them a bit upsetting. The orchestra he had backing him sounded nice though.

We remained in the beer area for Glasvegas, while a couple of heartstoppingly beautiful tour guides tried out their English on us (well, Chris), then saw the start of Arctic Monkeys (they played "I bet you look good on the dance floor" about halfway through, which was handy) before Chris and I went off to one of the club venues to try and get in to see Echo and The Bunnymen.

We got kind of ripped off by a taxi driver to get to the club, but it was worth it because while I was paying him a group of people near the front of the massive, massive queue forgot to move forward and Chris valiantly pushed in.

It was a long wait for the gig, but that was worth it too. Echo and the Bunnymen were playing their Ocean Rain album in its entirety with backing from what I think was an 8 piece subset of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra or something and it sounded incredible. Really incredible. I kept on telling Chris they just sounded like the Lightning Seeds but I didn't really mean it.

After they'd finished we hung around in the club for a bit, I lost some money at blackjack both due to my own inability to quit while I'm ahead, and subsidising the guy next to me who could only afford one go and immediately lost, while Chris forgot which room we'd been in and wandered around looking for me for half an hour. Then he went home and I acted as a non-threatening distraction tactic for a local girl trying to avoid the attentions of some pissed up English blokes on a stag do. I nearly accidentally wangled my way in to the after party by hanging around outside after it closed asking all and sundry where I actually was, but it's almost certainly for the best I didn't.

I made it to the site for about 3 the next day, feeling surprisingly ok, though the drizzle and McDonalds helped, just in time for Vampire Weekend, who were really good. The guy seems to have stopped pretending to be English in between songs, which can only be a good thing. They played some stuff from their forthcoming album, which sounded much like the old stuff, but the highlights were Oxford Comma and that one about getting out of Cape Cod. Both had me jumping up and down. Well, going on tiptoes and then getting off my tiptoes. The rain was getting heavier, and despite taking a mac to Sweden I'd not taken it to the festival site, so Gary and I went off to the beer area to shelter under the bar tent, and talk to some crazy Danes who'd somehow managed to get wasted already. One of them fell over on the way in. It was a beautiful sight - almost in slow motion - she tried to stop but her feet just carried on going. Chris turned up eventually and he and Gary went to town to watch the Arsenal game to get out of the rain, while I watched Nas and bought a hat to make up for the fact that my hoodie was soaked through, and that had the desired effect of making the rain stop. Nas was ace by the way - I always seem to really like it when hiphop guys have live bands.

I wasn't really keen on Amadou and Mariam - too bloody happy, and Basement Jaxx were ok in a ridiculous kind of way - the woman has a very impressive voice. We watched My Bloody Valentine from the beer area, though I kind of wish I'd got a bit closer to give them a proper go - it just sounded like a big mush from where we were. I do suspect that's what they were going for mind. I wanted to watch Lily Allen, because I'm a bit in love with her, but we only lasted three songs because it wasn't very good (I think the crappiness of her music is one of the things I love about her - her band are all about 50 - bit odd) and we went to watch Teddy Bears, a Swedish act, who, wait for it, are actually teddy bears:

Gary really liked them

I thought they were great too, but I went off just before the end to a club to try and see Jay Reatard but there was a huge line, and I ended up talking to these guys

(William and David - originally from Britain but now studying in Gothenburg and Oslo respectively - nice guys) in the queue for next door and going to Gothenburg's equivalent of the Kambar, which was a lot of fun. I ran into a Scottish hen night on the way home after they eventually chucked us out, and they were a good laugh too, but I think I just went on about Lily Allen. 

Today was a bit more of a struggle - Gary and I met Chris and Janne in the same Irish pub we'd met in on Thursday to drink a lot of coke and watch the Man U game. Janne wasn't feeling so great.

On the way there we spent a good 40 minutes watching an Aussie street entertainer who somehow managed to string doing two handstands and the spilts, and making a load of guys take their tops off into an hour long extravaganza. Fair play to her I guess. 

