Monday, September 17, 2001

Tomorrow night, I'm hoping it doesn't rain; I'll be spending the night in a wooden circlet watching a performance of Cymbeline with a cat and the enemy of anglers everywhere. Should make for a good night, as long as I can avoid thespian spittle and bollock-freezing. The joys of the groundling are many, kids; watching a five-or-so member cast take on 25-plus roles should be just one of them.

If the blog's quiet tomorrow, it's because I'm either working my arse off, or because the computer's still dead and I'm dancing around it, howling and cursing. Take your pick.
11:03 PM | ± | [mail]

Grr.

This blog has been a bit quiet today. A rainy Monday in London town. And why so silent, I hear a couple of disinterested onlookers ask? It's rather simple.

My computer crashed. Again.

This is the third time in about a month. And boy, am I happy about it, as you could probably tell. The annoying thing is that I was in at work on Sunday, actually - shock! horror! - doing some work. Unheard of. But yes, the computer was working fine, shut down OK - the whole shebang. It just wouldn't start up this morning, is all. And I don't mean that it was just being a bit persnicketty and wanted a cup of coffee and a dose of net porn to get going. No. I mean that I got the happy "System Folder? You have a System Folder? Well, I never!" message, with cute graphics and completely useless, don't-even-try-booting-from-the-CD-'cause-I'll-stay-fucked demeanour. Not impressive, either, was the fact that it took about six hours for the tech bloke to bother to come upstairs to find that his knowledge of what was wrong was about the same as mine, and that "we'll have a look at it tomorrow when I can bring up a spare HD.".

Gah.

If the fucker isn't working by 10AM tomorrow, I'm going to be putting in a big order for a) a new G4, b) Mac OSX and c) a fuck-off sized pimpin' stick. Ain't no computer going to slow me down, sucker.

But hey. I'm home, and managed to get through a chunk of The Mysteries of Udolpho on work time - there's absolutely nothing I can do without my computer at work, except drink tea, read, and glare daggers at people playing David Gray in the office, while I listen to atonal noise via headphones - so the day wasn't completely a bust. And just to shift things onto another topic: ooh!. Thanks to Brooke, I know now how to equip my matchbox with some of the most wonderful space-saving doohickies known to humanity. This is good. The pages don't, however, offer any hints as to how to get the financial security needed to actually buy most of said doohickies. This is bad.

Right. More later. Maybe. Mail and stuff are calling.
8:26 PM | ± | [mail]

Sunday, September 16, 2001

Right; as the Dream City FIlm Club play on the stereo, I'm trying to recount what exactly I've been doing this weekend. Thankfully, it's mostly been involving unplugging, in a big, big way - and I'm feeling a little more relaxed for it.

Friday night was spent having a couple of well-needed drinks with the lovely Dawn "Enemy of the people!" Carr, who, as always, was great fun, and even roped me into getting along to a performance of Cymbeline at the Globe before it closes. After a couple of beers, homeward-headed was I, where I ended up getting acquainted with the gift I'd been sent by the godhead that is Russ; a DVD copy of Rushmore that'd been purchased when it was revealed that I hadn't seen the movie. To concur with an opinion posited by Brooke, some days ago, Bill Murray is the fuckin' man. Lovely, lovely film - Max Fisher is like a younger, geekier Ferris Bueller, but with a bit more depth. Hell, he produces school-level productions of Serpico - how can you beat that? The relationship/contest between Murray and Schwartzman is really touching, in places - I'm surprised this gem had escaped my sight for so long. It certainly opened my eyes to the depth that Murray can reach if he's allowed. Just wonderful.

Saturday saw an excursion to the Tate Modern to check out the Juan Muñoz installation, Double Bind. It's fabulously atmopheric: half of the Tate's entrance space has been split into two floors, with two endlessly-cycling elevators installed. Walking on the lower floor is like walking inside a carpark, with light shining down from vents cut into the roof. Inside some of these vents, one can grasp views of a hidden world - sculpted individuals are caught in the act of embarking on secret journeys, turning away from the viewer and appearing to move down hallways, into doors. It's quite creepy in a very David Lynch-like way. If viewed from above, a large flat space is presented, with some vents visible, others being nothing but tromp l'oeil paintings. The elevators are the only things moving, descending and ascending - empty - all the time. If you can imagine the elevator scenes in Angel Heart, that's getting to the level of wierdness that this piece communicates. Well worth it, if you can get down there for a look.

