fork in my eye

Okay, here goes nothing...

2009-07-31T07:06:00.000-07:00

Right. Here goes.

So today is the final day of July. And originally it was going to be a new August revolution, although tomorrow is also Pride so I might actually go and get drunk in the park with the gays tomorrow, and start the revolution shortly after. To be honest, it's more a resolution than a revolution.

Now firstly a bit of a preamble/disclaimer. I am not Stephen King. I did not kill John Lennon. I haven't finished reading On Writing by Stephen King yet, but one of the things that stood out for me from this (other than Stevie being v. defensive about being labelled as a 'popular writer') is his; "People say 'do you only write when the muse visits you'? I say yes. I do. And the muse visits me between 9am and 5pm, monday to friday."

Now that's all very well, Stevie. And to be fair to him, he writes a bloody darn lot. At some other point if I get the time I'll get into the awful situation that faces Stevie K - the fact that it's 20 years since he wrote The Stand, and he's never going to get even close to writing anything even half as good. I haven't read The Stand.

So, anyway. Revolutions.

I neither have the time or the money to flirt with the muse as much as Stevie does, but I also have a bit more time than I currently set aside to actually writing. So here's the plan. Come august (proper), there's going to be a good deal less of the smokin' and the booze. (Again, S.K. doesn't even remember writing Cujo, he was so whacked up on goofballs. Well, fine. I don't even remember reading Cujo.)

And this is where I bite the bullet where my mouth is. This is the target, sir. One piece a week. Not much, to be fair. Let's clarify that. One GOOD piece a week. A poem or a story. I'm only allowed to cop out and do a 4 line poem... rarely.

I know it's not the best place to be posting these, given that it's a vintage blog that's fallen into disrepair and I never really come back to visit, but until I can teach myself all the advances in webdesign that have happened since 1999, I don't really know if I can teach myself to make a better website. So yes. On here. From August. And please do send me abuse if I let things slide.

meandering nostalgia

2009-04-08T04:28:00.000-07:00

i can't promise this is going to make any sense. I've always been a nostalgic person, used to say I only did things in the present tense in order to sort out a new set of memories "we're making our own flashbacks" still listen to the music of 1997 and the past is important. from about 1998 I was into making websites and somehow got sidetracked into thinking with that grave importance of youth that what you write ought to be serious. took me a couple of years to escape that - I don't think I do serious very well and to be honest don't need to...

at the moment I'm being (haunted isn't the right word) by names and faces from the past - each broken connection each missing person each letter unanswered .. I can't stand my own inability to keep in touch with people - and I see flashes from the past, each as crisp as the bright spring day (didn't I tell you I remember everything?)

and never forget / and never look back

when you write poetry I don't think it's about words that like each other, it's about fresh words, and this is what's so important about cliches - they were once beautiful words; as Jacob says, "you could cut the atmosphere with a knife" - when coined, this sounds so fresh! such an exciting metaphor! these days you wouldn't dare use it and a good job too... and so for years I've wanted to write about moments in the past, to crystallise them, not like a butterfly collector but forever fresh and sharp as a memory or a thought and a place that you hadn't given a thought to for years but suddenly comes as if no time had ever passed, the "fizzy movie tomorrows", the power of teenagers and of a way of looking at the world that you'll never be able to do again; nothing so trite as "my friends are so beautiful / i want to die" a true untainted sense of euphoria (no dance anthems please) more like the soar of smashing pumpkins through the park I guess

god I can't believe I'm talking about fresh words and lapsing into cliche. this is the point, I think... for years I've been trying to write about these vital moments and find myself either as muted and awkward as a youth or as serious and filled with passionate intensity as a youthful website...

there has to be a way.

The Holy Roman Empire VS H & H Fried Chicken and Kebabs

2009-03-09T05:57:00.000-07:00

Twas the night before Christmas
And all over the town
Nothing was moving
Not a mouse made a sound

And we find our young hero
Sat here by the bar
Merry-making around him
Drinking beer by the jar

The tavern was busy
High spirits abound
And he joins in the singing
And buys the next round

Now Alex was a good Catholic boy
As I’m sure you all can see
And he counted out his blessings
Like beads on a rosary

For even the Pope has a tipple
And the odd glass of port is just fine
So Alex drank the Holy Spirits
With a sip of Communion Wine

For there was no Chance of Damnation
And risking the torments of Hell
Until things began to go badly
It begun with the sound of a bell

That’s last orders please!
Come along ladies, and gentlemen, please!
That’s last orders at the bar!

It was ten minutes before Christmas
Alex lowered his glass
And bidding farewell to his companions
He set off to Midnight Mass

He cheerily strolled along churchwards
Wrapped tightly in his scarf
With the tiniest sway and a stumble
Tapdancing round snails on the path

But as Alex took the forty steps
A temptation came his way
The smell of grease and cooking meat
Made his attentions go astray

Meat glistened and spun on its pillar
Burgers sizzled upon the flame grill
The scent of onions filled his senses
And gave our young hero a thrill

He eyed up the tubs of chillis
The sensation was divine
And it happened on this very evening
He put his immortal soul on the line.

The chicken was thrown on the griddle
Whilst flames burned under like hell
And for the second time that evening
There rang out the sound of a bell

You want salad?
O María, Virgo et Mater sanctíssima,
Chilli sauce?
ecce suscépi dilectíssimum Fílium tuum,
Lettuce?
quem immaculáto útero tuo concepísti,
Mayonnaise?
genuísti, lactásti atque suavíssimis
Garlic Mayo?
ampléxibus strinxísti. Ecce, cuius aspéctu
You want warm pitta bread?
laetabáris et ómnibus delíciis replebáris,

No thunderbolt ever struck Alex
And he watched Gokan cooking instead
Who trans-substantiated Rubicon
And broke the pitta bread

Alex never got to church that night
Though goodwill was wished to all men
And after his hot chicken feasting
He never went in there again

But he waits for that day of judgement
When the last of the seals is broke
When the whore and the horsemen go riding
When all is fire, and brimstone, and smoke

For only then will he discover
If he has an immortal soul
Or if it turns out that he sold it
For an H & H chicken roll.

Now here's a funny thing...

2009-03-09T05:54:00.000-07:00

Back in the days when I actually used to write stuff on here, was it:

a) Because there was more exciting stuff going on for me to write about,
or
b) Because there was less exciting stuff going on, giving me more time to write,
or
c) Less free time AND less exciting stuff...
or
d) None of the above.

I really hope it isn't C.

Party Politics and Wikipedia

2009-02-18T06:13:00.000-08:00

... these are a few of my favourite things.

So I haven't posted anything for a good while - all I really seem to use this blog for these days is to pass on messages to my contacts in the Chinese secret service, but what with the latest Tories changing facts on Wikipedia fiasco, I thought it's worth pointing out a few other things that the IP listed to Conservative Central Office has seen fit to alter over time.

Some particular highlights include making the Tory party the oldest political party in the world, slandering poor Ipswich, and defending one of their MPs being made a fool of by Chris Morris.

Particular failures of Oliver "Don't Let Letwin Win" Letwin are smoothed over, whilst any suggestion that BNP leader Nick Griffin was ever a Young Conservative has been taken out.

But it's not all about changing history. There's still an opportunity for that delicate Tory wit ... or are warthogs going to be discriminated against in Davey C's manifesto?

... feverish

2008-10-10T04:57:00.001-07:00

Mark Bellinghaus
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo

Don't normally get ill. Always been quite smug about having a SOLID STEEL constitution and years without a sickday. Soldiered on for a week or so not being able to eat anything more substantial than peanuts and chocolate and drink anything healthier than stout. with the belief that I had recovered simply for the reason I could eat again I said "god, if I ever get ill again I might take some time off work, rest..."

I don't think I was really any more well... been feverish and my ear swelled up to twice its normal size - all red and twisted out of shape. had a couple of days off work and been wandering in and out of sleep. The doctor stuffed me full of antibiotic and told me never to wear an ear-ring ever again. back at work today still loaded with antibiotic and little apple-shaped vitamin c apples.

checkuser. I need to find a new hobby.

other than that I seem to have been sucked into creating a papier mache theme night or something along those lines - and becoming deeply sucked into party politics intrigue - I think it started with the labour party conference and have since been avidly studying every piece of credit crunch solution, as well as watching videos on the internet of tony arguing with michael howard in 1990. is that cool?

let sleeping blogs lie

2008-09-05T05:14:00.001-07:00

Heck, I love a bad pun. But there is something pretty sad about an abandoned blog. Not to mention the fact that if you read someone's blog, and then they just suddenly stop posting, you start worrying about them, right? "My goodness. I sure hope they're still alive."

Well, at least this one trailed off rather than ended suddenly. Whimper not bang.

I keep thinking about starting it up again. Each time I just have a lack of faith that I'll actually keep it up. We shall see.

Plus if I look back through the archives (it's a pretty handy way of remembering what happened when) it's a whirling bundle of excitement. Was it all so much more exciting back then? Or does it just seem so in retrospect? I have rose tinted eyes in the back of my head.

A lot of things have happened. It's the end of summer, I think. I bought a book of Old English Customs (in an attempt to re-capture my Englishness after a discussion in Scotland that the Scots, Irish, Welsh, Cornish, etc seem so much more aware of their regional identity than the English. Except for Morris Dancing.) and was filled with melancholy. All the best bits are the "Sumer is icumen in, Lhude sing cuccu!" rituals of the arrival of the May. Last year we went up to Hollingbury Hill Fort at dawn on the first day of May to watch the Morris Men dance in the summer. It was incredible. Shivering on top of a hill with a bunch of weary morris men and a fire, and then they danced as dawn broke and sang in the summer. And then they all wandered into town to get loads of breakfast and dance around town until they collapsed. Coarse coarse men.

So, in a way, it's the opposite of that now. September has sulked its way in with a flurry of rain, slumped like a damp umbrella in the corner.

The summer itself has had its ups and downs. Late august has always seemed a dangerous time. "It's always the dangerous time."

So we shall see. I'm not going to even start trying to fill in everything that has happened. Let's see what Autumn brings.

Certain members of our friendship group...

2007-09-23T16:36:00.000-07:00

So, it's been a few months. I'm in St. Albans sipping John Smith's Original Bitter after a night at the Rat's Castle. That fortress from the war of the roses, overlooking hatfield road with a watchful eye. I bought a Londis lighter. It's been a long time since June. I'm going to attempt to step backwards towards that time, bloggue wise. Wish me luck. I once summarised Neighbours for the last two years for Frank Tong. We were in the Bee Hive. I was in the Bee Hive yesterday. It has become a wine bar and Nina works behind the bar. At this point I realised that I had been going to the Bee Hive for 10 years now. And it has had six re-fits. When I first went to the goat Alan was 12. When you have to commit to work then it is harder to take a holiday. I am listening to the song about the day the music died. Richard Whiteley conspiracy theory. I'm in St. Albans. We moved out of our house overlooking Hanover like an owl, perched in the pepper pot. We get a new house on Tuesday. It's on Queens Park Road. I pushed my hand into the drain, in the old house, up to the elbow, but still it wouldn't unblock. We paid an 80 yr old man to mend the drain. We painted all the walls and moved all our stuff to underneath the Pomplex. The Pomplex is where the Pombear lives, growling at the walls for his honey. Daniel Taylor lived at our house for six months and then moved to cornwall and shooed the drug fiends from looe and walked across the river and cycled off into the wilderness and didnt eat or sleep but took off all his clothes and wandered in the woods until it started raining and he came home. Now inspired by discovering the meaning of words he has taken on being the chef and cooking hearty pub lunches. When we cut open the chair he would sleep on, we discovered a great stash of pound coins and blocks of rave puff. On the 9th of July was my birthday and on the 8th of July was Hanover day, which was a parade! with Dale Who and I was greeted in the morning with the gentle hooting of the teasmaid a Narwhal a Tapir and an Owl! Animal heads, borne by my friends and with a leap we dressed and took part in the Hanover Day Parade baying and whistling. Dale Who writes erotic stargate fan fiction. Over the last two days, in St. Albans, I have become consumed with some delighful fan fiction, including delightful episode of EROTIC NIRVANA FAN FICTION. Jesus Christ. It's ***exactly*** like my dreams.

Hanover Day was fantastic. After the Animal Parade, we meandered around the joy, with a whole "endangered species" flurry of urgency and excitement. Keith Trampleasure, morris dancing bearing the head of an owl. We got in the Hanover Directory. Tom and Joe made me a cake in the shape of Stuart Lubbock. He is just floating there in the pool (made of blue jelly, he is made of marzipan) with the apple in his ass. It's horrible. It was horrible. And somehow the most beautiful gesture I could ever possibly think of.

He went mouldy, in the end. We buried him in Queens Park. I've been trying to finish my book. It's called "CITY BOY IN BLIND SPOT TRAUMA". It's a collection of poems and short stories. It's totally nearly ready. But it's been totally near ready for a few weeks anyway. I'm totally lame and slack.

Alan is working as a gay text jockey and trying to move to Amsterdam. Nicky P is pumping weights in the cellar. Amy is an animal impersonator-for-hire. Jed keeps hearing micro-house in the back of his head. Andy has lost his bike. Rosanne is hooked on hot dogs. Tom has now recieved his hood and cloak from KKK supplies. Alice is pregnant. Uncle Chris got fisted.

Well! Hi there!

2007-06-28T06:18:00.001-07:00

Well! Hi there!
Originally uploaded by cellar.door

It was just a normal day for Hugo, the aquarium cleaner at “Fish World”, the new large fish centre in the middle of London. It was the end of his second week of work, and he was just showing the last of the people out of “Fish World”. He shut the main doors behind the last person, and then went off to clean the aquarium. He got out his Wax Polish, picked up James, the conger eel, and begun to scrub him vigorously. The went round like this, cleaning fish and then placing them back in the tank. However, he just finished polishing Boris, the large Trout, when he noticed that Bob, the 6 foot Herring, was missing. He began to panic, as Bob was one of the best Fish in the whole place. It was only yesterday that he had been telling a small child about how Bob was found wandering around in the Pacific Ocean, lost and confused, when he had been rescued by the “Fish World” people. Hugo was really worried, and so he drew up a poster asking people to look out for Bob the Fish, then left. Unfortunately, he forgot to replace the lid on the tank containing Herman, the very dangerous Tuna.
During the night, Herman climbed out of the tank, stole a pair of roller skates, and skated off into the streets of London (Herman could breathe the air because he was wearing an aqualung. these are quite common, and most Ground dwelling fish have them nowadays (because otherwise they couldn’t breathe), they are not that expensive, and save on hospital fees.)
Meanwhile, Bob was having further dificulties. Earlier that day, he had jumped up out of his tank, and had got caught in the rafters of the building. As a tall person passed, he fell off, and landed on the tall person’s head. The tall person did not notice, and Bob was carried off out of “Fish World”, and into the back streets of London. Bob then was found by the meanest gang of people in the whole world, who were going to rob him of all of his money, but as he was a fish, he did not have any money, and so he was not worried. He leapt up in the air, and slapped them round the face with his enormous tail. The gang were so surprised that they all fell over, and made Bob the leader of their Gang. Eventually, as Bob introduced new members, the Gang was made completely of Fish. The key members were Bob, the 6 foot Herring; Edwin, the very large Plaice; Roland, the small but mean Flying Fish; and Justin, the short and fat Salmon.
Whilst Bob was living a life of Crime on the streets of London, Hugo, the cleaner, was sacked from his job at the aquarium, as he lost two very expensive fish, and had to seek further work. He went to Oxford, where he studied Sculpture at the university, before moving back to London, and he opened a shop which sold rare examples of Paving Stones.
Bob was still enjoying life as the leader of this gang. He used to sit back in his chair and eat seeweed, which was imported from the Pacific Ocean, Bob’s home, whilst his followers brought him news of the day’s events. Life continued like this for about 6 weeks, until suddenly, all this was upset.
Bob was sitting in his chair, just chewing on a particularly nice peace of seeweed, when suddenly Herman burst into his office. Herman was the very dangerous Tuna, who escaped on the same day as Bob on a pair of Roller Skates. Herman had sold his roller skates, and used the money to start up a business dealing in illegal goods, namely Cheese, which is banned in many parts of London due to its strange effects when left in a dark room for 5 years and then eaten. Herman said to Bob “I want to take over your Gang, I challenge you to a duel”, and so He and Bob had a duel, they stood back to back, walked 30 paces away, and then ran towards each other at high speed, and tried to knock each other out with their heads. Herman cheated, and glued a horseshoe to his head, which knocked Bob out. When Bob woke up, Herman had taken his gang, and left him in a small puddle in the middle of Oxford Street. Bob then realised that it was the 23rd of December, and saw the approaching shoppers heading towards Regent Street....

What will happen next? Find out in Bob II

Wild Oats

2007-06-07T08:34:00.001-07:00

Rosie & Buster Brown
Originally uploaded by lightgazer

It's been a while. We're running out of ethnics, of Paula Radcliffe jokes, of bad puns and holsters. It's June. It's Summer. That was April. That was May.

I'm feeling thoughtful and queasy and pained. No matter of orthopaedic chairs soothe my back like a soothing hand or a silken baby octopus would. It's a Thursday afternoon. Behind me, the Steine pulses, like the hollow tummy of one longing for a baby.

Two months of silence; Where have we been? A flurry of media-whoring, both literally and metaphorically. Going to France to a houseful of owls, riding on a broken stairlift. There will be time, there will be time.

Mr Farenheit

2007-03-29T08:05:00.000-07:00

maya: nerves of steel
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.

It's been a busy week.

So from Tuesday until Friday I found myself running around the cold streets of Brighton with a Hong Kong TV crew making a travel documentary of Brighton. It started off a bit shakily;

"Hello? We are at the station to meet you! What do you look like?"

"Oh god! You're at the station now. Um... darn. Sugar. I'll be there in ten minutes."

Door slams. Rapid patter of tiny feet towards the station.

And then I took them to the Marina and we shivered around in the cold for a while.

"Um... there are the boats ... and there are some shops..."

"You're very young to be a producer, how old are you?"

Thankfully, by the end, things got better, and we got to go on all the rides on the pier and play the best game of petanque ever; "Yeah! Petanque!" Somehow, anglo-cantonese relations resulted in the belief that Petanque was the regional sport of Brighton and so we joined the hordes at the Petanque terrace for a Friday afternoon game of Petanque. We bought a kite, tried on hats, went behind the scenes of the Royal Pavillion (all the animals are on loan from the Booth Museum of Natural History. Score.) "It should be me behind those ropes. I'll kill you, Parkinson!"

