Boe Faced

Much disappointment on my trip to Brighton yesterday, when I didn't get to see the main object of my visit, who appeared to be out of town. Still, at least I got to see Space Pig.

Uncomfortable moments over dinner, when the contentious subjects of evolution, religion and intelligent design were raised in the midst of what had been a remarkably light-hearted and good-natured day. The dread silence was broken only by the snarfling of pepperoni.

That's pizza for you. Me, I prefer pastafarianism.

Just 'cause you feel it, doesn't mean it's there

I've been limiting my internet activity for the last week or so for a couple of reasons. Firstly, I went to a stag weekend that, while tremendous fun, took a little longer than usual to recover from. Secondly, this week I've really gone back to work, with all the attendant pain which that involves. Fact is, I haven't really wanted to spend too much time staring at a computer screen, which can only be healthy...

Anyway.

Working from home today, which allows me the luxury of starting a little later, and hence the opportunity to have a morning browse of the newspaper. And, as is my wont, I've started noticing patterns. Patterns about patterns, and how to interpret them (or not, depending on what you're looking for, or trying to prove). A paranoid would-be literary critic's dream...

All from today's Guardian, I'm afraid:

CIA fail to find messages to terrorists in TV broadcasts.

The martians aren't coming.

Global warming hits 'tipping point'.

Right: to work now. Poo.

Spam update

I don't receive spam emails at home, my somewhat meagre prophylactic measures having had the required effect.

At work, however, where they have sufficient budget and personpower that you would think they would be able to prevent this kind of botherage, spam seems to be a real problem.

Emails this morning from:

• Bucketed I. Stealthy
• Bibiana Huynh
• Furr Christopher

The last one makes me feel vaguely uneasy...

Hi ho, hi ho

Back to work today, what joy.

I'd anticipated somewhere in the region of 400 emails which would, at the very least, need deleting. In actual fact, I got off much lighter than that, with a total of 267. Once I'd got rid of the spam, the circulars, the one with the 10MB attachment (and the related "Your mailbox is over its size limit, what a shame disk storage isn't dirt cheap these days"), and the ones I frankly couldn't be arsed with, I had it down to a much more manageable 30. Which I'll deal with tomorrow. Or on one of the days which will, inevitably, follow.

Most fun for the day was to be had in my "junk email folder", where the senders of said junk are demonstrating unparalleled levels of either boredom or inventiveness these days. Not in the contents of said junk, obviously: like any good geek, I'd rather set about the insides of my computer with a blowtorch than even try to open something from someone I don't know, particularly when they seem to think that penis enlargement is a priority of mine.

No, the amusement was to be had in running down the names of the aliases employed by whichever spambot it was that had seen fit to send the stuff to me in the first place. In times gone by, these emails would disguise themselves behind the name "John Smith" or "Jane Brown" in a desperate attempt to assume the identity of someone in your contact list. These days, the aliases assume middle initials, and these are the best examples I found today:

• Scald I. Exactness
• Shrieking B. Roget
• Prickly I. Sheers
• Monkey L. Rebounding
• Constance L. Engined
• Rejoining H. Agitated
• Valve H. Crosier
• Anecdote V. Volstead
• Ruses C. Sternly
• Nobody O. Nicaragua
• Glances S. Resuscitating
• Lorentz H. Laxness
• Granularity J. Being
• Cellphones V. C*nt (ahem, rude word)
• Staunch H. Gorgeous
• Yves G. Sidelight

My favourites, as will have been guessed by now by anybody who knows me even vaguely well, were of course Monkey L. Rebounding and Granularity J. Being.

The only question outstanding is: what do those darn middle initials actually stand for...?

Oedipa goes for a walk, but Fevvers will fly

I blogged for a couple of months last year, when I had enough time free from work - and thought I had enough to say - for it to seem worthwhile. When work began to take over my life again, as work invariably will, I stopped. And doubted that I would start again.

The blog lay unattended for a year, gradually slipping down the google ratings until it vanished from view. Occasionally I thought about removing it. I don't regret a word I wrote, but friends I've spoken to about it since have been honest enough to say that they didn't often recognise the voice which I had employed as "my own"; so, for their benefit, I thought about excising it from the record. But I was, goshdarnit, just too busy to get around to it.

About a month ago I received an email from a stranger describing themselves as "An Acquaintance". I read it, and it made my neck prickle; until I realised that it was indeed from a stranger, and was merely a comment which had been made against my last post (email notification of such comments being one of the services which those kind folks at Blogger offer). In his comment, this chap (I assume that he is a chap) had asked a simple question about one of my favourite books, The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon.

The fact that strangers were still looking at my blog was comforting, and made me decide not to remove it after all. I looked at the webstats provided by my isp, and saw that I was clocking up 40-50 hits a day on average (not all of which are searchbots!). I found this flattering, if slightly unnerving. And then, of course, I started to contemplate the possibility of posting here again.

