Remember when machines were going to free us all from the drudgery of work and lead us into a utopian life of leisure, novel-writing and blogging? As recently as the 1980s people were predicting that computers would make us so efficient our main problem would be finding ways to fill up all the free time we’d have.

So why is it I don’t even have time to draw breath this week, let alone write a blog post (well, apart from this one of course)? In my business there was a time when you could tell the boss/client he couldn’t make that last minute change because there wasn’t time to get the typesetting back or have the artwork redone or find a different photo — now no one ever says “no” because the deadline extends almost to the minute before the job gets printed. Those old limitations were physical, human limitations, but now it’s all possible with a few keystrokes our poor human selves are working longer and longer hours in an effort to keep up with the 24/7 flow of work that computers and the internet have made possible. All that computer-enabled “free” time has just been filled up with more work, I’m super efficient these days but I’m also completely knackered most of the time.

All of which is my way of saying I’m having a really bad week.

Download: Crushed By The Wheels of Industry (12″ version) – Heaven 17 (mp3)

Oh well.

It’s some consolation that I think we were the better team (and I’m not looking at the game through Blue-coloured glasses) but to come so close and then have the trophy slip away – literally! — was more heartbreaking than if we’d been crap.

This wasn’t the post I wanted to write today, but here’s the record I was going to put with it anyway.

Download: Chelsea Morning – Sergio Mendes And Brasil ’66 (mp3)

I can’t believe that twat Ferguson is saying they deserved to win because of their “history” — what does that have to do with winning a football game? Bloody Manc bastards.

I’m off to London for a holiday tomorrow so there won’t be any posts for a week or more. I haven’t been home in two years so I’m excited to be going (not least because I get show my little girl the city her Daddy grew up in) but that’s mixed with the sad feeling I always get when I go back that it’s changed too much for me to really feel at home there anymore.

The other day I was talking with another London-born friend of mine who lives in New York and we both agreed we couldn’t live there now as the place we knew just doesn’t exist, not just because the clubs, pubs and cafes we knew are gone but now there’s a level of in-your-face vulgarity, rudeness and 24/7 consumerism I really didn’t think the English were capable of. Which is fair enough, London is a vibrant, modern city and is supposed to move forward, there are more great restaurants, more shops, more choice in all sorts of things (if you have the money) but I’d gladly lose a little of that in exchange for fewer surly teens jabbering loudly and moronically into their cellphones on the bus, fewer nasty drunks in the West End on a Saturday night, and fewer chain coffee shops (aren’t we supposed to drink tea?) Yes, I’ve turned into my Dad, he was born there too but left when he retired, couldn’t stand the traffic and the people anymore.

But it’s still the place I grew up in and lived for 30 years, my family are there along with a million great memories, they can’t take that away from me. No matter what I’ll always think this song is true.

Download: London’s Brilliant – Wendy James (mp3)
Buy: “Now Ain’t The Time For Your Tears” (album)