Comments

ST LUKE'S: My apologies to all my readers. I was under the belief that nobody was leaving any comments on my blog. However I did find them in Blogger and have published them all. I will be highlighting a couple for special consideration. (Knowing winks in the direction of Nicko and Mikhail!)

Bridge by Michael Cross

BEDFORD ROAD: I might have mentioned a couple of months ago that I went to see design installation by a guy called Michael Cross in a small converted church in forgotten corner of Southwark Park. I just found these pictures on Rob's computer so here they are.




With attribution but without permission.

I'm Not a Celebrity Let Me Stay

BEDFORD ROAD: Another week gone. They're flying by at the moment. Each one making up a couple of dents before disappearing into the slipstreams like rocks battering the Millenium Falcon in an asteroid belt. (Now if only I can find a giant space creacher to set down in.) Kate arrives on Thursday, Mum and Shannon a week or so after that, then Nick and then it's Christmas. Working six days a week only adds to the acceleration.

But it's been good. The winter is starting to settle in and I really am waking up in the dark, leaving in the gloom and then searching for a ceiling by three-thirty. Saturday I had breakfast and Flo and Louises, then went to Camden for a dirt cheap leather jacket, stopped off at the Tate Modern to look at Pollock, Bueys and Twombly, then to the NFT where I got times mixed up and couldn't see a yakuza film whose name escapes me. Saturday night was dinner at Lisa and Greg's with Elerig and on Sunday I went wandering through the North Downs in Surrey. Last night was another Yakuza movie, Yakuza Graveyard, again at the NFT and, hopefully, if I can swing it tomorrow night I get to see Bogie in African Queen.

So like I said, I've been busy. Now I've got to go get working on a draft of the French word for 'voyage' because I'm so far behind. But then I always seem to be behind.

Thinking of all of you, at different times.

Yada Yada Yada

BEDFORD ROAD: This is what Kramer always wanted to say on Seinfeld:

Mal Michael = Scum

SCUM

The Ashes and Autumn

CLAPHAM COMMON: To the English fans out there I've been reasonably contained, by Australian standards, about the Ashes but now you've seen what we're about: Have some. On toast. That's it.

Duncan Fletcher is a muppet. Your best player would probably be our sixth best player and who plays with three slips for the first over of a Test Match anywhere.

On another note I've been loving my first true Autumn. Every morning as I get out of bed, each day darker than the previous, I glimpse a tree lit up with flames of yellow, orange and red. Though as the month had lengthened, little by little, the flame has dimmed as berries and leaves have been scattered by the wind. I might hate the early sunsets, but I love these colours.

Seperated at Birth

ST LUKE'S:

Nick Griffin of the BNP and Ricky Gervais of TV

Boredom

ST LUKE'S: Have you ever been so bored you feel like microwaving your own eyeballs to see what happens? That's how I feel now.

Would you do it?

ST LUKE'S: Saw the Flaming Lips last night. It was amazing to sing along to "Yeah Yeah Yeah Song", not just as hopeful, but largely vain, protest song, but instead as one that somebody, somewhere in the world, may have heeded.

"With all your power
What would you do?"

Well the good voters did the rest of the world a favour and helped get rid of, or at least weaken, a rogues gallery of villains.

Aside from that the show was backed by awesome visuals, giant hands, lasers, balloons, aliens, santas and all the other lunacy you expect at a Lips show.

A Star Is Born

ST LUKE'S: Kate made her debut as a major theatre director tonight when the St. Joseph's Christmas Concert premiered at La Boite Theatre. Unfortunately I haven't got any credit so she thinks I have forgotten about it. I haven't. But I am too proud for words.

It's Official

ST LUKE'S: Fox News is the Republican mouthpiece. We knew that already but this memo makes interesting/disturbing reading.

See it's not shit, it does work (apparently)

Today and yesterday - That's the weekend to you

BEDFORD ROAD: Not much to say this weekend. Worked yesterday morning after four hours sleep then went to see Key Largo which is showing at the NFT as part of a John Huston season. A great film with good performances including an absolutely electric Carol Trevor in an Academy Award winning role.

