OK Comics, Leeds had organized a special late night launch event at their shop in Thornton’s Arcade. There was free pizza and soft drinks at a table in front of the shop and quite a few fans had already arrived and were tucking in or browsing round the shop where there were special deals only available on the night.

I half expected people to be there in costume and was disappointed to see that there was no-one who had come to the event in costume, and then most appropriately the Flash appeared, this was significant as the story that had kicked off the new 52 was the “Flashpoint” series starring the Flash.

The highlight of the party was a presentation on the cosmology of the DC Universe by local writer, science fiction enthusiast and time travel expert Mark Johnson, the whole thing was done in a fun way and included diagrams on a flip chart.

There was some heckling but it was all good natured. I joined in too commenting that two of Mark’s diagrams of the alternate timelines were the same but as seen from different angles, someone else shouted out that I had a point. You might hear it in the video below.

At one minute past midnight the new first issues of Action Comics written by Grant Morrison and Detective Comics by Tony Daniel, went on sale; also Swamp Thing, OMAC, Batwing, Batgirl, Stormwatch, Animal Man, Justice League International, Men of War, Hawk & Dove and Green Arrow started new series with new first issues Also available were Justice League number 1 by Jim Lee and Geoff Johns, released the previous week.

Needless to say a queue had already formed.

The evening was a great social occasion with much discussion about the merits of the reboot and the scope of the DC reboot in particular; however everyone did seem to be excited about the new direction. (See the link below for my take on the subject).

DC Universe Reboot

On Tuesday April 3rd OK Comics held an Avengers V X-Men launch night, where Mark Johnson’s second presentation: “Science of Death and Resurrection in them Marvel Universe” was given. (Thanks to Michael Valentine McAndrew).

Nicole Foss is an internationally renowned researcher, currently on a speaking tour of Europe. She was the main speaker at the 2010 National Transition Conference.

I got the wrong bus so was a bit late but managed to get a seat on the front row. I got the impression the talk had only just started, perhaps I’d just missed the preliminaries and introductions.

Nicole Foss is co-editor of The Automatic Earth, where she writes under the name Stoneleigh. She and her writing partner have been chronicling and interpreting the on-going credit crunch as the most pressing aspect of our current multi-faceted predicament. The site integrates finance, energy, environment, psychology, population and real politik in order to explain why we find ourselves in a state of crisis and what we can do about it. Prior to the establishment of The Automatic Earth, she was previously editor of The Oil Drum Canada, where she wrote on peak oil and finance.

What is happening with global financial systems? What can we do? and How can Transition Towns help? Were the questions Nicole Foss attempted to address in her talk.

After the talk there was tea and coffee provided, this was followed by a question and answer session.

Her presentation reminded me of a weather forecast, with charts and graphs showing the current economic situation and similar events in previous years (and centuries) finishing with the forecast for tomorrow, which is bleak therefore as with the weather forecast; there were flood warnings or fog warnings and suggestions of how to cope.

Needless to say, we now have an automatic door light and also a burglar alarm and better locks.

Now we’re having power cuts as the new street lights don’t seem to be working very well, or at all.

First we were provided with a generator and then when it became obvious that the power cut would last a while an additional fuel tank was provided.

There was a Blues concert on featuring the Crisis Blues Band and Maximum 90.

Maximum 90 where on first and sadly like many bands relied too much on their drummer who had two levels; loud and very loud, it seemed to me that we were subjected to multiple gun shots to the temples.

While the other band members were playing their instrument the drummer was banging hell out of his, to be fair he did have another beat up his sleeve but it was no better.

The third piece, (number? track?) that the band played, I think it was called “Victory” had a rest following a short introduction, the drummer beat his sticks four times??? Why did he do that, did he think that bit of silence needed to be filled by him, or where the other band members so inept that they couldn’t count in their heads?

Obviously this band weren’t my cup of Earl Grey though they did go down well with the audience generally who called for an encore.

The headline band of the evening were a different kettle of fish altogether, if only for the fact that their drummer had more finesse, he didn’t overpower the other instrumentalists and on occasion even played with subtlety.

The Crisis Blues Band had a lead singer who sang with clarity, he was supported by a lead guitar player and a keyboard player that were well worth hearing, particularly in the band’s only instrumental.

The only disappointment was that towards the end of the concert the band played a crescendo piece that would have been ideal to finish on, it got the biggest round of applause but then the band carried on to play four more songs, the eventual finish did go down well but I feel that would have been the better penultimate number with the crescendo to finish.

During the interval there was a raffle and I was lucky enough to win a couple of bottles of Newcastle Brown ale.

www.crisisblues.com

www.myspace.com/maximum90

The cat was mostly black with a bit of white under the chin and on one paw.

Thought she might be difficult to see.

Dad wanted to name her Shashka as our previous cat, I liked Shadow, but Dad didn’t, I looked up shadow in other languages and settled on the Macedonian, Senka.

The following day came and went with no sign of Shshka. The first few days were quite worrying but then as time went on and we started to speculate on what might have happened the worry became worse; the worst being not knowing what had happened.

Dad hadn’t seen a cat body on the road so we thought that maybe someone had taken her in and was feeding her.

I Checked the “Lost and Found” section on the Huddersfield Daily Examiner web-site, there were quite a few cats found but nothing that matched Shashka’s description; Dad decided to telephone vets where cats seem to be handed in.

Dad’s Brass Band friend Davina had suggested printing some posters that they would put up in the neighborhood the following day while I was at work. I created a poster based on what Dad had written which he laminated.

During my lunch break the following day I went to the Huddersfield Daily Examiner office to check the Lost and Found section, unfortunately there were only two copies for the past week but a member of staff said that such adverts are always posted on-line.

When I got home that evening I heard that Dad and his friend had asked to put a poster up at the local Car Wash, a staff member told them that he saw a black cat run over recently, Dad went to put more posters up and was hailed on his way back home by another Car Wash staff member who said he was sure it was the cat in the picture that had been run over.

We were now resigned to the notion that Shashka had been run over by a car visiting the Car Wash but decided to wait until the following weekend before deciding whether to get a replacement cat.

This seemed like a good idea but meant that I would need to fend for myself for my evening meal. I wasn’t keen on that idea so I sent a text to my brother who has luck would have it was eating in Leeds.

We arranged to meet but David and Helen saw me in the St Johns shopping Centre and crept up behind me.

We went for a meal of fish and chips at Nash’s and during the conversation it was suggested that I join David and Helen at the concert they were attending at Leeds Town Hall.

After the meal we made our way to the Town Hall where I was able to purchase a ticket for the concert.

The programme comprised music by Mozart and Tchaikovsky. Kirill Karabits lead the Bournemouth Symphony orchestra in performances of Tchaikovsky Symphony No 4 and Variations on a Rococo Theme with Steven Isserlis as the cello soloist.

Steven Isserlis gave a stunning performance.

The weather was so nice this weekend that Dad and I decided to go out for the day on Sunday to Lyme Park.

Before lunch we went for a walk outside of the Lyme Park boundary. We found a nice walk over the hill and then down a valley in the woods, eventually we had to climb out of the valley and came upon a cliff where I went to pose on the edge and was surprised to see a young lady sat on the cliff edge enjoying the peace.

When we got back to Lyme Park we went to the cafe for lunch after which I went walking on my own, Dad sat by the lake.

My chosen route was up to the Cage and then across to the Lantern. On my way down the hill back towards the lake I came accross a deer Park where I saw the Lyme Park deer.

Shortly after arriving back at Dad’s location I had an ice cream served from an electric ice cream van, then we headed home home for a Chinese take-away to round off the day.