I took them to the Fringe Launch on Thursday night, which was a massive soiree of networking, hecticness, glamour and filth.

"What does 'brilliant' mean?"
"It means.. 'great! splendid! excellent!'"
"Ohhh... I see... brilliant! And what does 'cheeseman' mean?"
"Um... a man who sells cheese?"
"Ohhh... I see... cheeseman..."

All this would have been much more easy if I'd preceeded the filming with a relaxing weekend. But, like a fool, I ended up running around for the whole weekend doing a various host of things. Spending Friday with new friend Laura from Hanover way, we ended up going to go see the Bobby Mc Gees play at a punk night at the Hope. Delightful ukulele harmonies and Jimmy playing at being a polar bear. The Globe. Jed unscrews a wall-mounted waving fan and sets it up in our house. Tom and Jo Filth have an apple. Sussex Arts Club. A dreadful 90's covers band. Gareth in a dress. Setting up a band called "The Trials of Life". I put my foot in it. Visuals Tim's birthday. Tim sits in a chair. Daniel and Tom and Jo set off to 'find Andy'.

So on Saturday we stroll into town and see Rosanne and search for somewhere to go for a drink that isn't too Irish. Goodness. We're almost tempted to give up, don our shamrock hats and sip at some Guinness when we find the Ranelagh. Surprisingly empty. George had a poo in Trafalgar Square. We go get some Japanese food. Lots of tenuki scuttling about. Alice calls us to let us know that she's going to give us a ring in about half an hour. We stroll up to the Lord Nelson. Alice is wearing striking outfit! We sip at porter and cider in the Lord Nelson and Alice tries to persuade Maya to change her method of contraception. Tommy arrives. Urges all to accompany him to Born Bad. Me and Anna run out of money. They set off to Born Bad and I wander up to the party, where suddenly, in Pelham Street, there he is!

DAVE THE MACHINE!

Like a shiny glistening, Dave the Machine with Jools and Andy meander in the opposite direction. I go to the party. Evelyn's party. It turns out that Tommy got the wrong day and takes everyone to Born Bad a day late. Meanwhile sipping at ale with various faces from Brighton High Society and I briefly play the accordion. I think I've misjudged things for not long after I get there I am confused and slumping around.

Oh, the next day! It's the extravaganza at the Hope. How talented my friends are! We live in a beautiful world. Me and Jimmy go back-to-back with some poetry and ukulele playing and piano miming and crowd response action and this is when I make my greatest mistake perhaps. There's something about tottering onto a stool on stage, declaring "I feel like Freddy Mercury" and then crashing down into a mountain of guitar pedals. I'm still bruised now. Still, the gig was fun. I try to hold it together, get a free copy of Get Lost magazine, rant about Princess Diana, bury the hatchet, watch Cassia loop things, laugh at Angry Sam, catch up with young Cathryn for the first time in a while, watch the Pom Bear play the guitar with his back to the audience and slump over the drum kit, see DAVE THE MACHINE playing his flute

The next day I was hosting The Ukulele Research and Development Society and with a newly created kee-tar but no backing band I strolled out into the rain aching. Witnessed some avant-existentialist-keyboard-ironing-irony who were later to pop up at the Fringe launch in an ammonite-stealing-revealing manner.

I'm cold, I'm cold.

St. Christopher's Medal

2007-03-14T09:29:00.000-07:00

Not a spring leek
or a cullion.

I give you an aubergine.

Hold it.
See it's black glossiness.
Baby whale,
It nestles for protection in your hands.

It is the only vegetable
Other than cigarettes
to contain nicotine.

Hold it to your face.
Breathe. Breathe it again.

Salt it.
Fry away the bitterness,

The tender solipsism of seasoning.

In the sieve, a gold-panner's bounty
A bounty of love.

Lobster Claws for Hands.

2007-03-13T16:19:00.000-07:00

Haystack Owl
Originally uploaded by dullhunk.

Well good evening ladies and gentlemen, and how are you of this fine evening? Hoping you're all keepin' it splendid. Marvellous.

So I'm totally well busy at the moment. I'm making a travel documentary with a TV crew from Hong Kong in a week or so, plus I'm trying to put a book together City Boy in Blind Spot Trauma in time for May. Plus I'm trying to make a kee-tar and organising Brighton's first legal brothel and serving ale to the needy-of-ale and being a newsboy. I'm all weak and broken. At the moment I'm spending tuesday night sitting in my room twitching.

Seamus has gone back to Ireland for a week. Lucy is living in the cupboard under the stairs and making her money as a street-artist and barkeep. Anna moves Alan Bennett style with a trolley full of tools. Daniel Freakin' Taylor is Peter Schaffer's new biggest fan. Tom scored with some hot girl on Friday night and ever since then they've been on a taxidermy, kareoke, booze and pork scratching binge, taking in some twee-core and electro-pom-pom-pow over the weekend when time allowed in between all the "going into the partnership". Filth.

Andy celebrated being thirty on Thursday by going to the Marina and going bowling. Me and Anna had tickets to the Hove Bear Baiting Festival, so we leapt on a Falafel Bus to Hove at half past five, ducked and dived around the clientele of the Evening Star as we watched the Medieval Haircut Bonanza erupt in front of us. Sipping at a fine glass of Owl and then suddenly leaping on a bus with Jimmy Prince the Irish Prince to the Marina for backspin and a surprising encounter with the Sexecutioner.

Andy got thrown out of Asda for trying to open a packet of Cashew nuts in the shop. For shame!

We went back to Andy's house. Lucy did a wee in Jana's bed. Not even by accident.

Cornish Night was a great success. Surrounded by Cornish as I am, the festivities for St. Piran's day involved Cornish Ale and Pasties at a fine establishment. Banners with Cornish flags and slogans and a quiz; "Which river separates Cornwall from England?". Sadly Spingo Special meant I slept upon a stairway.

What else happened. I went to a movie premiere. Brighton extravaganza. Whitehawk boy done good amidst stolen diamonds James-Bond-fighting-gangsters-waist-deep-in-water-in-a-canoe-slalom-practice-lake scenario. It'll be dark soon, and they mostly come out at night. Mostly.

Oh, by the way, I'm going to be reading poetry / playing my kee-tar at the following events, so if you're in the Brighton area, then do come along.

Get Lost Magazine / Beatabet launch; The Hope (formerly Polar Central) (formerly the Pig in Paradise, but in the bit that used to be the lift), Sunday the 18th of March, 7 o clock until 12.

The Ukulele Research and Development society, The Pedestrian's Arms (in Foundry Street), 8 o clock til 11, Monday the 19th of March; this is jimmy's night but I am hosting it for this month. brilliant.

Okay, I'm sorry, I don't normally self-promote myself so horribly blatantly on the internet. God, that was awful.

So, there's blatantly hundredsof things more I really ought to rant about, but I reckon I should stop now, and carry on another day when I'm feeling a bit more coherent. I've got a day off tomorrow. excellent.

Tom is amazing

2007-03-01T05:07:00.000-08:00

Narwhal Crest
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.

Sainsburies. London Road. The final hours.

The friendly face of Brighton supermarkets closed its doors for the final time yesterday. Goodbye, London Road Sainsburies; it's been a hell of a journey, and we made it together.

Tom was the last ever customer of London Road Sainsburies. He describes the emotional final minutes; "staff were in tears as a grand thankyou to customers was read out over the tannoy, and people were ushered towards the checkouts for the very last time."

I had to be at work by half five, and couldn't get time off to witness this historic event, but I'm glad Tom was there, black-clad, candle in hand, to see off an old friend.

They are opening a new one in the New England Quarter today. But it'll never be the same. It's like when a beloved pet dies and you get a new one. "But it'll never truly replace Danny", you weep at the forlorn and hopeful little scamp.

London Road Sainsburies, you will be missed. You will hold a place in my heart next to the Co-op Department Store and Hanningtons. Maybe one day the world will be ready for the likes of you once again.

---

Be Foxy's Friend! http://www.myspace.com/foxytime

Beef "Jerky"

2007-02-22T08:54:00.000-08:00

JimmyMcgee
Originally uploaded by mertleblu.

So it's Spring! It was the first day of Spring yesterday and I went outside in the balmy February sunshine without a warm jumper to celebrate!

I've been doing lots of things. Well, actually, I feel a bit like I haven't been doing anything, but I'm going to commiserate by writing about some of the things I have been doing, which will make it seem like I've been doing lots, so to speak.

It was Tommy's birthday yesterday. Despite feeling thoroughly antisocial; "What have you been up to?" "Nothing."
I went out anyway and found a great gathering of people at the Globe. I'm a bit wary of the Globe since the only two times I've been there were 1. Splattering blood all over my nice yellow t-shirt at a poetry night (possibly more on that to follow) and 2. Being well and truly thrown out after losing a fight with a bat (animal) and umbrella (mineral) after bi-fest, but it was actually okay. It's still stiflingly hot in there, and the four wall-mounted fans did their best, but I still ended up getting far too hot. Daniel Taylor was really sick on Saturday night and Anna gave Tommy a shrink-wrapped package of Spice Nutriment Boke in the shape of a fish. Now that, ladies and gentlemen, is friendship.

I wrote a big load of stuff in a text file for my blog and I think I've lost it. My laptop is slowly cracking up again, and even the thought of installing Photoshop on it is a distressing prospect. Tom has put a password on his computer which means if I want to make any graphical images I have to use this program which came free with a scanner my dad bought in the late 1990's. No amount of pleading will affect Tom's 'one rule for all' system. Which is admirable in a way, but I'm glad he's not my teacher. And I'm glad I'm not still at school. Not just because I'm 25 and it would be a disasterous situation to be in.

So you might have to wait for the bloodstained yellow shirt incident and the Poetry VS MCs incident, etc, with the bated breath I have come to expect from you all.

Me and Anna made sushi. Actually, Anna made sushi whilst I tried to chop things and dabbed at soy-sauce with some old bits of bread, but I was helping in spirit.

I'm trying to put a book together. It's a book of poems and short stories and it's going to be called "City Boy in Blind Spot Trauma" and it's going to be available from May at the latest if everything works out. Which is quite exciting in some ways but again quite difficult in others. And I'm going to buy a dot com, or at least a dot org, but I won't mention the name yet in case someone gets in there first. Ha.

Amy is organising a Cornish Celebration in aid of St. Piran's night at the Evening Star (5th March, 7.30pm) which is going to involve Pasties and Cornish Dancing and Cornish Ales and other things of the West. It seems everywhere I turn I encounter a cornish person at the moment, so it will be well attended, but as the flyer proudly declares, "non-cornish welcome". Which is both fortunate and necessary.

I bought my first big block of stilton and first big jar of garlic pickle of 2007. Fine dining tonight!

Hair

2007-02-19T11:14:00.000-08:00

chris and bag of hair
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.

If evolution is anything to go by, I am going to become bald and fat. This realisation came to me as a teenage biology student, and shocked my indestructable but awkward frame with the cruel truths of age and death. I, however, got off lightly.
An unremarkable peer named Ryan enquired how, as his mother, father, their respective parents, and his siblings all had brown eyes, his eyes could be blue.
"What colour are the milkman's eyes?" was not the reassurance he was expecting.
My father is neither fat nor bald, and therefore, due to the primitve grasp of genetics I had previously held, I never feared either condition would ever descend upon me. However, with the dark hair and eyes, not to mention the stature, of my mothers' side, I began to picture my maternal uncles. They were all fat and bald.
Currently, I show little signs of becoming fat and bald. I have cut my diet to a bare minimum, and sport a fine shock of hair and mightly sideburns, although there are some signs of recession above both of my temples. The problem is, I can control my weight but not my hair growth. I may never be fat but baldness is inevitable.
Consequentially, I have started collecting hair.

Materialism

2007-02-09T05:15:00.000-08:00

high five!
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.

Things I have accumulated in the last few days.

- thousands of vitamin C sweets, each of which contains 100% of my daily allowance of vitamin C. I'm averaging 700% a day.

- three pints of fresh brewers yeast

- a massive bag full of hops

- a terrifying mug of a dog with rolling eyes

- Lyrical Ballads

- 481 sheets of white paper

- a registration form for a poetry brothel

- humiliation

- a drinking problem

- a thursday-night-friday-ad

- two feathers for my hat

- a big jar of garlic pickle

- halloumi

Opening chapter.

2007-02-06T14:50:00.000-08:00

Pregnant
Originally uploaded by Scrybl.

The sound of music twice an hour
Ever since I was a boy, I had always loved rock ‘n roll. So when I get into the business at the age of twenty two, I was surpried at the ab sence of sex and drugs,the companion volumes of rock and roll. However, after six months in the business, I realised that the sex and drugs were merely overwhelmed by the frantic and adulterous hot action with politicians the job involved.

Again, I turned my face away from the typewriter. Another day, another story about parliamentary infidelity. I was beginning to think I should have taken that Daily Mirror job. It wasn’t even popular infidelity. I scoured the book of parliamentary scandals (published 1997) for inspiration. This latest tittilation featured no Minister who had ever served under Thatcher. I had to get out.

This is how I found myself bound aboard a 19th Century whaling vessel, bound for the Pacific Whale Peninsula. And this, dear reader, is not where we need to be.

Bovine Macbeth

2007-02-04T09:45:00.000-08:00
"But who would have thought the old man had so much cud in him?"

Political Love Song

2007-01-31T08:25:00.000-08:00
I’ll be the Petronella Wyatt
To your Boris Johnson
The shy undergraduate
From Portillo’s youth
More than a footnote
In your memoirs
A flattering testimony
When the papers hear the truth

I’m a diligent under-secratery
Ambitious, sharp and keen
We’ll out-scandalise Profumo
Make Back to Basics Squeaky Clean

I’ll suck your toes
In a football strip
Rendezvous on Hampstead Heath
You be the Speaker
I’ll have the chief whip
Clenched firmly between my teeth

Looking back, it all began
In 1963
The chatterly ban
Was a flash in the pan
And I met my first MP

You be Thatcher, I’ll be Dennis
We’ll weather the political storm
I’m Edwina Currie to your John Major
Something new, a break from the Norm

I’ve met with Hughes and Oaten
I’m the bottle in Kennedy’s drawer
I’ve had right hooks from Prescott
And still come back for more

A week’s a long time in Politics
And I know they say sleaze is a sin
But if you’ve got a spare day round Westminster
I’ll do my best to fit you in.

Five Things

2007-01-30T06:06:00.000-08:00
1. I'm reading about the Cold War at the moment. It's incredible.
2. I'm going out for a drink with a pigeon-and-squirrel-hater this evening.
3. "Dave the Machine, Dave the Machine.
How you pistons gleam. Yeah, Yeah they gleam.
Dave the Machine, Dave the Machine.
Your so tuff and mean. Iron like you reign supreme."
4. There's only nine days left to register to take part in the Brighton Fringe.
5. Academic Fraud / Plagarism / Plagarising something insignificant and obscure.
6. Spending all of yesterday filled with apathy.
7. Dirty Girl. Thumb Stump.
8. Stronger than she looks.
9. Andrew Tibbetts' 100 Posts about my Sex Life.
10. You'll have to .. take the cups .. to the square tent .. wash them up .. tea from the square tent .. square tent ..
11. That was such an experience.
12. Spotting a fellow Woodcraft Folk and doing the Envoi in Sainsburies.
13. Vacuum Packer!
14. I wish I was one step ahead.
15. The Sainsburies Closing Down Reggae Party.
16. Dig Dig D. I. G. Metaphors.
17. I need to have the energy and dedication to start going to every poetry night in town, on my own if I have to.
18. Douglas Coupland is dead.
19. Patrick Moore is still alive.
20. Cup-of-tea-now?
21. We made an egg biscuit yesterday. Jed frothed up the egg white, put it in the vacuum packer and sucked all the air from it. Then we microwaved it and then finally depressurised it so it went flat. We need to make it more like a jaffa cake, possibly with a halved raw frozen egg yolk.
22. Lascivious.
23. Beware the dolphins, Jason.
24. I don't know where the bag of hair is any more.
25. You will note it says "Bob the Fish" on my 1998 diary. Now there's a pseudonym from the past.
26. Sitcom with Anne Frank and Sylvia Plath living in a converted bus.
27. I'd never trap a bee. I'd never hurt an owl.
28. The Canary of the Sea.
29. "Disgusting".
30. The Eye of the Swarm.

Motivation

2007-01-25T05:52:00.000-08:00

miller time
Originally uploaded by groc.
So I have been thoroughly bad at keeping this up, which makes me ashamed. It is January, I am supposed to be being Productive. I totally sat down to be productive last night and all I did was spread misinformation on the Internet.

On the plus side, Sparks are the most excellent band ever. Honestly. They actually have EVERYTHING. Go listen to their songs on their michepase page.

There are so many things I want to do and I'm such a slack-lord. I'm supposed to be organising a Poetry Brothel and putting a book together and forming a Jill Dando theme pomp-rock band and working on the blueprints for Box Marley (the Christmas toy for 2007) and misleading Wilkipedeo and writing letters to various old friends and superimposing a crack pipe onto Craig Charles's hand digitally on every single episode of Red Dwarf and making them available on the internet and going to Cambridge and Birmingham and London and the Tring Museum of Taxidermy, and I haven't done a single thing off that list yet.

For shame! Having the internet in my house has NOT made me more productive. This is ace, however. oh!. It's a video, though.

Hopefully writing these things down will make me do them.

Second Hand Blu-Tax

2007-01-11T04:53:00.000-08:00

Roast chicken monday
Originally uploaded by Sandygermsmanson.
Firstly I must apologise, I have of late been greatly slack in actually posting on this little scamp. I have, also, of late spent very little time at home, which may have something to do with it. Now, my wandering days are over, and I intend to be getting a domestic on as much as I possibly can. Or at least a work-on, which may be the same sort of thing.

I'm preparing various posts at home about all the non-Brighton things, so, for fear of accidentally repeating myself, they might have to wait for a few days until I can wrest my laptop from Daniel Taylor and blog the six weeks of different forms of transport I have taken part in.

Instead, let us return to the fair city of Brighton and Hove, otherwise known as the Quite Windy City (curse you, Chicago! Just because you've got a musical and you're the home of ER and Police Camera Action, you think you can purloin an epithet like that? B&H was called The Windy City when it was burnt to the ground by the French in 1506!). I'm at work. I'm having a cup of tea.

