Can you teach me how to fight?

Update: It seems that someone has beaten me to my idea of a hat based home intruder system. Chia Hats would keep anyone out!!

(look at the cute little kid at the bottom! awwwww....)

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No... but I can tell you where you may hear The Junior Boys playing their track, Can you teach me how to fight, and the wonderful, highly addictive In The Morning.. and I can also tell you at least three people that will be in the audience!

Oh the joy!! More to come, I am just in Chia(MENTAL_STATE) = THRILLED, so I thought I would share. Sorry for the geek humour... oh hang it, no I'm not!!

if you haven't yet, you can check them out at My Space http://www.myspace.com/jbees

I love you all! Especially people who give tickets to great gigs as birthday presents! They are the best!

The worst day of my life

Update: Can't get enough music?
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Man! I just think I have had a contender for the worst day of life scale! Yesterday was a real doozy. Had an interview in the morning that left me feeling like I had been assaulted. It had a numerical reasoning test. Should be no problem, huh? Yeah well, my brain said something along the lines of, “I have already done way to much for you recently, and now you want me to divide numbers under pressure? No Sir!! I’m outa here.” Actually, it could have also been saying something like, “I don’t do this shit anymore!! I have calculators and spreadsheets for this crap!”. Whatever it was, there was a long resounding silence afterward for about the period of the test. How awful! I went back into work afterwards but was too shattered so I went home and went to the Rixy in Brixton, ate popcorn and watched The Breakup.

Review of The Breakup

Firstly, this film is a bit creepy. You can’t help thinking of the film Mr & Mrs Smith and then shaking your head. Mr & Mrs Smith = Brad pit married to sexy, mysterious powerful women. The Breakup = Jennifer Aniston going out with a guy who is a slob, still plays computer games at whatever fat age he is, is a tour guide on a bus in Chicago and can’t even do that properly, and she is devastated that she has broken up with him and spends the rest of the film trying to win back this dipshit while he brings strippers home. Hmmm.

Film itself? It redefines the word “banal”. Actually, it doesn’t. The current definition is perfectly suitable already. But it did cheer me up on a dreary day, and that means that I can’t be too harsh about it, and I guess does say something for the film.

After the film I had to go househunting to a place that I really, really liked to meet the other person. Yes. That is exactly what I was in the mood for.

For the first little moments I had the urge to return home, and the thought of my still existent flight home in October wasn’t sounding so crazy. Such a weird day. I think that it was my little body and mind give me a tap on the shoulder and saying, “You are not superhuman!”. Ok, maybe it was a thump over the head with a piece of 4 by 4, but that was the gist of it. Who would have thought? Me? Mortal?!

Anyway, today I am back to superhuman status and everything is so far quite peachy. The below little character is entirely random. Happy Friday!! .



PS - If you already have downloaded this track, the above is just my little trick to get everyone to listen to it. It is gold)


PPS - If you don't really think that the above should could as worst day ever, try doing the above while feeling like you are wading through some sort of black treacle. That is the only way I can describe it! It was awful!

Live you life with a compassion you can be proud of, and let your last breath fade away with dignity and love

Last night I moseyed on home to find some rather interesting construction work had occurred in our entrance stairwell (our flat is one big Esher-esque series of steps). Then, as in the slow penny of Monday morning, I started to realise that it may not have been as constructive as I thought and may actually have been deconstructive. Ah yes, we had been burgled. Robbed! I have inserted a picture of a cat-burglar (thanks google – our love will never die) though evidence points more towards it being some sort of hippopotamus-burglar. The door is really rooted.



I was home alone for a couple of hours and had some errands to run, so it seemed a rather nonchalant affair for a while, “Oh yes, I see the burglars have dropped by…” type thing. Housemates were in a bit more of a flap when they got home, and then it was the landlord, the locksmiths and the discussions about steel frames and “London bar” locks.

Long and short – I didn’t loose a thing. The iPod was hiding under a big pile of books (without headphones I have been reading more) and Choco’s camera was under a (very) bizarre hat that my mother sent early for my birthday. Thanks Mum! Housemates were not quite so lucky, with one of them loosing a laptop (she is devastated).

Thankfully, also, I am not in any way to blame. It would have been awful if they had come in through a window or a door I had left unlocked. But no, this seems to be burglary of the good old honest bash-the-door-down-and-grab-stuff variety.

