It's been an odd old week.

Monday 18th

I work in the BBC, whose offices are but a mere hop, skip and jump away from a little pub called Morrisons in Belfast city centre. It's painted green on the outside if I remember correctly, but hey, give it a chance. The beer taps are so close to your office desk, your senses follow the crisp flow down the stairs, past the back gate, and into the warm bosom of your first sweet pint after work. (Drink problem?) Meabh and I went down for a quick one, over which her desire to go cage diving with sharks was much probed by my wussiness: "What, you mad woman! You'll come back with your arm chewed off you!" Mark joined us shortly after for his first pint in two weeks. He's a final year student, whose loan has just come through, so it was a little reward to himself. I smoked far too much, and could feel the noxious gases swell, not greatly combining with weak American beer. We make arrangements to go and see Jimmy Carr play at the festival, that's if I'm not being shackled to my office desk on the night in question.

Later, I meet up with Leanne, who's working til midnight, for the briefest of drinks before Auntie Annie's staff kicks us out. It's only 12:45! I still have half a whiskey in front of me to savour! No, much maximise time in pub... hide from glare of bouncer... close ears to calls of "Time gentlemen, please!" (Drink problem?)

Tuesday 19th
Charmain are I are walking up Botanic to go to the book launch of Rosemary Jenskinson, an e-mail buddy of Charmain's, and quite a promising short story writer. I stop in the newsagents to buy some smokes, while Charmain is on the phone enquiring about a job. There's some shouting from outside as I pay at the counter for my cigarettes. I step out of the shop and Charmain says, "Here, I think those kids just nicked that bike." We go into the shop and ask the guy behind the counter if he owned the bike outside. He groans, and rubs his brow, saying "Oh, man." The guy is Sam, a Canadian, who tells us that he must have hit a run of bad luck, as his shop sign was stolened the day before, and his friend, who runs a yoga class in the same street, had her bike swiped two weeks ago. He commiserate him, and chat for a while, and head forth to the reading.

The reading is at Bookfinders cafe, run by Mary, who is incredibly supportive of the writing scene in Belfast. She asks as soon as I'm through the door what I'm up to at the moment, which is encouraging. The reading goes well, and I'm convinced enough to buy a copy of Rosemary's book. I chat to a guy called Tim, who is fiercely intelligent. Off the top of his head, he develops a theory that a poem I wrote with Ruairi called Wakey Wakey. The theory compared the cyclic movement of Finnegan's Wake with the 'one day' template of Ulysses to the structure of the poem. Basically, he concludes that we've acheived in one poem what Joyce took over thirty years to write. I want this guy as my agent!

Most of the group that attends the reading heads en masse to the John Hewitt. I talk to a number of people on the way, including another cool Canadian called owen, who I met before in White's Tavern. We reminisce about the time we almost got beaten up by 'mongoids' as he calls them- i.e. spidey thugs. At the John Hewitt, I talk to Charmain, and then to a really top bloke called Gerry. We chat about poems, and writing, and other nonsense, and I ask him to attend a poetry night we run. His friend Kevin, or Keiran, chats to Charmain, vaguely trying to charm her I think, but not really succeeding. I spy him later on in the night trying his luck elsewhere. I tell Gerry about belfastpoets.com, and hope to see him again.

We stagger out of the pub, towards City Hall, and chat to two guys who seem as drunk as we are (Drink problem?)- Francis and Ronan- who kindly give up their taxi to us. Thank you guys!

Wednesday 20th
Working in the BBC has it's benefits- today I spoke to Honor Blackman on the phone. The Data Protection Act probably restricts me to telling you why, but I can say that she was absolutely lovely and delightful to talk to. I was starstuck!

The BBC Club held a 25th anniversary party for Children In Need. I kissed Pudsey Bear and then sang to a song from the South Park movie. The compere plucked me from the audience as I was singinf along to the song anyway, to perform it in the Movie-oke segement of the nigt. Famous scenes are played on a screen behind you, and you get up and act out the scene, following the words kareoke style on a screen in front of you. "Hey you in the white shirt! You seem to be enjoying that song, why don't you get up and sing it for us?" So I did, and a star was born.... and then extinguished with Jack Daniels and Coke. (Drink problem?) We dance the night away and I realise that I'm still quite shy, despite me acting the eejit.

Thursday 21st
Watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind with Mary Rose, as we can't agree what movie to go to see at the cinema, and between us drink a bottle of Bush that Richard so kindly bought me back from Crete. (drink problem?) Really need a good night's sleep at this stage...