For the last week or two I've been in the grip of a great poststructuralist Archive Fever. I have boxes of it, the clutter of many a mopped brow and emptied pocket. When I was back in St. Albans, I turned my attention to 1995-1999. I've since been working my way through 2000-2005. The former was condensed down to a mere cupboard-full, and with many surprises and notable memorabilia, including some original Ky Tung Pang artwork, my 1998 diary, Malteser Dancefloor booklets (hell yeah!), and letters upon letters upon letters...

Ky Tung Pang self portrait, 1999

Cover of 1998 Diary

Not only has this delve into Nostalgia been productive and fun (I even found my Picture-Of-Drew-Kirk-Jacking-Off-That-Is-Signed-By-Alan-Fletcher), but it's filled me with a great desire to catch up with numberous people I've completely and utterly lost touch with. I hate losing touch with people at the best of times (I imagine it probably goes hand in hand with keeping great boxes full of 'souveniers' from the past), and leafing through these massive crates of forgotten clutter really brought it home. So this is another resolution for the '07. To find them and to bring them home. In a manner of speaking.

The other resolution, I think, was to form a band in the style of Queen, and record a concept album about the murder of Jill Dando, telling the dual stories of Jill Dando and Barry George, the Amateur Stuntman Turned Celebrity Obsessive accused and convicted of her murder. And we're going to dress as birds of prey and have bird-of-prey-handler glove stylee microphones. As has often been noted before, there's not enough innovation in the music scene these days.

January is a frugal month, and has been breeding much home economics from those around me. Tom made four loaves of bread in 27 hours yesterday, one after the other, whilst Jed is converting a massive heap of sevilles into marmalades of varying sweetness. I bought some blackbean sauce to cook with but ended up spooning it.

So the downside of working today is that I don't get to witness Andy and Jacob's viewing of some hot philosopher on philosopher action. They're having a grand viewing of Donald Davidson in conversation with John Mc Dowell. Much as I would love to watch these titans clash, not to mention Mc Dowell and Davidson, I may have to wait for another time.

More resolutions to follow, I imagine.

2006-12-20T06:51:00.000-08:00
Lots of things have happened. I got the hat that the captain of a ship might wear. (The Admiral's Pie?). I witnessed a jaunty echidna mooching along. I got to stroke a little soft mochi for a while. I got a gluegun as an early Christmas present. Paul Pepper moved 2 doors down from my family. I got to go to a wedding for the first time in 12 years. I posted a package full of bees to a prolific journalist. Patrick Moore died. Art Garfunkel got out of prison. Anna went to sleep in a lift. The pombear got shot by a dart.

10000 miles of tough luck, three spoons and a basset

2006-11-14T04:51:00.000-08:00

Holiday
Originally uploaded by derAmialtebloede.
This is actually quite embarrassing. So Tom has this baseball bat, like, a proper one. You can see why people keep them under their beds; they're massive, and quite a scary thing. So the other day I was in bed, and I heard this crashing from downstairs. It doesn't sound good. So I go downstairs in my dressing gown and there's this little chinese guy in our house. He doesn't seem to be up to any good, and no-one else is about. Maybe someone had invited him to stay and not informed me, but I think it was more likely he was trying to rob us. He hadn't noticed me. So I went and got the bat. I came into the front room with the bat, and challenged him. He just lunged at me, but I rebuffed him with the bat. Then it gets a bit awkward. I chased him out of the house with the bat, but in the scuffle, somehow I managed to a) lose the dressing gown, and b) get locked out of the house. There I am, trying to get back in with nothing but a bat to shroud my modesty, shouting and cursing and banging on the door. I think one of the neighbours must have called the police. Now they assumed I was a madman and took me away. No charges were pressed, thank goodness, and when we got to the station, which is quite close by, they let me go home and even gave me a big blanket to wrap myself in. They kept the bat, however.

I have, of late, lost all my mirth.

Well, in a manner of speaking. I do seem completely incapable of going out and, for want of an infinitely better phrase, 'socialising'. I don't seem to have the knack any more. Either I attempt to go out and manage to choose a day when everyone seems more up for a 'quiet night in'; or I get all excited but find myself sound asleep by quarter past ten. Plus much of the time we end up going somewhere where I can't hear a darn word anyone is saying as I've got much issues with my hearing and it's hard to find somewhere of a weekend in Brighton that isn't packed and loud. I will get the knack of this in time, I hope. After dozing off last night in the Penthouse (perhaps the scene is just too soporific), I did wake up a bit on the journey home, and tried deep frying. I made onion rings and battered pepper and one battered garlic, but they're not quite right. I don't know if I'm doing something wrong. I was thinking of chopping up some garlic and coriander and mixing it with the batter. This might work.

A Moustache Trilogy

1. Upper Lip

I am sure your lip was never that size before
I never really noticed your upper lip
As particularly suprising
Before
Difficult to recall

A good lip, I’m sure
Not worthy, perhaps
To rise above
The forest of upper lips
That shrouds my memory

Perhaps that moustache you had
Has stretched it.

2. ‘with epicurean fervour’

Oh forested plateau
Oh wolfish moustache
The woodcutter approaches
Brandishing his axe

3.

Lip hair here.
Here hair, there.
Lip hair there.

Here, lip hair
Here, hair here.
Lip hair here.

Here lip, here.
Here hair, there.
Lip hair, where?

Here, lip, there.
Where hair? There.
Hare lip here.

Matt the Cripple is in town. He has currently a broken arm, which happened in a fall from a window, fifteen foot to the ground. This was due to the fact that the human pyramid that previously held him up had departed, leaving him to try to climb through the alas too small window. He was being put in plaster in Bath hospital when he left, stealing his x-rays, and getting on a train to Brighton. He took the x-rays to Brighton hospital but they didn't want to have anything to do with it.

Lucy is also in town. After an unsuccessful fling with John Leslie, the 'celebrity rapist', she is back to exact revenge after he sung an offensive song about her and placed it on his myspace page. Whether she will succeed where Ulrika Johhnson et al have failed is yet to be seen.

I also had a visit from a beautiful girl with a glass eye. Replete with John Prescott t-shirt and Mark Thatcher iconography, Annie Hell rolled into town. We bought sparklers, watched Neighbours (there is now a blind girl, Sky is pregnant and Stingray is the father but he doesn't know, Karl and Susan are back together but he slept with Izzy after she accidentally drugged him with sleeping pills, Lou's russian fiancee has been kidnapped by the russian mafia so he is now moving his considerable charms onto Janelle, and Max has gone on a meditation weekend with Katya and a bag full of salami. His visions involve him winning the World Cup but Katya's meditation has a more saucy nature, and Max himself is the subject. Of course, I knew all this already as I've been reading the episode summaries on neighboursfans.com since the TV broke, but it's nice to see Neighbours in the flesh now and again.

Real Ale Poem no. 2

Kronenberg
is spelled Kronenbourg
And Foster's
Has an apostrophe

It costs ten pounds to join CAMRA
And women
Get in free.

Tom has been befriending nazis on the internet. This is why we have this rather splendid picture of Hitler on the beach. The nazis tend to have photographs of hitler, blonde tennis players, and maps, for some reason, on their Fliicr accounts.

He also went back to his old house and rescued his guitar and keyboard. The keyboard is a power-synth and it has no end of fantastic sounds it can make. It looks like the floundering musical act that was Pukulele might just have a new lease of life.

Oh, and I am now a Master of Arts in English Literature. Splendid. A befitting qualification for a barkeep like myself. I have spent the last week making a big list of plans. Ideally, if all goes according to plan, I will be an auctioneer by june!

Custard Apple

2006-11-07T06:19:00.000-08:00

fried chicken head anyone?
Originally uploaded by Francesen.
So on the close-to-second anniversary of Andy's neighbourly "Happy Halloween Neighbour" trauma, Rosanne attempted to up the ante by putting a PIGS FACE on the wall of our Landlord's house. Thankfully Jed stopped her and confiscated the pigs face.

"I'm at the bottom of Trafalgar Street ... I've got the pig's face ... nobody else likes him but I have him..."

More on the face to come. The other day we were sitting on Tom's roof to admire a beautiful sunset (hippies! I cuss you bad!) when it turned out Jed was having a bath. This discovery was made as we saw him through his window from Tom's roof. "Perverts!", he shouted, as we bade a hasty retreat from our voyeuristic delight.

Tom is back, by the way, sans dog. We tried to ask him about it, but he's not saying anything. He looked like he had been living in a ditch for a week. He's re-reading The Wasp Factory. God Jesus Christ.

Andy has moved into his new house with Jools and Andy K and Erica and Cassia and Jana. It used to be owned by the man who owned the Ocean Rooms with very much the same decor, a pink-and-silver theme on the walls and padded vinyl flooring. The pombear already has his paws in the drawers.

Poetry Slam Final yesterday. I came a thoroughly disappointing fourth. Cheered myself up by drinking far too much and making a scene. Perhaps. What I definately did is accidentally end up making unfavourable remarks on some kind of interview for Brighton TV (whatever the heck that is). Oh well. There's still quite a chance no-one will ever see it. Going to take a different approach to Poetry night in the new year. Ah well. Jimmy was splendid as usual with fake stick-on-sideburns and a torrent of haiku. Dan Riviera captivated the audience with an epic psychedelic sprawl of power. Mark Gwynne Jones was there, but thoroughly disappontingly failed to read any poems at all. And yes, of course, Disraeli won, but you can't really fault the poetic prowess of someone who's been to Iraq and seen what's going on out there. A lesson our political leaders need to learn, I believe.

So the Pigs Face. There was an offal-festival at the Pull and Pump. Daniel Taylor managed to remove the face from a pigs head and they engaged themselves in a photoshoot session, encouraging members of the public to wear the face as if it was their own, whilst Tom took photographs. Eventually the inevitable happened. Daniel was branded a 'sicko' by an angry girl, who took a swipe at the face with her bag. The face got tangled with the bag. The girl began to fight the face, stomping it with her pointy little shoes. Daniel wept in shock and surprise at the sudden demise of his art. The girl left. The pig face lay, injured but not beyond rescue, on the floor.

I think at this point I had already left. We ended up in the Fish Bowl with Seamus. Girlies!

Fireworks night. We didn't go to Lewes. Instead we climbed up a big hill, found ourselves trapped in the race course, but managed to escape, and found ourselves upon a great plateau above the city, watching the fireworks burst. They were holding a dog show in the next field but all the butterfly lions and puff dogs were distressed by the loud noise. The sturdy pug, however, remained cheery and resilliant. No community bonfire.

Book.

2006-11-06T07:52:00.000-08:00

IMG_8021
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
Bought the most incredibly titled book the other day.

Let me take you down

The true story of Mark David Chapman, the man who shot John Lennon.

Hopefully the book will be good also. How could it not be?

shakespeare, t.s.eliot, james joyce, jacob, jackson pollock, michael jackson

2006-10-24T05:44:00.000-07:00

Tommy
Originally uploaded by MrNickyP.
Saturday was a tramp across the countryside with cows and discovering Apple Day! Great sloshing buckets of various cider and chickens with fluffy feet and a sheep being led about and morris dancers (although we missed the clog dancers) and hay bales and an actual Owl which I whistled at and it hopped about and flew at me with its talons out "He's got a way with owls". What an Apple Day! And then we found ourselves caught in a thunderstorm in Lewes as we wandered around Lewes castle,

another day we found some glowing worms with shells for heads, perhaps we were actually the only people to ever see them

Who is Dave?

2006-10-24T05:07:00.000-07:00
"if there is anyone in the Brighton area who would liek to model for shots like this one please contact me."

Andy IS Russ Meyer.

... maybe it was a thumb ...

2006-10-17T05:05:00.000-07:00
With a bit of luck, it'll ruin his life--forever thinking that just behind some narrow door in all his favorite bars, men in red Pendleton shirts are getting incredible kicks from things he'll never know. Would he dare to suck a sleeve? Probably not. Play it safe. Pretend you never saw it...

It's Tuesday again.

Tom and the dog have vanished. They've been missing since Sunday morning. We went to the Car Boot Sale in the Station Car Park. Saw a pom. That little scamp pirhouetting about on the end of his lead. You could see the gleam in Tom's eyes as little 'Scraps' cowered in fear from the biting spinning pom. He bought a teapot with hideous faces upon it. We got on a train to the countryside (southease) leaving Tom with the dog. They've gone. They haven't been home.

What would you do? He's not answering his phone. He's a clever strong lad. He can look after himself, even out in the wild. I've seen him kill rabbits and feed on their flesh before. But I'm still mildly concerned. The posters are still there.

In other news, I spent much of Saturday drifting in and out of troubled consciousness. Not quite as bad as Coley Holy War, who, the weekend before, went to sleep at about 2am on the Friday, and woke up on Sunday morning, not realising he had missed a day. There's something funny up with the sleeping at the moment. Who knows what will happen once British Summer Time ends.

Wee Elboo rolled back into town on the Saturday night. She has started to sick up into her sleeve. Apparently she is not actually living in a big house full of boys. Instead, it's just because 'the girls aren't really worth mentioning'.

We took Andy James Nelson into the countryside with us on Saturday. After a joyous train voyage to Southease, where we found a pond of frogs, we began to climb a hill. Andy sat on the hill and didn't move. In the end, we left him there, and strolled through the "Garden of England", as some have referred to the South Downs in the past. In the distance, we saw a chalk quarry. An indistinct black clad figure appeared to be collecting chalk and wrapping it in their black jumper. What was he/she doing? Was it Andy? Why would Andy do that? Maybe it wasn't Andy. Daniel Taylor saw a Peregrine Falcon. We picked apples from the trees. Eventually we found ourselves in Glynde. Pints of ale in Glynde.

So apparently this town in the North had a seagull problem, so they employed this man to climb around on the cliffs breaking eggs in the seagull's nests, in order to mean there were less seagulls with the next generation. In the end the man had to leave town, because the seagulls remembered him and would attack him whereever he went.

Also elephants have been known to have similar revenge attacks; a man in an african village shot an elephant, and the next day the whole herd came along and destroyed the village. Nature fights back! Power to the cuttlefish!

Read poems at the Ukulele Research and Development night last night. Went well, for a change. Got the chance to read the Moustache Trilogy for the first time. Perhaps shall put some of it up here. They too were beautiful names.

Worked from open til close at the pub on Friday. Power. I need more shifts. Seamus won a Beer Engine (one of those big pumps one would use to deliver ale from a bar) from the Worthing Beer Festival. "Ulster says yes!". Imagine an incoherent stumbling Irishman with a slurred northern irish accent careering about with a 'Beer Engine' "Woulds you likes a pint of hophead there?". Beautiful.

Andy and Jed nearly got de-limbed. Amy is on woo-fest. Anna has been growing hundreds of exciting vegetables on the allotment. Me and Anna went to the launch of The Station at Preston Park station. A tiny tiny little harmonica. Doug wearing a bee-suit. Buffet!

Un-dog interlude

2006-10-10T05:38:00.000-07:00

breakfast
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
No change on the dog front. In some ways I'm getting quite attached to him. My current opinion is that there's nothing I can do about the status of little stolen Scraps; me and Jed tried to help him break for freedom the other day and Tom stood by the door with his bat guarding. It is with a spirit of resigned acceptance that we now play with him; he does have a good life now.

Recent departures:

Elboo has gone off to the Big Smoke. She's living on a big floor full of boys and is no doubt constructing felt tubes and hanging out with the London hipsters like George and Ollie Gimp.

Maya Semray: Jetted off to South America after constructing a wee tent under her dining table that resides in our book-lined dining area. We can only hope that she'll be okay as she left her "learn Spanish like they talk in South America" CD behind.

Dave the Machine: Cogs whirring, the well-oiled Dave ground his way straight from France to Edinburgh, in search of a "better class of crack-fiend". Our only consolation was to spatter our watercolours in the creation of Dave the Machine fan art. Coming soon.

Recent Arrivals

The Admiral; Andyjamesnelson rolled back into town after a similar sojourn in France; filled with a new entheusiasm from the Island Project we shall expect a new deluge of photography, poems, and filthy sex-drawings. Cock of war, anyone? Oh, I'll have a slice if there's some going.

Pink Amy; Notably less pink, after two and a half years of sleep deprivation and genki drinks, A to the A joined our Prison of Captured Dog (or house) an advent of wine and ring-based-cooking and pastimes.

Louise: Hunting, shooting, and fishing, but no vegetarian baked beans in Alaska. We've failed to arrange a cup of tea over the last two weeks. This is how organised I am.

- - -

I'm sure there are more arrivals and departures that I've left out. It's not a comprehensive list, by any stretch of the imagination. We found a massive wardrobe in the street the other day, which was worth carrying the whole of the way up Southover Street. I want to get some victorian oval picture frames for "Marie Turns Head into Wizard's Face".

You will have to excuse the vile tabloid branding for the greatest of all images.

St. Albans was lovely. Fighting our way through the melee that is St. Albans Bear Baiting Festival, a stolen glimpse of Phil Sumner, young conservatives, the swelling Cross Keys, finally catching up with Simon, Paul Pepper moving around the corner from my mother and father. Trawling through the boxes of nostalgia under my cabin bed.

Does anyone out there want an office temp?

Dog

2006-10-08T08:06:00.000-07:00

SA Monster Munch - back
Originally uploaded by Sul.
Now there are posters all around our area with pictures of little "Scraps" as Tom has dubbed him. No change in Tom. He's stopped going to work so he can be with the dog all the time. Scraps dines well, it has to be said, fine glossy fur and shining eyes. A mound of raw steak coruscates onto his dish each evening with just the whisper of a sound, to be devoured by the new and missed animal

More about the dog.

2006-10-03T06:58:00.000-07:00

DSC00491
Originally uploaded by brainstormer.
Here is Tom with the little dog. He's still got it. He's bought it a bowl and a lead and some dog food. I've tried telling him he ought to give it back, but he's refusing to, cradling it in his arms as if it was his own child. What do I do?

Really big, wrapped in cling-film and in the neon room

2006-10-02T03:38:00.000-07:00

Really big, wrapped in cling-film and in the neon room
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
I just really want an opportunity to post this photograph.

Drama

2006-10-02T02:40:00.000-07:00
So I got back to Brighton today and all hell has broken loose. Tom seems to have completely lost any sense of what is appropriate, and has stolen a little dog from Queens Park. I think it is called a Bichon Frise, one of those little stumpy white ones with funny flat heads. I got back in the house and he's sitting there in his chair, holding the dog in front of him and chattering to it. In a reasonable, sober manner, he put the dog down on the floor, and offered me a cup of tea. There is a dog in my house. He claims he "rescued it from Queens Park yesterday". Now firstly we've talked about having a dog and we're not making any big decisions yet, and secondly it's not really on to go stealing people's pets. He seems totally unconcerned about it, although he did call in sick to work today in order to look after the dog and make it some clothes; "poor little thing, you'll get cold, won't you."

