Merda D’Artista

It’s Hallowe’en again, which if the Torygraph is to be believed will result in our streets being thonged with deranged hoodies, demanding sweets on pain of eggs and flour from decent, hard-working families all for some terrible thing that isn’t even proper British but American and is nothing like guising at all, oh no.

Disappointingly, there doesn’t seem to be much of a Satanic Panic going on this year, which is always good for a laugh.

Panics are always better when Satan is, as you like, invoked. Especially when it is put against Wicca, which is less of a sinister witch cult and more of a nature-loving thing invented by a civil servant from Liverpool.

I remember reading a book (not as far as I know affiliated with the Wicca in anyway) which mentioned making love potions.

Apparently you need a talisman from the person in question. The best thing was either a pubic hair or some of their menstrual blood. Which begs the question, if you are able to obtain either of these things either you don’t need the potion or you are a very disturbed individual.

But the day after Hallowe’en is All Saints’ Day. What’s more talismanic than all the saints in the world, all together on the same day, rocking out, as it were?

I’ve long been a fan of saints, the best thing about Catholicism in my opinion. You’ve got loads of them, for every eventuality, you can have new ones, there’s a hierarchy. If only they have avatars like in Hinduism they’d be perfect. I can see where the Candomblé people are coming from.

One of my favourite saint-related things are the so-called incorruptibles and the odour of sanctity. I have a horrible feeling that when I die, I won’t emanate a heavenly scent. It’ll probably smell strongly of hummus. The non-saint I consider to be a master of parodying such things has to be Piero Manzoni, who made efforts to preserve his breath and sell his shit.

Also every saint has a talisman, from St Sebastian and his arrows, to St Agatha and her hacked-off breasts.

What would your talisman be? And, is there a patron saint of blogging? Because there should be. I shall write to the Vatican about this forthwith.

She Gets So Hungry At Night She Eats Her Jewellery

You may heard if you are interested in such things, but for those who are not a massive shopping centre, supposedly the third biggest in the country is opening around 15 minutes walk from my house.

I’m conflicted on this. On one hand, it will be quite useful to have the common shops within walking distance of my house, a situation that I haven’t managed since I lived in Bristol. Christmas shopping (unless I get my act together and buy everything on the interwebs and sent it all to my parents’ house already gift wrapped which, truth be told well never happen) should be made easier. Impulsive visiting of the Waitrose deli counter will be made as easy as a walk in the park. They might tart up the Green a bit.

On the other hand I have a horrible vision of the Green turning into a cross between Notting Hill and High Street Kensington without any of those places’ redeeming points. There is already a shopping centre with a cinema, which I assume will eventually become completely empty, unless Argos ends up striding it like a collusus. Or Peacocks (I can’t see that happening). And the nightclubs will be filled in with concrete.

Still… hooray for capitalism!

I Am The Fly

Various wires expressed in the form of music:

• The Wire. Supposedly the best television series ever, but of course I’ve never seen it. Which makes it the new Sopranos as far as I’ve concerned. Often featured musicwise, according to the Guardian, the Pogues, Mos Def and Marvin Gaye.
• The Wire. Music magazine that wouldn’t think twice about featuring a composition comprising of cats purring or someone who amplifies the valves of their trumpet with contact microphones.
• Wire. Punk band who look like geography teachers with exceptionally brief songs. Like this one.
• Wired. Technological periodical. Not sure what kind of music they like.
• Totally Wired. Song by the Fall. About amphetamine I would assume.
• Wires. Song by Athlete. About incubators I would assume.

Who is your favourite?

The Bell Jar

There is a long-standing tradition (in fact it should be a fallacy really with its own name and chapters in books on literary criticism as it is so popular) that all art is autobiographical. In the most part, novels are rarely overtly autobiographical (except for the debut novel which is usually a painfully earnest tale about someone becoming a writer) although of course there are often autobiographical elements in there. But the narrator and author are two different people with possibly contradictory opinions on things.

Which reminds me of blogging somewhat. We have an author (the me that exists in the “real” world) and the narrator of this blog “Billy”. Billy looks like me and occupies the same body, but is often different.

I am restricted though, by my editorial policy which states that I’m not allowed to make things up on this blog. I can take things to absurdity, conflate situations, muse inwardly but I can’t make something up out of nothing. But if I didn’t have such a policy… why, I could do anything!