Growing Old Without Drink

Read a Tom Waits interview. He talks about having a desire to hold the mentality and fashion of the old while still in his youth. Do I want to be old? Old is a state of mind that does not necessarily come with grace. People think that more old people (old by age) should take up this manner than is currently happening. You cannot tell the old how to be young; they either retain the spirit, or grow into their years, memories framing the final structure of their support network. That is, if the find they have one at all.

And yes, I am aware that I am using the word as both an adjective and a noun, when I do not really know what it means. The young never will. Am I falling into cliché, recycled words? The conscious always reframes from repetition.

Talked about what we want to attend in the forthcoming festival. Tom Waits mentions he hasn’t touched drink in twelve years. Should I give up drink? Here’s an idea for a stage show: tour the country, relating drunken tales, balancing up the pros and cons for abstinence, the arguments for and against alcohol intake, and then ask the audience what they think. If, overall, more people think I should quit, go twelve months (one for ever one of Tom’s years) without the drink in mouth, and then return to do a follow-up show the next year speaking about the dry experiences and if they enlightened my life in any way at all. On the first night, I will break the vow and have a drink onstage. Would anyone pay to see that? Of course, it will be highly humorous! Maybe my want for alcohol will demur as I get older.

Web Design In Grey

I'm doing my nut in (not a euphenism for masturbation) tring to plan out a new design for my website, it really is damn annoying. There's a certain shade of grey that I have fallen in love with, not unlike the gre of the keys on this laptop, which I know is dull, and boring, and depressing, but!- if you overlay white text onto it, the image is sharp, distinct, easy to read. The colours do not bleed into one another, and that's the important thing, to make it appealing to the eye. But grey?

I remember in Home Econonics in Second Year, our teacher telling us (and full right her knowing that fourteen years old may think think this notion absurd) that you taste with your eyes. Some of us laughed, as suspected, but I nodded like a wise sage, and thought, "true, very true." I may even havepouted as you do which mulling over a proposal. Anyway, you wouldn't eat a food that's grey, would you? What types of food are grey? Monkey brains mabye, but I've never had them. A stick of Wrigley's Juicy Fruit: but that isn't really food, so I guess it doesn't count. Though, you do place it in our mouth and chew...

Have you ever seen One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest? There's a scene in it where the big tough Indian fella finally sas something after Jack Nicholson's character offers him a piece of gum. "Mmm, Juicy Fruit" he replies, instantly refreshed and satisfied, and not in a Homer Simpson craving for deliciousness type of way. I wonder if the scene remains in the stage version with Christian Slater? So many Hollywood names going to theatre howadays. Good to see, adds some credibility and artistic merit into a profession which is seen as being at risk of being dangerously hollow at times. You following so far?

So thanks to the chewing gum, we have the set up for a great plot development in a riveting movie, and most likely, an interesting stage production as well. Which is my justification, albeit a loose and weak one, for using the colour grey.

Guitar

I’ve started writing songs again. Nothing major, just strumming away at the guitar: bought new strings and a capo to encourage me. I was going to buy an acoustic, only cost fifty bucks, but I went to play it in the shop, and didn’t get a great sound out of it. Maybe that was more due to my playing abilities rather than anything else….Anyway, I heard this tune from the Frames, called Pavement Song, which has really inspired me to get a few ideas together. The chorus goes “I want my life to make more sense, I want my life to make amends…” which is pretty much how I feel at the moment. Scribbling a few lyrics down as well, nothing like my poetry. The feeling and progression is loose, not as structured or tuned as my poems might be. I find it quite difficult to have more than one skill running at the same time. Either I am writing songs, or poems, or performing poetry pieces, or sketching, or drumming, etc; but rarely are two or more running together simultaneously. But I’m concentrating on songs for the time being. If only I could actually sing, I’ll be downright marvellous.

Archives

Previous entries from Live Journal.com

Sep. 15th, 2004 @ 08:01 am I am a robot!
It's Stevie's leaving do and we pile into the pile around the corner from work. After repeat listens to Goldie Lookin' Chain's "Half Man, Half Machine" I think it would be hilarious to spend the entire night saying "Greeting humanoids. I am a robot. My prime directive is to go to the pub and drink beer. Do you compute?" This seems to amuse for about five minute and then everyone quickly gets tired of my computerised voice. I however think it is the funniest thing that's ever be uttered. And I'm not even drunk yet. I bought Stevie a can of foot spray as a going away present; it absolutely stinks. Unsurprisingly, the can is left in the pub at the end of the night. The rest of the night is a bit unclear. I remember vaguely talking about football. Possibly something about going home to visit your family? I said to Stevie I would right something up about the night. Happy now, you bugger?! Say hello to the 'Pool for me. A pint will be waiting for you when you return at Christmas... though of course, by then, it will be quite warm and flat...