20 letters to a friend

2006-10-01T09:38:00.000-07:00
Sometimes you can see the leaves turning brown on the trees. I became filled with an urge to track down the many people I have been compoundly bad at keeping in touch with the other day. I'm currently back in St. Albans. Last night we found a brown suede hat on the ground. Have you lost a brown suede hat? What is your address? My email address is bokestalbans. Today me and Annie Hell wrote alternate words on a postcard. The Tourist Information Centre is closed on Sundays. Losing touch with people makes me sad. Paul Pepper now had big curly hair. I want to get a desk for our new room.

03678371

2006-09-25T08:13:00.000-07:00

flat animal
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
It has been a thorny month. Each time the sun blazes we declare that it is the last sunny day of the year and hope to savour it. Now all I want to do is sit in my new house in an attempt to get my money's worth.

August - September in Thousands

- Twenty thousand words
- Six thousand pounds
- Walking fifty thousand feet
- A thousand miles of cock

It wasn't all writing and boxes and money, sure. A delightfully tranquil boat trip down the river Arun in the deflating Marine Patrol 3000. Sitting on a wall eating cheese-slices and coleslaw sandwiches. Going out for Yukata and Chi-hu. Roof! Boat!

We have a lovely new house. It was actually worth the cupfuls of blood and sweat and hair that were expended in getting it.

I have lots more to say, I am sure. Oh, death. Won't you spare me over for another year. Tasting sessions. Truffle oil. The rarest beer in the UK (allegedly). Deep-frying a half of cider. Denouncing Salman Rushdie as a "poor man's Anne Frank".

I want to write a column about birds for a free Brighton magazine. It's going to be called "Bird Page".

Rumour

2006-08-26T10:08:00.000-07:00

Sweet-potato
Originally uploaded by MrNickyP.
So now I have fallen totally in a puddle and walked into a lamp-post in the last 48 hours. Give or take a few hours. I was late for work. I was walking briskly up the hill I live on. The next thing I know I am hit smartly in the face by a very solid lamp-post and sprawled on the floor in great disarray.

Matthew Pateman is a professor of literature (and expressive arts) at the University of Hull, and has been a member of famed boy band Bad Boys Inc and worked as an actor.

In TV, he played the role of outed gay singer in the series Doctors.

In his academic career, he received PhD from the University of Leeds, and became a teacher at the Scarborough unit of the University of Hull.

His major publications are:
• Matthew Pateman: Julian Barnes, ISBN 0 7463 0978 3, 128 pp, 2002.

Checkup

2006-08-25T02:40:00.000-07:00

Surprise in the Underpass
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
I was walking home yesterday and I stepped into a puddle and suddenly found myself in water over my knees. And then Anna's bike fell over and so did I and I was totally immersed in the puddle. It was very suprising. It was a bit like being baptised and being drunk at the same time.

Owl Fight!

2006-08-19T18:07:00.000-07:00

Owl Fight!
Originally uploaded by wildgrizgirl.
I live in a residential neighborhood in a large city in the US. On three separate occasions in the past month a small (about 6" tall) owl has swooped down from behind me and clawed me in the head. It doesn't hurt, it's just very disquieting to be standing in your yard at night and out of the blue something with the mass a litte more than a tennis ball bounces off your head with its claws digging into your head. It only happens from behind, it only happens at night, and it only happens when I'm standing in a place that provides an unobstructed flight path. The blows are quite direct and they make my head move a litte. The claws have never drawn blood, but it is really annoying none the less. I want to sit in my yard at night and drink beer in peace and not worry about getting clawed in the head. The latest attack happend about 15 minutes ago and so I thought I'd go on line and see what other people do when they are involuntarily involved in a turf war with an owl. Haven't seen much on the net, so I am going to attempt to net it and release it 5-10 miles away. I don't care if it has a nest. I am tired of being held hostage in my own house. I respect the little guy for taking me on like that, but if the net strategy doesn't work I'm going to buy a pellet gun and shoot it.

This is the reply I got to my Fighting an Owl question.

Blowing my own trumpet.

2006-08-19T17:47:00.000-07:00
I'm sorry about this. But if you go to myspace.cium / battlejam and listen to the song called "battlejamlivesession" you can hear me ranting about water and rats and 4th generation deformed incest rats at this thing we went to a few months ago. I'm not entirely sure how it happened.

COURAGE means MARROW!

2006-08-19T16:43:00.000-07:00

Marrows
Originally uploaded by TomsFarmDiary.
This was why we attempted the marrow-stuffing. The best bits were the haloumi and the cherry tomatoes. Even though I might be saying it because they were the only bits I bought and Anna bought the marrow and the rice and the garlic and the onion and the ginger. In fact she grew the garlics. However it was not as COURAGEOUS as the stuffed aubergine. We filled it with mozarella (and other things I cannot remember) and baked it. That was amazing.

Actually it turns out it's meant to be courge means marrow. Hence the courgette.

Tom has the 'Tower"

2006-08-15T15:39:00.000-07:00

Man and beast
Originally uploaded by squacco.
Needless to say, I haven't been around much at the moment. Our internet's gone, definately for good in this flat, which means I'm unlikely to post anything very regularly at all until mid-september. Which is probably a good thing as I've still got about 15 000 words to write and 15 days to do so. On the minus side, it means you can't see the amazing pictures I've made on photoshop. (The new thief of time. Since I've been writing-all-day I've cooked more meals than I usually do, made four grotesque photoshop pictures (well, some were quite beautiful), nearly embarked on the making-blue-cheese project, tried to get funding to start our "Giant Poms Here" business... that sort of thing.)

However, there are a whole host of well exciting things that have been going down that I would love to write about. I'm not really sure if I'll get the chance. But some of these things are;

- Hanover Day; (Community! Event! Breakfast! Romanian Brass Band!)
- Pride (Gays! Party! Lack of sleep! Bear Party! Guy with blood all over his hands and the morning papers! Anniversaries! Kids!)

and various poetry gigs, Evening Stars, funny animals and other adventures. I'll tell you about them another time.

In fact i was so drunk i slept with this indian grocer called Ramesh Ramesh

2006-08-03T06:36:00.000-07:00
Afternoon. Darn. Sugar. Heck.

So on the plus side I have a new house to move into in mid-September.

So on the minus side I have nigh on twenty thousand words to write for the last day of August, and I still don't have a computer.

It's a Flaubert's Parrotesque look at Julian Barnes, concentrating on themes of authenticity and the nature of fabulation in history. I'm absolutely bloody darn terrified.

Three reasons to say No

2006-07-31T08:47:00.000-07:00
(Alan, Andy and Tom)

Drugs. Don't do it. They might make you feel great and make you love everyone and make all the colours swirl together and Anne Wilkinson wearing a bikini and go-go dancing, but it doesn't stop Elvis from being some kind of closet Nazi. Here are three more drug episodes to learn from.

a) Acid Alan

I'm working in the pub. Alan comes stumbling up to the bar. "What do you recommend?" I pour him a pint of ale. Handing him back his change, his money goes flying all over the bar. "Are you okay?", I ask. "I'm trying to.. moving.. requires a re-calculation.. of.. architecture...". He goes to sit outside. Eventually Nick and Rosanne come and find him. As he leaves, he utters "There's something .. is there? is there something I should or should not be doing?" He produces a £5 note. "Do I need to buy a drink for the person who is going to replace me?". No-one really can answer this question. Nick has a half. Alan goes with Nick and Rosanne.

b) Andy and the Jehovah's Witnesses

Andy is alone in town on Saturday night. He goes to a drum'n bass night and someone gives him four E tablets. Andy eats them. He dances the night away to pounding drum and bass music. At nine in the morning he wakes up on the seafront, all spangled and confused. He decides to walk off home. On the way home, he passes the Brighton Centre, where the Annual Jehovah's Witness convention is going on. Andy decides to reconcile himself with his Jehovah's Witness past, and goes in. He spends three hours in the Jehovah's Witness convention, talking to Jehavah's Witnesses, twitching, muttering and rolling his eyes. He is discovered asleep in Weatherspoons at half past two.

c) Tom and the Performance Enhancing Drugs

Rosie, Cosmos and Tom end up going out and taking some kind of heinous chemicals. Greatly spangled, they gradually make their way back to the house, and time rolls round to 7 o clock. Already twitching, blinking and trying to devour his way though a sturdy wooden spoon, Tom decides to take copious amounts of more heinous chemicals, and then go to work. Despite sneaking off to the toilets to take more throughout the day, he "entered more data than ever before", and "I don't think they noticed."

* * *

This bloggue entry isn't supposed to be bigging up drugs, or denouncing my friends as the fiends they must sound here. These, I can assure you, are isolated and suprising incidents. And that ain't a word of a lie.

Camping Trip

2006-07-31T08:35:00.000-07:00

Evidence of Daniel Taylor's escalating madness no. 1
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
So this is the thing. So this is where we are. All this is meant to be is a blog entry about our camping trip to Devil's Dyke. But all that imposes on my tongue are bitter lines about adultery.

"So write the script - illness and debt,
a ring thrown away in a garden
no moon can heal, your own words
commuting to bile in your mouth, terror -

and all for the same thing twice."

It was a camping trip. There was no adultery.

In fact it was a spendid camping trip. It's such a good thing that a short bus-ride out of Brighton leads us to the downs, owls and rabbits and badgers and foxes and possibly some kind of psy-trance rave coming over the hill.

Tents. Cooking. Gin and Tonics. Anna's Birthday. Daniel Taylor getting up at seven each morning and walking back into Brighton for work. "They're tents. They don't have walls." A thunderstorm. We found a park ranger who was going to show us some adders, but we never saw any. At one point, we went for a walk, and were all lying on our backs in the field. As this includes Jacob, it looks like we were all lying callously around a poor man in a wheelchair who had fallen over and couldn't get up.

A splendid weekend out. When we got home, we ended up at a street party in Erica's street. Musicians, cider, bathtubs. Phone Nast Dave. Rosanne; "I've got three hours off. I can drink a bottle of wine in three hours." She sure could. Dom is going to get married. He didn't let us meet his Fiancee.

There's a lot of it about

2006-07-27T03:52:00.000-07:00
The heat. The terrible heat.

Walking up Trafalgar Street, suddenly fat drops of rain begin to fall. Within a few seconds, they are everywhere. A sudden torrent of heavy drops scatters around me. People dash into pubs, under trees, into the doorways of shops.

By the time I reach North Gardens, the rain has stopped. The street is already steaming.

So anyway...

2006-07-26T04:50:00.000-07:00

Nicole meets the Manatee
Originally uploaded by dulcelife.
Keep your eye on the news. Great things are afoot. Run, you fools. The battle of the Pomme. He weighted the same as a Baby Whale. Three suits and a violin. The pure gold of the music hall. The eye of the swarm. The man who can clap with one hand. These premises were TOTALLY DESTROYED in a zeppelin raid. A more realistic fear-of-death than Nietsche had imagined. Library Square in red paint. Just a half, eh? The crushing of small animals in the novels of Virginia Woolf - Discuss. The Canaries of the Sea. To hell in a handcart. Grind technique. Jerry Fodor's No. 1 Stalkathon. These are the things that made us laugh when we were young. Lucy Lucid. One twelth of a teaspoon. Little humbug with legs. Jason rubbing salt into the wound. That's not a thumb! He bought a tent factory. A selective mute as a child. Her glass eye was my hard boiled egg. Back straight, don't shirk technique. Skimming lessons. I am disabled - communicate with me. Picnic tables and joggers. Party mix. Geeta's Lime is Sweet and Squeezy. Having a traintrack lifestyle. Breakfast of Champignons. The steeple emerged from the water as a reminder. Desperate, Chris, or Disparate. The sensation of insects crawling in the ear. How brittle? Peanut brittle. A floor as thin as a cigarette paper. The butter in the tent. Everything's coming up Millhouse. It's Special Brew-o-clock. I want to be a chin slammer. Cats in the womb. Her greatest fear was a smoked list. An obsession with abstract nouns. A loving coo at oysters. Two different types of grasshopper.

Consider the use of tenses in this sentence;

" And as I watched her, before she became aware of me, I whispered to myself; 'Everything begins here' "
- Julian Barnes, Talking It Over

"Daily reminder...Thursday.

2006-07-19T07:49:00.000-07:00
"Purchase feeble public access cable show and exploit it."

Whoa. I feel sorry for whoever that is.

ham hands

2006-07-19T05:36:00.000-07:00

The siblings (Nicky P's birthday 2006)
Originally uploaded by Sandygermsmanson.
This is my current favourite family photo. You will see here me with my younger siblings.

1. Brighton Hip Hop Festival. A lovely day. Shame about much of the music. "Hello, are you Shiny?". That's neveer happened to me before. Actually it's kind of on a par with being recognised as Bob the Fish at various points in my past. That was cool.

2. A terrifying tent in the Medieval area with sounds and images coming from all directions around Maya and some musical act with a mannequin puppet child doll dancing on the stage all pale ald lit and fires blazing in the hot sun as we crawled under a V shaped sandwich board, and suddenly, unexpectedly, Morrised one off. The sound of sticks hitting sticks and well timed bell twirls, handkerchiefs existing only in potential.

3. Somehow I thought it would be a good idea to being a unulele and a harmonica bob-dylan-stylee strap to Jimmy's Ukulele night. And then try and play the ukulele. And also drink stupid amounts of cider to pluck up courage to play an instrument I can't play. And sing. And recite poetry. I think it went quite well.

4. Fresh victims in the wars of religion.
a) Cat Stevens (killed by a plane)
b) Salman Rushdie (killed by a plane)
c) Mark Chapman (killed by Paul Mc Cartney)

Advert.

2006-07-13T09:11:00.000-07:00

up close and personal
Originally uploaded by gail on the web.
I am looking for someone with a lot of money and a good sense of humour up for pulling off the BEST PRACTICAL JOKE EVER. If this is you, then please do get in touch. When I say a lot of money, I mean helicopters, kidnapping of large animals, etc. That sort of money.

Words

2006-07-11T10:07:00.000-07:00

Chris's poster
Originally uploaded by Sandygermsmanson.
We met a stumbling teenager called Tim who; despite the crumpled can in his fist and stack of can-husks at his feet, could still name every King and Queen of England since 1066.

"Hey Tim! Who was king or queen in 1558?"

"Elizabeth the First"

We couldn't find the moles and slept in a clearing next to a massive tree, arms sticking out everywhere. In the morning, my telephone had gone.

In the morning, we got a train to St. Albans. Parkinsons, olives and garlicky cheese. Andy got cussed bad by my teenage sister. We met the beanbag.

25

2006-07-09T06:06:00.000-07:00

hitler snowman
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
I'm sitting in the desolation that is my flat. Tommy is cooking breakfast and I have a Doraemon mask. I am 25 today. Daniel Taylor has a new voice and has given me Sherlock Holmes - The Card Game. There are two dogs in front of me; a Squirrel Doggie and a small yellow dog with high heels. Andy gave me a Bob Dylan Harmonica Holder. There is red wine on my white linen suit. Rosanne gave me a wallet made from capybara skin. You can see the fish-like scales. Last night we sat on the concrete jetty at the end of the Groyne for a while as the waves lapped around us and Earnest played the banjo. My mother and father gave me a teatowel with the nautical flag symbols on it. This morning I woke up in the front room on a mattress with photos taken of my semi-clad sleeping form. Tom, Andy, Cosmos etc have made scenes in all the late night shops they could, and at the Car Boot sale at six in the morning, they bought new sunglasses. Tom buys a new set of sunglasses every time he gets spangled. By this means, we gain sunglasses but lose wooden spoons.

We're going to go to a gay dog show.

2006-07-05T09:34:00.000-07:00
Lottie stood in front of the mirror, and smiled knowingly at her reflection. She was 37, but looked as if she wasn't a day over 29. At this rate, by the time she hit sixty, she would still appear to be a fresh-faced 45. "Forty five?" She shuddered, hands fluttering to her face as if to sooth the wrinkles that would one day arrive. The mirror would have to go.

summer sunrise solstice celebration

2006-06-26T06:47:00.000-07:00

Piano
Originally uploaded by MrNickyP.
how busy we all are these days

the "becoming more effective" clutched tightly in my hand

busy having fun, busy working, busy trying to do something

We spent six days at the Summer Sunrise Solstice Celebration. These are some of the things that happened:

cycling with a swollen finger collapsing bicycle lock and useless bag for a crab-suited interview and Jed's name blazoned on the wall I left and the chemist gradually brought the swelling down and then a sojourn back in bed with mushrooms on toast leading to a rushed shopping trip and dividing (daniel taylor calling the night before with a dog called peaches held lovingly in his hand) and TOOL and finally without camera but meltdown and maya holding her festival folofel for a journey with freshly cooked asparagus and a nice glass of white wine and my tent full of cold acid and eating crisps at fareham with national anthems ringing in my head

finally on the bus which is an old double decker bus and then suddenly climbing the hill in the sunshine and alice with glass of cider recklessly held as if she is at the animal fair, putting up tents and a scurry into town averted by the arrival of henry and lots of waiting and smoking at the crossroads when beefy occurs and eventually after a stroll down a country road past some sewage works henry appears and finally a pint of ale and my phone goes off as the messenger (earlier maya spread soft cheese on pitta bread with cucumber and we were condemned to find more cucumber) and nick and anna hell and george and russell arrive more wanderings and [gap] the morning it is one of the most hot days I think at this point and under the beating sun we find a large conical shelter. george and alex rival their competing flurries of tight clothing and I think me and nick just wore what we normally wear and (anna is blue) somehow we lose everyone and caught up in a flurry of introspection (earlier daniel taylor arrives on a horse drawn carriage) and gazing into each others dilated eyes

before we sit under the spiralling (stocking) furniture and torturous anecdotes tell themselves in as rapid a manner as possible with barrymore "I'm feeling very sociable; more sociable than usual). a distinct absence of baebes.

so the middle bit is kind of a distorted flurry and I think we buy cider in wine bottles from a man who has made vegetarian sausages from cheese and we see a turkey and all sorts of wee little chickens and hens

still no sign of alan. still no sign of alan. the third night I fall asleep. jed still hasn't seen any football. fleeting glimpses of maya but she is moving too fast. we see various bands at some point, most notably including some teenage rock kids called durban poison who are cross that no-one is joining in the teenage rocking and some people called the bloody maries who have their good moments but they are all too infrequent and then INSTILL who are incredible and thoroughly make the day (and if you've seen 70 hippies moshing on ketamine then that's sort of what I mean). bless the metal kids. it was thoroughly incredible

by the time it gets cold poof is still dressed as a french maid and he fashions some impromptu trousers out of a set of two jumpers sleeves enfolding his legs but one of them is a hoodie and when he goes for a poo it falls into the hood. this was a difficult moment.

henry serenades us with his multi-faith songs and still no sign of alan. the hunger breaks are running out

It`s actually quite interesting. We all think that robbie is a bi-sexual hip-hop artist with piles.

