Feedback Friday :: Conversation Piece

bulk :: 13st 7
exercise :: none
back pain :: crippling
chair purchase attempts :: 4
chair companies called :: 2
chair purchases :: 0
% of chimps working at chair companies in question :: 100
no. of passionate kisses :: 0
no. of desultory kisses :: 0
decent days of writing done :: 3
marks out of ten for the week :: 5

So. These are the photographs I wanted to show you last week, when I posted that vicious little rant that some of you found a tad off-putting. Interestingly, Ben mentioned something the other night about the slightly unpleasant tone I tend to exhibit. I tried to resist it for a while - because ideally I’d like to have the warmth and amiability and purity of intent that seems to come so naturally to, say, Bill Bryson - but Ben was absolutely right. I am rather negative, and bitter, and certainly cynical, and generally disrespectful, and judgemental. I’m quite the misanthrope really. But I still love it. You know. Everything. I still love everything.

Anyway, here’s something positive for us all to rejoice in, hold hands and dance around. To recap briefly, I discovered this public art in South Shields just a few days before leaving the North East, after missing it regularly for three or four months. It really moved me. It made me feel warm and amiable and pure. And I loved the fact that they hadn’t been vandalised. You can bet your arse they would have been in London. Eh? Bloody Londoners.

Enjoy.















































Good, huh?

I’m currently leeching internet from a company downstairs (ssshhhh), and they’re about to turn it off till Monday morning, so please ensure that when I check back in then, I have a massive ragbag of comments waiting for me. Come on, it’s easy. Join the conversation! What did you think of the sculptures? Do you like Bill Bryson? Isn’t he nice? Don’t you think TS Eliot looks like Aleister Crowley? Makes you think. What are you up to this weekend? I’m not up to much myself. Writing. I’m trying to write something. Ben and Imogen are both away doing musical things. Imogen’s in the States for a couple of weeks and Ben’s spending the weekend in Dublin. Bloody musicians eh? Life of Riley. Life of O’Riley in Ben’s case. And you? What are you doing? What are you wearing? Do you think I’m needy? Oh, just speak to me, for God’s sake, you motherfuckers!

Oops.

Sorry.

Feedback Friday :: Naked Prejudice

bulk :: 13st 5
exploratory rides :: 2
other exercise :: zero
tobacco intake :: elevated
insolvency threat level :: elevated
pages of The Da Vinci Code remaining :: 276
new friends made :: 7
new friends lost :: 1

Before I get back into the thrills, spills and humiliations of life in London, I thought I’d like to properly say goodbye to the North East.

On the whole, as I'm sure made clear, I didn’t enjoy my time up there. Although my sample jar – sociologically speaking – was clearly only partially full, I found it a suffocatingly small-minded place. I mean, actually like no other place I’ve ever been – quite striking in its negative incapability, with vast tides of the population seeming to exist in a state of almost intentional closed-mindedness, in a way that you just don’t see down here, not to that extent. In London, I think, people exist. Even if it’s often a rather confused, haphazard or accidental existence, forced by numbers. Up there they just drift through their soulless concrete cake-boxes like colossal graceless whales sucking up Gregg’s pasties and Bacardi Breezers, trading nods which sit firmly on the fence between suspicion and simple-minded friendliness; the men with their stone cold, lifeless eyes, their giant elastic guts thumping through their football strips like they’re perpetually starting a fight, jutting thighward like enormous chin-pillows of flab; the women with their tiny pinched mouths and surly ashtray children, Brian tattooed fecklessly to each and every neck; and everywhere, harsh empty faces slipping apathetically down hollow skulls, like dirty wet rags in a raw, unforgiving wind. You know?

But aside from all that, I wanted to say something positive about the area. To end on an upstroke.

The first thing I’ll really miss about the North East is the glorious coastline, which is raw and feisty and at points breathtakingly beautiful.

Actually, that’s it.

But something happened in the last week – on my penultimate ride to South Shields, I found something I’d hitherto missed, something which made me return with my camera for the last ride, two days before I came back to London.

It was this...

Oh.

I just spent over an hour preparing the photographs I took. Around twenty of them, there are. And there isn't enough internet connection here to upload them. Not at the moment. Ah, well. All the more for next week.

Fresh start next week, you know.

Aaah, London.

In the meantime, have an exciting weekend, won't you, and happy 9/11!

I Have An Announcement To Make…

You ready?

Here it is:

I am going to be the next Dylan Thomas.

Make of that what you will.

What do you make of it?