As you might have read in recent posts, I'm taking a bit of time off work again. So it's much easier to start maintaining a blog at the moment. I'm going back to work again soon (possibly next week, if I feel well enough), and I'd really like to carry on posting, if that's possible. It's fun, and it's therapeutic to have some kind of outlet, however ephemeral.

I promised my strange acquaintance that I would try to re-read Lot 49, and post about it on my blog. I'm not going to have time to do that, though. I've read Pynchon's book about eight times, and I have enough books sitting around on my shelves that I haven't read yet to make me realise that I'm not likely to get around to it again any time soon. So, by way of a consolation, I've posted something which I wrote about it a while back. Ten years ago, to be precise.

A few words of warning. It's long (over 7,000 words, including trimmings). It isn't concerned wholely with Lot 49, as it also considers one of my other favourite books, Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus. And, as befits the purpose which it was originally intended to serve, it has more than a whiff of the academy about it.

However.

I've read through it today (OCR software, like all other software, is not 100% reliable), and I'm not unhappy with it. This is unusual for something I wrote over ten years ago. I'd go so far, in fact, as to say that it is the closest I have ever come to articulating my world view, my philosophy of life.

I wouldn't recommend you read it if you don't have time, or if literary criticism as it was taught in British universities about ten years ago gets your back up (goodness knows, it gets mine up). But if you want to know what I believe, and what drives me, then here it is.

I've posted it in html format, and in MS Word format (which is a little better laid out, and paginated so that you can tell how far you have to struggle before you reach the end).

Peace.

The war on terror is over

Say hello to the global struggle against the enemies of freedom.

More about freedom.

Clearly male

Seek and ye shall find, I reckon. Waddya reckon the elusive and enlightening "14th fragment" was...?

Nun hugging update

Returned from Dom's stag (a very good time, thanks for asking) to find I'd received an email from Hopkinov. Turns out he'd been perambulating around Krakow and had found himself very nearly sandwiched between two separate parties consisting of (he estimated) up to 35 nuns altogether. Concerns about his own personal hygiene meant that he forsook the opportunity to hug even one of them. However, a few moments later, he was passed by a busload of 'em, one whom managed a shy wave in his direction; so he's obviously emitting the right kind of vibes.

Come on kids! Let's make it happen!

Here's a picture that made me smile this morning.

Smoke lingers round your fingers

Laugh? When I saw this I nearly spat out my teeth...

(Cheers to sevateem from the outpost for the link).

Flame off

My very good fri3nd Dom popped round last night for some brief respite from frenzied wedding preparations: and also because he's a little bit worried about me.

I have a chronic condition that can be severely exacerbated by stress, and I realised on my return to work from holiday this Monday morning that I was re-entering a potentially hazardous environment. Working on the principle that prevention is better than cure, and with my employers' blessings, I absented myself from this environment.

I now have a note from my doctor which says that for one week I am medically incapable of working. I've been treating it as an extension to my (well-deserved) holiday, and an opportunity to do some thinking about exactly what it is that I want to do in this world.

My fri3nds and family, with their memories of the acute crisis which I went through a year or so ago (which is detailed in earlier posts to this blog), have naturally been a little concerned. And I've been doing my best to reassure them that I'm fine, just taking it easy and thinking about stuff.

Dom seemed to be suitably reassured during his visit last night (tho' I've told him, and some other people that I care about, to keep an eye on me over the next week or two). As he departed to re-enter the wedding maelstrom, I asked him for a suggestion as to what I could do today to pass the time in a relaxing manner. We discussed a couple of options, then settled upon a bicycle ride around Richmond Park.

This had still been my plan earlier today, but by the time I returned from my very late breakfast the Metropolitan Police Commissioner was advising Londoners to stay exactly where they were.

After watching the TV news for long enough to reassure myself that London remained intact, I decided instead to take a stroll along the overgrown abandoned railway path that lies at the bottom of my street. Dom introduced me to this, a couple of years back, before I moved to the area. For a while, we flirted with the idea of making a film down there, a ghost story or something like that. We haven't yet abandoned the notion, but what with busy jobs, shift work and imminent weddings, it's hard to find the time.

You know how it is.

So I set off with my camera, thinking about scouting potential locations, or at the very least taking a snap which I could post here, on my blog. The path, as usual, was pretty deserted. A few hundred yards ahead of me, I could see a family out together, walking their dog. I passed a bearded gentleman, sitting reading his newspaper, and we nodded at each other. The sun was just coming out, there was a nice breeze, and the path is shady and secluded enough that you can almost - almost - believe that you are not in London.

I was walking at the very leisurely pace which I deliberately employ when I am not working or in a hurry to get anywhere. Despite this, I made a good deal of ground on the family who were walking in front of me. It then became apparent that this was not a family, but a group of four "youths" (to use the noun usually employed on local news bulletins). Two of them were were wearing hoods, and the dog was stout and bow-legged.

I paused.

One of the known symptoms of my chronic condition is "excessive risk-taking behaviour". The people that I care about will be heartened to learn that after a brief pause, I turned and went back the way I had come. My post about nun-hugging t'other day was fresh in my mind; along with the rather alarming Wikipedia entry to which I linked.

