End of July 2015 – Newsletter

Posted on August 6, 2015 by volpeadrian

So hardly had I got started with the iAdrian project than we’ve had to shelve one of the prototypes and seriously look at the rest of the project going forward.

It’s all well and good starting something like this due to the huge demand of people wanting to come back as me, but when the hardware and the software don’t work hand in glove, we are headed for difficulties.

So we have been in the media spotlight over the last couple of weeks.

I have standards to uphold and when the prototype goes off piste so dramatically, I am seriously thinking about cancelling the whole thing.

I suppose it is really down to the fundamental lack of understanding about how I behave. There is always going to be a black sheep, a bad apple, but at least let’s try and avoid that if at all possible.

So in order to set the record straight I should say that future prototypes will have to look seriously at their conduct and we are going tweak the i8 (all the pies and) chip, or replace it with the new German i9 version.

Artificial intelligence is all well and good, but there has to be a degree of intelligence, self-regulation and self-awareness. A certain standard should be set, and I have set these standards.

So it is not kooool (you can tell I’ve been in Paris!), to think you can replace red Lycra with an orange bra and leather jacket, you are not trying to dress like Wonder Woman!

Eiffel Tower

It is also not cool and more of a cliché to spill your ‘Sherbet Dib-Dab’ on a young ladies chest. As for paying for things, cheques are soooo passé and contactless payment seemed entirely inappropriate for this kind of transaction, so dear Lord for heaven’s sake pay with cash, it’s what rolled up notes are for!

I do not condone any of this behaviour and all future models of iAdrian will be fitted with a remote cut off switch, whereby any behaviour which I do not deem commensurate with the image of the brand will result in the immediate suspension of the account and prototype, any subsequent transgression; in termination.

At that point I will take your clothes, your boots and your motorcycle!

The whole premise of the iAdrian project was to produce a ‘Replicant’ of me that was more Harrison Ford, and less Mr Bean.

It will be fitted with a gyroscopic sensor that determines the nature of the Replicant’s movement and a failsafe device that will ensure that the iAdrian does not fail at any crucial point, also a proximity sensor to make sure no-one else is around to avoid embarrassment when anything does break!

Once again I have been travelling….

Chez Moi?

Yesterday I was sipping Pastis in Montmatre after a fact finding tour to see if I could add a Jazz appreciation app as part of the package.

If you appreciate jazz, this link is my friend Pat’s sister. Lovely girl, incredible voice, super talented, Sara will go far. Maybe with a little help from our friends!

https://soundcloud.com/sara-dowling/sets/from-shadows-into-light-album-sampler/s-pQZeC

and wine tasting?

So I wandered the streets of Paris in the small hours wearing my special beret, glass of absinthe in hand, following a little green faerie. On and on I walked, down narrow side streets until through the gloom I noticed a lantern above a door, a man with eyes like Marty Feldman stepped out of the shadows.

“Niccccceeee to see you both”, he said, and he ushered me into the labyrinth.

Down and down I descended into these caves beneath the Seine following this strange music, hypnotised, or just led by a bottle when suddenly I entered a dimly lit room, full of strange characters, a couple were dancing and a band were playing in a corner. This strange music called Jazz was trying to seduce me, was I undergoing some kind Daliesque transformation, the couple dancing were cutting some strange shapes, and I realised, I really had drunk too much absinthe.

They were Smokin’ as you can see by the proximity of the fire extinguisher to the drummer.

Slowly I floated to the surface to find myself lying on the beach at the side of the Seine, but what I realised was that it wasn’t all a surrealistic dream, or was it?

Had I now entered some sort of nightmare world? Is this how the French make a silk purse out of a Sow’s Ear, or at least the rest of the frog when you’ve taken his legs?

Frog minus Legs.

Despite the debacle over the iAdrian, I have begun to realise that I have become bestowed with super-powers. Beyond not suffering from hangovers, I am now able to walk through steel and glass.