Ahhhh Brixton.

Off topic:

My head is doing funny things without regular music listening. It throws lyrics and songs at me randomly in the middle of the night, on waking, on the tube. I woke this morning with Mirah's While we have the sun in my head. Thought I would share cause it is pretty.


While We Have The Sun
by Mirah

Let's take the time to walk together while we have the sun
You never know when temperamental weather's gonna come
And if you want to face the death you're never that far from
Just take a breath and sing to it when all the day is done

So sorry about all the sorrow in your life you'll know
It's true that all the ones you love will someday have to go
And everytime you say goodbye you'll hear the trumpets blow
A serenade to the soul, all surrounded by the glow

If you feel all broken 'cause i left you there too soon
Just know that it's not up to you to make the flowers wilt or bloom
And if you think you're lonely then just listen for the tune
Of all the stars i left for you in the chest of the moon

If you want to shake whatever separates you from
The holiness you want to make your life on earth become
Live your life with a compassion you can be proud of
Then let your last breath fade away with dignity and love

Let's take the time to walk together while we have the sun
You never know when temperamental weather's gonna come
And if you want to face the death you're never that far from
Just take a breath and sing to it when all the day is done

The slowest penny

This morning I really did think that the world was on its head. The tube was virtually empty, and the office was locked when I arrived. This is not unusual, I usually get in about an hour early, and the managers arrive shortly after 8am, but as the minutes slipped by I started to really wonder whether I had missed some vital information the previous week, like, “Your company will cease to exist as of this weekend”. Bored out of my brains after waiting for 50mins, I went to a coffee shop to buy a juice and asked the girl whether there was any reason why there was noone about this morning. She just looked piteously stupid and said something about bus timetables changing. Now, London PT can be pretty wacky, but even a severe timetable change couldn’t have stopped everyone from getting to the office. Finally a familiar face arrived, my morning waiting friend from “operations”. When I started complaining about waiting since 8am for someone to come she looked at me a little odd and said, “you mean 7 am…”. Well, this was when the slowest penny started to drop.

Hmm. If you can get up an hour early (5.45am) and shake your fist at the world for not following suit, you know you are a little too well rested for anyone under the age of 50.

I gotta get out more!

Which brings me to how your day is going. It turns out that, on average, your day is going pretty damned well!! 21% of respondents had "sun shining out of their eyeballs". Since I think that the sun shines out of the arseholes of all of my friends and random readers, this makes for a pretty sunny bunch!! Meanwhile 17% of people are about to explode from happiness. I am well impressed. Impressed and bored. Bored to death of having that damned survey on the side of my page, so it is over. You will have to determine your own average happiness from now on.

Instead we have a new survey in honor of tangles really really not knowing what is going to happen in the future. I have now been in the UK for about 2 months. I am in contract work that will end shortly. You, gentle kind all-knowing reader, can help me see into the future by completing the NEW SURVEY on how long I will end up on these bonny shores.

PS - if it is over 6months please send food.

You can't see tits on the radio

I have just been insulted by someone I have never met or seen. As part of my current plan for world domination, I have had to send off to Melbourne Uni for some academic transcripts including a photocopy of my drivers license. After a bit of a kafuffle about address, this is the ensuing email;

Hi (tangles),

Not a problem, I will send it to the UK address. By the way what a
beautiful picture you have on your driver's license.

Best Regards
INSULTING MAN.


Now, many of you are probably thinking, “but it is probably quite a nice photo”. Let me assure you, and Mat back me up here, it is NOT a nice photo by any stretch of the imagination. I hope that my resounding “humph” can be heard right over in his frigid little Melbourne office. However, it is also quite funny, so he may hear something like, “humphgiggle”, which he may pass off as just a pigeon fart. There are a lot of pigeons at Melbourne Uni.


Other than that, things are burbling along. I am applying to various things and options and stuff but will not jinx it all by revealing more. Also, if yoga can simply be the act of rolling out your mat, then surely getting to a yoga studio but not actually doing the class is also somewhat yogic. Heres hoping.