2006-06-14T07:49:00.000-07:00

This Machine (Dave) Kills Fascists
Originally uploaded by MrNickyP.
So Jed has of late become a fan of different sorts of tea. Black tea, white tea, green tea, herbal tea. He has been sampling the eclectic delights of different teas available to him.

However his latest purchase is possibly the most unusual of all. This substance is known as Meno Tea, and the advice on the back suggests that unless you are 'a woman of a certain age' it is inadvisable to drink this tea, as it may affect hormone production.

Jed insists that he bought the tea believing it somehow relates to Meno (in a Greek philosophy) sense of the word, and yet is still sipping it down with scant regard for his hormones.

* * *

The weather has been beautiful (well, hot... there seems to be a difference between these words in both official and colloquial usage) and the weekend has been a flurry of either cursing the indoor-nature of my job or sitting on my roof / the beach drinking gin and tonic.

Things have been busy; often a complicated flurry to do two things at once. Early June is Birthday Season. Maya "Your baby has the same birthday as Daniel Freakin' Taylor" Semray should be able to tell me exactly who has been celebrating their birthdays over the last nine days.

I found myself wearing Kangaroo Boots and a tailcoat and following some cloaked chanting breakcore kids in a flaming-torch-led procession through Brighton on the 6th of June (the 6/6/6, it would seem), down to the Concorde where the Grand Master Fittin' Trampled Horse Jacker himself, the Venetian Snares played some of his delicately filthy pounding breakcore. Followed by Scotch Egg so as I took a big run up with the kangaroo boots and we converted Tom's potato gun into a sponge blunderbuss and ... horrible bloodshed and carnage ensued.

I already have a reputation for falling asleep in my workplace (thankfully when not at work). Oh well, I thought, at least things can't get any worse.

Yes they can. I managed to fall asleep on top of my boss the other day. We were on a bus and as the bus turned a corner Anna tumbled off into the aisle and I was in grave danger of falling off somewhere so Karen (my boss) came to steady me. And I fell asleep on her.

I'm going to go see TOOL tonight. Hopefully I'll find myself in a field tomorrow morning all blacked up sitting behind a tent with a set of fabric paints painting a spiralling red and black design on the tent

Wonga Bonga Land

2006-06-04T12:41:00.000-07:00

Desperate Dan - Racist
Originally uploaded by MrNickyP.
Nicky P, thank god one of us finally got round to uploading this incredible Desperate Dan story. Nick offers a brief summary of events leading up to the final denoument.

This is from the Dandy Annual 1981, the year I was born. Old!

German Love

2006-05-31T09:26:00.000-07:00

The cake broke! Oh no!
Originally uploaded by fluor.
So you know how you imagine how something is going to look in your head? And it doesn't usually turn out exactly like that.

Well, my ideal plan for the DJ Tea and MC Cake set was to involve Dave the Machine taking a big gulp of bubble mixture, and then regurtitating it like a mother-bird feeding a baby-bird into Daniel Freakin' Taylor's mouth, who would then gargle with the bubble liquid whilst I knelt on the floor next to them reading Daniel's poem, "German Love"

German Love

Eyes should be brown or blue
Hair dark. sound attitude
Back straight, don't shirk technique
Make love once then repeat

Ready to dare and trust
No Aries or Taurus
People with kids don't apply
You've played the field, I don't mind

You will have German Love
I want your German Love

If you're still reading this ad
You might get what I have
You're loyal and such a flirt
Must see photograph first

Don't lie; height, build or age
Two dates, numbers exchanged
One look then I will grade
Have you goods you can trade?

You will have German Love
I want your German Love

* * *

As it happened, everything I had ever hoped came true that night in the Volks. Me, DJ Tea, Rosanne, Daniel Taylor, Dave the Machine, Anna and Becca converged upon the Volks, where we listened to some pounding pounding breakcore, before, armed with spoons and electrical devices, Tea and Cake begun in the downstairs room. The usual tortured bokecore jitterings of Tea and Cake filled the room, along with dancing gimps, breakcore mentalists and psy-trance ravers, sponges and teaspoons flying through the air, and Rosanne running around the place electrocuting people with the electric device. The interlude took place about half way through. It worked perfectly, and with the added spectacle of making Daniel Freakin' Taylor boke up all over the floor.

We finished with the Water and Rats song, and then somehow managed to persuade the audience to lie on the floor as a sign of their appreciation (I don't know why, but DJ Tea just doesn't like clapping, and lying on the floor is so much more expressive)

Splendid evening. Splendid. Previously we went to a Victorian night in Lewes and Daniel successfully gargled with bubbles and read his German Love poem to Andy Chef and a man with a video camera and Rosanne drew a little scampi and the gaunt Professor Elemental

FEAR ME! I AM BEEFY!

2006-05-31T08:13:00.000-07:00

Mr. Beefy
Originally uploaded by The Enid Complex.
So I have three events to document today.

In reverse order.

The weekend that's just happened. Spring Camp.

The tuesday that wasn't yesterday but the one before. DJ Tea and MC Cake.

And the wet weekend that hasn't just happened but was the weekend before that. The Firegathering.

So. First things first (chronologically, that is), last weekend (not the one that's just happened but the one before that) we went to this wee little festival in the local area (well, close enough.. it was next to Gatwick airport, or at least close enough to say "Look at that low plan! Fine, then..." every five minutes or so, if we had wanted to).

It's organised by Will the Jug who is a really tall fellow who looks a bit like a Toby Jug and splashes water out of his head like in the Wasp Factory but a bit less gross. He's also a juggler. Me and Anna and Maya got on the train and travelled up to Three Bridges as Maya told us about her parents' sex lifen and we drank beers and ate falofel. At three bridges we met some other people going to the festival including Ben and Talia (?), and Adam who used to know Arthur and, it turns out, can throat sing, and can throat sing in a Heavy Metal way. Adam is cool.

So we got there after a traumatic six-person taxi ride with a lost taxi driver, and as we arrived in this field it begun to rain, but we put our tent up and strolled around the site. Big tents, one with a stage in it, the other with a tea-shop. I bumped into Nicky who is a light hearted Freudian with journalistic ambitions, she was wearing her scarf that looks like her hair and makes her talk like Elton John. They also had this unusual glass-house esque complex which had a boarded-over swimming pool and a hot tub (not boarded over). We sat down in the tea-shop tent and had cups of tea with some of the people we had met including the girl who works in the Hope who I keep IDing and some other girl who had mud-poi and whose name I can't remember, and ended up getting accidentally really stoned. Stumbling around a bit confused and it still raining a bit and then Andy K and Evelyn and Steve! turn up, together with a big italian coffee machine that Andy bought from a closing down gourmet cafe the previous weekend and has converted to run on bio-diesel.

As the evening goes on we sip at pints of ale from the bar and drink gin and tonics and sit to watch a band, but they seem to spend about an hour tuning up and so we wander on.

Will the Jug really wants me to read some poems during the festival and I assure him that I will when I get the chance

So what ends up happening is that me and Anna kind of flake out a bit and go to bed at about half past two. When we get up in the morning the rain is stopping and we find Maya writhing in the hot tub all twitching and wild eyed "it was cold but it's warming up..." she was keeping a low profile and playing it cool and I think she got away with it. we share some kind of vegetarian breakfast and maya eats some raw carrots and shows us her new found friends who feed us drugs for lunch but they don't affect us that much. we drink gin and tonic and wander about. the sun is now up. but however the previous night has left the site muddy as it is and my pixie boots are pretty ruined already (they are sort of converse-esque shoes and made of canvas, they are known as pixie boots because the ends seem to point upwards, in the manner of a medieval gentleman, or, so I must assume from the name, some kind of pixie. a quote "just look at Frank Black! who says tubbers can't be rock 'n roll stars!") and so I decide to walk around in bare feet which works well until I am stung all over the soles of my feet by nettles

so the day goes on and we sip at ales and Will the Jug urges us to go see a cabaret and then something happens, we are sitting on a straw bale and maya has fallen asleep in her tent for a bit and we see Andy K and Evelyn and then suddenly Andy K is buying loads of acid off some man and he is licking acid off his hand and evelyn goes "Bloody Andy! he's buying acid... That's my breakfast money!!" andy emerges spiralling and Evelyn admits that actually it's quite tempting "I'm going to have to be his carer for the next ten hours" we watch a bit of a rage against the machine covers band called Bad Science for a bit and then as we leave the stage bit we see two guys spinning fire whilst naked. that was cool. we sit round the fire and i'm a bit confused and seeing all these unusual colours and then suddenly Will tries to get me to read some poems but I'm not really in the right state of mind and then we wander more around and the glasshouse has become some kind of flared out acid disco which is intense in some ways and quite unexpected in others

the next morning steve! can give us a lift home and so we pack our things and go and find maya and she is in the hot tub and "still feeling the party" so off home we go and leave maya in a field

as she is out me and anna sit in her bed and watch films and drink gin and tonic. we call Tom. he is at All Tomorrows Parties watching Andy destroy curtains

Red/Green Colourblindness

2006-05-22T03:50:00.000-07:00

Red/Green Colourblindness
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
as a supplier of lo-fi, bad and otherwise unprofessional photography personally, I think I prefer bodies to buildings, especially when there isn't any black and white. I love the garish colour and the trimmed off body part.

Lame Joke no. 263

2006-05-18T08:03:00.000-07:00
You're so fat they don't need to write Chubb on your door key.

and the band played on...

2006-05-18T07:18:00.000-07:00

Flower of DORAEMON
Originally uploaded by secondimpacttaro.
It's been a hectic weekend. Dude, it's been a hectic weekend. It's Thursday today. It has been a busy weekend.

So on Friday it was Dave the Machine's birthday. Except I was working in the pub and so rather than celebrating 25 years of Machine, I served drinks to those celebrating this momentous day. Dear God. Tom doesn't even remember being in the Evening Star and he was there for 4½ hours. Maya leaning over the bar saying; "You've got really beautiful eyes. I'm serious. Really beautiful" to Jo who was trying to serve three customers at once. Daniel Taylor placing the entire contents of his pockets (about £8 and a signed photo of Wheelie Willy the Disabled Dog) on the bar and demanding "a mix of all the spirits" for Dave the Machine. Alice and Rosanne drinking a bottle of wine each. "Did we? I'm sure we didn't."

So work I did. Ah well. Afterwards I took the ukulele and strolled down to Bond Street where they were all sitting in the street wondering what to do next.

Of course the next obvious step was to go down to the Spiegeltent where they obviously wouldn't let us in as it was about to close so we sat outside and Tom covered himself in Nutella and I played the ukulele and we charged people 50p to "Kiss the Nutella Boy!". Tom got one kiss and no money. My jacket is covered in nutella. Maybe I kissed the Nutella boy.

Saturday and I bounded into town on my kangaroo boots in order to 'cover' the street performances day as part of the Brighton Fringe Festival. At one point I fell over in the street because the sole came off the kangaroo boot and I was lying on my back holding an umbrella and the ukulele and Daniel came and put the sole back on the shoe and pulled me upright and then before I knew what was going on I was standing in the middle of this crowd of people holding an ukulele and a big red umbrella and wearing kangaroo boots and I think they must have thought I was some kind of street entertainer. So I started playing the ukulele and bouncing around on the kangaroo boots. Quite limited for a street entertainer but I guess I was kind of on the spot. They seemed to enjoy it anyway.

More wandering the streets (or bouncing about the streets) and then we popped into the Basketmakers Arms for a half and Daniel Taylor went home and got the guitars and then we went off to the Pavillion Gardens for The Meatles.

The Meatles! The world's first meat-themed Beatles covers band! Aftr a shaky start, we got into the swing of things, and decided to move to the crossroads in the middle of the Pav Gar for the performance. Here's a brief setlist (as far as I can remember)

Strawberry Veal Forever
Being for the benefit of Mr Tripe
Grey Kipper
Whilst my abbatoir gently seeps
She's got a chicken to fry
I wanna hold your ham
Let it Beef

I think we did one more but I can't remember what it was. About half way through (I think it was as we were about to play Grey Kipper) this stumbling drunk man came along and begun muttering about drainpipes and heckling us. And then he called me fat and punched me in the stomach. And then Jacob told him to go away and so he wandered off. Other than that the Meatles went really well. Then we were cooking some food a bit later at Anna's house and this completely crazy guy called Konrad showed up from Canada.

The face of the teenage heartthrob is about to change. Konrad is intense. He wanders around constantly smoking and with a can of Stella in his hand, wanders off at a moments notice and is really rude to people all the time. In other words, he's incredible.

We went to go see some fireworks in Preston Park. They were quite good. And then we stood around for ages and Anna got hit by a frisbee and then we wandered around and picked up Colin and ended up in some kind of somersault rally and I think I somersaulted too far for I hit my head on a grass verge and then we were going to go to a party with Colin but we didn't and we went to the Hobgoblin but it turns out I am actually barred from the hobgoblin for having an identical twin and so me and Anna went to the Belle Vue and then we sat there for about an hour and then went home before something disasterous happened.

Sunday. 254 Morris Dancers. Keith Trampleasure in a jester outfit. Othello. Half-breed jokes.

bugs lice termites sandfleas roaches potato bugs grub worms stinger bees spiders ticks and blow-flies

2006-05-11T05:22:00.000-07:00

Is Daniel...
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
quick cup of tea before neighbours. In the front room Tom is trying to fix the potato cannon he made a couple of years ago. A large grey plastic tube gushes out flame. Tom clicks an adapted gas-cooker-igniting device, which sparks the gas in the tube. Gouts of flame spurt. Meanwhile, in Tom's room, watched over by a yellow dog in high heels, Andy and Rosanne gaze transfixed at the artily composed photographs from a man who calls himself "Canadian Cock".

Gaunty and the Tubber

2006-05-10T09:27:00.000-07:00
She was cello shaped
He was more like a bow
And a beautiful sound emerged
As he rubbed his horse hair
Against her cat gut

Slacker!!

2006-05-10T02:59:00.000-07:00

hey you...
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
Okay so I have to confess, I have been very slack on the old Blogguing front lately, and it isn't just because nothing has happened.

So hopefully I shall have a bit more blog action soon to go over what the dickens has been going on over the last month or so.

This may include;
- fish-head-spearing by my mother
- the "beanbag"
- nick eating a mouthful of midges
- schenkferleir rauchbier
- riding on a souped up double decker bus with the cast of othello in a hot-tub and four ladyboys
- getting "happy slapped" on southover street
- meeting Héléne Cixous
- picnics, boomerangs and a big grey dog
- being attacked by a Pomeranian
- Tomas Straussler
- ten reasons not to keep a cuttlefish as a pet
- "don't forget the fuel!"
- the Brighton Morris Men's recruiting committee
- Dave the Machine's little dancing legs
- being photographed sureptitiously by Anna's family
- Ginger Skatey Tom
- Homebrew no. 3
- Stealing little Annie Hell's house keys
- roof gun deckchair breakbite party
- KORN
- "get yourself a pineapple! treat yourself!"
- probably the last party we ever have
- possibly interrupting some kind of neighbour sex orgy
- Usually coming round for dinner
- and a full complement of steam vehicles, poets with unusual voices, the monotony of juggling and Anne Frank jokes.

Watch this space. But not too closely. Just wanted to say Hi, really.

More Rabbits.

2006-04-08T03:56:00.000-07:00

signs of spring
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
AS a postscript on the rabbit story, the RSPCA came round last night.

Total Interaction, as Jed would say. The dead rabbit saga is over.

Just like a modern shopping centre

2006-04-07T09:16:00.000-07:00

Phone Mast Dave
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
We woke up the other morning to the crashing sounds of Tom and Daniel Taylor in the house (this is Anna's house, rather than my house, where Tom and Daniel Taylor live, along with Rosanne, and me occasionally. But Rosanne was in Austria so it was just the two of them). "Hey, come out! We've got a surprise for you!"

What surprise could greet our sleep-encrusted eyes on this of all mornings. Oh. It's a dead rabbit with its guts all hanging out. Tom and Daniel Taylor proceed to skin and cut up the rabbit. We have a cup of coffee on the doorstep and then go out.

Now a week has passed. It turns out that they bought two rabbits. So in our fridge there is one complete but dead rabbit, and one rabbit pelt, just waiting to be taxidermied.

More animal news. The phone rings the other day. It's Tom. "Quick, come down to Sainsburies. There's a pomeranian in a basket!". Now I've heard of this basketed pom before, but never seen it. With fluid motions, I leap into my awaiting shoes and throw my jacket round my shoulder, nearly get killed by a speeding motorcycle on Upper North Road, and skid to a halt on Western Road. There's Tom. The Pomeranian is in a basket on the front of a mobility cart belonging to an old man. Man and Basketed Pom push past. Tom had such a good day. He made a bread and butter pudding, had to go out for more milk, and saw the Pomeranian in a Basket again in Waitrose.

John Leslie - Celebrity Rapist
A poem to the ascent of prime numbers

Leslie
John Leslie
Oh do not rape me
Stop now! Desist, John Leslie!
You may have raped Ulrika Johanson, but
Lucy Record shall emerge untouched from your vice grip
And my nose is filled with the crackle of Richard Bacon. Is cooking.

I've been upstairs trying to write a big old essay about Tom Stoppard (nee. Tomáš Straussler) which means that on the lovely day that yesterday was, I had to decline Tommy, Maya and the Machine Brothers' kind offer to go down to the beach, inflate Marine Patrol 3000 and go for a sail. Now these kids had been up all night on some grotesque machine-led drug fest. I stayed in my room and addressed the immediate issue of authenticity in The Real Inspector Hound. Strolled down towards the beach at about sixish, and it turned out that they had already got cold and went to the pub. One thing led to another and some random guy called Ed was inflating the Marine Patrol 3000 in the Bedford Tavern and Dave the Machine all pouting and red-lipped and back home with a boat for the rabbit leaping out of the fridge and getting shot

maya sleeps in a crumpled heap on the mattresses in the kitchen to be stepped on by Daniel Taylor in the morning as he prepares the buffet

Filth!