Also, I have cooked the greatest spaghetti Bolognese you will never taste. I cooked it for Keith and I. Keith deserves it because even though he’s a selfish swine who drops his mates at the merest hint of a vagina, he’s a fucking talented artist. I mean, just look at this.

Oh, and he thinks my brand new muscles are sexy.

And he’s right.

They are.

In fact, now that I think about it, I might get a tattoo. On my burgeoning bicep. Or elsewhere. I’m not sure where actually.

But wait! What joy! I can whore it out. Oh, I really really love being drunken.

Splenetically Moderated Comment Whore :: What tattoo should I get? And where on my sexier-by-the-day, soon-to-be-drop-dead-gorgeous, oh-my-God-what-have-you-done-turning-down-this-divine-hunk-of-meat body?

Keith's Talent

The first time I realised that Keith had proper talent was when he made me a birthday card for my 18th. It was an ink and watercolour depiction of the front cover of a novel I would never write. The novel was called Irresistible. It was about an ugly man who one day wakes up and – against all odds – finds that he is utterly irresistible to all women. I did manage to write a couple of scenes and it was the most hideously embarrassing teenage wish fulfilment imaginable, thankfully long destroyed.

The cover on my card featured a brooding, saturnine version of me surrounded by what can only be described as a bevy of buxom beauties, all fawning all over me, groping me, licking me, breathing me in. It was magnificent. Scantily clad they were. All adoring, imploring and swooning. I actually pleasured myself once or twice looking at that card. (I've never admitted that before.) I was blown away by it and I showed my gratitude by a) never writing the novel, and b) spilling half a bottle of red wine all over the card. Klutz. I hated myself for some time for that.

After that card, however, Keith rather got off the horse. Aside from stoned doodles and the occasional caricature as a gift, he didn't really do anything much for years. Every now and then he would say, ‘I really need to start doing some art’, but then he’d get another job making a fake forest for an advert or decorating a drug den for a pop video and all of his creative juice seemed to get channelled into that.

Then earlier this year his hands began inexplicably to shake and he was diagnosed as having MS. Then they found a shadow in his brain which turned out to be an aneurysm.

It might seem a strange thing to say but I’m beginning to think that this was the best thing ever to happen to him.

In the last six months, his output has increased a hundredfold. A magazine has even paid for the privilege of publishing his work and he’s taken on a couple of private commissions. He’s even started turning down proper work to devote more time to his own stuff. (Take that, toads!)

This makes me really happy. Although I know that Keith is great at his job (I know because he’s always telling me), let’s face it, it’s still a job. Whereas his own artwork is so much more than that. It’s a calling.

All of which is by way of introduction to Keith’s latest piece of art, which I think is up there with his best. And I’m not just saying that because it features another flattering version of me.

It’s based on Mr and Mrs Clark and Percy by David Hockney.



Keith’s version is here: Keith and Stan and the Ghost of Pablo. Check it out.

Neat huh?

There are three things I would say about his representation of me however.

1) it’s at least four stone too light
2) it’s at least 35% too handsome
3) it’s at least 6.66% too evil

I love it. David Hockney is a lucky guy.

So, to keep the interactivity going - I know, I know, I'm like a cheesy DJ - tell me, has anyone ever drawn a portrait or caricature of you? Was it any good? Or were you bloody annoyed? Leave your answers, or anything else you have stored up in your heart, in the comments.

Thanks.

Your Children Aren’t Special. Mine Are.

There’s nothing worse than those ghastly parents always wittering on about their kids and how amazing they are when really they’re not that amazing at all, they’re just ordinary little blobs of meat learning how to be humans.

‘Oh, little Steve is so talented! Look at this picture he did with crayons. He’s only seven!’

‘No, he’s not talented. That picture is crap. An untalented four-year-old could do better. Stop it now. Steve is a moron.’

The reason I mention all this is because I find myself about to come over like a deluded parent, the only difference being, I’m not a parent, and I’m not deluded.

My friend Keith – who may well be the closest I ever get to a son – has ditched his old blog and started a new one. He’s taken with him the best of the art he’s done over the last five months and put it into one post at his new place, and I - for one - think it’s amazing. So I’m clucking over him like a proud parent and telling everyone about it. Awww. Little Keith is so talented! And I remember when he was wiping his own faeces on the wall. Actually that was only last week. Awww.

So. Look at this and tell me it’s not astonishing: NotKeith’s Greatest Hits April ’08 – September ’08.

Thank God for MS and aneurysms.