Well not quite, because I’m always going to have some kind of restriction, even if it is a rather outwardly pointless ouilipo type manoeuvre. Trying a new approach was part of the reason for my alternative blog, which has a different, but secret (for now) editorial policy. (Also the individual authors of that blog may have different editorial policies that contradict mine, or they may have none at all)

Regardless of this, however, there is a school of thought that states unless you are writing a blog as an appropriately outrageous “character” everything you say is what you think in the real world. Which is clearly not true. The artificiality of the situation works against that; you find yourself writing in a particular style which isn’t necessarily the most natural one for you. Plus you are either shouting to an empty room or desperate to prove to yourself that someone is listening.

The same thing happens with poets and singer-songwriters leading to much misunderstanding. I’m all for self-mythologising but this can be taken too far.

What do you think? Do your blogging and real selves get along, or do they argue?

Who Ya Gonna Call?

Idly browsing through wikipedia the other day, I noticed a stunning similarity in the appearance of collage artist Kurt Schwitters, maker of the Cathedral of Erotic Misery.

and master droll actor Bill Murray

Could they possibly be related?

St. John Of The Cross Did His Best Stuff Imprisoned In A Box

Because I haven’t done anything relating to “toilet science” for a while. I thought I’d mention this.

I had a moment of inspiration the other day. I have decided to write a book.

But when can I find the time with my busy, modern lifestyle? (Sorry, I’m making myself laugh at that idea)

The idea hit me this morning though, why not write it on the toilet? Most people do things like crosswords and read comics but I’m going to write a book. I have a nice book of graph paper (they didn’t have the narrow rule A4 paper I like in Rymans, dammit!) and I intend to write something in it every time I’m… erm… occupied.

If I knew where to get index cards, I could write the whole book on them. They are the perfect size for keeping in the toilet after all. Plus I could have the satisfaction of ripping off the working methods of Nabokov.

It also has the plus point that if I’m short of blogging material, I can plagiarise it and post it up here, like today.

I can feel a small bead of sweat slowly dribbling down my back. It makes me uncomfortable as I am very aware of it, slowly running between the shoulder blades and down the lower back. I attempt to cool myself down by blowing upwards, sending some of my hair up slightly, but not cooling me down much at all.

There is a bit of grit under my fingernail, resulting, I think, from a crust of bread, or possibly an olive. And I’m late. Again. (I’m not late very often, having as I do a pathological fear of being late)

You get the idea.

Right I’m going to have a bath now, as I do every single Sunday. I am a creature of habit, depressingly so.

Six To Eight Black Men

I’ve seen two adverts promoting Christmas products just now.

How strange, I was under the impression it was October.

There’s only one thing for it, to drown my sorrows. With mince pies. And egg nog.

Snapshots Make A Girl Look Cheap

Excuse me? a voice said.

Yes, I said, attempting to remove the correct earphone.

Do you mind swapping seats? continued the voice and the owner of the voice indicated another person who was sat opposite, That way we can sit together.

I pondered for a moment.

In theory I would like to swap seats, I said. But there is a small problem. You see, I can tell from cursory examinations of your clothing and demeanour, not to mention the fact that I’m a totally judgemental bastard, that you are a freshly-forged couple, probably on your first visit to London and if I swap seats I’m going to have to sit directly opposite you and you are probably going to make me want to puke with all of your demonstrative lovey-dovey activities, which I will keep accidentally seeing out of the corner of my eye and which will distract me from my other highly important tasks; like reading a book, trying to guess who is going to get off at which station and deciding which person on this carriage has the best shoes.

Well, obviously it’s me, came the reply and the shoes were displayed to me in a studied-casual fashion.

Not bad, I said, but it’s not going to convince me to give up my seat. This seat is right at the end of the carriage and I do get rather pleasant blasts of cool air across me every time a train goes past the other way. The seat I will swap for affords none of these advantages.

Look, was the reply. You are right it is our first visit here and J—- and I may annoy you with our irritating tweeness and easy-going affection for each other, but consider this: if we were sat opposite we’d have to talk louder so that we could hear each other and you’d overhear annoying elements of our conversation over the quiet bits of your music and that would be far more annoying to you than an occasional peck on the cheek and/or hair ruffle don’t you think?

