I'm sure the odds on which Reinford would make it big first gave Kyle something like 5/3 and me something like 10/1. (Kyle for theatre/acting, me for doing something not really even newsworthy but possibly amusing). Don't even want to think about what Glenn's odds would be.
Anyhow, turns out it was neither of the frontrunners. Way to go Reinford. Richards.
A reference in The New Yorker means you've made it in my book.
Talked about the London marathon last Sunday... well one guy is just finishing today. He's been running the whole thing in slow motion -- one step every 5 or 6 seconds. Sounds like the kind of bad idea that I'd come up with and then actually execute on just for the story.
The weather here has been fantastic ever since I've arrived really. Apparently London fog is a big lie.
One thing I'm impressed by on a daily basis is the bike-riding skills of my fellow Londoners. They navigate bus lanes and confusing intersections fearlessly, avoid pedestrians and taxis with confidence and ease. I'm scared for them -- these men and women dressed in suits and sundresses. But they ride on in perfectly straight lines, never minding the double-decker bus that trails their rear wheel by only a few feet.
And lots of them do so while also talking on their mobiles.
Remember overalls? Saw someone wearing a pair the other day. I remember when I wanted some. Thankfully my mom said no and instead made me a fashionable pinkish-red jumpsuit from some sort of parachute material, which I proudly wore on the first day of 6th grade.
I've taken to wearing dock shoes every Saturday. I think the fact that I've already developed an obscure, potentially alienating habit officially puts me on the fast track towards being a reclusive hermit.
In a few weeks I'm going to a financial symposium just north of London in the town of Hertfordshire.
The conference lasts two days, but the majority of one day seems to consist of "country pursuits". Wondering just what country pursuits consist of, I dug deeper and found the following event description:
Experience the thrill of the great outdoors with laser clay shooting, a quadathalon of shooting events and falconry within the grounds of The Grove.
So that should be fun.
The laser clay shooting sounds simple enough. I think that quadathalon is actually a misspelling of quadrathlon, meaning there will be four phases of shooting. Not sure what we'll be shooting, but I'm lobbying for The French.
As for falconry... if you're not familiar with it Wikipedia explains it as "an art or sport which involves the use of trained raptors (birds of prey) to hunt or pursue game for men."
It'll be a nice resume builder if nothing else.
Nearly ran with one on last night. That was close.
Also -- when did I start using both straps? I remember in middle school thinking that I would never be one to do that.
I did it again. First muffins, now the #17 bus.
As soon as I found out how superior buses were to the Underground in certain scenarios (getting to work in my case), I told everyone I knew. Granted here in London that's less than 10 people, but they probably each know 10 or more people and probably passed that bit of wisdom along.
Now I can't even get a seat on the bus, and yesterday one passed me by at the stop because the bus was at capacity. Exponential growth is a dangerous thing. I need to start keeping secrets.
It's going to be called "For the Birds" I think.
Currently it is 92 pages long (including a cover page).
Other measures: 17,837 words, 78,660 characters (average of 4.41 characters per word, so very readable), 1,592 paragraphs.
I'm going to try and finish it up this weekend and then I guess I'll start sending it around. Although I kind of don't want to because that's probably where it will end. But oh well.
If it does get made, these artists will feature on the soundtrack:
The Rapture (opening office party scene)
Ibrahim Ferrer[or]Mulatu Astatqe[or]Manu Chao (while Jane cooks dinner)
Broken Social Scene (while John cleans up after dinner, and when Jane takes Vicodin in the bathroom)
Richard Ashcroft (John plays it on guitar when Jane is high)
Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton (when John is at the hospital)
My Morning Jacket (when John is depressed around town)
Jeff Tweedy (John plays on guitar)
Kings of Leon (when John goes to the office Christmas party)
Ratatat (also at Christmas party, probably while Brad is dancing)
Beirut (when John is on the plane)
Random Spanish music and probably some Seu Jorge (Bolivia scenes)
And then probably these guys at other times and during the rest of the movie:
Ryan Adams
Gillian Welch
Kate Havlevich
Apostle of Hustle
The Album Leaf
Arcade Fire
Wilco
Feist
The Go! Team
Sigur Ros
White Flight
Jose Gonzalez
Sufjan Stevens
Joy Division and/or Prince, depending on how things work out.