Aug. 12th, 2004 @ 05:46 pm The supreme hat.
Friday night, big work do, supposedly a semi-formal, which means an excuse for the girls to buy new shoes. I don a tux, shabbily, there's a bow tie- clip on!- but most importantly, I have a hat. Same hat as left over from my gangster costume last Halloween. I love that hat, but rarely have a valid reason to wear it. Apart from tonight! Oh yes, I will wear my supreme hat with all the sartorial grace on the roaring 1920s! Wow, look at him- he has a hat! A fine peaked sleek black monster of a hat. People will ask if there can wear the hat. Some will ask for photos with the hat. A few may even choose to dance with it. One person will decide that the hat is just so fine and dandy that they will STEAL THE HAT AND DISAPPEAR HOME WITH IT! Thief! Lies, subterfuge, corruption! A dastardly deed indeed, not excusable by drink, but fueled by sheer wanton greed and jealously! Someone who could not bear the attention grabbing glory of the offending article of head wear and felt that something desperate had to be done!Well, it either that or I just lost it under a table somewhere....


Jul. 16th, 2004 @ 03:43 pm Handshakes
I spent the last five minutes of my lunch break today talking to a drunk. Maybe he was attracted to me as I was carrying a bottle of tequila at the time. The guy pointed to a bank, and said that he had worked there forty years ago, when it was a linen merchants. We then chatted about my hometown, Omagh, and I noticed a quarter bottle of spirits in his jacket pocket. We shook hands, and soon after, I began to worry about the hygiene of this man. I could imagine my skin burning, developing some odd disease, probably scabies. Twenty minutes later, my hand remains unwashed....


Jul. 12th, 2004 @ 03:56 pm Tequlia, cat food and gravy chips.
My old friend Mikey visited for the weekend. We talk poetry and go drinking in the John Hewitt Bar. While I order drinks, a girl has an argument with a barman over what is the most Northern point of Ireland. Turns out girl’s friend is Mikey’s cousin. She has a nice lip piercing, and I decide I don’t look punk enough. Drink with her and discover new love for tequila, despite having to suck every lime, orange and lemon at the bar to pacify the need to gag. Emmet solves my problem of not having anywhere to live for the month of August my volunteering his mother’s place while they holiday in Spain. For the whole month. I meet his mother for a cup of tea. Worry about looking after the cat, until I find out the cat has gone. Phew. I hate the smell of cat food. Go to Graham Coxon gig, which is pleasantly punk-driven. Miss support band due to ridiculous early opening hours. Decide to get a six pack. Go on diet. Drink more water. Hungry. Damn. Eat cheesy-gravy chips and pastie baps. Am happier but unfortunately, not leaner. But getting fitting! Feel like a Radiohead song. Catch a few good movies.


Jun. 29th, 2004 @ 08:04 am You are touching my ass
Friday night; Gemma's leaving do. Get out of work at midnight; witness a guy getting seven shades knocked out of him as Lenny and I walk to the club. Bouncers don't step in (I find out later form a taxi driver who use to bounce(?!) that you can't interject if the fight happens outside the bar, though the taxi driver would have smacked the guy if it happened on his turf). Get into club. Find the others. Gemma almost knocks me down with a hug. Dance a lot. Elaine demands I dance. Dave spends what feels like twenty minutes at the bar convincing me that registering customers' complaint is a form of poetry. A girl keeps groping me on the dancefloor. I turn around and say to her "Escuse me, do you not think I realise you are touching my ass?" She doesn't look up. I turn round and commence dancing, and then she does it again! Talk to Conor about a short story of his. A 40-year old guy dances on his own, perving over young girls and hassling a friend of mine. We keep a close eye on him. Meet a guy in the toilets I haven't seen in seven, eight years. We spend ten minutes trying to figure out how we know each other. Very hot. Need cool air. Leave five minutes before the end so I can get outside. Breathe.


Jun. 19th, 2004 @ 03:31 pm It's been a while...
Hello. Ho hum. What has been happening? Well, I talked to my delightful landlady, isolated as she is from the rest of the planet where electricians, plumbers and mechanics of all sorts do not enter, in fear of actually doing some work and taking care of your tenants. Some day I will track down this world and bring to it the notion of consumer satisfaction. Families will cry out in joy and rapture that their breadwinners can provide for them again; councils will initiate a Nation Day of Celebration for the Re-Discovery of the Merits of Work; economies will experience booms like never before; the land will be rich will honey and rivers will flow with wine;and everyone, man, woman and child alike, will shout for the freedom of work like some kind of crazty communist regime that actually worked. No longer will society be left to lie in ruin, with platforms and achievements crumblings around them. We will grease the pistons and fuel the engines and let the train roll down the tracks to liberty!My washing machine broke down this week.


