Fringe Magnets (and more London)

Tags

Beau Brummell, Edinburgh Fringe, Francis Bacon, Jazz, London, Lucian Freud, Omelette, Savile Club, Savoy Grill, Tate Britain, The Pantiles, Tunbridge Wells

So, five nights of Well, it’s Woody under our belts, average audiences just over seven, and average, split-two-ways takings, fifteen quid (plus one US dollar). And a few walk-outs, including tonight’s which I liked to think was due to being offended by my rendition of Hamish, the teenage masturbation pome, but may just have been part of this growing trend of seeing forty minutes of a 55-minute Free Fringe show and leaving to avoid making a donation.
Isn’t politeness odd? It feels less rude to leave during a performance than to walk past a starving artist with a collecting bucket and not put anything in. From the receiving end,it feels ruder (just in case you were wondering).
We do it to entertain. If we also get money so we can eat occasionaly, that’s great, but there’s no need for awkwardness or embarrassment just because you’re a tight-fisted bastard.
Only jokin’.

---

Anyway, back to my London trip … where were we?

Day Two

A former member of the now defunct Albemarle Club, one Oscar Wilde, said, ‘only dull people are bright at breakfast’, and despite (or because of) its theme of sodality, the Savile has a ‘no talking at the central breakfast table’ rule. As there was no one else there, I had my fruit and yogurt in silence anyway.

Then I headed off into town. On Jermyn Street I bought a shirt in the Scottish Arts Club colours of pink and blue (despite the heat, I had to wear jacket and tie for my visits, and I sported the Club bow tie at the Reform, see pic) and then a Gatsby from my old favourite hat shop (see pic).

           

No wonder I had to take an Elsie with Geaorge ‘Beau’ Brummell …

A friend of a friend, who’s a friend on Facebook, works as a volunteer at the Tate, so she got me in free to All Too Human (the body in art, mainly in British art, Sickert, Spencer, Bacon, Freud etc) and Aftermath (art in and just after 1918).

And then I met with my old colleague, John ‘Bonker’ Harries for part two of the gastronomic pilgrimage: the Savoy Grill, for a meal starting with Omelette Arnold Bennett, made for the writer in the 1920s and a permanent fixture on the menu ever since, and a dish I have often cooked for myself since I came to live in the land of smoked fish.

Absolutely delicious, though their modern, starter, take is lighter and smaller than my old-fashioned main course version, which I tend to call Omelette Gordon Bennett because of the mess I make trying to serve it up neatly (which they get round by serving it in the pan). The guinea fowl which followed was equally delicious as was John’s liver (not in the Hannibal Lecter sense f-f-f-f).

Future visits to a bar in Buffalo (chicken wings), a convent in Mexico (molé poblano) and a Piedmontese battlefield (chicken Marengo) will probably remain flights of fancy.

Back in the real world, we then headed out to Tunbridge Wells, where Bonker (now retired) lives.  In the evening, we went down the area known as the Pantiles for an evening of outdoor live jazz and to meet Doreen, his lady-love.

Over swing jazz and a pint or two, we discussed the trip he and I were to go on in the next instalment …

 

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Demention of Manacles

Tags

3D printing, geek, kit, self-assembly

Why has your loyal correspondent not done much writing, of blogs or novellas, this week?

 

Because your loyal and stupid correspondent has been and gone and bought himself a three-dimensional printer (for a project he can’t really talk about on here).

But he hasn’t bought just any 3-D printer. Oh no, he’s bought a cheap self-assembly, for-geeks-only Chinese clone of a high-end printer for under £100.

OK, it saves him around £600, but that’s £600 he could actually just about afford (for reasons which I can’t go into yet) and could well regain anyway with the proceeds from the project he can’t talk about, probably not ever, never.

And it causes him a lot of agonising, swearing and probably strain on his ageing (and broken) heart.

But it’s sort of assembled. It sort of switches on without going bang, and the software in Chinese has been replaced with a free download software he can understand (sort of). Maybe he’ll summon the courage to connect everything up and get all the drivers loaded and the plastic thread fed in and print some trivial shape to test it soon.

But first, he needs a long lie down. Go away.

A Little off the Top, Sir?

Tags

circumcision, I'm Reviewing the Situation, kitchen, Oliver!, parody, Under Milk Wood

What a busy week.

On Saturday I took on the mantle of Richard Burton, as First Voice in excerpts from Under Milk Wood.