One interesting phenomenon about moving to a new country is that I've no ingrained philosophy or wisdom on things like:
1. Which companies or franchises are evil corporations.
2. Identifying characteristics that might identify someone who may hurt me.
3. How to dress on certain occassions.
4. What to say, what not to say.
5. Whether every guy at my gym is hitting on me.
I hate big evil empires. When I lived in Chelsea I had the choice of a big Sainsbury's for grocery shopping or a tiny little Tesco. I assumed Sainsbury's was bigger but have recently discovered that Tesco is like Walmart with a world domination complex.
Suspicious individuals are easy for me to identify in the States. But pretty much everyone looks suspicious here. And those characteristics that I identify with people who will steal from me or punch me in the face are spread evenly through the population or don't exist at all. I think a lot of gang members here are actually pretty good dressers.
Nothing much to expand on for #s 3 and 4. #5 has the potential to be pretty comical. At first I was kind of intimidated at the gym -- lots of gigantic dudes. But the more I paid attention, the more I noticed that they often traveled in twos and wore fashionable spandex.
Oh I thought of another one:
6. How bad bad words are.
I think we see this a lot in the States with folks speaking English as a second language. Sometimes they'll say something and everyone is like 'holy cow that was really awful, and in this context especially'. I probably do the same here because I know generally what the curse words are, but I could also easily confuse one with a non-offensive version (like darn v damn) and I also don't know which ones are really bad and which ones are just kind of cool.
The London Marathon was this morning -- at over 36,000 runners (and this year, one person who danced the entire distance) it is the largest race in the world.
This week someone asked me: How long is the London Marathon?
A: Same as every marathon: 26.2 miles.
I don't blame people for asking these kinds of questions, because really the only people who care about marathons are those who have run one, are going to run one, or know someone training for one. I am all of those people.
I started running after graduating college. I really hate running, but on my friend Brad Miller's awful advice to always have a hobby that you hate, I began running while living in Denver in the summer of 2002. Running at a high altitude meant that when I moved to Charlottesville a few months later, everything was easier. My distances increased accordingly.
I never really considered running a proper race, but one early morning Brad and I found ourselves at the starting line of a 10k trail run. We both wore basketball shorts and tennis shoes, and found ourselves intimidated by runners decked out in spandex and designer running gear. It didn't take long to discover that gear does not the runner make, as Brad and I beat many of those wearing moisture-wicking jerseys and short shorts, and lost to many dressed more randomly than we were (one guy dressed in a Satan outfit comes to mind).
From there, the races started getting longer, and Brad in particular started descending towards running snobbery by gearing up at running stores.
My defining race was the Chicago Marathon in the fall of 2003. I trained for the race for 18 weeks, which was basically like working the worst part-time job ever. I ran 5 days a week, with a long run each Saturday that prevented me from doing much on Friday nights, or punished me if I did.
But punishment was kind of my strategy -- I figured that if I ran at the hottest times of the day, without being properly hydrated and/or nourished, things would be easy come raceday. I was kind of right. I beat my goal of 4 hours, finished strong, running the second half of the race 15 minutes faster than the first half. And I beat a Kenyan (though I did lose to 8,079 others).
Other running moments worth memorializing:
- The time Brad and I were running a 5k and were scared to death to notice that an eleven year-old girl was on our heels going into the home stretch.
- Running the Charlottesville 10-miler wearing a SpongeBob SquarePants outfit.
- Running the Charlottesville 10-miler wearing booty shorts and a keytar T-shirt.
- The time that I got back from a long run a minute too late and went number 2 in the front yard.
- The time my friend Javier did the same thing.
- The time Brad did the same thing.
- The time Brad led me for an entire race, but inexplicably took a wrong turn up a garden stairway, a move that required him to run behind a race official who was pointing in the opposite direction.
- The time when, during a late night, I promised Brad that I would run the Charlottesville Half-Marathon the next day -- a race I had not trained or registered for, and a distance 3.1 miles further than I had ever run before. That was a pretty bad idea.
- The annual running of the Turkey Trot -- a Charlottesville 5k that takes place on Thanksgiving morning and is run by preppy country club families. We crashed it for three years straight and ate their bagels and donuts after finishing.
My favorite memory came the day before the Chicago Marathon. That year, for my dad's birthday, I registered him for a pre-marathon 5k. I liberally called it a gift. He trained for it for weeks in advance and by raceday knew how to pace and had a goal, which we beat. The best part was that we ran it together. The second best part was that he wore a headband.
Just had a whole post written on the London Marathon and my own experiences running, and I somehow lost it. I'll put it up tomorrow. (The London Marathon is tomorrow which is the reason the subject came up.)