May. 29th, 2004 @ 05:08 pm Duodenal
I have been diagnosed with an ulcer in my small intestine. The doctor says I have basically burnt my guts out. How I have exactly done this, I have no idea, apart from a nasty case of vodka jelly.... Side effects of the medience include hair loss and the development of breasts in men!!!! Eek!!!! The medication lasts four weeks, after which I hope to be ulcer-free, bald, and have a lovely bosom.


Apr. 30th, 2004 @ 12:43 pm Website
Oh, the effort to run one's own website. Constant updates and uploads, self-editing and critical feedback, the selection of suitable photos, the laughter at unsuitable photos and the endless check of site statistics to see if anyone has bother to check your work out in the last few days. *signs* But of course, it is all for the love of the game....


Apr. 23rd, 2004 @ 11:22 am Uprising
North Street Arcade burnt down last weekend. We are all shocked yet hopeful of new beginnings. There is the possiblity of some charity events happening throughout the next few weeks. In the meantime, check www.cqaf.com for details of the poetry slam on the 7th May and help support the owners of Arcadia cafe!http://www.nics.gov.uk/press/sd/040420c-sd.htm


Apr. 17th, 2004 @ 02:22 pm Dreaming of cats
Odd dream last night, quite disturbing. Myself and a few of my cousins were at some kind of event in a church hall in the Fairhill in Cookstown. Outside of the hall, my cousin Mark was entertaining my cousin Eileen and myself with his flash new trainers, which were very slidey, allowing him to glide about and do all sorts of weird dances. He ran off down the street after doing the moondance, and Eileen and I walk down the street arm in arm.While we were walking, I spotted a small cat lying down on the street, but I was engrossed in our conversation and thought little of it. A few metres down the road, I saw another cat. I thought, "There's two little dead kittens, I wonder what happened." I pointed it out to Eileen, yet we kept on walking. Suddenly, the whole pavement was covered in dead cats, but they had been gutted out, leaving just their heads and skins. We ran to get away from this sight, all these flat felines sprawled out over the street, taking care not to step on any of them. At the end of the street, some live cats were lying asleep, but the sound of us running woke them up. Some of the cats saw the remaind of their friends, and ran off. A few just looked at the dead cats and wondering what on earth had happened. We looked at the cats.What was that all about?


Apr. 15th, 2004 @ 07:37 am The Passion of Easter
I have now joined the multitudes of shocked cinema-goers who have gasped, squealed and hid behind spread fingers at the flogging scene in The Passion of the Christ. It is gruesome to sheer extermity, and yet, for believers, I guess the film still does not help us understand the extent of Jesus's suffering. The film did take some creative liberties I think- how come the rope on the decaying donkey was in pristine condition? What on earth was the baby in Satan's arms laughing at the flogging all about? And Satan himself- looking like the wrestler Kane from WWE in a black robe borrowed from the Scottish widow! Why did Judas's guts not spill out when he hung himself, in order to create the field of Golgotha? Maybe the film-makers considered that unnecessary and gratuitous. But despite all this, I guess that it is too easier to pick holes in a film adaption of the greatest story ever told, as there are so many differing interpertations of it.I watched this film on Easter Sunday, then went home and read two chapters of Acts. My friend and I were subdued leaving the cinema. If anything, this film will shake up your faith a bit.


Apr. 12th, 2004 @ 05:08 pm Easter Monday
... and no eggs in sight. Yesterday was dead, though oddly enough, even the empty streets of Belfast bring out the tourists. I suppose there's not many photo opportunities to wave your arms in the middle of Royal Avenue while you friends tries to fit in the whole of the City Hall behind you in the frame. Today is much the same. Many shops are still shut, but still the masses crowd the streets. Today, I help the owner of the Passionate Cafe open the shop shutters- she apparently could not manage to do so on her own, and as I was passing by, she asked for my assistance. I was rewarded with a free drink for my troubles, which I saw as a rather kind token of gratitude in today's smash n' grab society. Uh-oh, I sound old and nostalgic, longing for the good old days, don't I? Everyone always harps on about the good old days, and when I am old, if I ever get there, I too will berate the youngsters with tales of old and stories from my glory years. When did these days occur? They seem to have happened so long along, that any trace of them has been lost in the aeons. Maybe we should just all buy each other Easter eggs, and that would cheer us up...