2006-04-04T13:43:00.000-07:00

St. Albans Market
Originally uploaded by CSsmith.
If music is the food of love, feed my love, trumpet-boy.

I wanted that to be about the old man who plays the accordion outside of W.H.Smiths, but I just couldn't figure out a way to make it sound reasonable.

Procrastination is what happens when you've made other plans.

Um. Not sure about that one. Me and Jacob did get a chance to make our Sylvia Plath joke yesterday...

So Ted Hughes gets back from work. In through the door he comes. "Hi, honey, I'm home. Wow, that smells lovely. What's in the oven, darling?"

MY HEAD!!!1

Yet another issue with the phrasing, I think. Please don't hate me, I do like Sylvia Plath really. Heck, I've even enjoyed reading Douglas Coupland now and again and it didn't stop me and those two IT mock-mocha sipping hipsters from kidnapping him and nailing him to a metallic cross made of computer terminals.

No, really. Look, here's a picture of me feeding a baby sheep with a bottle.

There. I'm glad that's over. So yes, I fed a baby sheep with a bottle. We went to the Seven Sisters Sheep Farm. We saw all sorts of baby lambs of less-than-a-week old. And some baby pigs. And of course lots of grown up sheep and some massive big pigs and some funny ducks with really long torsoes.

What else have I been doing? Rosanne destroyed her finger at Jacob's birthday party a few weeks ago. Actually it was her thumb. But it was completely damaged in a door. I mean, she broke it in seven places. A thumb doesn't even have seven places. She had an interview at Bath Spa. We went to Bath to go stay with Matt the Cripple and as we got to Victoria Station the handle fell off her po-fo. So we had to fight our way through a big mangled heap of commuters with an injured thumb with train-ticket glued to it and a big portfolio with no reasonable way of holding it. Got to Bath. Matt the Cripple grabs Rosanne the Cripple and tries to swing her round and crushes her thumb yet more. (Actually, Alice had squeezed the broken thumb a couple of days before.) We meet a thoroughly annoying singer-songwriter.

Did some other stuff in Bath too. Went to the theatre and saw a Romanian production of Twelth Night with subtitles scrolling up the side of the stage in broken-shakesperian english. Matt the Cripple works for the Bath Theatre Royal. Went to the Bath Postal Museum. Matt took a load of Rosanne's thumb-painkillers. (We actually had a bet how long it would take Matt to try to eat all Ro-ro's painkillers. The winning guess? Less than 15 minutes.)

God bless Myspace. I found an old friend who I have been wanting to get in touch with for ages AND I got to read a story about exploding rats.

Sorry, this isn't the most coherent blog-post I've ever written ever

The Changing Face of Ireland (parts 1 and 2)

2006-03-24T06:35:00.000-08:00
The Changing Face of Ireland pt. 1

Alas, the dark peat has covered the land,
The bog, the flax dam,
Like my father, poised, upon a roof
His shovel held high,
Fell, like a descending leaf,
A graceful descent, above the bog
Eaten by a bear.

His spade, now, lies rusty and old,
I stoop, to pick my pen,
From the wet peat.
The slap of sod onto the earth,
The taste of potatoes,
The bottle of elderly gin on my windowsill.

I turn and write. To set the ground
Shaking. a comet passes. But I do not see.

Tonight, I shall go to the Bee Hive.
No longer a place for honey,
But a pub. We shall drink there tonight.

Although I am broke. And must scrounge drinks
From my kindly friends. Surely one day
Someone shall give me a job. But for now, I turn
Take up the spade, and dig.

The Changing Face of Ireland pt. 2

Phone Mast Dave
amidst a waterfall of dreadlocks
parted the rapids
and reached for a lighter

Dublin accent
With a twang of canadian
For this
We have hip-hop to blame

Cyclops like
He took Ulysses from my bookshelf
A handy flat surface
To roll some jazz

Stately, Plump
I hoped he didn’t roach the cover.

teenage and frantic

2006-03-15T09:31:00.000-08:00

andybourg 1977
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
On Tuesday Afternoon, Tommy spent approximately seven hours, twenty pounds, eight cake tins, an entire jar of marmalade, and other exciting objects he may have found in our kitchen. The kitchen surfaces gained a new blue sugary coating. By twenty past eight me and Anna were sitting in the Hand in Hand, sipping ale and wondering whether anyone else was going to turn up. They didn't. We wandered on down to the Hanbury Ballrooms, where various musicians were Sound Checking on the stage, Dave the Machine was attempting to operate a mixing desk and play the flute at the same time, and Andy was running around preparing for his big "Two Nine". Surprise guests from out of town included Nicky "model-handsome good looks and perfect pop song structure" P and Ollie "the face of the teenage heartthrob is about to change" Gimp. As people arrived, Tim (with band) began performing, with Andy's grotesque selection of photographs displayed on the projector behind him. The effect must have been mildly disconcerting for poor Tim, as the crowd reaction didn't seem to match his MC-ing and Poet-ing. "Oooh, look, there's Chris with butter spilling out of his mouth! Oooh, there's Dave the Machine killing Lee Harvey Oswald!". Next, the Bobby Mc Gees began their 'domestic violence with ukuleles' twee-core, interspersed with Jimmy shouting at the audience to shut up, followed by a distorted-ukulele-twee-punk-butterflies with a flurry of plastic Figurines.

Next, it's the live debut (and first rehearsal, I guess) of Pukulele and The Meatles. Now Pukulele is me and Tom's redneck country tweemo band, featuring me on harmonica and slide whistle, and Tom on ukulele and casiotone. We sing a song about how the animals we used to live in harmony with have turned on us. We attempt to do a cover of 4st 7lb by the Manic Street Preachers but Andy comes up on stage and tells us that we can't play any more because time is short and The Meatles have to get on the stage. So The Meatles, the world's first meat-themed Beatles covers band take to the stage, featuring John Lenin, Ringo Stalin, Senator Paul Mc Carthy and Mark Chapman. Ringo Stalin bumbles around at the back of the stage and occasionally trips over a cymbal and sings some Beatles songs. But it's all good, and The Meatles serenade the audience with Strawberry Veal Forever and have them all singing along, waving lighters in the air to the rousing chorus of Let It Beef.

Old Uncle Flute-thing then began playing, with MC Emmental delivering some less than cheesy lines, and Dave the Machine fluting it up like the Pied Piper of Hanover.

AND THEN

At this point, things began going a bit strange. The aforementioned cake was brought onto the stage, and everyone serenaded Andy with a fine chorus of Happy Birthday. I had a grotesque acceptance speech flashback as he attempted to thank everyone his eyes rested upon. And then the cutting of the cake. Oh god.

So Daniel Taylor is a chef. And has a massive £90ish two foot long razor sharp chef's knife. And of all the knives in the kitchen, which knife did Tommy choose to bring as a cake cutting impliment?

Tom, on his knees, on the stage, arms stretched out above his head, plate and cake above him, as Andy stumbles about on the stage with a massive knife, jabbing at the massive mound of cake. Within about five minutes, the situation can only be known as cake tragedy. There is cake everywhere. At one point the knife sticks point-down into the ground and quivers there. Daniel shudders. Andy knocks Nicky P's pint out of his hand and broken glass and beer mix with the cake. The knife is confiscated by the Hanbury Ballrooms; "It's not a Hanbury Ballrooms thing. No venue lets you take a knife like that in!". Phone Mast Dave pirhouettes in the cake and glass on his tiptoes, dreadlocks swirling around him. The net full of balloons bursts open. The balloons are full of strawberry fondant. They shower everyone in strawberry-ice-cream as they burst.

And then they asked us to leave.

We gradually make our way back to Andy, Tommy, Dave the Machine and Victoria's house, popping in at Alex's to see the most incredible iron-leaf bathroom. Then a renegade taxi driver takes us to The Fridge House. Me and Rosanne have a good old fashioned singalong to the Moldy Peaches, just like the old days. People come in from time to time, comment on how dreadful a band they are, and then leave. I cook up some curried banana (very nice. A bit sweet. Perhaps needed some garam masala rather than lasagne sheets) Phone Mast Dave drinks Tommy's plum brandy and mutters for a bit. I lose the entire contents of my pockets and worry for a bit. And then I have a most uncomfortable night's sleep in the hall, with Dave the Machine stepping over me to go to work.

We go out for breakfast in Cafe Motu, and go to the pub for a bit. Andy and everyone go bowling the next evening. Me and Anna babysit Alice and Ed's wee baby so we don't go. I still haven't managed to go bowling with Andy. Maybe one day.

Mad "Alan" Two Parties

2006-03-09T09:21:00.000-08:00

kangaroo boots fall #4
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
so remember the day when alan went to Ozzfest and bought a load of those herbal 'highs' tablets and took one and it didn't work and so he just took all of them at once and then he broke his face in the mosh pit at raging speedhorn and then disappeared and ended up wandering around a car park at six in the morning in milton keynes and then came camping with us the next morning and just spent the whole day sitting behind a tent smoking cigarettes and painting 'tool' on the back of the tent?

This is me lying at the foot of the stairwell which leads to our flat.

Alice and Maya and Anna made Tommy a cake in the shape of a moustache. We went to the Great Eastern. We met two random drunk people. We took them to Alicats. I don't have any money and so I smuggled in a big bottle of cloudy cider. I fall asleep in Alicats.

On Saturday Tommy had his birthday party. Me and Anna were working so when we left the pub at one in the morning, and strolled up to Tommy's house (it's got a fridge outside), there was already no end of party clutter all mingling on. Glasses of whisky and ginger with chunks of ginger floating in them. Andy has taken all the furniture out of his room except for an anglepoise lamp. It either needs a mattress to make it all Heroin Chic, or a pot-plant to add that 'documentary' aura to it. Upon this floor, lit by the anglepoise, Tom writhes, clawing at invisible shapes in the air. Tom used to be such a sweet innocent boy. Now, as he meanders his way about the place, past this group of people I don't know, one of them points at him; "There's the guy who put an e pill up his ass for a bet." Oh dear god. Tom. Dude.

Me and Alex Poof sit on this chair in Dave the Machine's room, and Jimmy Mc Gee is there at Tommy's house. Jimmy is a twee scotsman with an Ukelele. Now I was going to have a boxing match with Jimmy at some point, but it turns out that he used to box for Scotland. He's going to kick my ass. Dude. He performs a number of magic tricks, making coins appear and disappear. "Oh look. There it is. It's under your watch!". I think the magic is lost on Tom. "Where? What coin? Did you have a coin? Hello?"

So then at one point, me and Tom are standing in the hall, just up on the first step of the stairwell. Sam comes running past, heading for the door. Alas, he doesn't get to the door in time. Me and Tom get sprayed with boke. It's quite shocking. A bit like a wet, bokey version of being shot. Sam does a bit of a Phil Kirk on the door, scrambling for the handle and boking up. Eventually he gets out and bokes up outside. Poor Sam. I go upstairs to wash the boke off and borrow a shirt from Tommy. Tom, I think, means to do the same, but actually finds a pink t-shirt and puts it on over his existing clothes. Then we climb into the attic and Tom manages to aquire some grey and pink trousers and a long fur coat.

At one point we're sitting in Andy's documentary room and Andy just comes in muttering and just spits beer out into the corner of his room. "That's my spitting corner.". O god. Please don't let Andy have a spitting corner. Rosanne and Tom react to this by spitting in the other corner of Andy's room. Jesus Christ.

Downstairs some kids are playing some kind of pounding techno music and dancing. I find a big old blanket on top of the wardrobe in the hall, and go upstairs to Tommy's room and go to sleep.

Apparently my other three housemates all came up to Tommy's room also and there was a point when the four of us were all curled up together in a big Clifton Place sleep heap. However by the time I wake up they've all gone downstairs and Anna is there instead. We go downstairs and everyone else is in the front room. Maya is outside the back climbing a tree. I almost expect her to attach a swing to it like in Junk, but she doesn't. Rosanne has gone to the shop and bought lots of breakfast and a big packet of Beef Jerky, which she devours, singing shake hands with beef as she does with a glint in her eye. Breakfast. The Sound of Music. Coffee. A glass of whisky. We manage to stroll into town without buying any more pets. The Battle of Trafalgar. Feminist Noisecore.

Garden Party

2006-02-27T05:33:00.000-08:00
The party would have been perfect if it was not for one thing. The dusk of the summers evening and glasses of wine and just the right number of canapes and how delicately prepared! The gentle hubbub of people chatting and enjoying themselves all looking radiant in their beautiful outfits, lit by paper lanterns and a dark suited string quartet playing away all the time. But oh, that odious Peter Brown! With stinking cigar and prickly beard and that ragged excuse for a tailcoat he spirals into view, spitting out coarse jokes from under the flecks of red wine on his moustache. Of course it is only a matter of time before I am cornered and he presses close to mutter awful endearments and to spit out smoke, slapping his leg with each brutish jolt of anecdote. Chloe and Michael sweep past, cooing and raising glasses of champagne but there is no chance of rescue as Peter capers, snatching more wine from a flustered waiter and lighting another cigar from the butt of the first.

The sun is completely set now and the stars are out and people are dancing slowly to the string quartet by the fountain, as with cautious glances we emerge from the rhodedendrons adjusting our clothing. To my horror his cigar is not only between his teeth once again but somehow still lit. We part company with one final clash between wiry beard and cheek, and back towards the house he swaggers, until the next time.

Somebody else's truth...

2006-02-23T09:25:00.000-08:00

George Harrison dies
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
'Fiction is telling the truth by telling lies, as opposed to telling less of the truth by telling facts... When you read the great and beautiful liars of fiction you feel that this is what life is. This is true, even though it is all made up'. - Julian Barnes

"Coffee begins to pour"

2006-02-23T08:46:00.000-08:00
there's blood on the shoe, it will not do

We didn't manage to go camping last weekend. It seems we might have burnt our boats with quite a few of the sites in the Hertfordshire area. I miss camping in February. I might go sleep on my roof. St. Albans stirs gently in the winter breeze. The Bee Hive has gradually been sliding downhill for the last few years, but the tide really tipped within the last six months, and, gently oiled, down London Road it proceeded. There was a nice couple of weeks when you could lean out of the side window and collect your order from H&H 2. So we found ourselves in the Hare and Hounds, which has become buzzingly popular due to the paint fumes and price rises. We did go into the Bee Hive on the way home, and Nick left through the fire exit to go and look around the deserted Odeon.

so sleepy recently,

perhaps i have ME

going to make curry

Ooops.

2006-02-23T08:38:00.000-08:00

Ooops.
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
Okay, so Tom and I tried to sell Alice's baby in the Friday Ad. No-one called her. In fact, the first she knew of it was when she opened the Guardian magazine on Saturday and there it was in the "comedy misprints" section. Still, I guess it'll be something to show wee little Alfin when he grows up.

Toeing the party line

2006-02-20T05:43:00.000-08:00
It wasn't about being ashamed. It was about decorum. Ivor was a man of principles, and wooden legs didn't fall into the category of polite conversation. Now, if it had been a war injury, that would be different. He could let it slip in a delicately understated comment, merely hinting at altruism, bravery and sacrifice. The wooden leg would be a feather in his cap. But no, for he had been born just too late for the hope of any combat. Instead, it was a motorcyclist with a stomach full of rum who had mowed Ivor down one dark night, twenty years ago now.

Even back then, Ivor had been a proud man. The stick that he carried was a mark of distinction, rather than a prop, a support for someone who couldn't stand by himself. And these days, Ivor had plenty to be proud of. His success in business was equalled only by his rise through the party ranks, until now he stood, ready, for the pinnacle of his success. To become the man the community would look up to. Within a week, the by-election being a mere formality, Ivor would take his rightful place as mayor of the town he had lived in for the last eighteen years.

It was only at times like this, late at night, that he would sit by the fire, thinking about his leg; the secret that could ruin him.

His wife was the only other person who knew, and she knew better than to mention it. she remembered those terrible days after the accident, when her once sprightly and ambitious husband lay with his face turned to the wall, struggling to come to terms with what had happened. Although he might believe that he had, she often thought, he would never quite be the same again.

A couple of days later, Ivor returned home after addressing the party meeting on the approaching by-election. His wife lay already asleep in bed, and Ivor poured himself a glass of whisky and sat at his desk. In a few days time, he would be a very high profile figure in the community. And there was a chance someone might discover his secret. What sort of a politician would he be then? He knew that these days, there were politicians with glass eyes and false teeth and guide dogs, and probably even a couple with wooden legs, but he didn't want to be one of those. Firstly, he thought, they had used their injuries to get into power; celebrated them. And secondly, his wooden leg was his secret and nothing to do with his political career. He imagined the effect of an announcement, just days before the election, of his leg status, and shuddered. Not his style at all. It would stink of vote grabbing. Of going for the 'pity vote'.

And yet, he thought, what would happen if it came out? The party had enough trouble with scandal already, let alone discovering that he had decieved people about his wooden leg. That was why he had moved here in the first place, to make a new start. To not be known as 'the man with the wooden leg'.

Ivor finished his glass of whisky, and poured himself another one. There was really only one thing for it. And with slow, deliberate gestures, he reached for first his writing paper, and then his fountain pen.

Dear Sirs,

It is with a heavy heart that I must offer my resignation from the party, and I understand that the timing could not be worse. However, my reasons, whilst personal, are serious enough, I believe, to warrant such a decision.

I hope that I remain,

Your friend,

Ivor Harrington

moderate comments

2006-02-13T04:29:00.000-08:00
so you i will talk soon
so you i will talk

and so when we woke up this morning it was not the third, but the fourteenth. and we thought, "where have the days gone?". maybe they were never there at all. maybe we just slept through them. and then we think, 'what would we have done on those eleven days?'; what petit mort would have passed us by? I am very fond of my memory. I don't miss my span of attention.

"scissor happy and over-keen"

some were angry, and believed that the government were trying to cheat them out of their days. "this is how it starts". As far as I can remember we just climbed on the roof and sat up there and watched, but for some reason it gets hazy around there

to realise

2006-02-13T04:13:00.000-08:00

horse in a hat
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
it's the point when you realise that the chin slamming lip synching bell ringing accountancy master wearing a ragged pinstripe suit has made it into the Guinness book of Record before you

a. "damn my german past"

b. Said they slept
through the whole thing.