I spent days tuning, breaking and buying new strings for the banjolele, I shifted all the crap from one end of the kitchen to the other, ready for the gas safety inspection. All back now… 

The annual check is the only time the area gets thoroughly cleaned. There were enough breadcrumbs under the breadbin (aka microwave) to give each of the Five Thousand a doggy-bag to take home.

But between all that, this week I ‘a’ been mostly makin’ — a video. First preparing the accompaniment using the poor man’s Sibelius 7, Noteworthy Composer (plenty good enough for my purposes, so thanks, guys). Then setting up some sort of backdrop and recording it as an OK draft at least.

So here it is. A sensitive subject, insensitively handled, I’m sure it will give offence to someone for one or more reasons.

Well, if I don’t offend nobody, I ain’t doing my job right. Looks like I’ll be offending as many as five or six people a night during the Edinburgh Fringe too: catch our show at Bar Bados on the Cowgate, 8pm nightly except Mondays.

Without further ado or any apology, except to Lionel Bart, I present via youtube:

… and the text (if you’re a glutton for punishment) can be found here (with glossary)

 

By Irritation Only

Tags

banjo ukulele, banjolele, customer service, Edinburgh Fringe, remote control, television, Ukulele

It is a source of wry amusement (though not of surprise, at least to a structuralist who knows that every statement implies the possibility of its opposite and that sod’s law rules over all), that the growth of corporate ‘customer service’ departments has led to the near-extinction of the last vestiges of anything remotely worthy of the name. Indeed, dedicated ‘customer vexation’ departments couldn’t do a worse or more annoying job.

Yes, of course a department in which dedicated and well-informed bright young things answered each phone call personally within three rings and gave careful consideration to every petty query would be prohibitively expensive and counter productive, as the sparky employees would soon lose the will to live faced with endless queries about which is the ‘any’ key they’ve been asked to press and who haven’t checked that their spodulator is actually plugged in and switched on. And the cost of that would be passed on to the punters. 

But after a day in which I should have been recording a video, rehearsing Under Milk Wood and trying once more to tune a banjolele, but have instead spent ages on phone and website trying to sort out my non-functioning electricity meter, book a visit for a gas inspection and get a replacement for my tv-box remote control, I am more convinced by those who want to go off-grid, live by nature’s clock and shit like bears in the woods. That and firebomb a few offices — though that way only the poor schmucks they use to keep their customers from holding them to account for shoddy, not to say shite service would bear the brunt of my frustration.

Let’s bypass the on-going saga of utility futilities and go straight to the gas inspection. My landlord has been getting me to arrange this for him ever since he fled the country to work in Hong Kong and snorkel off some of the world’s most exotic beaches (which seems to take up most of his time, if his social media feeds are anything to go by). Every year there have been more hoops to jump through to arrange it and I think (hope) we just hit peak hoop. In previous years I think I’ve gone straight to the local firm who do the actual work and arranged with Morag that Angus will come oot next Tuesday.

Not any more.

The insurers don’t have one of those annoying, “if you are calling about a claim, press one” systems. Oh no, they have a fucking infuriating, “if you are calling about a claim, please say, ‘I am calling about a claim'” systems. Shades of the sketch with two Scotsmen screaming “Ulevun” in a speak-your-floor lift!

There was a twenty-tiny-digit number on the letter I got, telling me the inspection was due, but it didn’t say that was the account number so when the voice asked for policy number I said “don’t know”, which didn’t phase it, so, in my best re-ceived pro-nun-ci-a-tion, I gave the property address, phone number, my inside leg measurement and whatever other trivia it asked for, eventually to be asked the obvious question of what I was ringing about. From the series of options I clearly stated I was ringing to “arrange a gas inspection”, and was immediately put through to a woman who asked me when I put in my original damages claim. And then redirected me to the gas inspections department, which a human operator could have done ten minutes earlier, if it wasn’t for all that bollocks.

Once on the phone to the cheery Diane, it was plain sailing and very chatty. No, I don’t have a dog … well, I have a stuffed one, but he’s usually harmless. Diane makes note to warn fitter: ‘looney’.

Then it’s the tellybroadbandphone provider. Look online. Lots of helpful FAQs (so called because within five seconds they have you yelling, “What the FAQ would I ask that for?”) and a tree of options within options that would dwarf Darwin’s tree of life if it contained every species that ever lived. Eventually I get to ‘lost or broken tv remote’, which will have to do, though its more a case of tv remote falling to bits with old age, rather like its owner, who would quite like a modern replacement for the whole cable box, which is so old it isn’t even shown on their screen as one of the models. Not that it matters, as the best the ‘help’ system seems to do is direct me to ring 150 on my phone and press option two. Only, option two is for phone issues, not telly. But option two within option one (faults) within option one (telly) does seem more hopeful. It’s to do with telly service not working, which is as near as it gets.

