| Sheffield |
[22 Nov 2009|11:32pm] |
Sheffield, 450 million years ago, was under the sea ... General Barchiopod watches over Brachiopods minor.* Meanwhile, in nineteenth century Benin, an elephant tusk carving shows a leopard at lunch, and a leopard-skin floppy-ear pill-box hat.
*A spoilsport says, there were indeed many 'articulate brachiopods' in the Ordovician, but I don't think they walked around on their pedicles like it looks like these are doing.
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| o noes! Ewar Woowar. |
[17 Nov 2009|08:35pm] |
what do you call a man with a plank of wood on his head?
- Ed Wood
what do you call a man with two planks of wood on his head?
- Edward Wood
what do you call a man with three planks of wood on his head?
- Edward Woodward
what do you call a man with four planks of wood on his head?
- I don't know, but Edward Woodward would.
but what happens to that joke when Edward Woodward is dead?
I loved the re-runs of Callan, so glad I saw them, which my parents had liked when originally on.
So much so that mum had Edward Woodward records, of him singing some standards, - mostly bought by me for birthdays etc. it must be said, having been told by dad that she was a fan - I wonder in hindsight whether she was as much of a fan as that, but they were dutifully played, and to this day, him singing 'I've got you under my skin' is for me the original, and that which I hear in my head. All others heard later are pale imitations. (it's much more emotional for me than the lightweight Sinatra version.)
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[16 Nov 2009|11:47pm] |
night falls fast these days
but no milky way rises
no sparkly sky river
to allure or inspire
for townies like us
civilization,
that baleful, lambent
stain on the sty, our view
o, pity poor us for we do not see
Betelgeuse and her myriad peers
in pirouette about the Pole at night
The stars dance ever on, in vain!
no wonder our poetry is pedestrian.
writ not by candlelight
but a candescent electric bulb
and a computer's liquid crystal display,
beside the somewhat inadequate heat of a gas fire,
might retire under the tog-many duvet in a minute,
in my bothy.
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| Who |
[15 Nov 2009|10:19pm] |
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Waters of Mars reminded me of Flummery's Handlebars. It seems they recognized RTD's character arc early.
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[13 Nov 2009|02:59pm] |
I recieve advance copies of (from a list I've just taken over)
CLARKE:MY SPIRIT LIKE A CHARMED BARK
and think, wow, what an evocative phrase ... oh, I see, its Shelley, Percy Bysshe.
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| linky |
[11 Nov 2009|09:11pm] |
Clive James on Madmen
in which my hero returns to TV crit, which he cut his teeth on, and interesting to hear a perspective from someone who was around at the time. I liked his linking it with Deadwood, in amoral-or-are-they characters (not without some sort of moral code by their own lights, but one we may not agree with nor are meant to) I think he only errs in mistaking the significance of the pipe, which is shurely having fun at the character's expense, his pose of gravitas, quite contrary to implying that there is actually any. (and of course, there is a Writer amongst them, too, who is not that one.)
Perhaps interesting to set his take slightly against The Applicant on audio here by Sylvia Plath
(and I enjoyed hearing her reading her Parliament Hill Fields muchly too)
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[04 Nov 2009|09:08pm] |
Sheffield,
chimneys whisper
of what they've seen
millstones
mossy in walls
are not turning
street trams
universities
are hill walking
chip shops
Tescos and pubs
are still thriving
yes but
The Blake
is boarded up
Hush, Sheffield,
when chimneys whisper
don't say steel,
hush, you tarmacadam town
concrete and brick, wait
the deer will return.
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| back at work |
[04 Nov 2009|11:51am] |
I am having a job! After four days of swine flu, this is great!
I went to update the master diary in which we note holidays and sick leave, which is an A4 black hardback paper diary still, and found it open at December, which gave me a momentary Rip van Winkle or Hans Castorp feeling, - My god, is that right? Have I been away all November?
A feeling helped by the fuzzy time of being ill, sleeping in the day and awake at night, feverish or just fuzzy-headed, out of focus, slightly adrift from the normal flows of time.
And that when I left the tree was all copper golden klimptian-clad and glinting in the sunlight, and now, leaves all gone, it is a silent charcoal black and grey shape, absorbing the light, not reflecting it. Making a monument of itself.