Absolutely brilliant weekend, though I do feel like I could do with another holiday to recover from it. Fortunately I'm going to Japan tomorrow! I don't feel very prepared...

Before I describe the events of the first proper day in Gothenburg, here's an "Aren't The Foreigners Funny With Their Funny Words" sign gallery.

Sorry. There's a fire extinguisher outside my room with "skum" written on it too but I can't be bothered to go and photograph it.

Last night, after I had my bath, which was very nice, I discovered a foible of the hotel bathroom design, which is that when you unplug the bath the water pours out of a pipe into a second drain in the middle of the floor.

Which is all well and good in principle (if a bit odd), but the higher pressure of the water coming out of the bath compared to the water in the drain means that the entire bathroom floods for ages, soaking any towels that you may have left on the floor. Specifically, the towel with which I was intending to dry myself. I found another though so it was ok, then I stayed awake later than I meant to watching Swedish telly, which is pretty good - just loads of shows in English with Swedish subtitles. I watched a whole Waking the Dead.

This morning I went for a wander, getting well and truly lost in the process. I think I have my bearings now though. I saw this cool big church

A statue of a naked guy with a fish (turned out to be Poseidon)

and some inflatable white horses.

I'd been meandering in what I considered to be roughly a straight line in the direction of the town centre for about 45 minutes when I arrived back at my hotel (via the Scandinavium, which I thought was going to be a big glass bowl containing vikings, but was actually a hockey stadium).

I was more successful at my second attempt at navigation, and met up with Chris, Gary (who'd both been up since ohshit o'clock) and Janne at the designated place to sit and watch the oppressively attractive Swedish world go by for a bit before going and getting our festival wristbands. On the way there we, oddly considering my funny foreign sign photographing activities that morning, passed an exhibition of photos of funny English signposts. My favourite was the one where they'd translated the word "picnic" into 6 languages, only for it to be pretty much the same in each of them. Here are a few

We also saw this amazing piece of nautical engineering sail by

When we'd got our wristbands (I nearly got knocked out by a revolving door on the way in) the others went to drop stuff off/have a sleep and I went to the sauna and jacuzzi in the hotel. I'm so getting a hot tub - I still feel great for it, a good 10 hours later. I think they put some minerals in the water or something because it was really hard not to float.

The festival we're going to (Way Out West) has a nice format of bands playing in clubs around the city on the Thursday night before the festival and then after the two main days. Tonight we were planning to go and see Blitzen Trapper and two Swedish bands whose names I've forgotten (my vote was for St Vincent, because I'd heard good things about her live, though neither her album or Blitzen Trapper's inspired me with a great deal of confidence to be honest - she's a bit weird and intricate, and the Blitzen Trapper stuff I've heard sounds like a weak imitation of The Band), but the show started later than we thought so we had a round of minigolf (the same course I played this time last year, when it was under an inch of water) to pass some time. It was a competitive match, featuring 2 amazing whole holes in one from Gary, only marred by a disgraceful nudging of my ball by Chris from right next to one of the holes (which was on top of a mound) to a "bunker" (bit of astroturf painted white) a good 10 feet away. Little sod. I managed to hit his ball with my next shot (which *would have* been an easy putt) but it just moved it closer to the hole. Story of my life. I had been leading at that point but the terrible injustice of it all preyed on my mind for the rest of the round and I ended up coming last. One shot behind Chris. Oh the irony. That paragraph reads like I actually really care about minigolf. Nice.

Anyway, by the time we'd finished we'd received word that the queue for the Blitzen Trapper gig contained several times as many people as the venue would hold, so we just went to a bar (which had a weird TV show on with a topless chef who was the spitting image of ex Cambridge United striker Dave Kitson prancing around, flexing his muscles and cooking a steak), sat down, and who should be at the next table but (at least some of) Blitzen Trapper! They spent fully half an hour complaining about their allergies (they all seemed to be gluten intolerant, as is everyone in America I suspect, and the one with the long beard can't eat eggs) and pronouncing Edinburgh wrong. Rock and Roll. I think we'll get to see some music tomorrow...