Couple of random thoughts/notes just so your visit wasn't a complete loss:
1. Half Nelson, a movie starring Ryan Gosling, who I don't really like, came out to pretty great reviews here. Not sure when it came out in the States. Soundtrack is original music by Broken Social Scene which means it's probably great. Anyone checked it out?
2. Speaking of films, just finished up my screenplay, tentatively named For the Birds. Or at least got it really really close to send off. I think it's good but who knows. Whatever it was fun to write.
3. Great Arsenal v Tottenham game this morning. For those of you unfamiliar with the rivalry, I live near Arsenal and am an Arsenal fan. Tottenham is like one mile away. Both (North) London clubs. They hate each other. Great game despite the ending.
4. I think I'm going to this party tonight: www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU9CTfR15GI. The birthday boy, Jose, is Venezuelan, and everytime he says "Venezuela", it sounds like "Minnesota". That's probably why he's in a Facebook group called: "Where are you from?", "Venezuela", "oh..Minnesota!", "NO...VENEZUELA!!!"
5. The title of this post, "Bollocks", can be roughly translated to mean "Balls". It's a more vulgar version of "Shucks", and a less vulgar version of "FA", which is an acronym for something. Interesting that the phrase "The dog's bollocks" means that something is out-of-this-world fantastic. These Britons love to swear and are quite good at it. Very creative. At the end of the game today a fairly harmless looking woman let off a stream that gained her a great deal of respect by most in attendance. I didn't really understand most of it and only remember that at some point the words "shabby", "crabby" and "bastards" were sequenced.
You've been waiting for today, because today is the inaugural posting of the highly anticipated "ask er/uk"! Let's get right to it.
Dear er/uk,
What is your favorite book? What is your favorite band?
You're the best, Eric
Great question me! My favorite book is The Brothers K by David James Duncan. It's just got everything. So epic and so inclusive of all these great ideas and locations and context.
Favorite band would be Broken Social Scene -- so nuanced and honest, so eclectic and complex. They can save the world. Every time I listen to them (whole-album listening only, they'll do little to impress on a one-off basis, at least initially) I feel hopeful.
No Brothers K. No Broken Social Scene. No Eric.
Know Brothers K. Know Broken Social Scene. Know Eric.
For good measure, my favorite city is Seville, Spain; my favorite Tshirt manufacturer is Loomstate; my favorite soccer boot is the Copa Mundial by Adidas; my favorite pronunciation of Adidas is "ah-dee-das"; and my favorite movie is The Royal Tenenbaums. By now you should all know my favorite magazine and my favorite nationality. Oh, and blue.
Warmest regards,
er/uk
Dear er/uk,
Who would win in a fight, a Chav or a roaming pack of SWAGs?
Yours in blogging, Brad
As background, here are some definitions:
Chav or Charv/Charver is a mainly derogatory slang term in the UK for a subcultural stereotype fixated on fashions such as gold jewelry and designer clothing. They are generally considered to have no respect for society, and be ignorant or unintelligent.
[S]WAG was an acronym used particularly (but by no means exclusively) by the British tabloid press to describe the [Soccer] Wives And Girlfriends of the English national football team. But by now it's become a universal acronym, and generally just identifies all rich wives of athletes who enjoy shopping and fame by association. The full history of the acronym and all of its iterations can be found here.
My answer: I'm always keen to go with the numbers, so score one for the SWAGs right off the bat. Additionally, SWAGs are known to be ruthless and tenacious. And they have long fingernails and sharp teeth. True, most of them are skinny (size zeros as we say here in Briton), but I would envision them adopting a similar attack pattern to wild dogs, which you can watch for yourself on the Discovery Channel in the Planet Earth series. SWAGs win.
Hugs and kisses,
er/uk
Dear er/uk,
Why hasn't the London real estate market cooled considerably? I am looking to put down roots, and I don't want to put them down in Surrey.
Your loyal reader, Andrea
London is so hot right now. It is literally the center of the universe. Or at least the central metropolitan hub connecting the U.S., Europe and Asia. Which means it's so awesome that no one can afford to live here!
Just saw this bit of research last week, which looked at the affordability of houses for five different key workers -- nurses, teachers, firefighters, the police, and ambulance workers.
Nurses and firefighters face the biggest difficulties, with the average house price being unaffordable for nurses in 99% of areas, while firefighters were priced out of 97% of London's boroughs.