A couple of hours gallery-cruising later - and after picking up a copy of Allen Kurzweil's wonderful A Case of Curiosities, a book I'd read years ago and loved, which isn't surprising given that it's about 18th century automata - Catherine and I made our way to Anna, Rob and Bronni's housewarming, about five minutes away from Waterloo. I was massively impressed by the light-up drinks cabinet in the spectacularly '70s-wallpapered loungeroom, and had a really good time - relaxing, eating, drinking, and impressing all and sundry that not only could I make martinis on command (it was a James Bond-themed housewarming; I dressed in muted tones and feebly joked that I was a generic henchman), I could talk unparallelled amounts of arse after having consumed a couple of said drinks. A good night.

Today saw the shocking realisation that my new haircut, if I go to bed with some styling product or other in it, will, after a night's relaxation, render me tonsorially-identical to Michael Portillo. Not a good thing, you'll agree. But struggle on, I shall. I spent the rest of the day lounging about, cruising through town, and returning home with a) a gigantic sandwich in my bag (god bless Subway and all who sail in 'er) and b) a plan to do bugger-all. Both a) and b) have been pursued with some gusto.

Oh, and I bought Rammstein tickets. While I'm eating soup - in about a week, I'm guessing - I'll keep myself sane with thoughts that come December 2, I will be watching a homoerotic/rock/techno/cheese concert in which large German men will be setting light to themselves. I can't wait.

OK: time to head off. I'm reading Meg's copy of Bill Bryson's tome on Australia, entitled Down Under. He's still a bit of a git - sanctimonious, mayhap? - but it's a nice to read something that gives a more-or-less accurate picture of home. I'm about two-thirds of the way through the thing - I started this afternoon - and I think I want to get it finished before tomorrow. G'night.
10:52 PM | ± | [mail]

Shall blog a little more later, but have been a little taken aback to notice that Ansett Australia has shut up shop. It's weird; the airline's been such a part of the aviation business in Oz - I had a way-cool Matchbox cargo-carrier Ansett-liveried plane when I was ten - that to think of it being not around any more is just bizarre. But still - 16,000 jobless and 45,000 (at least) stranded - fark! It's certainly not aiding trans-Tasman relationships, either, if shite like this apparent pilferage turn out to be true. Yeeps.

Right. Homeward trek. More later.
5:36 PM | ± | [mail]

Friday, September 14, 2001

Lovely stuff: Anna has tracked down a guide to St Dunstan's in the East, the church I was impressed by (amongst others) while rambling around London last weekend.

Today's been a workin' day. Not a lot happening, though to paraphrase Tim Rogers, badly, I got a new hair-cut/that cost me just five quid. That, and a copy of Ackroyd's London biog, and I'm pretty much set for the day.
5:29 PM | ± | [mail]

Excellent relaxation needed? The conoisseur chooses Cliff Yablonski. Why? He hates you, that's why. I was weeping last night after reading some of this. And there's 190-odd pages of it. Cruel, very cruel, but unnaturally funny.
[via tajmahal]
1:36 PM | ± | [mail]

Thursday, September 13, 2001

Exactness is a fake.
-Alfred North Whitehead

No, it doesn't have any woopy-woopy meaning. I was just reading Alexander Roob's Alchemy and Mysticism: The Hermetic Museum and noticed it in the introduction, pertaining to the problem with reconciling what you see with what the facts are - very much a concern with alchemical illustration, which is laden with facts, just waiting for the interpretation to unlock 'em. Lead into gold? Is that a lark or a goose? Reading problems ahoy...
10:42 PM | ± | [mail]

Larva House are an ambient/electronic Japanese pop godsend. Oh yeah.
6:26 PM | ± | [mail]

Let's put Nostradamus in perspective: the man didn't know shit about the AFL...
3:20 PM | ± | [mail]

I've thought it over, and I have to conclude
Bill was right, we're just a "virus with shoes".

Not a lot of posting today. Have been spending a bit of time, while working, listening to Michael J. Sheehy's second album, Ill-Gotten Gains. Recorded in a church in London, though it sounds like early (ie; good)-era Chris Isaak. Same soulful cowboy sensibilities, in a chiming, reverb-filled cage. Brilliant, brilliant stuff; sounds like it was recorded at night, while sitting down with a bottle of the brown in one hand and a broken picture in the other.
2:29 PM | ± | [mail]

Wednesday, September 12, 2001

Go, Aussie go! John Howard condemns the assaults, memorably, as "an act of bastardry". I think that one slipped through the minders - at least he didn't call them "a pack of arseholes". It's a bit like hearing my dad comment on it around the barbie, truly.
4:23 PM | ± | [mail]

Barbelith now has a forum dedicated to the discussion of NY and Washington events. It's good. As is these pages on the WTC; they posit theories about the collapse of the buildings.
1:06 PM | ± | [mail]

