From my kitchen window I can see a convenience store. In front of the store there used to be a silver sports car with its tires slashed. I found that sight to be comforting, as it was a pleasant mix of unattainability and wanton destruction. But today when I looked out the window, in place of the sports car, there is a van with "dial a keg" written on it.
Anyway my day is ruined!
These days I have wireless at home, so I don't need to go into work at the weekend. Also I download music. I was disappointed to see that the first result for Richman on youtube is "Dancing at the Lesbian Bar" It is a great clip, but he has done so many other great tracks, such as Roadrunner (that Bob Dylan even played). It is a great video, but...
As part of "my research" for this post you can see another side of the modern lovers.
Last weekend I read "The non-designers design book". This was an
useful short book on making documents look cool and interesting. The
book was all about choosing fonts and layouts . As I write most of
documents using latex, where Knuth has made most of the design
decisions for me already, this may be of less relevance. However for
talks and seminars, I am getting bored of seeing the same style files
constantly in use.
I was intersted to see that it is better not to center everying on the page, but it can look better to either left or right justify text and pictures.
There are four basic principles
Perhaps I will now try reading Designers Are Wankers
On a red roof close by, a fat bloated seagull pottered about. Two bad omens for the start of good Friday.
The invisibles are a 5 person cell fighting authority using violence time travel, and various other chemicals and meditation highs. Pure fantasy reading, well perhaps not.
The bus stop for the bus I take to work overlooks a canel. One day there was yellow sign on the grass by the canal warning people not to walk there, because a company was spraying for Japanese wank weed. On the other side of the canal men in huge black gas masks were marching up and down with huge yellow casks on their backs. People mostly ignored the signs, when their dogs need to shit, no deadly weed is going to stop them.
At work more workman walk outside my office on the concrete balcony wearing huge shiny gas masks and muttering to each other in some strange topologically twisted language. The building manager said they were removin asbestos. But that doesn't seem likely for a building built in the 1960s.
One day I walked out to the bus stop. There was a cracked car, its windows were all shattered. White silky fluid was sprayed all over the car. When I came home at night, the car was gone. Perhaps someone was trying to reach me, to give me some kind of message, but was stopped. Too many strange things are happening close to the canal.
I don't want to ring your depression bell, but I have predicted my
own death. The picture is of my stove top. If you look at carefully
you will see that gas is still on. I only use the minimum amount of gas, so
that my beans come slowly to the boil. However sometimes I forget to
turn the gas off, partly because it not very noticable. One day I will
forget and the flames will start, and my bones will become crispy.
Note that one of the reasons that I have survived past the age of 40 is that I know that cooking hot food after coming home from the pub is as dangerous as smoking cigarettes. I am talking about normal day time cooking.
It is very hard to focus on my life, when I know that it will be ended by my need for a can of beans.
I was planning on showing a picture of an expensive car, perhaps a
Porsche, that is parked in the parking area of my flat. This was to
demonstrate that I live in a reasonable area. However, I thought that
if I went outside and took a photograph of an expensive car, that would
make it look a bit suspicious, as though I was planning on stealing
the car. What if I posted a picture of the car on the internet
tagged with the location, then a crack team of car thieves would
come and nick it. This is the type of thing that makes Daily Mail wet
their pants with cowardly rage.
So I took the picture of the car from my window. You can't really see anything, but I don't need to go to prison. The next time you meet me, you may call me "Professor Moriarty", and if I remember this post,I will chuckle wildly.
I was forced to move last year. I am now living in a more sedate
area. There is a rural canal (convenient for drowning) at the entrance
to the crescent where I live. The view is a bit crap, because of the
skyscrapers. I can't feel that I am losing my edge because of the
village atmosphere hidden away in the Maryhill area of Glasgow.
Google street view doesn't too close to my flat (bastdards). If you
are interested and the technology works, you can see that I have to pass
through a dark wattery tunnel to get home. This middle class life
really is hell.
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I am surprised that I hadn't read this book before. It is the first novel in the Jerry Cornelius quartet. Even with the ravages of time and overslurped wine, I am sure that I have read the other three books in the series. I always wanted to read the first book, because Jerry had a non-stop party at his house for a couple of months (this was actually a bit of let down, as it is described in a single paragraph).
At the end of the book Jerry, either died or became everyone. So I don't think that the Cornelius quartet has a linear time line. The programme in the title refers to software.
I was in Tesco on Thursday. I dropped my bank card
on the floor. I was just gearing up to bend down
and pick it up, when a little old lady picked it up
for me. "Are you having problems bendind down?", she asked.
I didn't thank her! I limped away in shame.
I am so unfit at the moment. Too many late night cocktails,
eating big meals at lunch, and taking the lift,rather than the stairs.
But I can change (hopefully). There used to be a shop near me
that rented cars. Now it offers "pole dancing" exercise classes. I could be so fit (and maybe sexy too).
So the QCDOC is finally switched off, for some of
us at least. This was the occasion of the wake for the
QCDOC held in my office. The evidence is below.