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| Synth Brittannia |
[21 Oct 2009|08:49pm] |
on iplayer till Sunday, well technically Mon 3:39 am
So many memories... (my monophonic synthesizer and friend Roger's miniKorg included)
Amongst the many things that struck me was this - that Phil Oakey visited Susan Sulley's and Joanne Catherall's parents to assure them that nothing untoward would take place if they took the girls out of school for a tour of Europe, which would in fact be an educational experience for them in the seeing-art-galleries and culture sense*. and how that reminds me of the Pre-Raphs assuring Lizzie Siddal's parents that nothing to stain her character would take place. It will all be very proper.
(Oakey, sweetly, recalls that he took two girls rather than one so that they could look after each other in what was bound to be, given otherwise an all male band/environment, a raucous tour, but then adds that actually it wasn't that raucous, and the men mostly read books.)
* They visited Cologne cathedral, but otherwise it was mostly night clubs.
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| linky |
[20 Oct 2009|04:20pm] |
Jonathan Meades on Bladerunner
- Clive James says, "I myself continue to be deeply miffed by his piece about Blade Runner: doesn’t he realise that my own dress sense spent twenty years in debt to Deckard? Or perhaps he does."
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| back down south |
[20 Oct 2009|01:07pm] |
Overheard on Walton Street this morning, one gentleman in a suit to another, "It says 'up to two "r"s'."
(he was looking at a parking metre)
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| Sheffield |
[19 Oct 2009|09:41pm] |
Stanage Edge.
I've never been to Sheffield before but the place reminded me of my original home on the other side of the Pennines - same clear but damp air, same bricks in the houses, same good chip-shop smell, and the hills all around .. and moors nearby.
The Bakers offer 'Premium Pork Products' as well as presumably bread.
Tanning shops more numerous than Waitroses.
But with smart new trams. And shiny Sheffield Hallam Univeristy (poem by Andrew Motion on the wall) and c.
21st century northern. Excellent.
and next the Peake. We saw some climbers, cyclists, and runners, the last all in x-man black lycra uniform, enjoying their nearness to some real landscape, and walkers with tiny children on their backs, talking about fashionable shoes, while walking over the moor slightly followed by the brood, the tiny's siblings, and their husbands.
And affordable houses.
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| Proposition |
[04 Oct 2009|11:12pm] |
when reviewing films we note
1. Does the hero have Father Issues? If not pass. Pass/Fail
2. The (as it is called) Bechdel test, do two women talk about something that is not the male hero? If yes pass. Pass/Fail.
3. Manic Pixie Dream Girl is present? If no, pass. Pass/Fail
easy code to append to every film review ala
Hamlet: FFF*
District 9: PPP**
* MPDG = cordelia Ophelia
** father-in-law issues are not the same, and (2) is a bit weak, possibly wrong? i stand to be corrected.
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| Cley next the Sea |
[04 Oct 2009|06:32pm] |
Need to catch up.
So, I have been to Norfolk for the first time. North Norfolk coast, and it wasn't completely flat. Very nice, in fact. Have been in Poppyland, bewtixt pine woods and sea, on the (now decommissioned) sea-defences by the salt marsh flats, along shaley beach to Blakeney point, on the sea in a boat for to see the seals, on the coast path and dunes, and using a miniature railway and the excellent coasthopper bus. with ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) topaz_tree.
All a bit back in time, North Norfolk, apart from the SUVs trying to get through narow lanes.
First impression of Sherringham - where first got off the trains to there - streets packed with old people (hooray, I feel relatively young!), some of them dressed in clothing / uniforms from the 1940s. (The steam train line was booked for that weekend by a WWII recreation society, the rest were the local retirees and tourists.) Add bi-planes and other prop planes flying overhead occasionally and red telephone boxes and you have time-warp conditions.
Some sorts of loud Machines heard moving/operating along the streets pre-dawn: we speculate they are removing any modern-looking incursions.
Dolphin Cottage in Cley: a place entirely made from Ikea. And very nice for it. (all hidden inside, away from the putative revisionist machines)
Anyway, all-round excellent holiday. Having tried the flat lands and not been scared off, would now do Suffolk sometime too.
( pictures and links to galleries )
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