Didn't hear or see anything.

Didn't hear anything.

The lab boys tell me
that somebody chased Parkette...
through the house
with a power lawnmower
I would have thought that
would have made some racket.

Crazy with the heat.

Schiz-o-darn-phrenia...
all over town last night.

What else happened last night?

Well, somebody torched
poor old Father McKeen...
with a flame-thrower
or something.

Must have been a Satan cult
or something.

Either that or that weird human
spontaneous combustion thing.

That really happens sometimes.

Hell of a thing.

That's not all.

Marnie Burke was found
wandering around stark naked...
laughing her ass off,
flipped out.

The psychiatrist figured
she'd probably witnessed...
one of the murders,
and she's just in shock...

but I've seen people
flipped out before...
and this girl
is flipped out for good.

I don't believe
she'll ever stop laughing.

Two bizarre murders
in one night.

This world is chock-full
of nuts, Cooley.

Don't forget that.
Weirdos, schizos, bozos.

Well, accidents happen.
That's all there is to it.

Two bizarre accidents
in one night.

Accidents?

You were just
calling them murders.

We'll just
file a routine report.

Just clean and tidy.

Chinese Socialist Realism

2006-01-27T04:20:00.000-08:00

Capybara
Originally uploaded by The Cats Jungle.
So yellow page after yellow page. January is heading to its end and it's a wet Friday morning and I'm drinking coffee and putting off baliffs. It's been a month of Nutriment Spice Hotel and large cups of tea at airports. Lots of tea in fact, freshly prepared at our bedside.

The other day I was sitting in the soft chairs in the library which look out over the whole campus, reading through a book on "Faith in Fakes" (the grand plan! the grand plan. but this shall come later.) when I looked up, and there was Jed, performing a jig upon the Library steps. I also managed to find a book which attempted to biographise Sherlock Holmes as if he was a real character (which, of course, he was). So in Holmes's day, the place which is now 221 Baker Street is in fact part of Upper Baker Street. So where did Holmes live? Given the positioning of the cabs in The Hound of the Baskervilles, it seems reasonable to guess at somewhere in the early 60's. Number-wise. We get the side of the road, of course, from The Adventure of the Empty House.

I broke a substantial piece off my front tooth the other day. So I stuck it back in with superglue, putting the superglue in my back pocket in order to have it to hand, in case I broke my tooth again. And subsequently stuck myself to the chair for an awkward five minutes.

Little Wee Twee Tom's birthday. Anna and Maya made him a cake in the shape of a Pug. This was incredible. Daniel Taylor bought him a horse throw (a large medieval catapult device) and a sharp axe. Hence massive chunk missing from doorframe.

Maya (observing wee little baby Alfin, wandering eyes and hands clutching at invisible objects, making sounds). "Wow, he's doing that Tom-at-New-Years-Eve thing!".

Been round to see the New Family a couple of times, sat on Alice's big blue Orthopaedic Ball and drank tea and looked at wee little Alfin. Birth sounds intense. Dude.

I bought a Really Big Lightbulb.

(Observe Tucked-in-Shirt. Rosie tells me this is "hip". What it did point out is that Tommy's hip is over a foot further off the ground than mine. And he's over a foot taller than me. Hence, the height difference is all leg. Dude.)

-Fig. 2.-

Dear God.

Anyway, the Really Big Lightbulb (thanks to Jay for tipping me off what the 99p shop had to offer) sadly only lasted from my house to London Road before stopping working, although it does function as an efficient wine glass once the electrics are removed.

You did say Balfour Road, right?

Oh god. So, imagine, if you will, that we are all cordially invited to a soiree at the Maison de la Alex Poofy Head. Marvellous. As Rosanne and Daniel Taylor are off to some Fruit and Veg event dressed as a Cello and Bow (plump and gaunt), they arrange to join us later. "It's in Balfour Road. Opposite the Cobbler's Thumb". (Number removed to save Alex from blog-reading-visitors. Saying that, he might want that). Okay, so we went to the party. Splendid affair. Wine out of a lightbulb. Sitting on the roof. Icelandic people. Doctor Booth and Doctor Beige. Hot tub offers. Port and Bourbon and other hideously sweet drinks. Give me cherryade any day. Eating an onion like an apple with Dave the Machine. Walking and boking.

So it isn't until the next morning; "Oh, I wonder where Rosie and Daniel went last night" that the penny dropped. Alex doesn't live in Balfour Road. He lives in Argyle Road, opposite the Cobbler's Thumb. Balfour Road is about 2 miles out of town. A hazy memory of Daniel calling from a phone box. "Where are you?", he asked. "Balfour Road!", I responded, only to be cut off with some abuse. O god. They got to the Cobbler's Thumb. Walked up Argyle Road. And then got a taxi 2 miles out of town to Balfour Road to go to the 'party'. O god. Oops.

Pub Crawl. Kangaroo Boots.

So Kangaroo Boots are like boots, but they have a spring-like device on the soles allowing you to bound along, kangaroo-esque, at quite a pace. So after Tommy and Tom and Maya and I had cooked breakfast, we decided to take a stroll along the seafront. Despite the awkwardness of these boots in Waitrose earlier for breakfast-shopping, I figured the promenade would be a more suitable venue for kangaroo-esque bounding. And O, it was. Except after a bit of seafront strolling we ended up going to the pub. And then another pub. And before long it was about midnight and I was falling down the steps of Wetherspoons (O god. Nearly six years in Brighton and this is the first time I've been to Wetherspoons. And I'm wearing kangaroo boots and they're refusing to serve Daniel Taylor any more rum and so I have a go and I'm waving my rabbi card about and demanding booze and then as we leave I fall down a flight of steps because I've got these ridiculous boots on.)

One of those days, really.

And that's before we take into account the Bear Bash and the Really Big Newfoundlands and Victoria and the Penthouse and Phil Moody and the rat and the hamster and a mountain of pies, and I still haven't told you about Cornwall yet...

One of those days.

2006-01-19T02:11:00.000-08:00

hamster!
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
So Alice had a baby at eight o clock yesterday morning. Congratulations! Ed was there handing out cigars apparently.

To celebrate the birth of Alfin Jack Danger Impey, Little Wee Tom and Daniel Taylor each tried to drink six pints of milk in an hour. Daniel Taylor completed the 'milk challenge' with no bokage in 54 minutes. Tom had 4½ pints of milk by the time the hour was up.

Rosie, Tom, Tommy and Daniel Taylor came home with a hamster today. I'm not sure if we're responsible enough for a hamster. At least it isn't a duck. He's called Alfin.

Wrongbow

2006-01-09T04:23:00.000-08:00

origami crayfish
Originally uploaded by -sou-.
So a lot of water has flown under our bridge.

From St. Albans, to Cornwall, to St. Albans, to Brighton, and here I am, complete with kangaroo boots and pine. The Latest 7 magazine called me a hussy.

So how to document what's been happening. On Satuday me and Rosanne found ourselves in The Victory drinking pints of Peculiarberg.

And then, as occasionally is the case, we end up having a sibling-esque fight. Sort of a ridiculous bar brawl with chairs being smashed over each others heads, and then I'm lying under the table and Rosie's kicking me, and then I throw her across the room and with a horrible crash, she collides with a wooden door, crumpling down onto the ground. Everyone in the whole pub looks round at what appears, to all intents and purposes, to be me, throwing a small girl into a heavy wooden door.

I'm going to get lynched, aren't I.

Thank goodness for our last minute emergency technique, which involves leaping into each others arms and explaining; "We're brother and sister!".

It almost always works. However, the final denoument in this theatre of the absurd is that one of the onlookers turns out to be Grace. Yes, Grace from St. Albans who we haven't seen in a couple of years. "You haven't changed a bit", she says. What's that supposed to mean?

On the plus side, I didn't get lynched as a wife beater, and Ro-ro was okay, and it was nice to see Grace too.

* * *

Saw Tommy in Jessops. He was on an errand to buy Andy a lens cleaner. Irony works in funny ways.

* * *

More about Cornwall to come. More about White Christmas to come.

* * *

Entertaining Amy around Brighton as she becomes the only person I've ever met to regularly absent-mindedly buy bottles of wine. Not to mention a great wave of vicarious broodiness. Alice is so fat these days. And it's only a matter of days before the wee child emerges from her womb. Before long it's going to be running around her front room rolling an orthopaedic ball before it like a sea lion. Or so I imagine, I've never seen the Wizard of Oz and I don't really know what children do.

* * *

The other day Dom glued a silvery-grey wig to his head, making him the spitting image of Steve Martin. Then he engaged in an unusual courtship ritual with this girl all dressed up in sepia. Now what would their children look like?

But the guttural mutterings of horny communist body builders was the symphony of healthy pleasure I needed.

2006-01-03T17:45:00.000-08:00

The Death of St. Alban
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
it's 2006 baby
last year i was 24

this year I'm going to be 25

so as we ran across the sand and dirt and bomb craters towards their trench, someone looked at us, and told us that we were getting a bit over the top.

and so with christmas over we spent a day with tea being made for us by the second best machine. machine! and then onto the carriage with little jo white and a tiny torch.

call. call!

"this ain't the summer of love"

so the next morning, down to Looe on the train. cod on, boody

Nutriment Milk

2005-12-30T18:02:00.000-08:00

Baby Tapir
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
So I was sitting on my porch on an upturned Safeway green box, and suddenly I realised, that every item of clothing I was wearing, I have been given in the last 6 months. Now I'm sure that's quite a new experience for me, although I've never really considered it as an option before. Pants (vertical stripes) and socks (brown) from Father Christmas. 29' (no belt required) jeans from family in Florida. Tweed shoes from TK Maxx, care of my kindly mother. Stripy (horizontal) black and white gondolier's t-shirt from family in Venice. Red and yellow shirt with a crab on it from Anna. Green and white checky shirt from TK Maxx (see above). Orange and Grey stripy jumper for Christmas. I'm so lucky!

So it's been a weekend of Albanians and sliding. Of teasmaids and green lights. Of blistered fingers and blistered eyes. St. Albans Abbey, the oldest bridge still in use in Hertfordshire (no doubt with George and Parge still poised upon it). The largest baby ever born in St. Albans City Hospital. Drum Solo. Felt necklaces. The big blue cat who travels backwards in time. Racial Harmony Mr January Homo-erotic Scarf Sliding. "Well now I've seen everything! At this time of year? Coots fighting! Sticking their feathers out! I wish I was at home in bed with a good woman!". Being tripped over by a video camera. "Is there a singer/songwriter in the house?". Suddenly I turned to find myself being wrapped up in a net of sellotape. Onto the stage with a wayward accessory. Colonial India. Deflato. Cups of tea in bed. Whistling. Ollie's blanket full of girls. Snap happy.

Fly safely.

trip to london, part 2

2005-12-22T18:04:00.000-08:00

Clambake
Originally uploaded by Jon Fodor.
so I thought I ought to return to our trip to london as I promised to. so on sunday morning we woke on ollie's bedsofa and he has a swedish housemate called honey, seriously; "hi honey!". however we do not see honey and just roll around on the bedsofa and bring ollie tea in bed and then we go to the 24 hour bagel shop and get ourselves some bagels and then we go see the flower market and there is an accordion band and we see the device for placing a christmas tree in a net and see some ornamental cabbages and various bulb-sellers and then we wander through the streets of liverpool street and reaching the station set off for ealing where we meet anna's grandma who gives us tea and talks to us about cherie blair and the yoga centre and then takes us out for lunch and we wait for the bus. late bus. but we go on the bus in the end and it takes us to this place where we cross the road and overlooking the river we eat curry. I don't know what happened to me this weekend, it might have been all the walking, but I found myself on an eat frenzy and ate so much food once again. i swear I shall get fat if I am not careful. but we eat curry and talk to anna's grandma and then we have a cup of tea and stroll along the river where there are lots of old boats moored, some with dogs on them, one with a dog and an easel and plants and a whole house. we wander down the river and then gradually stroll back, where we go back to anna's grandma's house for a cup of tea, and then after a while where we look at photos and then we go and get on the train. anna's grandma is cool. but we go along to hammersmith and we call robbie and it turns out we should have got off at hammersmith because to go to robbie (what, THE robbie ennis? who works for the BBC? my god!) 's house we have to get off at bloody earls court. i hate earls court station. they never tell you what train to get on and how to get somewhere and you can't even smoke! in your frustration about getting lost. by some miracle we ended up on the right train and went to robbie's house, where he offered us coffee and then jumped over the wall into the shop and bought us beers, and showed us photos of all the people me and robbie went to school with naked. pictures of them from when they were grown up and put a guitar covering their 'presence' and e-mailed it to rob. and then he took us to his local pub where we drank ale. we then got on a bus and drove past the old lady anna used to look after and then got to liverpool st. station and paid 20p to go wee and then went to the vibe bar where tim was playing his gig. fee and tim and seamus and mooky and moses and sylvie and some people who knew neil balmer and some people who knew amy and some people I've blatantly forgotten were there. ollie gimp turned up in a bit. and then robbie bought us beer and we 'mingled' for a while and then there was a crackling which was the air conditioner about to set on fire. tim's band played and it was incredible, one chap was playing with some decks and the other fellow was playing with a laptop, whilst tim and this girl were mc'ing over the top. it was cool. i danced briefly in a mock-slinky style but I can't really hack the dancing.

the gig was amazing. most excellent. we ended up buying much expensive booze from the vibe bar, and then the brighton cru went home, and we brought robbie back to ollie's house, where we answered the big golden boat. it got later and later. robbie needed to cross half of london. ollie made a big pepperoni pizza but as me and anna didn't eat meat and robbie can't eat cheese he ate it all himself. eventually rob actually went home, apparently (in his words_; "Ive then gotta walk back to liverpool st. hop on a bus to oxford st... change busses and get on one going to notting hill gate stop for a kebab then walk from there. i could probably hang around for a more direct bus but i get too impatient sometimes... if i leave just after 1am that`ll take me till 2.30-3ish to get home.

but im sure ill get home just fine."

So it all worked out okay. We listened to some of Pulp's back catalogue, and Ian Dury and the Block Heads, before going to sleep again on the bedsofa.

I was meant to be at University for my final lesson and "drinks with the class" at eleven o clock but given that I've been neglecting my studies lately and am not even getting close to reading 25,000 words by Umberto Eco, let alone writing them about him, it didn't really surprise me that I didn't make it. We lay around in bed, eventually got up, Anna woke Ollie Gimp whilst I went out for bagels. We had tea, ate bagels, and then Ollie walked us to the station, to make our way back to Brighton. I think I fell asleep on the train. I can't remember. What happened that evening? Oh yes. Classic Rock.

"The Festive Season is drawing nigh ... I will blist you in your one eye ..."

2005-12-22T06:24:00.000-08:00

Nativity Scene
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
Wishing you the most excellent of Festive Seasons. It's the first year in about eight or nine that I haven't managed to make Christmas Cards. I feel ashamed, like I'm getting less productive as I age. The Nativity Scene photoshoot is the closest I've got.

But anyway, enough dwelling on Christmas past. Like a massive jug of mulled wine, the wave of Jesus's Birth flows towards us, hopefully un-reminiscent of a Boxing Day tsunami. I need to buy things for my family. I'm going to go walk up Hatfield Road.

Wishing you all good joy and fun tricks for this time of year, indeed.

Tapir and capybara pool party

2005-12-21T15:10:00.000-08:00

Tapir and capybara pool party
Originally uploaded by zombie squirrels.
"The capybara or "capy", as it is known by American afficionados, is found predominantly in Southern Brazil, Northern Argentina, Venezuela and Uruguay. They are either hunted or, more recently, farmed as a source of leather and meat. Indeed, in Venezuela, the capybara is considered a delicacy, costing up to $4.50 a pound as of 1999. The pork-like meat is "tender and tasty yet low in fat", 1.5% versus up to 20% for beef. For at least one Venezuelan, it is "the most scrumptious dish that exists."

In the 16th century, capybara-addicted Venezuelans appealed to the Vatican to classify it as fish so that it could be eaten during Lent. After all, capybara can hold their breath while swimming underwater for at leats 5 minutes. They also have a slightly fishy taste. To the delight of Venezuelan Catholics, the church granted the request effectively associating capybara to Lent like Thanksgiving turkey."

Tapir and Capybara in the same picture! That's like finding a picture of Richard Branson and his kids swimming with dolphins folded up in your wallet when you really needed one.

i don't like the santa heads

2005-12-19T17:17:00.000-08:00

i don't like the santa heads
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
so here i am back in st albans

so here i am

so the poetry slam final was on monday. twitching, dedicated mouseheads and chips. into the polar bar. jimmy in a suit. angie in a top that said andy. the naked mystic caught a cold. comedy berkson narrators. i'm first. expensive guinness. gravel spills everywhere. cardboard cut outs and cussing. big bombs. buses. politics. heckling gently. forgotten lines. suddenly in bursts elemental. like a swooping bat hooded figure he makes his hip hop presence felt. never since run B.R.I.E. have cheese-themed MCs discuss quirky shops with such effect. much flustering. little wee tom is dragged down a flight of stairs. venue packed. gardens. immigrants. brigton hip hop mcs. flowers. glass eyes roll everywhere. emmental once again does his thing. me jimmy and emmental in grand final. american girls. funk drummers. too much fat, not enough sex. hot girls in yellow dresses. andy going crazy with a blue paint marker. onto the stage comes shiny mc shine. a verse about 1997 (it was the sonnet what won it). bowing under portillo's all-night-lips, fido and josie, where you are now, whoever you are now. free Tom Waits! finally "for is it so bad / that we can rock a mic / or an a4 lined pad" hip hopping it up against spoken word. 21 seconds over time. jimmy castigates unruly pupil tom. emmental considers the importance of music. victory for emmental! shiny is in second plaice but only because jimmy over-ran the time limit by about two and a half minutes. i'm in the semi-final in oxford. marvellous.

other than that, me, andy, tom and daniel taylor are going to form a meat-themed-gabba-breakcore-beatles-covers-band called The Meatles, featuring John Lenin (little wee tom), Ringo Stalin (andy james nelson), Senator Paul Mc Carthy (me) and Dorian Gray (daniel taylor). It's going to be amazing. Let it beef.