I'm in a hotel room in Gothenburg watching an episode of The Simpsons I've never seen before and running a bath ready to soak in while finishing off the fairly excellent historical whodunnit I've been reading, before having a nice long sleep. I kind of feel like I should go and wander round the city a bit, but I've been in need of a big rest for a while. I'll be trying out the jacuzzi and sauna in the morning I suspect. I wonder how long I can keep this outrageous run of only staying at hotels which have saunas going for.

Here's the view from the window if you look out.

Here's the view from the window if you look down.

Oh well.

There have been some huge developments in my life in the last few days. Specificially, I got a fancy new telly because my old one kept turning itself off, and some fancy new garden furniture because my old picnic bench kept threatening to break under my weight again. I'm really quite excited about both, though I think getting four chairs for the garden might have been hopelessly optimistic. To be honest, getting two would've probably been pushing it.

Not really done much else. Adrian and Joey came over on Saturday to do some recording. Here's Joey showing excellent sartorial taste.

As usual when people come round to record, I made sure that the performers were made as comfortable as possible.

At least I didn't make Adrian wear a towel on his head this time. The song we did sounds pretty good I think. And I got to have veggie sushi from Tesco.  

Right, best go, got soaking, reading and sleeping to do. Is it wrong that the thing I'm most looking forward to at this festival seems to be Lily Allen? I've got to admit I'm a little surprised.

Paris is definitely making a play to be my favourite place in the world. Edinburgh might just about be holding it off, but I dunno. Glencoe has definitely succumbed. I had a really nice long weekend visiting Jason and Krys - just what I needed. And the fact that I've been there quite a few times now meant that I didn't feel too guilty sleeping and watching DVDs a lot. This is probably going to be briefer than I normally would be, but work's as busy as a bastard this week, and that combined with pub quizzes and Morning People recordings mean I won't have time to write again until Lord knows when.

So, I turned up at Gare Du Nord at lunchtime last Wednesday, having had a relaxing journey - seriously, Eurostar is ace - and wandered round aimlessly for a bit until Jason spotted me, then we got the bus to where they live.

It's pretty big by Parisian standards - there's enough room to swing a cat.

Sorry.

We had a quick lunch of cheese, bread and wine and went off to look round a couple of decent churches, have a walk through the Jardin de Luxembourg, have a beer while watching Ronnie O'Sullivan beat Steve Davis (very continental), have an excellent kebab and do an open mic in a very busy Scottish bar (I played Edinburgh, The Easy Way Out and Watertight to general apathy - Krys and Jason both went down much better, though Jason did attract some weird attention from some girls in the corner). I went to bed and had a slightly disturbing dream about having to cancel the gig that would have made me famous because a minor thing had broken at work.

We'd decided to get up nice and early and make the most of Thursday. We finished breakfast by 2pm and went to the Natural History Museum, concerned it would be shut before we'd looked round. It's different to most of the other natural history museums I've been to in that it's full of animal skeletons instead of stuffed specimens. There are a few pickled things (kitten with splayed out guts anyone?) but mostly just the bones. Not that there's anything wrong with that. And it's excellent for vocab learning. Here are a few pictures.

The triceratops is my favourite dinosaur. Is it unusual that I still have a favourite dinosaur? Protoceratops is my second favourite but they didn't have any of those. There was a sabre toothed tiger though.

One of my clearest memories from my childhood dinosaur books is that the iguanodon has really pointy thumbs. They thought they were a pair of short horns at first, but then it wouldn't have had enough fingers.

When we'd finished in the museum and had a quick McDonald's (they give you the code to the toilet door on your receipt! No wonder everyone pisses in the Metro!) we wandered through the botanical gardens to catch the bus to Le Tour Montparnasse.