In news straight from the couch, I watched The Wickerman the other day. When I put the DVD on, it cleared the room within 20mins. It goes down as being one of the wackiest films I have seen that still retains some semblance of cohesion. It also contains a shitload of nudity. If wacky nudity and a plot about as scary as The Birds (i.e. really not that scary. I mean, they are just birds for Christ sake. What are the going to do? Poo on your jumper?), then The Wickerman might be the film for you.

Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving With a Pict

I am actually a bit flat today with the news that Syd/Roger Barrett has died. He was the guitarist and creative energy behind the first line up of Pink Floyd and was truly bonkers, but in a really delicate and creative way. He left the band in the late 60s and spent the rest of his life living with his mother in Cambridge eeking out the odd solo album. I have always liked the early stuff - which happily decontructed my idea of the notion of "song". Anyway here he is when he was young.






Also, here is a photo of my parents place "Shindagin" and a bon fire that they had over the weekend. I got a bit homesick with the news. It all looks so green!




So I will leave you with the Pink Floyd lyrics from Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving With a Pict from the album Ummagumma.

Aye an' a bit of Mackeral settler rack and ruin
ran it doon by the haim, 'ma place
well I slapped me and I slapped it doon in the side
and I cried, cried, cried.

The fear a fallen down taken never back the raize and then Craig Marion,
get out wi' ye Claymore out mi pocket a' ran doon, doon the middin stain
picking the fiery horde that was fallen around ma feet.
Never he cried, never shall it ye get me alive
ye rotten hound of the burnie crew. Well I snatched fer the blade O my
Claymore cut and thrust and I fell doon before him round his feet.

Aye! A roar he cried frae the bottom of his heart that I would nay fall
but as dead, dead as 'a can be by his feet; de ya ken?

...and the wind cried Mary.

[In English] Thank you.

I woke up dreaming, I was asleep

Gawd. Woke at 4am this morning with this flipping song going round and around my. head. Ironic, no? (I woke up singing I woke up dreaming I was asleep) It is from a VW ad that is screening at the moment. Doing some internet searching this morning I have divined that it is Men in White Coats by The Dallas Guild. Yes, it makes me feel better. [You can listen to samples here and here ]

Reason I didn't sleep that well was that I was hitting the yoga a little hard on the weekend. I did a course over three days in Ashtanga yoga (the one that gives Madonna really big arms). It really knocked me for six! The yoga itself was tricky, but having to remember all the bits and stuff was a complete mental overload. I spent the rest of the weekend wandering around like a zombie that can't lift it's arms cause they hurt.

Also I am in WEEK FOUR of not drinking at all. This weekend Katie and I are going to have a special lunch at The Ivy to mark the occasion.

Coffee, strawberries and artichokes

Update

So we are all "over the hump" huh?

For some Thursday perks check out Thom Yorke (aka dude from Radiohead)'s new album The Eraser. This review on SMH sounds promising and there is a link to sound.

Also, in related but purely selfish news, I have ordered some new headphones (Mmmm sennheiser ). I ordered a new release white pair so that I look less like a DJ and more like a sucker for marketing gimmics.

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Well. Can’t complain about that weekend. It had all the elements; strawberries, watching other people sweat it out (from the safety of a pub – actually not really watching, but reading a book), fresh country-side air, farmer’s markets and shopping in Angel (my new favourite pastime).

On Saturday I went to look at a share house in Angel. Was orright, but gut feeling said “No” for some reason. I haven’t heard back from her, so maybe our guts were on the same wavelength. Katie dropped round for a chat before being pickpocketed down the road in Brixton. So she came back for more chats and dinner. I think that she should get pickpocketed more often because it was a nice night, but she may have another slant on the whole thing.

Sunday I duly followed the lass to Blackheath where she did very well running in the heat while I sat in the pub drinking OJ and reading a book. Also, and this is news, I had THE BEST COFFEE SINCE I LEFT MELBOURNE. My god!! Even the coffee in Italy was shit compared to Melbourne. Truly, on average. I am sure you get the odd good drop in Italy, but the average standard is way worse. Oh, actually maybe that is not fair because I am comparing country Italy to city Melbourne, but still. Italy. You’d think it would be better, huh? But fancy finding such a good coffee in Blackheath??? I am thinking of moving to Blackheath.

Sorry if all my news is of a contented domestic variety, but, contextually, that can't be helped!