Batman

Keith got back from a weekend of goodness knows what last night and he said to me, apropos of nothing, ‘So what’s your favourite animal?’ and I said, ‘Cat. The cat is my favourite animal.’ And he said, ‘What’s your second favourite animal?’ and I said, ‘Bat. The bat is my second favourite animal.’ And he said, ‘What’s your third favourite animal?’ And I said, ‘Rat. The rat is my third favourite animal.’ And Keith said, ‘Really?’ and I said, ‘No, not really. The squirrel. Actually I think the squirrel probably comes second. Bat third.’

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the cat? Give me three adjectives that sum it up’, and I said, ‘Affectionate. Lazy. And superior. Willfully, chillingly superior.’ He wrote them down.

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the squirrel?’, and I said, 'Ingenious. Spectacular. Aloof.’

Then Keith said, ‘Which characteristics do you associate with the bat?’, and I said, ‘Chaotic. Repulsive. Slightly dark.’

Then Keith nodded his head, then shook it, then said ‘hmmm’ a lot. Then he said, ‘Well, apparently, the first one is how you see yourself. You see yourself as affectionate, lazy and superior. Then second is how others see you. Others see you as ingenious, spectacular and aloof. But the third is how you actually are. You are chaotic, repulsive and ever so slightly dark.’

‘But that’s bollocks,’ I pointed out.

Keith nodded. ‘Hmmm,’ he said.

'Can I change the order?' I said.

Keith shook his head.

‘So what are your favourite animals?’ I asked him.

He shook his head again. ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘I hate animals. I’m going to bed.’ Then he went to his room and painted this. I think the brain looks like a cock.

I don’t know what Keith did with his weekend but the fact is, he came back distinctly weirder than when he went away.

I Am Living With A Madman

Should I be afraid?

Yes.

Yes, I should.

Post Mortem :: It’s What He Would Have Wanted

Now, some might consider this a little distasteful, but frankly speaking, they can go hang.

Tribute to Pablo is artist-in-residence Not Keith’s first paid commission. I commissioned it myself, with pizza. I said, ‘How would you like to paint me a picture of Pablo? In exchange for a large rectangular pizza?’

‘Only on the condition that I can fill it with passion and fury and spite,’ he said. ‘Only on the condition that I can have it scream with the indignity of death and shake a thousand fists in the face of God, crying “Too cruel, this world, too cruel!”’

‘OK,’ I said.

One thing about Pablo, he had a wonderful sense of humour.

J Evans Pritchard PhD Spotted in Leicester Square

Sally took this photo with her phone in the Photographers’ Gallery yesterday afternoon.



It’s a man enjoying an exhibition of 2,700 passport-size photos of Maria Elvira Escallon, taken over a period of ten years. It sounds cool. I wish I’d thought of that. Eleven years ago preferably.

The man in the picture was a visiting Turk. His name is Melik. I know this because he told Sally when he tried to pick her up, and Sally told me. His opener was, ‘Do you know how many photos?’

Not a PUA.

Sally pulled a befuddled face.

‘How many there are,’ he said. ‘You guess.’

Sally guessed.

‘Higher,’ said Melik. ‘Higher.’

2,700.

He knew because he'd counted them. He'd counted down the side, then he'd counted along the bottom. Then he did the math.

It seems to me a rather strange response to a piece of visual art. I suspect Melik probably works in a bank.

Oh, and when I think of Sally getting chatted up in a gallery... I grow below. Is that wrong?

Happy Leigh, Ever After

Crikey. What a wonderful weekend I’ve just had. Let me bore you with it right now.

On Friday evening I went to the Tate Britain and an evening of free events entitled Drawing on Jarman. I went with Sally. Sally. Pride of our alley. I told you I wasn’t gay. Now I rather like Derek Jarman – at least I enjoyed Caravaggio many years ago when I saw it, and Jubilee wasn’t entirely repulsive. So I thought a bunch of his short films would - at the very least - be interesting to look at.

So first up, we sauntered into a screening room called the Lightbox, where Imagining October was being shown. Billed as a ‘rarely seen experimental short film’ and ‘a dreamlike mediation on art and politics in the final years of the Cold War’, it became clear after a matter of minutes why it was rarely seen. ‘Rarely endured’ is probably nearer the mark.