Unfortunately, it being France, the bus drivers were into their 4th consecutive month of striking as a show of solidarity with Caribbean oyster divers or something, so after 20 minutes wondering what was going on, we went to get the Metro. The tower is very tall. A good 20m taller than the BT Tower

It's also kind of unattractive, which means that if you're at the top of it, Paris looks even more amazing, because you can't see it.

As it got dark I got a bit overwhelmed by how romantic a place it is - the soft lights, the uniform colour of the buildings, the smell of the Metro (when you can smell it above the piss). And then I noticed that the population of the roof essentially consisted of 21 couples with their arms round each other, and me. Still, this is my favourite photo I've taken in ages.

We went back to the flat, ate foie gras with toast and onion jam (which Jason made) and tartiflette (which Krys made), which were both delicious, and watched 6 or 7 episodes of "How I Met Your Mother" which is bloody hilarious, at least at the start, before I went to sleep and had a surprisingly detailed dream about my new keyboard.

We did actually manage to get up early on Friday to go to the Musee d'Orsay. It's pretty great.

I got a bit obsessed with taking pictures of small sections of masterpieces. 

There'll be a small prize for anyone who can tell me whose hands they are.  And anyone who can justify the size of this gigantic (double!) bed.

When we'd seen pretty much all there was to see, I went to meet Severine. I had about an hour to get to her neighbourhood, and thought it'd be ok to walk. And it would've been if a right turn really was a right turn and not slightly less than a right turn so you end up facing at right angles to where you think you're facing after a while. Luckily I had a map. We went for a walk down a cool covered passageway with cool shops and a very expensive wax museum

before going into the Opera only to be turned away because it was about to close.

So we took the Metro to the Parc des Buttes Chaumont, which Severine eventually let on was entirely man made. A quick wikipedia tells me it used to be a quarry and was commissioned by Napoleon. It's really nice - I bet it's properly lovely in the summer.

Then we went to look at these picturesque little streets

Which, sadly, have this at the end.

God, I've really got to go to bed. Friday night Krys and Jason were playing at an Irish bar, and were great. Oddly, a couple of pissed up guys managed to wangle their way on stage to do songs. With varying degrees of success. Saturday was another big lie in followed by a fried breakfast (I smuggled some Heinz in), more "How I met You Mother" and a party, which I understood much more of than I expected to (I wish I was brave enough to actually try speaking French) and really enjoyed.

I came back all refreshed and feeling great. It lasted a good 10 minutes into the walk to work yesterday. Which is much better than last time I went away.

There are more photos on flickr...

I don't normally talk about current affairs and stuff, because frankly I couldn't give a toss about anything that doesn't directly affect me, but am I the only one who thinks this whole Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand thing is really depressing? Is everyone in this country actually really stupid or is it a media lie? The global economy is going to shit, there's an American Presidential election on Tuesday, and everyone in the public eye is standing around like a bunch of primary school children one hand over their smirking mouth the other pointing and going "UMMM - you were naughty" at a kid who's hidden someone else's pencil case. How is it that journalists have the power to lose people their jobs simply by pretending to be outraged about things? I think they should make it so that the opinion of anyone who is pathetic enough to make a complaint about something on the TV or radio is immediately discounted. Take away their vote or something. And that goes double for anyone who complains about something they've not even seen or heard. I'm only half joking.

I went to the Folk Club open stage last night and actually went through with it this time. I had a small argument on the way with a bus driver who denied that the stop I've got off at every other time I've been to the Golden Hind has ever existed, but the nearest one that hadn't been got at by the Ministry of Truth wasn't too far away so it was ok. I played Alabaster because I got nervous (and I forgot a line! As if I've not played that song a million times), and then "This Place Is Dead Anyway" which I'm starting to like a lot, even if it isn't really sad enough to be a song of mine. My guitar was horribly out of tune though - I got all flustered out in the back room while the guys before me were on and just made it worse and worse. I'm not leaving home without my tuner again. My friend Kate finally conquered her irrational fear of the Folk Club and was ace. I sometimes wonder how they choose which folk singers get famous. The night was also notable for featuring my third conversation about Dream Theater this week, all with different people and none of which I've started. 