And the system asks me to stop watching telly (I wasn’t) and make sure everything is plugged in (it was) while they run a remote test, which would take a few minutes (I didn’t select, I hung up).

Now this did fix my wifi issues last month so it’s not totally stupid, except in this case I know the telly box is working fine and nothing they can do remotely will be remotely useful in correcting or even identifying a bust spring in a remote and ageing remote control. Remotely.

But nothing you can press gets you straight to an operator. I’m now told that selecting “I’m thinking of switching to a new provider” can do the trick, but I fear that would only be after selecting options within options of how long I’ve been with these, why I’m not happy and so on, none of which would be the expletive-laden option I’d most like to choose.

I should just say I had been trying the other option of ‘live chat’ from the get-go, but was constantly told that the team (active 8am to 8pm on Wednesdays) was not available right now (from 10am to 2pm on this fucking Wednesday).

But do I have any faith that, even if I switched to a promising new mob, they’d be any better (or remain good value) once I was a settled customer, would be worth all the upheaval of changing router, telly box, phone line? No, I don’t.

I’ll keep tweaking the batteries and try again tomorrow.

When I’ve tuned the banjolele.

For which my shiny new carrying case arrived today, yay. I’ve even decorated it with a Woody Guthrie tribute (and parody) sticker [This machine annoys fascists, (and everybody else, actually)]. Scottish fucking Power, Homeserve, Virgin bloody media, you may be masters of irritation but I reckon I can deliver far more offence, frustration and annoyance at the Edinburgh Fringe this summer.

Bar Bados, 8pm, nightly except Mondays. You have been warned.

Spring Trickles

Tags

Rite of Spring, Sacre du Printemps, Scotland, Spring, Stravinsky

Igor Stravinsky said that his ballet, Le Sacre du Printemps, was inspired by memories of the violent Russian spring that seemed to begin in an hour and was like the whole Earth cracking.

 Well, this year, more than ever, the Scottish Spring is like a shy maiden, that keeps poking her head round the door but lacks the confidence to make an entrance …

… for fucking months!

Oh to be in Spainland, now that April’s past! Will it never be warm here for more than a day?

Oh well, Autumn in Ronda beckons; I’m kinda fond-a Ronda …

How Sweet to be a Bloggerer … nibbles from my antisocial media week

Tags

ducks, Neil Innes, social media, Veganism

[A basefuck friend is to interview Neil Innes soon]

Gosh. Saw him at Uni with Grimms, in Leamington Spa when Off the Record came out and a few years back with the Bonzos. Great talent and Innes Book of Records was a gem of a show.

In 1973, my friend Dave (now my friend Jenny) was being driven into Manchester when he yelled, “Stop! There’s a duck!” Mike, the driver slammed the brakes on at great risk to life and limb, and Dave got out and came back with a large plastic duck on wheels. Later he cut the base off and wore the duck as a hat, à la “How Sweet to be an Idiot“.

A bunch of us were on a canal holiday in Stourbridge in the mid 70s, and all piled into a chippie for us teas. My ex-wife-to-be, Heidi, was wearing the duck as we got served, causing some amusement and bafflement. As we went outside to eat them, Dave took the bird back and wandered off. I stood with Heidi eating our fish suppers, when we were approached by a curious vision. ‘Twas a not-quite-young woman with a beehive hairdo, a near-transparent red lace blouse over a push-up black bra, a leather miniskirt over fishnet tights and six inch stilettos, accompanied by a short, squat chap in a tatty jumper and trousers. She had obeyed Hamlet’s injunction to ‘paint an inch thick’ and her false eyelashes reached us quite a while before she did.

“Where’s yer duck?” she asked the wife.

“Oh, it’s not mine, our mate’s got it now.”

“It’s not right. It’s not normal; you’re a weido,” she said in all seriousness. Her companion tried to pour oil on the waters — “they’re just young folk ‘aving a bit o’ fun”, but she got more and more worked up.

“No, it’s not right; she shouldn’t be allowed out. Yo sh’d be in Stafford, yo sh’d!”

Eventually she wandered off still muttering that Heidi should be locked up in said establishment and we spent the evening debating who actually looked the more ridiculous.

All inspired by Mr Innes.