So that sucks. Also interesting that nurses apparently get paid jack here. I think I also saw the statistic that the average home in London has gone up by £8k so far in 2007 (or $16k).
I hear Surrey is beautiful this time of year.
Your truly,
er/uk
Dear er/uk,
Why did William dump Kate?
Me again, Andrea
Like it was so obvious that William was like, not ready to settle down and Kate was all, I want to be royalty now William, we're supposed to be together forever cuz we love each other so much and I want to have ten thousand of your Royal babies.
But when you're already Royalty you realize at some point that like, your roving eye will be rewarded pretty much 100% of the time so why am I wasting my glory years with this chick who is just suffocating me when I could totally be pulling game even on my off nights?
I guess really she was just too middle class. Which some consider an insult, but which I see as a positive indicator/predictor into whether you will be cool and fun and have common sense. That and if you were an only child (which doesn't bode well).
Happily hoi polloi,
er/uk
Dear er/uk,
I hope you are getting paid in sterling.
Economically, Jeff
Sadly, not the case. It's as if they've just started a nationwide 1 for 2 day sale here for Americans -- buy 2, get 1! (no not 1 free, 1 total) But hey, everyone loves a sale! I'll even wait in line for it if you put it on the day after Thanksgiving.
Yours in consumerism,
er/uk
So that wraps up the first installment of "ask er/uk". Hope you enjoyed it. Feel free to continue submitting questions and I'll run the column whenever enough interesting questions collect (and there are no bad questions, only bad people).
How are they so good at certain things? I'm speaking of course of retail, political neutrality and being blonde. IKEA and H&M are Swedish brands that pretty much dominate everywhere these days. If you haven't heard of them by now, you probably live in a barn (barn-dwellers and other rural types make up approximately 95% of my readership).
The CliffsNotes version is that IKEA sells home products and H&M sells clothes.
Couple of interesting tidbits:
IKEA
IKEA is an acronym that stands for Ingvar Kamprad Elmtaryd Agunnaryd -- the founder's first name, last name, house name, and village name (they like to name houses and buildings here -- like today I went to Stornoway House, which is an office building).
IKEA is intricately setup from a corporate structure standpoint which allows them to avoid paying most taxes. They funnel profits through a nonprofit subsidiary and shell corporations. Hmm.
And to add to that, IKEA is also parent company to the world's largest charitable organization, the INGKA fund. At $36B, this fund is $3B larger than the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. But somehow, they don't really give that much money away. Some approximations put their charitable contributions for 2004 at $1.7M, which is lots less than the fund would make on interest in a given year. To put this in perspective the Gates Foundation gave roughly $1.5B in 2005.
But they do make a nice coffee table. And they are ecofriendly and like to promote sustainability and environmental design. And Swedish women make me blush.
H&M
Another acronym, this one less memorable. Basically H stands for Hennes, which is Swedish for "hers", and M stands for Mauritz, which is the first name of the guy who bought Hennes.
Nothing much else interesting about H&M it seems. They did once employ Kate Moss as their spokesmodel, but dropped her after she appeared in photographs snorting cocaine. She's still really the most famous non-Royal in London based on my brief experience.
Their clothes are cheap and fashionable, but not as cheap as they used to be. But dare I say MORE fashionable? I dare.
ABBA
Is also from Sweden.
Dear Eric,
Thank you for your feedback regarding our recent commercial using Coach Mike Krzyzewski. I appreciate the time you took to share your concerns. And we at State Farm will consider your reaction as we develop commercials in the future.
Sincerely,
Greg Sutter, Advertising Manager
State Farm Insurance
So I've been thinking about yesterday's events at Virginia Tech. I find myself putting a number on it, saying "33 people". And it's all relative, really. 33 can be a lot or 33 can be a little.
But then I got to thinking about how much potential impact 1 life can have, and decided that there really is no limit and there really is no relevant measurement. Every day we're in perpetual interaction with people and things. Our interactions impact those people and things, which potentially changes behaviors, attitudes and environments immediately and/or further down the line. It just spiderwebs. Every day in every situation -- we can't isolate ourselves or our actions. And we can't understand exponential impact. It's just too big and too complicated. We can't comprehend infinity.
Those 33 people led 33 complex lives, full of stories and experiences and success and failure and happiness and confusion. But their lives weren't just their own. Each of their lives had an impact on each of our lives before yesterday (but certainly yesterday).
