Saturday ramble

I went to the workshop this afternoon with Joe, the younger of my two sons. It's a most pleasant way to spend a Saturday afternoon, with good company, the woodburner lit, the kettle warm and listening to Exeter City playing football on the radio. Joey took these pictures of me.

This is one of the big jugs I'm working on at the moment. There's still a long way to go with it yet.



A blurred photo of the applied decoration. It takes its inspiration from a decorative technique employed on medieval pottery, whereby small pellets of clay were applied to the surface of the pots - so simple - and from the surrounding countryside, trefoils, roses and vetches in the hedgerow - not many of those about at the moment.



I put handles on the jugs I made earlier in the week. They have scroll handles of course, in keeping with the traditional Devon harvest jugs where the potters, with very basic materials, used this simple device to make such pieces more ostentatious.



Regular visitors to this blog will know that this picture here is my band, The Love Daddies. We've been rocking the hippies of Devon for more than five years. Recently the band seems to have pretty much fizzled out. The guitarist has moved away to North Devon and we haven't got together in ages, plus it's been winter and I've been busy doing the panto etc. etc. etc. It's a shame if that's the end of it, it has been a big part of my life. Who knows, it may still continue to be so, time will tell, we need to get together and talk about it.

I miss playing music, so was pleased at the opportunity last night to get together with a group of friends in my mate Clarkey's recording studio for a good old jam. Clarkey supplied some of the music for Hollyford Harvest, the film that was made at my workshop last year and is a top keyboard player. He also plays pipes in a band called The Maquires. His studio is completely soundproof, so we were able to carry on into the early hours without fear of anybody hearing us. My chum Filthy Phil was on drums. I've been in a band with Phil before, ages ago - a Sex Pistols tribute band no less. Even all those years ago we were too old to pretend to be the people we were supposed to be. We were suitably tuneless though! I have some photos somewhere, I'll try and dig them out, I was Doug Vicious - funny days, all that leather and leopard skin fabric.

Here's my good friend Andy Manson who was kicking out some great licks on the guitar last night. He wasn't playing this amazing creature I must add. This guitar, The Mermaid, is a great example of master craftsmanship - but then that's what you'd expect from a man who makes custom made guitars for Led Zeppelin amongst other great names of the rock world. A few years ago, Andy and his wife Debbie lived at Hollyford and Debbie and I shared the workshop. I don't get to see enough of them nowadays.

Hil's away this weekend at her cousin's fiftieth birthday party up North, so I'm home with the boys - they've got their friends round at the moment so the house is full of teenagers - We live in a tiny cottage, so I'm relegated to the kitchen - I like it that way though, we've always had a house full of kids, it's great to see them growing up.

Tomorrow morning, Marky Mark is coming over and we're off to the workshop to sort out the wood shed in readiness for the firing in March. There's a lot of stuff in there that shouldn't be and a lot of stuff in the kiln shed that needs to go in the wood shed. Inside the workshop's all but sorted, however everything that hasn't yet got a home, has been piled in the kiln shed, so I can't wait to get some order in there tomorrow.

Well that's it for now, I might wander up to the Half Moon for a glass of cider in a minute, or turn in for an early night - can't decide.