You have a good point, I said, but I’m still not 100% convinced. You see, I think you’ll only be on this train for one or two stops so the shouting won’t be too bad. Plus, what with it being a hot day for this time of year, the window at the end of the train carriage is wide open so I doubt you’ll be able to maintain a decent conversation for any length of time. Not to mention that because this carriage is so noisy, I’ll be careful to select “noisy” music so there won’t be any quiet bits.

Maybe this will convince you, was the reply and the bag that was being held was angled slightly differently so I could make out the details of the title and author on the spine.

Unbearable Lightness of Being? I said and, suddenly overcome by embarrassment, got off the train at the next stop before I bored everybody about how fucking wonderful Milan Kundera was although of course this book wasn’t his finest and so on and so forth.

They got their seat and as the train pulled out and I looked to see how long the next one was going to be, I noticed them taking the two seats.

Comfort Reading

My insomnia, like my hayfever, is characterised by being just annoying enough to affect me, but not bad enough for me to want to do much about it. It’s a bit like when you’re in a taxi, and the taxi driver has the radio on and you have to strain to hear it and the slightest noise will prevent you from hearing it. Better I suppose than having it on a ear-splittingly loud volume, but irritating none the less.

Anyway, I often wake up in the middle of the night and find it difficult to get back to sleep. Not impossible, mind, but it is difficult and therefore annoying.

The best way to get back to sleep, for me at least, is to read. This does occassionally result in my waking up with the bedside lamp on, which is annoying as well as a waste of electricity but it is better than lying awake, become convinced the ceiling is going to fall in or something.

I used to try listening to music as a way to get to sleep but it isn’t as good. It is perfect when you’re trying to get to sleep the first time, and you may have had a little bit to drink and it helps you fall asleep naturally. Even then you have to be careful as you don’t want something that is too intense and you’ll try and listen to. That is bad.

Books on the other hand are much better, despite the disadvantage of needing the light on. I don’t read under the covers with a torch, that is for people who are different from the other kids in school and who are slightly awkward, that kind of thing.

When I visit my parents, I often use the books I read as a child. This goes against my normal technique, which is never to revisit childhood things in case they don’t live up expectations. But I was at home, there wasn’t anything else to read without venturing downstairs for some CLR James, and so I re-read a lot of childhood books.

(Edited conclusion: Charlotte’s Web is nothing short of amazing, although I still don’t get why the pig is so lauded by everyone when it’s all about the spider.  The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is okay, although, bloody hell, it’s right preachy isn’t it? Roald Dahl: obviously good.)

But when I’m here I don’t have children’s books handy. So the ideal book is something straightforward, that I am very familiar with. Then the sleep will come.

I don’t have enough shelf-space for all my books, so books that will fit that description will be by my bed.

Looking now however, Thomas Pynchon seems to be there.

How did that happen?

Gordon Is A Mormon

One of my ongoing projects is looking out for people on the tube who don’t succum to the tyranny of the Associated Newspapers empire and bring their own reading material on the journey to work in the morning.

Then I congratulate them. Inwardly, naturally, I wouldn’t presume to talk to them.

This morning I got on a suitable stuffed tube only for everyone to unexpectedly clear out at Hammersmith. I managed to glean a seat between two people with non-Metro leanings.

I for my part was reading Journey to the End of the Night. Every time I get it out of my bag, I feel a certain frisson. I’m convinced someone is going to accost me and enquire as to why I’m reading a book by “that misogynistic Nazi prick“. This hasn’t happened yet though.

One of my non-Metro persons was smartly-dressed, smelling of washing powder, wearing a tie, looking somewhat earnest and reading a book the only words I could make out looking over his shoulder without looking odd were “Joseph Smith” and “missionary”. He must have been a Mormon.

On my other side was a teenage girl with split ends, reading a heavily annotated book which she was marking with further highlighter pen movements.

They are now my favourite two people. I was considering inviting them to my flat. We’d have tea and biscuits (obviously I’d ship in some barley cup) and discuss the sinister encroucement of free newspapers in the capital.

Then we’d work on our forthcoming treatise: Misogyny, Baptism of the Dead and Cracked Spines: Fun for All.