 

[Some guy asked for people to fill in a survey on veganism for his studies. In the ensuing discussion someone recounted their experience of being called a murderer (which he said betrayed a lack of understanding of the legal meaning of that term) by veggie weirdos, but said if people were doing what they believed, that must be doing good…]

Is it inherently good if people do what they think is good? Probably most crimes have at least one culprit who thinks the action right. After all, Socrates said no one does evil intentionally (ie we all think our sins can be justified in some way). I think vegetarianism is ethically dubious, but most veggies seem to think they have the moral high ground.

I once told my nephew I used to be a vegan until I realised I couldn’t reconcile it with my ethical and spiritual beliefs. My sister cut in to say “you don’t have any ethical and spiritual beliefs!” I said, “exactly, so why be vegan?”

I was of course being disingenuous; I do like to think I consider such questions all the time, even though I tend to say that spirituality is an affliction of the insufficiently occupied.

I also have a character in a novel explain a lapse from vegetarianism with, “the spirit is willing but the flesh is tasty,” though I am always annoyed when people genuinely ‘justify’ being carnivores with, “but I like meat.” I like butchering small children, but it doesn’t make it right.

I think Hitler and Stalin were doing what they believed; I don’t think they made the world better, except in stmulating those who want to stop people like them doing the same again.

To be fair I think those who say meat is murder know what the legal definition is, but think that definition in being anthropocentric is inadeqaute. Of course, a standard answer is that if meat is murder, vegetarianism is genocide, as many livestock species would have to be wiped out, to release land etc.

I can’t help feeling a lot of it stems from thanatophobia.

But the debate can only be a good thing. Sadly many discussions of this topic get rather heated and angry. So far this thread is doing very well. But I agree with David Hume that philosophy is best done by convivial discussion over a bottle of wine. I suspect he’d have been less keen on social media as a platform for meaningful discourse.

Two Imposters plc

Regent Road Park, Edinburgh

There’s unseen things in the undergrowth rustling,
Bustling away as I clomp on past;
Maybe a mouse but probably a blackbird,
Rummaging for juicy worms to break his fast

Two magpies flit through the bare trees chuntering,
Welcoming the sunshine with their promises of mirth;
I’m dressed for colder weather but I’m set on sauntering
As a rare day of Scottish sun warms the Earth

The old man sleeping with his life in plaggybags,
A bench for his home and a jumper for his head;
The views of the Firth and the Crags and the city
And, just for a change, I’m glad I’m not dead

24/3/18

Post Script

I took a pair of pictures with the phone she gifted;
I sat on the bench and I wrote this verse.
Then I walked off whistling and must have dropped or left it,
And the joy-led morning turned to afternoon’s curse

Aye, gentle reader, triumph and disaster. Not only had I just been checking out the venue for an exhibition of my shit in September, but I’d been celebrating, with a slice of Boston Cream Pie, some good news which I can’t say anything about for a few months. That and the first warmish day for ages and my usually miserable mood was kinda lifting.

Then I go walking a bit further, reach the Burns Monument and think I’ll take a picture of a Boston Terrier (there’s a theme here), only to find the Huawei is not in my bag or pocket. So I hotfoot it to the bench (not 2 minutes away).

No sign.

I ask people in the vicinity, I hang around them dialling the number from my old Nokia 1000, but hear nothing. Despair sets in. I ask the polis attending the nearby gun control protest, but no one’s handed it to them.

Despondently I head for home, working out what I need to change passwords on or who to notify. At this point, I realise how little I use it for anything important (compared to how much time I spend on it). Predominantly checking basefuck and twatter … and chatting to the delightful donor of said phone back in Chinaland using WeChat or Weibo.

That facility and a few photos I hadn’t yet backed up are probably the only losses. But the feeling of bereavement is disturbing. I can’t even think of a good reason to replace it, but still I beat myself up wondering how I lost it, try in vain to call  it or track it (google location can’t find it, the wash’n’go sim card has not been used, I suspect I’ve flattened the battery calling it and if someone has it and is selling or keeping it, they’ll probably have replaced the sim anyway).

But what this mainly brought home to me is one big downside of the solitary life: feeling the lack of someone to share the joy of the previous week’s news was bad enough; not having a shoulder to cry on or someone to distract me from the endless mental reruns of what I should have done is even worse.

Then I reflect sensibly and realise that this lack, in the few moments that qualify as triumph or disaster in one’s daily life, is more than balanced out by the quotidian freedom from having abuse or indeed rocks hurled at one by a live-in companion, which, when you’re as irritating as your humble blogger, is pretty much the norm.

Life, sad to say, goes on.  Ho and indeed hum.