I'm in St. A right now. Various meatings with my extended family. Pints of ale in The Robin Hood with Paul Pepper (what, the Paul Pepper from Can't Snorkel?), Simon and Annie Hell. A train journey involving gushing fields of tweed and a broken schnechlier rauchbier. One for the road with weeping muttering relatives waving business cards and the Beard and Moustache championships. Small baby niece. Squashy quiche and prawn inquests. Dirty calendars. Ranting at poor little George and Chris doing their vegan washing. Oh, St. Albans.

2005-12-15T16:26:00.000-08:00

Lady with Goat
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
Grand Final. Chips. Salt. Pacing. Jimmy in a Suit. Small Person's Game. Pricy Guinness. Berkson Brothers Host. Genius. Blue Pen Door Check. Poetry Slam. First. Gravel. Cardboard Cutouts. Bombs. Politics. Kitkats. Girls. Then suddenly in bursts Emmental. Swooping around. Too much fat, not enough sex.

Grand Final

2005-12-12T08:52:00.000-08:00

T. S. Eliot
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
Dear god. It's happened. I'm shaking like a kid with ADHD high on inhalers and energy drink. Terrified. Wish me luck.

The Screaming Faun

2005-12-07T09:20:00.000-08:00

Oh noes! My head is on fire!
Originally uploaded by Grim....
So this is how I ended up at the rowdiest poetry night I've ever been to. So me and Wee Little Tom went do the Great Eastern, where the staff were being educated in the tasting of wine. This involved eight Great Eastern staff, five regulars, Daniel Taylor, Alex Poofy, and Lou Carpy, all sipping from a great selection of wines, and tipping wines into a large silver bucket. Why, we shall discover later. So me and Little Wee Tom had a couple of glasses of wine, and Rosanne and Sam made long straws, and drank all the wine from the large silver bucket.

And then we set off to The Fringe Bar, for the launch of Get Lost, the Hammer and Tongue poetry magazine, which features one of my poems. (See 'Dumb and Explicit' for the poem itself). And so various people were there, including Alice (with large child in her womb) and Dom and Elizabeth and her friend Jo and Adam Cohen and Jimmy the Scotsman and a whole host of other people. And so I was performing two sets of poems, and so soon took the stage for the first one, and was greeted by great amounts of drunken heckling, most of which seemed to be coming from my three housemates, Ro-ro El-booshnell and Daniel Taylor shouting at me, and Tom performing on the 'Screaming Fawn', an accurate simulation of the sounds of a fawn in distress. Three poems on, I left the stage, but heckling continued until Jimmy laid down the law.

How does a poetry night become so rowdy? Some would blame the Great Eastern's free wine. I am sad to say that by the time the second set of poems came around I may possibly have also been slightly the worse for drink, as I leant over the mic and ranted poetry into the air. Apparently it went quite well, considering.

I'm in the grand final on Monday the 12th, upstairs at Polar Central, or 'The Lift'. Do come along if you get the chance.

trip to london, part 1 (nicky p stylee)

2005-12-07T07:36:00.000-08:00

Brick Lane Restaurants
Originally uploaded by davidcharding.
so yesterday i brushed my teeth for way too long, i got a bit distracted and kept brushing and brushing absent mindedly and then the toothbrush was covered in blood. i can't believe i did that. i've done it once before but that was with an electric toothbrush.

so I worked in the pub on Friday night, which now involves an extra hour of real ale and belgian speciality beers for entheusiastic old men. and then Rosie and Daniel came into the pub after it was closed and i was sitting up at the bar with a pint of winter solstice and they had been to see the nightmare before christmas and were tripping and so rosie performed her five different kinds of whistle for my bosses and discussed beef jerky suppliers and daniel elaborated on how chef had told him that in australia the sun burns away the ears of farmers and dogs and cats have their ears amputated to save the pain of them later burning off; "get in quick.. ten years head start". we were going to go to the victory for a drink before three o clock due to its new late opening hours but as we stood on a traffic island half way to crossing to the lit up steps we sang "this is halloween" to each other and then it suddenly tipped down with rain so we thought more of it. anna has a picture of a mole emerging from the ground on her wall.

the next morning we got up early and went to sainsburies and bought mushrooms and bread and butter and hoops, and had a cup of tea and cooked breakfast and then went to the spar shop and saw matt and then went to the station and went to london.

we had a bottle of lilt on the train and it's the first time i've drunk lilt for about eight years but somehow it tastes familiar.

on the train we planned our sightseeing for the weekend. so as we alighted at victoria we got a map for the tourbus, and went to go to embankment in order to stroll along the river thames and possibly see areas that feature in the film four weddings and a funeral.

"Is it raining? I hadn't noticed."

but as we stepped out of embankment underground station there was a massive march about climate change, and within minutes of smoking a rolly and watching the march we were set about by brighton vegan cider waving masses, and then we saw erica who invited us to come march with them, but we had too much sightseeing to do. shame on me.

and colin jumped on our back and then they all marched on and we watched for a bit and then we wandered through the streets and went to trafalgar square

PHONE MAST DAVE IS THIRTY

where there are much fewer pigeons and instructions not to feed them, and wee tiny seagulls far from the sea. it rained but fortunately we had a classy wooden handled executive umbrella and we saw the lions

and then after trafalgar square we went down to see the houses of parliament and westminster abbey and saw the march march past once again, and then we decided that as it was raining, we should go somewhere indoors, and so eating peanuts on the underground we went to the british museum.

in fact we got very lost on the way to the british museum and somehow ended up walking away from it and past the bank of england and the london school of economics and gordon brown lying in the street, glass eye twitching

but eventually we found our way there past 19th century oriental booksellers and japanese hot table cafes. a massive circular centre library with blue padded desks and great walls of books and doorways that look like shelves of books. then an incredible room which contained great tall sculptures of wood and totems and a doorway in the shape of an eagle on top of a lesser eagle with horns on top of a baleen whale, whose mouth formed the doorway. and cheery papau new guinea faces, and dancing carnival suits, and flying wooden creatures. there were also many rooms with other exciting things, including ancient models of cows and whales and birds.

once we left the british museum, there were two kids who also had to leave because it was the last straw, but we went to a cafe and had a pot of tea, and then set off to find brick lane and ollie gimp. after wandering the streets around liverpool street station for a bit, we eventually found brick lane, where a man lured us into a resteraunt and we were soon eating curry and bringing our own wine. behind us, a quiz show was being filmed, whilst the statement of greatness from Prince Charles (who shares a birthday with boutros-boutros ghali, but there is a 26 year age gap! fancy that!) played repeatedly over the music system. a fine meal it was. leaving the resteraunt, we phoned ollie gimp, who met us outside the vibe bar, and took us to an upstairs bar for hip young things, where we bought cans of beer and saw skater ollie's poem on the wall and we exchanged pleasantaries and gossip with gimp over pounding house music. we meet evá, who is dating young ollie gimp, but then she sets off to go somewhere else. somehow we end up going to some kind of benefit gig where we drink bass shandy and find our way into the abandoned house in stanmer park, where we stay on ollie's big fold-out-bed-sofa, one of two

Multicolored strap sandals with worn heel cap

2005-12-01T09:02:00.000-08:00

Multicolored strap sandals with worn heel cap
Originally uploaded by metrovoyeur.
"Red sole heeled soft sandals with a net of seven multicolored straps and a center linking piece necessary for maintaining the straps' uniformity. Shoe makers design these types of shoes with multiple color straps in order to produce a one for all ocassion footwear to match different dressing scenarios the woman consumer may encounter. Problem with these plural number of straps is that if only one becomes detached, it may be very difficult to reattach it and render the shoe useless aesthetically. Also notice the worn heel cap. Judging by the picture, this lady likes to put a lot of strain on her heels by playing with it while standing. She puts the weight on the heel cap and then starts to turn it repetitively like trying to drill a hole on the floor. This wears the heel cap faster than normal. By the appearance of the shoes, I deduce it is a slip on sandal. The pants doesn't allow me to see any ankle strap, but the structure of the frontal design makes it very imrpobable the presence of any ankle strap"

This is pure genius. The photographer here takes photographs of womens shoes, or just women walking around the street, and presents a detailed analysis of their foot (and other health) conditions, occasionally making guesses at their lifestyle, and what they might have been up to on that particular day. In other words, he's a roving stalker foot fetishist with a camera and a vivid imagination. Brilliant!

So once me and Anna Hell and Alex were standing outside The Horn in St. Albans when we were approached by three aggressive foot fetishists. These young and vaguely threatening young men approached us, and for a moment we thought we may be about to be set upon by the angry youth of St. Albans. However, all they wanted to do was get a look at Anna's feet. "Size five! Ohhhh. Oh yes. That's my favourite. Please can you take your shoes off for me."

And that's how Anna Hell ended up with syphillis of the foot.

melted recorder

2005-12-01T06:58:00.000-08:00
So more people buy free range eggs than buy fair trade coffee. Funny, really.

Fly-by St. Albans commentary rhapsody

2005-11-30T09:06:00.000-08:00

Tommy completes the circle
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
And so when you find yourself remaining perfectly still and attempting to align the slimming horizontal stripes on your shirt to an exact 90 degree angle to the floor whilst you string a triangle from the headphones of an imitation ipod and strike the triangle with the triangle beater at the end of an outstreched arm moving only from the shoulder as the sun rises and the sounds of classic rock reverberate through the room, your eyes fixed on the triangle, oblivious to the motions of s shambling parade of the confused around you.

Because this is what happened to me two weeks ago. Me and Anna found ourselves serving ale at the pub as dilemmas arose with the cellar, eventually meaning that a pool of ale-froth built up around our feet, and we had to persuade a couple of the regulars to go down into the cellar and move barrels about. So after some ale froth and other excitement, we finished work, and attempted to bring many regulars with us to Tommy's house. It didn't succeed.

Sounds issued from far down the street. Through the house we struggled, surrounded by a mass of people. Into the garden, where we sipped tea and dipped digestives, to help us digest. Then upstairs to playfully ruffle Dave the Machine's hair. "Hats off" Dave disappoingly has no hat, neither removed or otherwise. Somehow we are surrounded by the stumbling and the confused. Doctor Booth holds court with a glint in his eye and a bottle of wine clenched in his hand. "My boys, my boys." (This is how he refers to the glint and the bottle). I somehow end up talking to a freelance photographer and a young mother for a while. An attempt to make soup goes horribly wrong. Graham dabbles his fingers gently in his micro house. The sun rises. Andy plays breakcore. People leave. Tommy and Dave the Machine stop Andy playing breakcore. Andy plays classic rock. Me and Graham make tea and coffee in pans. Tea in a pan. Tea in a pan! Pan of tea! The coffee becomes irish. The Cheap Imitation Baileys falls into place. Potion. What happened? Pan of tea.

"the kindest and the wisest man"

2005-11-30T07:56:00.000-08:00

Harry
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
Harry J F Wykes 1952 - 2005

A legend. Waes Hael! Trustee of the Kibbo Kift, legendary among the Woodcraft Folk. Who says they're not DFs! "Hi Harry" "No comment". The White Hart Tap Barbeque. The Kibbo Kift Rock Opera blaring from his car as he arrives. Monkey Chuddies. Glastonbury. "I won that fight we had at AG". Wearing John Hargreaves' white cloak. "That's the trouble with modernisers, they never worked out how to count. Hope you're not using the rhythm method, Tamsin". Axes. Black cloaks and bootleg hoodies. Futtocks. "Sure beats the hell out of me."

(time passes)

2005-11-09T07:36:00.000-08:00

dog costumes
Originally uploaded by hyperbolation.
Once again, we haul out the Virginia Woolf stylee parentheses. Where, as some would state, life is found.

So yesterday I discovered this; Oh!. Wow. I got in the free Brighton press! Well exciting.

So on Saturday I was sitting on a staircase sipping at Whisky and Ginger when we met this boy who was considerably smaller than me. Now I'm not exactly the tallest of people, being one inch off dwarfhood, but "Tom", or "Smally" was definately several inches below my height.

Here's a picture of me and Elboo to display both of our diminutive stature. So sadly my encounter with "Smally" ended when Elboo picked him up over her head, and ran off, waving him around the place. Poor kid. I'm sad to have witnessed a piece of size-based discrimination.

A man in the Basketmakers Arms yesterday compared me to David Cameron. He didn't stick around long enough for me to discover what aspect of my appearance / personality / dubious family history caused this association with everyone's favourite potential Tory leader (now Ken and Boris have dropped out of the race), and I hope it's not my refusal to answer questions about cocaine and the use of birds of prey in fox hunts. An Eagle Owl? Honestly! Second only to "Whale Adventure" in Unusual Animal Use This Week.

Well, that and the fact that Little Tom has finally released the Little Dog.

The Cameron comparer, I am also sorry to say, has a stack of videos beside his bed, including Helen Daniels' death. Which makes my copy of Drew's Funeral almost pale in comparison.

I made tomato-bread, which would have been really nice if I hadn't put cinnamon in it. Rosemary, perhaps. Mixed italian herbs, maybe. But cinnamon? What the devil was I thinking?

I've got plenty more to say. It's been a week since I last wrote on here. But for the time being, I shall stop, and will hopefully continue tonight once I return home. I have 25 minutes to history class, and I need to go get coffee and cigarettes and write more abusive messages to the Hegel-remover. Honestly!

"incest-ridden doss house"

2005-11-02T09:58:00.000-08:00

Alice
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
This has to be the coolest phrase I've heard all week.

Bless you Alice. And Happy Birthday!

The teeth of the piano

2005-11-02T09:25:00.000-08:00

chris gets manhandled by me in a basement somewhere
Originally uploaded by bumpoowilly.
Sometimes you underestimate the effect music can have. The week has skuttled past like an otter. Time is short. Sleep is fitful. Poetry night was mildly parodic and sleep took me and we went in search of chips.

I'm in a state of some disassociation at the moment. It's hard to pin down. In Sheffield, perhaps it could be described as wappy. In many ways things couldn't be better. Oh, the eternal conflict between creativity and apathy. Oh, to have the time to work hard and play hard. Work hard, that is, as in have an extended period of creativity, rather than pull pints to pay the rent.

Some people make a living working in banks and shops,
But I pour ale for old men, let them tug upon my mutton chops.

I do love it dearly, however.

Omlettes in cafes, oranges in the soup, walking with sheep. Crouching down in the rolling countryside as a series of fat sheep mutter around us and the rolling hills live up to their name and spin like a classy resteraunt, like, rural.

Clutching a speaker, sitting on a moving trolley and on the ground with grandfather's legacy on my shoulders and taking hold of us. Rosie's feet poked from the bin and it took me and a kindly rasta to free her. Double dates and double whiskys.

I just went into Tom's room. He's had a small dog in there for a few days, and one of those umbrellas they use for school photos. He's been dressing it up in all sorts of outfits, mostly victorian. I don't know where he found the dog. I can only hope he bought it. I have visions of "LOST DOG" posters, accompanied by little 'Claude', sans clownsuit.

Daisy from puppy to dog

2005-10-28T06:38:00.000-07:00

Daisy from puppy to dog
Originally uploaded by beancounter.
As the sticks hit the edges of the drums to let the blues ebb from the keyboard and Graham slinked longlegged around the room in the style of a dinosaur, I saw Tom and Maya sipping water from a large empty cider bottle with a jagged glass spout, placed my foot on the high hat pedal, and rolled once again. Hit it, Tommy.

The afternoon had been regailed with tales of Apple Day, of chickens bearing their sponge riders with competitive glee. The cider recipts piled up in the plastic case, and before long, the clock had struck nine, and I was free to sit on the benches outside with a fine jug of cider and a dragon fruit. We gathered there, and prepared to wander to 'The Party House', or 'The Void', as the kids were calling it these days.

In Budgens, me and wee little Tom took advantage of a three-for-a-£10 red wine offer, and strolled towards Lewes Road, where we instantly found ourselves in a crowded kitchen with electronica glitching its way around the house, together with Gareth all dressed up in a red blouse and black miniskirt and published play. Sam and hats and a rare glimpse of the Phone Master, who looked at us with great concern as to our well-being. Something was calling me. Where had everyone gone. I ended up taking the mic. O god. And the drums, it would seem. No more playing at being a musician. It was time for us to try and break into the animal graveyard.

Up an eight foot wall and down a 20 foot drop, falling through trees like a vehicle in Jurassic Park. Probably not the best idea. So we made like the laidback horse on the other side. Wizened and bearded! Back to the Void. I think I passed out for a bit at this point. Where did everybody go? Suddenly we were the only people in a deserted house. What time was it. Time to press on.

This time to another house with a basement full of musical equipment. Drum kit, keyboard, guitar. Somehow I hung onto my hat and glasses, but my Rabbi card seemed to vanish into the ether. Into the basement. I play improv muttering jazz. "Then help him!". Finding things to smoke. Me and Tommy make the aforementioned slinking blues number. I play the drums. Tommy finally rids the keyboard of Enya sounds. Upstairs, it's a beautiful day. Teddy is asleep. We go out. Stepping out into the light, not buying any health foods, we find ourselves with bananas for breakfast and a bottle of cherry coke. To the park. I play harmonica to a golden statue who shares my height. Maya wades through a circular lake with stepping stones. Tommy becomes a fusion of bicycle and tree and moustache and fine English gentleman and he rides from his cycle sheds in Preston Manor to enjoy a game of football with eager practicing youths. "Look at that little scamp!". Graveyards. Squirrels. Lying on the ground. A man performing unusual motions on a large area of grass in front of the haha. We rendezvous with Tommy for a picnic. Alex jogs past, bottle of water in hand, hair awry.

A bite of the fruit, some pecanned salt, and it is in a state of hyperactive disorder that I meet Anna at the foot of Southover Street. As my eyes flicker in Pavillion Gardens, I hear about Whale Rider. Sleep. I need to sleep.

Won't somebody buy my ironmongery?

2005-10-26T07:45:00.000-07:00

A Crossbreed
Originally uploaded by Dolores Luxedo.
I have to make a living, you see. Pacing the streets, night after night, bearing fine examples of metalwork. A tin of rancid paint is upended, and we skip and slink among the drips. One by one, my companions are devoured by bees. I turn on my heel, and collapse on the spot, only to be carried from the slinky cocktail bar that we failed to get into. The ironmongery lost, and with memories of a battle with an octopus-like creature still fresh in my mind, we ascend the steps in a haze of memory and the working of time.

I think I have begun to find myself a danger to myself. And Dom, Dom is to blame. I have to make a living, you see. Stepping along Meat Street, a true life magazine furled in my hand.

I'm cold, I'm cold.

There there.