The only seat in there was a spongy banquette against the back wall which we shared with two other people, invisible in the dark. We managed about ten minutes, but only because Sally allowed me to put my hand on her bare knee, and then slowly move it up over her knee, under her skirt and onto her thigh. I was watching pretentious garbage that had nothing to do with either art or politics, peppered with images of semi-naked Russian boys stroking one another and sledgehammer phallic symbolism and I felt probably as sexually excited as I ever had before in my life. Life is queer. Then we left the Lightbox and Sally said, ‘What the fuck was that all about?’ She said, ‘That man is far too gay for his own good. There was nothing whatsoever to connect with there. Where was the empathy? Where was the human emotion? What kind of reaction was that supposed to provoke? Am I just being inhuman here? Did I miss it? Do you have to be gay to understand what the point was?’

I said, ‘Why are you asking me?’

I agreed with her that it was over-indulgent garbage. But some people don’t agree. The film scores nine out of ten on IMDb, which is just ludicrous. It has had only 12 votes however, and interestingly, the rating has fallen 38% in the last week. Hold on… there. My vote is now cast. Let’s see if we can’t get a more realistic score on there. I’ll show you, Jarman. Lovely man though, don’t get me wrong. Lovely man.

So I said, ‘Let’s go and look at proper art’, and we had a wander through the galleries, gawping at the good stuff. Now I don’t know about you but art galleries always get me a little excited. In the toilet area I mean. I get terribly aroused just walking around, no matter what I’m looking at. I shared this information with Sally in front of The Lady of Shalott and do you know what the little minx did? She kissed me passionately whilst touching me on the Johnson.

John William Waterhouse would have been proud. I reckon.

Then we went to the main bar where there was more Jarman being shown to the accompaniment to some wacky Aphex Twin-like music and where the Tate make their money on free events by selling severely mediocre wine at laughably high prices. We drank a little wine, ate a tub of olives and made up stories about the other people in the bar – some of whom also had the good grace to look appalled by what was being passed off as art.

After which we hopped on a bus to Clapham. Sally lives in Clapham. We had a tajine each and a bottle of wine in a Moroccan restaurant, then we went back to hers.

Now, when I started this blog, it was always my intention to be painfully frank – genital warts and all – but, having said that, I also feel the need to exercise a certain amount of restraint where other people are concerned. Well, some of them. All of which is a roundabout way of saying that I have no intention of taking you with me into Sally’s bedroom. But – rather like a teenage boy who wears his tie deliberately loose to ensure you get an eyeful of his love bites – I wish to make it absolutely clear that I went there myself.

Oh yes.

What a self-satisfied smirking smuggle I am.

Well, sod it. It was about time.

So on Saturday afternoon we went to see Happy Go Lucky and Sally had to tolerate the distinctly unpleasant site of me weeping like a giant sore for at least fifteen minutes after the film was over. It really got me. I love Mike Leigh, but the last three films of his which I saw - Topsy Turvy, Vera Drake and Career Girls - I didn’t particularly enjoy, and for at least the first ten minutes of Happy Go Lucky I felt I was in for another disappointment.

Poppy was really irritating me. Her relentless jollity and inability to let a single remark pass without attempting to make some kind of joke out of it really made me want something hideous to happen to her. I found myself praying for something dark, for Johnny from Naked to wander in and destroy her with some superbleak cynicism. But then when the darkness did wander in, in the form of Scott, driving instructor and joyless time bomb of neuroses and bigotry, I immediately found myself rooting for Poppy and willing her to turn him round and bring some of her happy go lucky into his life. And from that moment on, I fell in love with the film.

My favourite scene was the one in which Poppy spends a few minutes with a wasted, stammering homeless guy on a bit of derelict wasteland. Sally didn’t see but there were tears streaming down my cheeks throughout this scene. It was just such a perfect and beautifully touching example of human empathy; one human being reaching out and making an effort to touch another, to let someone know that they’re not alone. Which is kind of what Mike Leigh specialises in, I think.

On Sunday I got on with some work which has come up and I ran again. Following on from Frank’s push last week, I ran twice the distance I used to. It hurt, but I managed it. In the bath afterwards, I came to an important decision. Another one! This one is a hefty decision that I know I’m going to regret sharing with you. I also know that I have to share it with you, or I probably won’t get round to it. My decision is this: I’m going to run the London Marathon next year.

Yep.

So there.

Oh, and to round things off, I saw Sally again yesterday and we sat in the sun all day laughing and frolicking and me feeling rather like Caligula at a gymkhana.

You know, I don’t believe I have ever been this happy in my entire life. And it’s only May!

Look at the sun!

Huzzah!

Speaking of Dogs...

After my first was overlooked, leaving me sad, my second title has been taken up by Sam Brown over at Exploding Dog. Leaving me happy. And strangely proud. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you...

is it because I'm ugly