Then today I went walking from somewhere in Surry to somewhere else called Oxted. Lovely walk and I managed to get from A to B despite missing every major landmark listed in the guide. I'm trying to post some pictures but Blogger is being, as Paul Keating might say, recalcitrant.

Some pictures from last weekend

3

BEDFORD ROAD: CCTV cameras on the trip around the corner to buy a quart of milk. Somebody is watching.

Ding Dong the Rummy Is Dead

BRIXTON: So it seems that the Casino Staters alone have decided to elect that ragtag group of hypocrites, perverts and female bashers we know as the Republican Party. Oh and Tennessee took the opportunity to declare happily and forthrightly that it is well and truly in touch with it's racist past. And now that even Virginia has gone Blue we seem to able to look forward to at least two years of policy sanity.

I don't think I've had a happier political moment in the ludicrous six years of the Bush regime than this morning when I stepped inside a newsagent at Old Street and every single newspaper was trumpeting the demise of the Postmodern Poet of the Pentagon.

Rockvember

ST LUKE'S: Two thirds of the way through Rockvember (even though it started in October).

Tapes 'n Tapes last night at Kings College. It's an amazing venue with views of the London Eye, the National Theatre, the Hayward, the Thames and all the lights of Southbank. And beer for £2.50 a pint. It was the same venue for Mates of State a couple of weeks back.

Tapes 'n Tapes were good thought there is something about their sound which I think doesn't neccasarily translate across live. I've heard them on KEXP before and I thought the sound suffered in much the same fashion. Still it was a good night and it turned out the Rod, BK and Scottish were all going so I didn't haven't to stand around on my own like I was waiting for somebody.

Mates of State a couple of weeks ago were amazing. I only realised they were a two piece a couple of days before the gig. And married at that. The drum bangs the shit out of his kit and his wife on keyboards and vox makes the most beautiful noise. If you get a chance check them out. At least visit their Myspace page.

Bullet Points

BEDFORD ROAD: All right I'm about to go out the door to watch the world's favourite Kazakh and I just lost my last post so I'll be brief:

#1: Winter is here. It's colder and is dark by 5PM.

#2: Went to my first Premiership game on Saturday. Elerig got free tickets and took me along. Charlton versus Man City at the Valley.

#3: Fireworks in Battersea Park on Saturday night for Bonfire Night. (Yesterday it sounded like the Blitz with everyone setting them off all over town.)

#4: Bought some gloves on Petticoat Lane, and some bread, apricot and almond jam and chilli cheese at Spitalfields on Sunday.

#5: Visited Speaker's Corner, by accident, in Hyde Park on Sunday afternoon. It was amazing. A dozen self styled-preachers pontificating from step ladders, all clasing bottles of water. An absolute must do experience for anyone thinking of visiting.

#6: After two failed attempts I'm finally going to see Tapes N Tapes on Wednesday night.

Gotta run. Off to see the movie everybody is talking about. Will post pictures soon.

A Very English Haka

BEDFORD ROAD: More from the party:

Fuckwit of the Month

ST LUKE'S: Somethings piss me off. Rude people on the tube, moronic letter writers to the Yorkshire Post, Jose Mourinho and genocidal Sudanese Presidents. So he's meeting with China this week. Nice work guys. Way to embrace your status as a global superpower.

Let me just take a moment to quote the good president Omar al-Bashir: ""We were using traditional methods and measures to resolve the conflict." That is traditionally raping women, murdering children and throwing bodies down the well to poison the water supplies.

And this one: "We refuse to accept the entry of UN peacekeepers into Sudan, because the impact of our refusal is better than the impact of our acceptance." Try telling that to the 200,000 dead, the 2.5 million displaced and however many you want to estimate will be dead tomorrow, next week, next month and next year.

But then I guess Iraq always posed a great threat to humanity...

Sordid Sentinels

ST LUKE'S: I don't know if there are any Pavement fans among my readership but I'm excited. Wowee Zowee is getting the deluxe reissue treatment a la Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain and Slanted and Enchanted. And what's even better is that Brighten the Corners will likely get the same treatment in the future. You can read about it at Pitchfork.