Nostradamus in your inbox? As Flavor-Flav would undoubtedly say, don't believe the hype. The rest of the latter site, however, is a pretty cool collection of information on the prognostications of the man. Check it out, if you're interested...
12:51 PM | ± | [mail]

Another day. Yesterday's reportage on this blog was - as Nick pointed out - carrying a couple of circulating rumours; Camp David being hit being the most notable one. Osama bin Laden had made general, warning statements, but it turns out that these do not pertain to these assaults; he's apparently denied responsibility for the attacks, though he supports whoever made them. Apologies to anyone misled by anything here; that's not the intention. Last night's TV seemed to be tending towards the rather reactionary, hence the somewhat panicked musings here, though today sees the media presenting a bit more of a coherent picture. As ever, check the DALnet WTC update page, the BBC and CNN for information. If you want to help financially, there's accounts open here and here to facilitate it.
11:33 AM | ± | [mail]

Tuesday, September 11, 2001

I'm trying to avoid mentioning the current fracas in the states at the moment because it's just doing my head in. In a less-than-comical attempt to recap what I did on the weekend, I have to say that I spent Saturday traipsing across London, looking at Hawksmoor churches and some of the bizarre architecture of the nearly-deserted city. I've photos, which I'll put up when I finish dicking around with them - needless to say, it was a good day, though one that gave me the biggest blisters I've seen. Walking through the financial center of London is quite spooky, on a Saturday - all these gigantic buildings, empty. The streets, largely, too, save for cranes, moving silently, loading steel into the top of buildings.

In all, four Hawksmoor churches were covered: I'll detail them later, but a special mention has to go to Christ Church, Spitalfields, that is in the throes of being restored. It's awesome - we were passing just as one of the trustees was leaving, and she asked if we'd like to have a look around. The vertiginous exterior seems too small to contain the vast space inside - it's just unreal. I can't recommend enough that you get along to the open day they're having on the 23rd of September. The space is awe-inspiring. As, coincidentally, if you can find it, a bombed-out church in the city - St Dunstan's In-The-East. I'll post more when I get my memory back, but the walls are covered with ivy, and the interior is now a park. Brilliant, brilliant space.

Sunday was spent watching movies and finishing The Illuminatus! Trilogy, which is entirely undeserving of the praise heaped upon it. Fucking thing. I threw it across the room when I'd finished. Still, the day wasn't totally lost - The Name of the Rose and City of Lost Children got an airing, the latter being the coolest by far, if only for the design, the sheer size of Ron Perlman, and the way Krank pronounces the phrase "Silence, legume!".

Last night was spent catching the production of Cloudstreet at the National Theatre. I don't know what I can say about it except that it was totally brilliant. On top of today's grim mood, I'm feeling the pangs of homesickness because of the show. The Aussie accents, the vernacular; it was a suckerpunch, pure and simple. The acting was fantastic - Roy Billing looks like my dad! I have to say, too, that the two sets of parents (Billings, Gillian Jones, the fabulously husky Kris McQuade and John Gaden), Daniel Wyllie's Fish Lamb and Christopher Pitman's Quick Lamb, as well as Claire Jones' playing Rose Pickles were all outstanding. A minimal set, 10 player playing over 30 characters, and a minimal selection of props that set the scene instantly; it's one of the best things I've seen. It manages to condense the novel fairly well - and I'm exhorting you again to go read it - but the impact of the ending is lost a little, I think. Still, the five hours flew past. Though I didn't get teary, as I did at the book's end, there were moments of true sadness, and easy joy. Good stuff.

So I said I wouldn't mention Today. So I failed. I'm a stranger. This isn't my country, and it's not the country of the problem, either. Russ is probably your best bet: his blog has had a shitload of info so far, and tells what it's like to be an American right now. I'm scared for him, and all the other Americans I know, and stupidly, selfishly, I'm scared for myself. Blair supports Dubya, and makes himself and his country a target too, by default, depending on how this thing is handled. The "analysis" so far on the TV has tended towards the right-wing and the reactionary. It's as if they're making the assumption, largely, that war has already begun, and we're just waiting for the big boy to say that's how it is. If that's the case, I don't know what's going to happen, but I have the terrible feeling that none of it's good.

Metafilter's thread on the thing is worth your while. As are many of the US blogs that're telling how shit's going down on a grassroots level. I need to go and switch off for a while.
11:41 PM | ± | [mail]

For more, unofficial reports: DALnet's WTC update is well worth a look. So too is these two collections of images. Even worse? It was, apparently, predicted.
5:17 PM | ± | [mail]

TheRegister covers the developing story, with information about the lack of Internet coverage. Apparently, too, Tom Clancy has just called the attacks a "noteworthy incident".