I admit this has had less than 100% success rate. It has resulted in what some people have seen as bizarre and amusing incidents as I hone my powers, but I am starting to understand my limits and test them.

I have been most successful on the newest of tube trains, where I appear to be able to walk the entire length of the train unimpeded; also with doors when they are already open.

I still struggle with the older model of tube and closed doors which does result in me constantly banging my face against the glass like a persistent zombie, but I will succeed, and I have found that pushing, pulling, or even turning the handle on the door will allow me access through to Narnia.

Goodness the absinthe really has stayed with me this time!

Some of you have been asking me why I am not already in Ibiza. I am!

I sent out an updated prototype. We are still working on it, but one night at Amnesia and its memory was wiped… This aside the images being sent back show that it is having fun, in fact so much fun that I may have to go out and make some adjustments, this is likely to become a regular occurrence.

On or two people are a little worried that their faux pas will make it onto these pages, but I promise to keep your identity secret until, well what can I say, until you become famous?

I shall leave with some images of Paris at sunset. It took me a while, but eventually I was able to Photoshop out most of the graffiti!

New stock is already with us, plus a top-up of some summer fun. Photos will follow.

Ten reasons to visit Paris:

1: Jazz?

2: Absinthe

3: Caves

4: Inseinity

5: ……..

La Conciergerie

La Seine

June 2012 – Volpe Newsletter

Posted on June 30, 2012 by volpeadrian

This is a long one. Best to get that out of the way to begin with!

So much has happened this month. My, my, haven’t you all been so busy. It must mean the economy is on the way back, or you’ve all got so bored that some of you are actually doing something, asides from working.

Anyway, my plan was to meet up with Sam in the Cathay Lounge at Heathrow, we’d start drinking and continue until we were scraped onto the tarmac in Hong Kong. And if Mark had come along, we may never have survived the flight. Oh well, best laid plan of mice and men. Sam changed his plans and has headed for Paris. However, on the slight chance we both are in Hong Kong at the same time, we will try and do something en famile…

OK, slight problem, should I start again or just continue? Sam didn’t go to Paris, we are on the same flight, but as of yet we haven’t started drinking. I think we’ll take it easy and relax and catch up. We’re both going to have some work to do, and how else am I going to get the newsletter out? It is great to have Sam along, even if it’s so he can’t complain that it may be late. At least this time it might be his fault!!!

Anyway, I’m on the plane and only 11 hours to save the world! OK, OK to write the newsletter. It’s just that the former sounds so much more dramatic, and you know how I like a drama. And now the damn seat is broken, it’s completely flat and I’ve got to go and stand in the galley whilst they try to fix it at 2am, in the dark, with a toothpick. I should be catching up on my beauty sleep, wrapped up in my duvet, in my own individual little booth.

What am I doing in Hong Kong? I hear you all ask in unison.

Am I standing on top of a tall building in a typhoon? No really, you should see the video. A typhoon No. 8 signal passed through, so after dinner we strolled up onto the roof at David Tang’s Bank of China Restaurant to watch the passing typhoon. I was Batman to Hong Kong’s Gotham City. Oh, Adrian do get over yourself and the fantasy world in which you live.

No really; working is my response. Not to find new suppliers, as someone cruelly suggested. I am doing this for a friend who trusts my judgement. He has asked me out here to make suits for his wedding. Mountain brought to Mohamed, perhaps. Fool? Clearly, but I won’t have a word said against him, and his fiancé has made it clear that she thinks I’m completely mad or worse. We’ve met, only the once, and since then she has avoided me. It was the pale blue suede jacket for a stag weekend he was going to in Ibiza that did it, very “Miami Vice”. Well it would, wouldn’t it?