On Wednesday I went to see Ani DiFranco at The Forum. We'd got in there nice and early because Chris and Ashley who I was with didn't want to miss the support act, Hammell on Trial. It turned out that since Ani DiFranco is responsible for everything, the support acts, unlike at most 3 act gigs, went on at a sensible time, so we were stood around for quite a long time, but the venue managed not to totally run out of beer this time (though they were down to Tuborg by about half 9).

First up was Anais Mitchell. Nice songs, nice (if a bit cutesy) voice, nice guitar, nice face. Very Nice. I didn't like it much. I'm sure she'll be popular with the older audience, as cute young ladies who do Nice things always are. I was surprised to see her on her own at the back at one point. I expected her to be surrounded by a group of 45 year old blokes in denim jackets. The DiFranco audience is predominantly female I suppose. Which is fine with me - the gents was like a desert. In the sense that you could walk for miles in there and never see any evidence of civilisation. There was quite a lot of water about obviously.

Hammell on Trial went on straight after and was a different matter entirely. Big cynical loud mouthed guy in his 40s or 50s from New York doing right on almost-but-maybe-not-quite comedy songs. Hmm, that doesn't sound good does it, but it was ace. Anyone who can get a thousand people shouting "Fuck it!" at the same time is alright with me. There's a half a chance I'll go and see him again on Tuesday at Dingwalls, but I've been to London enough lately I think.

I didn't know how much I'd like Ani DiFranco - I've got "Not a Pretty Girl" and it's quite good (not her best I suspect) but I've heard bad things about the new one. I did see her at Glastonbury ages ago, and seem to remember thinking it was good (she was very intense) if a bit filled with brass. Anyway, long story short, it was excellent. I found this youtube video (from the actual gig I was at) of her singing my favourite song of the night

I'd not heard it before. I think you can actually hear my jaw dropping about halfway through.

I've not reviewed a gig with the I-Spy scoring system for a bit, so here goes. 

• -1 for a drum solo (though it was fairly tasteful)
• -2 for a vibraphone solo (rules are rules even though it was the most incredible piece of playing I've seen in a long time - imagine the most outrageously good piano solo you can, then double the speed and have the player jumping about - how do people get that good at things?)
• +3 for nearly making me cry (I think it should be +10 for actually making me cry - only Rosie Thomas, Jolene, Dar Williams and Greg McDonald have done that that I can remember) and 2 minutes' continuous spine tingling (I'm not sure about this rule, it seems a bit dependent on circumstances and my emotional state rather than simple facts)
• +1 for using the phrase "shitting rivers for weeks" without it sounding awkward

I've debated whether the mandatory -1 for use of the word vibe applies when it's "vibes" and referring to a vibraphone. I think it probably doesn't, so the total adjustment is +1, which gets added to my score of 8/10 for enjoyment (it would've been 9 but there was a lull in the middle where she played new songs, which aren't as good. That's not some "old song new song prejudice" - I don't know most of the old songs either).

I got back really late because they were running rail replacement bus services on both lines back to Cambridge. Good thinking lads. And we had to spent 5 minutes in Stevenage waiting for said bus. Cruel and unusual.

On Thursday I was in London again at a preview screening of the new Bond film at The Electric cinema in Portobello Road. I know I complain about work a lot, but it's really cool when this kind of thing (and the Champions League game the other week) happens. The cinema is ridiculously plush - leather seats with enough space that you can totally straighten your legs (the seats further back have footstools!), and each seat has a built in drinks cooler (with complimentary mineral water and popcorn). Despite all this, the thing that seems to have impressed me most (apart from all the free booze) is the fact that they served us scotch quails' eggs. I enjoyed the film a lot, as I always do with films, especially in the cinema (I'm so fussy about music and so easily pleased by films) but the general reaction seemed to be bemusement. As usual I took full advantage of the networking opportunity I had been afforded, ignored the fact that it the guest list was essentially me, Ciaron and loads of people from the national press, and spent 30 minutes after the film listening to the relationship issues of a BT employee whose name I can't remember.