Dickhead.
4:58 PM | ± | [mail]

Camp David has just been hit by a plane - other planes have been reported as down, too; Russ tells me that all Federal buildings, marketplaces and airports are locked down. The lower-half of Manhattan is in the process of being evacuated. There's rumours of more planes in the air; hijacked. The stockmarket's ratshit. They're evacuating buildings all over the place. What the fuck is happening?
4:34 PM | ± | [mail]

Here's some more on the terrorist attacks: BBC and CNN. The second tower just fell over, and there's apparently another hijacked aircraft, on way to Washington. Apparently, there's a car-bomb outside the Capitol building, also, and a second explosion's been recorded at the White House. Discuss it on Barbelith here, as it's pretty much the only site with information that I can seem to get through to.
3:37 PM | ± | [mail]

I can't get into a working news site at the moment, but the state of play seems to be this: two planes have crashed into the WTC in New York. One of the towers has now collapsed. Another hijacked plane has crashed into the Pentagon, which is now on fire. Whoever's responsible, I fear, will be completely annihlated. Set your international relations back a couple of years, kids. Links when I can actually get in.
3:23 PM | ± | [mail]

Fucking hell. Two planes have just crashed into the World Trade Centre in New York. One's supposedly a United B737 that'd been hijacked earlier.

This is not good.
2:43 PM | ± | [mail]

Today is composer Arvo Pärt's birthday today. If you've never heard the man's compositions before, then I heartily urge you to seek out copies of the Naxos discs that've been released, or the ECM-released Tabula Rasa, if you're a bit more cashed-up. I've previously ranted on a little about his discography here; as you can guess, he's a favourite of mine. About whom I've rabbited on enough, with disturbing regularity. Sigh. Just give his stuff a listen; you won't regret it.

Anyway. Happy Birthday, Arvo!
12:34 PM | ± | [mail]

Jeb can resist CCs. He's a stronger man than I, you know.
11:53 AM | ± | [mail]

-And if we can't kick Fred Durst's ass, I don't want to do it.

Attagirl, Courtney. She'll do it, too. The link leads to a minimal NME piece on the singer-guitarist's new band, Bastard.
10:12 AM | ± | [mail]

Monday, September 10, 2001

Good: a lawsuit against copy-protected CDs has kicked off. Bad: it's against an independent label, not a major, so probably won't make that many waves.
2:18 PM | ± | [mail]

This is my kind of themepark. Hot damn.
[via nutlog]
2:12 PM | ± | [mail]

One of the most influential film-reviewers, Pauline Kael, has died. Noted for hating The Sound of Music but digging Last Tango In Paris, her reviewing style was important in revitalising the film industry in the '70s, though her critical nepotism could be fairly obvious at times. Salon has some great articles in their Kael section, including a couple of worshipful pieces. I'd recommend, however, her thoughts on writing disrespectfully.

On retirement - she hadn't reviewed since 1991 - she suggested that

"Old critics tend to become tiresome, and I didn't want to be one of those old farts."

If only more critics were gifted with such perceptiveness. Here's hopin' I got it.
2:02 PM | ± | [mail]

So I took the test. And it turns out that my Brother in Weblogging is Brad. (Followed by Jish and Zannah. For reference, people I actually know came in sixth, seventh and tenth in degrees of twin-ness.)

Be afraid, people. Be very afraid. If I'm like you, then that means you're like me, surely? Eek.
[via plasticbag.org]
1:12 PM | ± | [mail]

Today's musical discovery is Sappington. They're a two-piece who bear a passing musical resemblance to Low - I'd imagine any slow, minimalist band with a female singer are getting pretty jack of that description - but they sport a take on the genre that sets them apart. I can't place my finger on it, but I really like it. Download a couple of songs from their Epitonic site - I particularly like "Submarine Mission" - and give 'em a go...
12:59 PM | ± | [mail]

An AOL user has claimed to have been present at the Jon Benet Ramsey killing - and now Colorado investigators are attempting to get the information that'll identify that user from the company. If it's a hoaxer, expect the hammer to come down, hard.
12:24 PM | ± | [mail]

Fraser (whose burglary fucking sucks) has listed another example of Kilburn's "colourful" characters. The walk home along Finchley Road now seems unusually quiet in comparison - especially when it's remembered that there's a good chance that this is the chippy that I used to frequent.

I'll never complain about the heat in Hampstead Delight ever again.
10:48 AM | ± | [mail]

I owe someone an Amazon thankyou. I don't know who, not yet, but someone out there's gettin' thanked. Mark my words.
10:31 AM | ± | [mail]