I'm in a pub as I write this (I intend to transcribe it when I get back home). I'm not drinking out of anxiety, or to calm my shattered nerves. I'm drinking because it is my custom, when I am not working, to have a single pint of my favourite beer at around 5pm. I feel totally unflustered, and am looking forward to having a couple of pints with my fri3nd Jerry in a Camden bar later this evening.

We owe it to ourselves, these days, to be just a little bit more sensible in how we approach the world. To decide when a risk is, or is not, worth taking. And to look out for ourselves and the people we care about.

I'll walk along the path tomorrow instead, and if I take a picture worth posting then I'll do so. In the meantime, here's a picture that Dom emailed me this morning. You can work out what it says about the world in the twenty-first century yourselves.

Peace.

It's Moon Day!

Yup, 36 years to the day since a team of NASA technicians and special effects wizards created the conspiracy theory to end them all. In honour of this special day, the nice people at google have posted this map which details all of the supposed moon "landings". Zoom right in to get the full effect.

Me, I have no doubt that armstrong was the first man on the moon, as this clip, unearthed by Fraser, proves (nb bad language, you have been warned).

Seems about right to me

I've obviously got too much time on my hands.

Off to bed.

Oh no!

More Krakow musings: during my trip I'd picked up antagonism towards the city's burgeoning tourist trade; as might be expected, more from the now alienated expat anglophone community than from the Poles themselves. So therefore, and as is pretty usual for me, I'd been reluctant to get the camera out.

On my last afternoon, Saturday, Hopkinov and myself flanned around the park that encircles the city centre, looking to capture the image of a nun (any nun!) which I planned to use to illustrate yesterday's post. They were, curiously enough for Krakow, pretty hard to locate; but we got one in the end.

Anyway, heading back into town, I'd conquered my photographic abashment enough to take some snaps of the pretty buildings and churches with which Krakow is blessed. Then I spotted this guy.

Thinking I'd capture some local colour, I framed him; and as you'll see from the snap, he turned, and caught the camera's gaze. I was embarrassed enough to try to engage him in conversation (having managed, in four days, to double my Polish vocabulary, from one to two words). And, as Hopkinov pointed out, I had yet to get my mum a present. So I bought one of his pretty bird-shaped ornaments. At only eight zlotychs it would have been extraordinarily rude not to.

There was the usual currency nightmare as I tried to locate a note small enough that I would not fear he would club me over the head and break for the border rather than return my change. But this finally circumvented, I turned and made to dash for the safety of the cafes of the Rynek Glowny. Then Hopkinov tapped me on the shoulder.

The gentleman was offering me his (frankly unsavoury looking) bottle of water. "He wants you to wet your whistle," Hopkinov told me. "It's traditional".

So, somewhat cautiously, I took the proferred bottle, placed it to my lips and took the smallest possible sip.

At which our friend let out an unholy shriek: "Oh no!" (for he had at least two more words of English than I did of Polish), and leapt across his tray of pretty birds to grab the bottle from my mouth.

My mistake was simple. I was with Hopkinov, a man whose own father had once described him as "the human equivalent of a mixed metaphor". I have known Hopkinov for ten years, and have never once in that time heard him utter a sentence which had only a simple literal meaning. Until now.

The pretty bird shaped ornament was, of course, a whistle. And, as the gentlemen demonstrated, having rescued the bottle from my grasp, his intention had been that I actually wet the whistle that I had just purchased from him. As I found out later, the whistle itself is pretty useless in an unhydrated state.

So we strode off, Hopkinov and I, he laughing and expressing gratitude that it had not been a bottle of methylated spirits (or worse, for we have drunk much, much worse, Hopkinov and I, over these years) which I had raised to my lips.

And the point is: sometimes to achieve clarity of meaning and purpose it is necessary that we speak literally, and are understood to do so.

And sometimes it isn't.

Hug a nun

Just got back from Krakow, having finally gotten around to my much-delayed visit to see my very good fri3nd Hopkinov in what's now become his native environment. A very enjoyable break, which I may post further about. If I get time.

Being from London and all, I seemed to spend a fair amount of time discussing July 7th with the nice folks that I met. I also brought tidings of a new craze that we've yet to export to Poland along with our beer boys: I speak of course of happy slapping.

Hopkinov, being a gentle (if troubled) soul, was naturally appalled. He told me that often while he walked the streets of Krakow he had to fight back the impulse to hug a nun. This to me sounded so very much preferable to happy slapping that it seemed to come from another universe.

But, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls: if we put our minds to it, we can make that universe our own. So go on. Hug a nun. Increase the store of love in the world.

And the next time you feel inclined (as we all do, from time to time) to employ the oedipal noun (I'm talking to cheeky live 8 pop stars in particular): try, instead, to use the noun "nunhugger" instead.

Be alert.

A totem for our age...

Uh, more soon. I think.