I don't know any of the victims or any of the victim's families personally, but that doesn't mean that nothing I've done didn't impact any of them, and nothing they've done ever impacted me. I'll never know, and I never can know, and even if I did know I couldn't understand it. What paradox: being so small and insignificant in the context of the world, and yet being so influential in that our everyday actions set the course for human history.
And it could be closer than just ripples -- maybe I bumped into one of those 33 in an airport or sat in the same room with one of those 33 in a restaurant while on vacation. Maybe we were on the same plane. Maybe one of them opened a door for me or maybe I made one of them miss their bus. Maybe I forwarded along an email that eventually reached them and made their day.
It seems random, but what if it's not? If I can't grasp infinity why should I be able to find order in everyday life?
I like living in the city because everytime a bus or train passes me by I make eye contact with a person or two staring out the window. Who's to say whether they're the same people everyday, people I've met somewhere in a former stage of my life, or participants in the next great tragedy.
We're all good at certain things. And when we think of our talents we tend to broaden the categories into fields of study, athletics and personality traits. Those categories are too general. Who cares if you're good at math or tennis? Certainly not me.
I am interested in greatness. To think of something you're great at (we'll say 90th percentile in the world or higher), most of us have to get extremely specific. I oftentimes wonder if I'm not the best in the world at: Catching things that I've dropped.
Say I'm holding a pen and it slips out of my hand. I will react and catch that pen before it hits the ground. I accidentally showcase this talent probably once or twice per week. Many of my good friends have seen it firsthand. And the item isn't important -- I've done this with paperclips, business cards, even a gallon of milk.
I'm also great at changing lanes -- even several lanes consecutively -- but since I don't have a car anymore and haven't really driven much over the last few years, I can't say for sure that I'm still great at it. This is why it's important to recognize the things that you're great at and groom those skills.
Sometimes greatness isn't about practice, it's about redefining things. Think about it. People will be interested in what you come up with. My friend Brad Miller would have absolutely nothing to live for if he couldn't constantly revel in the fact that his thumb is, proportionate to his body, the tallest thumb on earth.
If you ever see a book by this name, don't open it. The contents probably consist of a pop-up figure of a person pointing at you and a laugh track.
Thanks for all the great questions (Andrea and Brad). "Ask er/uk" will debut later this week and is sure to be an international sensation. I'm still accepting questions of course so please let your interests be known.
It is warm here. I've already transitioned from wearing full-length trousers to clamdiggers. The next step will be from clamdiggers to shorts. And the final and bravest step will be from shorts to booty shorts.
This blog officially has the power to move markets. Here's what I mean: a few days ago, when I posted about blueberry muffins, muffins were in abundant supply here in London. I remembered that whole 'from abundance, abundance can be taken and still abundance remains' saying, but apparently that logic does not apply when your readership extends through so many countries and demographics.
London is out of blueberry muffins.
I need to think a bit about how to use this new power for good.
All for now. Keep those questions coming! And by that I mean I haven't received any yet.
Today is a day to come clean. Mark Miller is the real Charlie Freund impersonator, not Steven Swartzendruber. Mark's comment on yesterday's post exposed my incorrect pressumption:
Hi Eric,
This is Mark, your sometimes-twin. I object that you thought said "Charlie Freund" comment came from Steve Swartzendruber, because...tada, it was me (speaking as an interpreter to Charlie, who lost the ability to type when he lost both hands in the Vietnam War, which explains his obvious malevolence toward [sic] your post and his searing desire to "get it right" when speaking of the intracacies [sic] and horror [sic] of war [sic. no full stop/period. but now I'm really just trying to get you back])
Steve -- I've given you too much credit. Quiet down and go have a seat at the back of the room.
Mark -- Well done. Consider that a point in the win column of our epic and sure to be lifelong alpha storyteller/general wittiness battle. Enjoy your relish.
The rest of you should all follow Mark's lead with the frequent and sometimes mischevious commenting. And don't forget to include questions in there for the soon-to-be incredibly popular column "Ask er/uk".
I love it when people comment on my blog.
(And mom -- if you don't know how to comment, you can do so by clicking on the link that reads "# comments", which displays directly below each post.)
The responses thus far have been overwhelmingly positive. The only critical comment I've received was in response to my New Yorker Caption Contest entry. It came from someone claiming to be my nemesis, Charlie Freund. While I found Mssr. Freund's perspective to be sincere and reasonable, I also think that:
1. The confidence inherent to the comment make sense given the fact that he won the contest, but...
2. aside from that, all of his insights are completely subjective -- my caption did communicate the emotions of helplessness and hopelessness, puns are ideal for cartoon captions, and the fact that we even play golf while at war is enough in itself to illustrate both the horrors of war and the virtues of golf. The picture is worth a thousand words, so your caption needn't be.
