I realised this very morning that inside the ipad version of Skin Deep, is a link on the app that leads here. Welcome to here. If you came here from there, I should apologise for a) lack of posts lately (busy) b) lack of tattoo stuff (like I don't push enough out on the front already but I've started to drop stuff into my tumblr so maybe I'll get it repointed there) and c) there is no c. Just a mug of coffee waiting to be devoured. I started watching Californication again this morning - from the beginning. Man, I love that show and after watching all ten seasons of Spooks last week, needed to get back to some kind of non-paranoia background noise. Are any of you reading this writers? It get's fucking lonely out here - the radio is fine but sometimes, you need a little bit more company than that. The radio is directed straight at you - they pretend to talk to you and involve you, but that's not what you need. What you need - in the absence of the postman coming round with a parcel or somebody who's lost knocking on the door - is to know that life is still going on outside. Even if it is pre-recorded and you've seen it before.

Then again, isn't that most people every single day of the week?

I did seven interviews yesterday. Looming in the distance are seven more but some of these coming are with people that I've had a bit of a Pro-Crush* on since I was a kid. (*Pro-Crush: the admiration of somebody who you adored when you were a kid whose world seemed many universes away from your own). Been doing this too long to get all gooey over any of them but still, it's always weird to find yourself playing ball with people you still think are kings among men.

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There's a lot of idle chatter out there at the moment from people proclaiming that blogs are dead - that they're a thing of the past. That maybe true if you were looking for traffic and cash and ended up with neither. The problem mostly stems from the fact that everybody had a machine of some kind. Laptop, iPad, iPhone (though holy fuck, who the hell let those Samsung things out into the world that you can barely get your hands around), they all come with a keyboard of some description. Stick a board with letters on it in front of anybody and they think they're a writer. There's your problem. Same as every phone comes with a camera and as if by magic, you can sign up to a free account with corpwhore.com and shit, would you look at that, you're a photographer.

No. You're not. You're neither of those things no matter how much you want to be.

Sounds harsh but roll with me on this. I realised a long time ago but have only just gotten around to formulating the thoughts, that, brace yourself - the internet is full of shit. It's empty. There's nothing here to see.

Yesterday, I saw something I didn't agree with in the biggest way. I know Waterstone's have started to sell kindles (yeah, go figure - it's like selling dope at the school gates) but there was a guy in the coffee shop yesterday reading a book on one. Let's write that again. A guy was reading a book on a kindle in a bookstore. A guy was reading on the device that will eventually shut your store down and put you all out of jobs. A guy was reading on a machine that he won't be able to do in that same place for much longer because it won't be there...

There should be laws but there aren't.

I like hitting a book up on iBooks as much as the next guy but what that guy did? That's like masturbating in church. Eating a packet of crisps between courses in a restaurant. Leaving your suitcase on the seat next to you while the pregnant lady has to stand.

Isn't it?

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Which brings me nicely to a close. If you want to do something great with a pen (i.e.: not writing) - try your hand at this, it might suit you. This is Mark Powell and he rocks.... you can check it out for real in the next issue of the mag.

Sometime yesterday while I was trying to get some of my fiction finished up, I came to the realisation that I could do much better than I had been. This led to me making a 'sweeping statement' as my friend Rowan likes to put it and I collected all reference to them and filed them away in the trash. So if you're maybe wondering what happened to those items, they have gone to a much better place. The stories however remain, they're getting revamped that's all - better characters, better stories but all wrapped up in one single direction with a far superior premise. Does it take everybody a really long time to get their thoughts in order? I don't know when it will be ready to roll again but the same rules will apply - a complete novel delivered as a serial. Right now, that's about all I know but behind the scenes, the work continues - and you know what? I'm much happier with the whole affair like this. It kind of makes a lot more sense and has taken a ton of pressure off.

Meantime, my new vinyl habit has spiralled right out of control in a very short space of time. I haven't bought this much music in what must be twenty years. In the short few days since I've had this Amstrad deck (or Ugly Betty as she has come to be known), I've made good start on a decent collection (or at least what I would term a decent collection anyway). Right now, it looks like this:

The Waterboys first three albums: The Waterboys: A Pagan Place and This Is The Sea, Mick Ronson's Slaughter on 10th Avenue, and Ian Hunter's debut along with his Short Back And Sides, Overnight Angels and All The Good Ones Are Taken. Sometime in the mail today, a cool copy of the Zodiac Mindwarp and the Love Reaction e.p. High Priest of Love should arrive. I'm going to stop there and kick back for a few weeks and actually enjoy the spoils of war. I will say this though - listening to vinyl is a massively different experience to both CD and any digital format.

Mr Smith has been vaccinated with a phonograph needle for the second time in his life - and all this vinyl has had a massive impact on me.

I have come to realise that I don't much like digital books either. I don't hate them but I adore reading and I love books. The e-reading experience is not doing it for me. I have tried and it is - frankly - an empty experience. This isn't my last word on the subject because it's quite complex. I think there is much value in e-books. At the moment, my main thoughts are that e-books are great for trying out a new author at low to no cost (if that sort of thing bothers you), firing out samples, when you want to take a huge stack of books on holiday or even to load up on textbooks that would otherwise soak up ... the list is endless really.

But it's not a book is it. Statement not question.

It's a novelty and it wears off.

Over the last few days and notably before this decision hit me, I have bought at least half a dozen books. A copy of Stephen Davis' LZ-'75 (The Lost Chronicles of Led Zeppelin's 1975 American Tour), Denise Mina's The Dead Hour, The Book of English Magic and some others that I forget now and can't remember where I've put them either, but the point is these were all chance pick-ups, not from regular bookstores either. Of the three named, I've finished two and am about to start on The Dead Hour. These are not the reading habits of somebody with a kindle.

These are the reading habits of somebody that loves to read books. But like I said, it's complicated because comics are turning out to be tailor made for the ipad. Apart from work, I have also moved all of my magazine reading to the ipad as well.

Who knows how this will all pan out. Maybe it's all too hard-wired into my psyche. It's all pretty inconsequential really but on the record right here, right now. I love listening to great old vinyl albums and I love well put together books.

Recently reviewed at The Void: The Woman In Black and Van Halen's A Different Kind of Truth