I did put him Neil’s way if he was in need of a tattoo. Talking of Neil, there was a picture of him and Scratch (his faithful canine companion) on Facebook, sunning themselves on a beach. He said he was only there a couple of hours, but I did notice a darker hue to his skin whilst chatting on Skype. He can still be such a rebel. I shall try to get there at some point and have my name engraved somewhere so I don’t forget who I am. Neil doesn’t do “shades”, nothing beats a good glare, and Neil can glare with the best of them. Sometimes I think he really enjoys scaring prospective customers by staring at them, or it might be a test. If they can withstand his withering glance, then they are able to the pain that will follow as he wields his needle!

Sadly Neil will be in London this weekend, at some celeb wedding or other. So we will miss each other. He will arrive with Ryanair, and stay in a tent in a field, I will not. He didn’t like that. I didn’t realise he was getting married.

I was in Florence 2 weeks ago for Pitti Uomo, a menswear trade fair. Given my comments about the state and price of accommodation there in the past, I was pleasantly surprised. OK, I happened to be staying there at the same time as Madonna, who I must say made a real pest of herself, by knocking on my door all hours of the day and night, a la Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.

I stayed in a very inexpensive bed and breakfast called Relais del Duomo. It was great, even though it was 36C outside, I didn’t even need to use the air conditioning! Clean and tidy, central and importantly very quiet, well apart from the bells of the Duomo. Really, if I want to be woken at that time I have Sunil. He, who lives in a different time zone to the rest of the world, compiled of 24 hours of work and 1 hour of sleep. Except Sunil don’t live int shoebox int middle ot road (Yorkshire accent). I normally set the alarm to wake me, but Sunil can be guaranteed to pre-empt it by at least a couple of hours.

Now I have a recommendation for you if you are travelling to Florence, it is a restaurant called “Trattoria Gabriello” and it is in via della Condotta. The owner Rita is wonderful. It seems to be one of the few original trattorias left in the centre, and at least there were some locals eating there, and not just infested by tourists like myself. I’m a snob like that, always a tourist, never a traveller. I ate there on Tuesday and the food is simple, and well cooked. She was being helped by her best friend Alessandra. We should all have friends like Alessandra, she took the time to talk to, and make everyone feel very welcome, whilst helping Rita because she wants to. Perhaps “Ale” is not the best waitress in the world, but she has other skills, she says she is working on her English, I feel, that with a little practice she’ll be fine. She also says she is a great driver, the scar on her forehead and the photo of her “totalled” Porsche on her phone may tell a different story!

Dear Michael was in Italy at the same time as part of his gardening leave. He went to Naples to see some friends and improve his Italian. We would chat by text, his main preoccupations appeared to be the heat, and why he wasn’t going brown. The feet of an albino cadaver were the words he used on the day before he left. However, I feel the highlight of his trip was the fact that these feet and his legs made a cameo appearance alongside Rod Stewart and Penny Lancaster in the Daily Mail, now only if they lived next door to him, what treats would lie in store for them!

Michael also has a very sweet tooth, but he is a cheap choccie kind of man, more “Fruit & Nut” than “Charbonnet and Walker”, and that says more about Michael than you can imagine. But he arrived back in London clutching a box of chocolates for us from a shop in Naples called “Gay Odin”. As Gillian said, I’m not sure what the Norse God’s reaction to being called gay would be.

Now in every box of chocolates, there is always one! This box, full of Michael’s specially selected goodies contained the worst chocolate I have ever tasted. Each of us who tasted it, curious to the others reaction, was the same. It was made of dark chocolate, so no problem there, but when you bit into it, your mouth was filled with Brut 33. It tasted like the after shave and it smelt like the after shave, all that was missing was Henry Cooper saying “Go on son, stop coughing, it looks like you’ll splash it all over”.

In Italy they put liquers into all sorts of strange shaped bottles in order to trick you into buying them. Being from Naples I expected this chocolate to be filled with Limoncello, not Brut.

After reaching for and finding the wrong bottle to fill this handmade confection, perhaps Giacomo is out on a date somewhere, the faint smell of lemons upon his cheeks. I must ask Michael which he prefers.