I think the transport network has something against me recently, the amount of close calls that have gone against me and unnecessarily complicated and expensive journeys I've had to take. We were shafted by the Hammersmith and City line taking 45 minutes to cover 20 minutes worth of line and despite a heroic (some might say Bond-like) dash across Kings Cross we missed the train we were aiming for by about 30 seconds. They were doing the replacement buses again and, despite there being quite a lot of peole who wanted to go to Cambridge hanging about in the cold outside quite a few empty buses, wouldn't take us until the next train that was meant to connect with a bus came along an hour later. We couldn't face standing in Stevenage for that long so got a taxi. Extravagant, but worth it.

My plans for the weekend are to watch the Cambridge game, roast a leg of lamb (and attempt not to eat it in one go), watch the Liverpool game, do a gig with The Morning People and finish off yet another new song (something seems to have flicked a switch in me a couple of weeks ago - I hope it lasts, and that these songs are actually good).

I can't believe Hollyoaks killed Max off like that. I wonder how long they'll keep the grieving process going this time. It's normally about a week in soap land but Hollyoaks is pretty good at dragging things out.

It's been a little while since I wrote because Jason's been staying and I've not really had a spare minute (in a good way - it's been really nice actually having someone around the house - I should probably get a lodger to keep me a bit saner. Or a pet.) I'm not sure where to begin.

In no particular order and no great detail then...

Last Friday I had the single most discouraging gig I can remember. I should know better than to go back to places that have been really good in the past. I was feeling a bit funny to begin with after a chance encounter at the station (I say encounter, I turned white and gallantly ran and hid behind a ticket machine) which tore down my carefully constructed belief that the tail end of my 20s was some kind of nice, if frankly unrealistic, dream. I think I've built up most of it again now. We (me, Jason and his girlfriend Krys who had come over for the weekend) got to the venue pretty early and hung around while the main act soundchecked, eating some of the food that Tony (the really nice guy who runs the night) had laid on. I appeared to have been billed as some kind of comedian because I kept saying funny stuff last time (guilty as charged). Even the barman went on about it. Unfortunately it's not something I can control. It bit me in the arse too, as some woman started laughing really loudly about 2 1/2 songs into my set, seemingly at the hilarity/crapness of my lyrics. I dunno what you're meant to do about that kind of thing - it's never happened before. So I got angry and sang that Ballboy song at her. She eventually walked out giggling and I felt like a complete loser. 

Setlist: Edinburgh, Watertight, Grace Cathedral Hill (curtailed slightly due to guffaw), You Won't Break my Heart, You Can't Spend Your Whole Life Hanging Round With Arseholes (with added venom - I played it pretty well I think), So Finally a Love Song.

However, as massively humiliating as my set was, it wasn't nearly as discouraging as watching the main band. It was sub-mediocre old guy folk/country music with lyrics that ranged from the uninspired to the vomit inducing. I see a lot of this stuff at open mics, but this was made especially offensive by the fact that the man clearly believed himself to be some kind of genius. They also had the least competent drummer I've heard for some time (even though the guy proclaimed them all "fantastic musicians"). After it was over (he played for longer than everyone else put together for some reason) he said to Jason, who is clearly an order of magnitude better than him in every single respect, "yeah, that 3rd song you played was alright - you'd make a pretty good support act". Blimey. Just watching him made me want to give up for fear of turning into that. Or for fear that people are thinking the same things when they're politely watching me as I was while politely watching him. I left with my eyes staring intently at the floor so as not to catch those of laughing woman and we went to Bury St Edmunds to stay with Jason's (really generous - thank you!) friends Kat and Ed, who had fortunately missed most of the fun. There was an amusing incident on the way back when we got pulled over by the police so they could breathalise Ed (he passed, obviously) and with perfect timing the window fell down into the car door as he opened it. Maybe you had to be there. We then stayed up pretty late listening to the Flight of the Conchords, who I'm going to give another chance - I must have just seen a duff episode in the past because it's funny stuff.