3. The commentor was actually my good friend Steven Swartzendruber, who shares my affinity for both The New Yorker and teasing people anonymously. If it really was Charlie Freund, how did he find my posting? Did he Google himself? Because that would be ridiculous.
Ok, now on to the real meat of the post.
In the interest of gathering feedback, improving the blog and adding an interactive element, I'm now accepting questions which will be addressed going forward in a monthly Q&A: "Ask er/uk". Questions can be submitted via comments or email. So think of the questions you've been dying to ask me, and I'll answer them with the same level of candor and sarcasm you've come to expect.
When I started high school I was 5 feet tall, 77 pounds. Wearing sweat pants and a hooded sweatshirt. Soaking wet. Holding an infant.
I hovered around 90 lbs there for a while and when I finally reached the 100 lb mark I was thrilled. Parties were planned, signs were made and hung in the halls ... and then the assistant principal took them down thinking that I was victim to a teasing campaign.
In college I bulked up from 120 to 140 thanks to a strength and speed coach who fed me creatine, oatmeal and peanut butter. His target weight for me was 180, which he only missed by 40 lbs.
Sometime after college I realized that my license still listed me at 105 lbs and 5' 8".
Nowadays I've ballooned to the 150 range, which effectively makes me the loser of a bet I made with Mark Miller. Not sure of the wager, but the bet was on who would be closest to their college weight at age 50. If you've seen Mark Miller lately you know that he hasn't added a pound (or the ability to grow facial hair which, in hindsight, is a gift I wish I'd retained).
Wait why did I start writing this?
Oh yeah, muffins. They are fantastic here. Miniature and blueberry. They're going straight to my thighs but I don't care they're so delicious. I probably average eating one per hour. I'm going to have to increase my nervous leg twitching to burn those extra calories. (Another fun fact for all of you -- my leg was once shaking so violently that I was asked to leave a restaurant.)
Man these posts just keep getting better!
I alluded to this in an earlier post: I type the dictionary.
One day at a time, one page per day, simple transposition. I started this on 22 August, 2004. I'm currently on page 430. If I miss a day, I do not allow myself to catch up, nor do I allow myself to type more than one page even if I'm feeling particularly ambitious. At my current rate, I should be done sometime in early 2008.
I can't really remember why I started doing this project, but it has served several purposes (1) enriching my vocabulary; (2) improving my typing speed, especially of characters and symbols, and; (3) providing me with an activity that I can do that makes me feel strangely productive, even if it's the only thing I do all day.
I remember Day 2 when I told Kristy Shellenberger, Mark Snyder (the future Mrs. Shellenberger), Matthew Krabill and Mark Miller that I started typing the dictionary. And they didn't think that I'd keep doing it. Well look at me now doubters! I'm too stubborn to stop doing something even if it doesn't really make lots of sense to continue on! I've typed a lot of words! And definition! Many times multiple definitions and for varied pronunciations! (Oh, and in addition to typing them, I highlight words that I would like to learn or use more often. Then, when I've completed all the words for a letter, I compile them in a "best of" archive.)
What did I learn on Day 430? A few of my favorites were propound, pro rata (I'm a sucker for Latin terms that I can mold into business cliches), prosaic, prosody (I think a funny poetry major t-shirt would be: "The only prosody are that there are no prosody*". Even though there surely are.) and protean. Not bad for 5 minutes work.
I was also reminded of the similarity, both in sound and spelling, of the words progeny, prodigy, and protege. Of which I am at least two. I'll let you decide which, and/or of what or whom.
*This shirt only makes sense if you use the simplest definition of prosody provided in my dictionary, which is: "The rules for writing prose".
Even in an office setting, while wearing a suit, a mullet is acceptable.
And at the pool, expect about 90% more speedos.
Oh and old dudes dating well young women.
And bad customer service.
And drinking in public.
And singing in public. By men. In large groups. Not choirs mind you. Or even men that know each other.
Wearing a tie that is extremely short or extremely thin.
And having a foxy assistant who fetches you tea and is always and only addressed as darling.
Lots of churches around here of course. Big, old and empty ones.