And finally congratulations are in order to Eugenia for getting engaged, I know she will be very happy, and finally to Greg the “Cougar Magnet” as well. He has found someone younger to be with and Farah is beautiful. What did you put in her drink, I must try it myself…..

September 2010 – Volpe Newsletter

Posted on September 29, 2010 by volpeadrian

How quickly the summer passes. No sooner were you slipping on the shorts and Birkenstocks than you were forced to put your shirt back on.

All right, those amongst you who support Newcastle United from the Gallowgate end never wear a shirt to matches as a badge of pride preferring to daub yourselves in black and white stripes of body paint, the name of your favourite player mis-spelt across your shoulders. My friend Alan with his black and white cashmere scarf will be labelled a sissy. What japes!

But, I may never go onto a beach again. Note the use of the word may, because, as you know I worship the sun. But though I laugh in the face of skin cancer there are some things that scare even me.

A recent survey had Princess Beatrice tied with Jennifer Aniston for the fourth best beach body in the world. The bit about being tied to Jennifer I can understand, but how on earth can Bea, out of Her Fergieness and stablemate of Huge Knees, have ranked so highly or indeed anywhere unless it was bringing up the rear in the 2.30pm at Chepstow?

Who makes this stuff up? And for once it’s not the wife.

Once again sciatica has raised its ugly head in the tattooing brotherhood. This time it is not Neil, who appears to be making a recovery (update below) but his now less able assistant Pink, not that big, shouty girl but a compact bloke and the least Italian Italian I’ve ever met.

The injury struck following a night of drinking Ricard and hierbas involving Neil, Scratch, Gillian and me.

I feel the tipping point was when Pink’s landlady Charlene, who doubles as the waitress serving said alcohol, popped up in the small hours to extract the payment of rent in kind. Pink is now wearing Neil’s corset, Charlene still being busy with hers.

It’s a flattering garment if you have the personality to carry it off and I will be stocking a few for autumn.

September has brought relief to Neil. An operation in Paris seems to have done the trick and restored some colour to his pallid complexion. He really was the palest man in Ibiza. “I don’t do beaches, man,” he has often told me.

Neil and I will continue our discussions about Adidas, and that fact that I wear the wrong type. It is a style statement for him and I wear it for exercise and never the twain shall meet. So I will not be out “sniping”, sorry – cheating – him out of that vintage Ivan Lendl jacket on eBay.

I think it is time to introduce a new celebrity. My D-list friend is still stuck with his vuvuzelas but has a panto gig for Christmas. I wish him well, it’ll give me a chance to torture him with Macbeth, while he rehearses as an Ugly Sister. He is already complaining that the make up artist, J’son, feels he may only need a little touching up and is unsure exactly how to take that remark.

This new celebrity considers himself A list. What sauce! He currently crosses the street to avoid me and shuns me in my favourite breakfast haunt, The Wolseley.

The shunning is made easier by the fact that I always get a better table. This is not the only location we cross swords over table rights and he always loses. Big up, all at The Wolseley, Jayne, Claudia, Jason and welcome back Shirley, keep up the good work, I know it really gets under his skin. No, it’s not Michael Winner, who was charming if a little sqwarky the only time I sat next to him – like being next to a tanned parakeet.

Recently Gillian and I went back to an old favourite restaurant. T’was an interesting evening. It prides itself on service and the quality of its food. Note, I say quality, not quantity. The service was slow and haphazard as if to mimic the lazy french driving style of a post lunch 2CV, desperately clinging to the road when a strong gust of wind would puff you into a ditch, if not the heady mixture of bordeaux and calvados. My rack of lamb was a lonely lamb chop, a single rib, artfully arranged to look bigger than it was. OK, those of you know me well will know this is a technique I have often used myself. Perhaps someone swiped the rest from my plate on the way from the kitchen; some hungry soul who may have still been waiting for his main course since lunch.

And finally a plug; we now have a stock of new winter merchandise. Well you didn’t think I was doing this for my health, or just promoting other peoples businesses.