I can't remember being so down about music as I was when I woke up the next day. It all seems a lot of heartache for very little return sometimes. I think, right now, I'd almost certainly stop if I had anything else at all to focus on. I don't help myself though. This place in London that I've always wanted to play at offered me a gig the other week, but I've not done anything about it due to my irrational phobia of ever phoning anyone. The 'release date' for the album is slowly drifting back too as day after day I fail to do any of the things I'm meant to be doing to promote it. I'm a little bit concerned about my state of mind at the moment.

When we got back from Bury (thanks for the lift Ed!) I had a real and actual letter waiting for me from someone saying how much a song I wrote had touched them. That made me feel a bit better. And kind of a fraud.

Anyway I had a much more enjoyable gig on the Tuesday before last, supporting Sam Isaac at The Portland. I was on first, and I thought nobody was going to come in, but eventually a fair few did and seemed to like it. There was certainly very little laughter. Give me a younger audience any day.

Setlist: Take it All, Watertight, So Finally a Love Song, 60 Miles With a Slow Puncture, Grace Cathedral Hill, You Won't Break My Heart, Radio Silence.

I really enjoyed the other acts, My First Tooth and Sam Isaac. His band looked like they were all mates from school or something, and were so obviously so happy to be there and on tour. The music was pounding and joyful and I grinned and stamped my foot the whole way through.

The next day I went to see Joesph Arthur at the Union Chapel. He is another of these people for who I have a very clear picture of the first time I heard their music. In this case at an HMV listening post in Edinburgh when I was passing through there with a ceilidh band 10 years ago. The same afternoon I discovered The Mutton Birds. He was also the first thing I ever saw at the Boat Race in 1998, supporting Ron Sexsmith. He was using a loop pedal a good 5 years before anybody else though he seems to have stopped now, which is a shame, because he was the best I've ever seen at it. I blame Tunstall for making it passé. I had a great time, but he does do that slightly annoying thing that Counting Crows used to do, of changing the melody to the best (or best known) songs to make them slightly less good (and consequently a bit frustrating). It's art I guess. The Union Chapel is such a lovely venue I could happily watch anything there (except for the support band in this case - don't remember the name, they were shit though and we went to the bar).

Jason came a week ago on Thursday and a fair amount of the stuff we did seems to have revolved around eating. We had a couple of impressive breakfasts. Here is a short film of some black pudding being prepared.

And here is a picture of a (different day's) breakfast

We also had a breakfast pizza for dinner one day

I also got to use my barbecue for the first time in 2 years (it seems a bit pathetic firing up a barbecue just to cook a single lamb chop for myself). Here is a picture.

Here is a picture of the tell tale signs of a Hakin:

I'm being slightly unfair - 3 of those cans are mine.

I think Jason did cultural things while I was at work (genius quote about the Fitzwilliam museum: "It's pretty good, but it's not The Louvre is it?") and the three of us went for a walk round town yesterday. I forget these days how pretty Cambridge is. It was also quite nice walking round remembering funny stuff I've got up to over the years. Like that time I was sick on Trinity Ball from above. And that time I sicked up half a burger fully formed. And that time Pete accidentally walked into the Cam up to his knees while going for a piss. We also watched a respectable amount of QI and Two and a Half Men.

Wow - how good was the tennis just now? Murray is like the anti-Henman - you wouldn't take him to meet your parents, and he wins from behind instead of losing from in front. I don't think I approve of all that punching the air on every single point. A little unsporting.

In other news, I recently discovered "Great Expectations" by Elbow, and have been listening to it over and over again. It's this week's "Slow Show" by The National.