From Wikipedia: Demographically, the largest religious groupings [in London] are Christian (58.2%), No Religion (15.8%), Muslim (7.2%), Hindu (4.1%), Jewish (2.1%), and Sikh (1.5%). As in the rest of the United Kingdom, only a small minority of those who designate themselves as Christians attend church on a regular basis.
Funny then that both Good Friday and Easter Monday are bank holidays. Hooray for 4 day weekends. I'll probably spend most of tomorrow playing brick-breaker on my phone.
I've mentioned his blog before, and if you're not a regular reader by now you really have no excuses (unless you're old or something). My brother Kyle publishes an outstanding music blog covering all genres (thus the eclectic title), with (very) occassional submissions from myself and my friend Brad. Album reviews, live show reviews, current events, lots of excellent downloads and playlists, and other things that you should just generally know about.
Read Café Eclectica Music here: http://cemusic.blogspot.com
Add it to your favorites. It's updated nearly every day.
It's also linked up a Flickr photo album with some photography highlights from my former life as a live music photo journalist. Some of them are surprisingly good. Check out my portfolio here.
Tomorrow I'm going to a boat race. Actually I'm going to THE boat race (www.theboatrace.org). Cambridge v Oxford, on the Thames.
Per the website: "Oxford have won four of the last five encounters but Cambridge lead the series by 78-73, since 1829 with one dead heat. The scene is now set for The Race on April 7th at 4.30pm."
And this year it's showing on ESPN in the States, I think. So you can watch it, 5 or so hours before 4:30GMT (11:30am for most of you).
I'm probably going to wear an ascot. Well, I'm going to find out what an ascot is first and then I'm probably going to wear one. I'm hoping this is one of those lo-brow/hi-brow events like the Kentucky Derby where there's a clear division in class of those in attendance. Those kinds of events just make me happy.
Postscript -- apparently this was only on ESPNu or something. And also, there were like a million people there. Seriously. Dozens deep on both sides of the river for as far as I could see in either direction. Cambridge won by a length. Way to go Light Blues! Way to beat the Dark Blues! Can someone please help the English with their mascot names!
CCTV means ClosedCircuitTeleVision. Next time you're in London, take a quick look around and you'll probably see a camera or a mirrored globe pointing in your general direction. On average, if you tool around London for a day, you'll be caught on these monitors 300x.
That's not to say that someone is watching and monitoring those feeds at all times, but it is an incredible statistic that would bother me more if I were doing more inappropriate/illegal things like I probably should be.
This week they announced that in certain trouble spots, they'll be adding audio to the CCTV setups -- not to capture sound, but to provide immediate scolding for those who choose to litter, vandalize or otherwise act as a nuisance as defined by the state. I'm expecting these sorts of warnings:
"Sir, you've dropped your shawarma wrapping. Please pick it up and dispose of it in the nearest rubbish or grit container. Many thanks."
"If I could bother you not to snog that lass if she's not wanting to be snogged that would be brilliant."
"Kindly stop smashing the Tottenham hooligans with those homemade spiked bats. Just for a bit. Cheers."
There's even talk of using a child's voice in some of the reprimands to shame the person into stopping whatever it is they're doing.
I was thinking that maybe a cool movie concept would be to have a film that was a mix of actual filmed scenes and soundless scenes from CCTV. The viewer would have to piece the off-air interactions together with the publicly broadcasted ones to understand the story. But it would be pretty unnerving how much of it you could understand just by watching the closed circuit feeds.
That first month was fun. I departed for London on 4 March -- a month ago today. Since then I've pretty much been running on adrenaline. Despite missing meals and just having a poor diet in general, staying up extremely late (but still waking up extremely early), wandering around in potentially dangerous neighborhoods in early morning hours, working a lot, spending money faster than I made it, and occassionally consuming one pint too many, I'm still alive. But you can't live hard and talk fast forever, and I realize that. That's why, starting tomorrow, I'm going to get my act together.
Here's my plan:
1) Gym membership. This is something I've missed. I only weigh 10 stones now (not really sure if that's more or less than when I left). I have played a few games of soccer, but that's really not cutting it. I miss pull-ups, oblique muscles, wearing a tank-top, and looking at myself in the mirror. And all the gyms here have pools, steam rooms (mentioned my affinity for those yesterday) and saunas. So I think I'm going to focus on LEARNING HOW TO SWIM. I know how to stay afloat, and I'm a master of the snorkel, but I never really learned to properly swim in a straight line, back and forth and back and forth, via freestyle or any other stroke. I'm also going to start rowing again. Running was great, but my knees and ankles were never really big fans. Swimming and rowing are "life sports", which means they're non-contact, non-impact -- like an elliptical except without being absolutely ridiculous.
2) Reading. I do read a lot here. A lot of street signs and store names. And also the free newspapers that they hand out in the morning and evening on the Underground. But past navigating the city and the city's sports, gossip and news, I haven't been reading regularly. I did bring a few books along that I'm looking forward to reading and working back up towards the 2 books/month pace that I strive for. Starting tomorrow.
3) Typing the dictionary*. I've been on travel hiatus here. Now that I've got my MacBook back and an internet connection at home, I can pick up where I left off: somewhere in the P's I think. Maybe somewhere around "peremptory", which means "dogmatic", which means "asserting opinions in a doctrinaire or arrogant manner; opinionated", which I often do and often am.
4) Eating healthy food and eating regularly. My brother and I are known for "forgetting to eat", despite our love for food and potentially enormous appetites. Sometimes we just get wrapped up in other stuff, you know? But no more excuses. I have a kitchen now (no cookware or dishware yet but that's pending). I'm not planning to do anything crazy like "cook regularly", but I do want to stock up on some breakfast goods (ie, cereal) and some fruits/organic goods (ie, Apple Jacks and Rice Krispies). And probably some sports drinks & water so I can rehydrate from a month that did nothing but dehydrate me. And also some yogurt and granola, which in combination with fruit creates a magical treat I like to call "yogurt with granola and fruit". It's a pre-gym must, and I'm sure I invented it.
5) Finish my movie*. I'm writing a screenplay. So far so good but I need to finish it already.
6) Live on a budget. I came up with a budget that I think will work. Now I just need to start keeping track of things. And I also need to start treating the currency here like actual currency instead of monopoly money. Even the coins. (I was at a pub watching Arsenal get beat the other day and I saw a guy win a thousand dollars in coins from some sort of game machine. The winnings fit comfortably in his pocket.)
7) Date less Swedish girls. Or at least take a break. It's not them, it's me.
*I understand that for some of you this may be the first you've heard of my typing addiction (dictionary-transposition and screenplay-comingupwith). I promise to expand on the purpose and focus of each in coming posts, as they are both relatively interesting.
Feel free to get your acts together as well. Tomorrow's as good a day to start as you're ever going to find.
Two intonations work here: Things that I like that they like here, or, Things that I like that they like here:
Smoothies
Steam Rooms/Steam Showers
The preheating of towels
Tight jeans
The first time I ever did my own laundry I was in college. (My mom already gets a lot of shout-outs on this blog, and certainly this deserves another round of thanks.) I sorted out whites and darks, started the cycle, and came back 30 minutes later to find that I hadn't added any detergent.
In subsequent years, my laundering skills have improved. Yes I have occassionally stained other clothes with new colorful shirts, and yes I should've taken some things to the dry cleaner instead of sticking them in the washer with my grass-stained soccer socks. But up until yesterday I thought I had things pretty well figured out.
I have a combo washer/dryer in my kitchen. I did three loads. On the first, I somehow turned the temperature up to some unbelievable degree as to unset the colors from some shirts that must've been washed 50x prior. Also the drying cycle didn't work so I had to hang these around the room to dry. On the second load, I sorted out colors and whites to prevent the same sort of problem -- things went swimmingly. After an hour and a half, my clothes were clean and dry. On the third, final, and most troubling load, I couldn't get the door open to get the clothes out. The cycle evidently has to finish completely and I somehow disrupted things. As I was to be out of this apartment by 10am the next morning, I really wanted to get things sorted out, especially given the possibility that the clothes wouldn't even be dry once they were finally freed. So I ran the whole cycle through again, went to bed, and this morning I had a washer full of clean, but absolutely soaked, clothes.
Which are now in a garbage bag inside of another bag which also contains my suits.
Today I'm busy moving across town, from a trendy street in South Kensington to an edgier area in Angel/Islington (a comparable move would be from the Meatpacking District in Manhattan to Park Slope in Brooklyn). Definitely positives and negatives to both neighborhoods. It's been fun here, but it's a bit posh for me. So I'm excited for the change and to have a more permanent place.
The Angel Tube stop has the longest escalator in Europe, which is just the kind of random fact that I'm known for collecting and redistributing. Last week that very escalator substituted nicely for a ski slope. Crazy Norwegians!
Check it out here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRvuGJF5NlE
Off to Dublin tomorrow for a good craic.
