commonpeople

I started my intensive french course this morning. Three hours a day for two weeks, plus homework. There's seven of us and a teacher from Paris. The teacher thinks I should be upgraded to Intermediaire Intensif. I think the teacher gave us too much homework for tonight. One of my classmates was once an assistant to Prince Charles (!?) How fast can you say "squeeze gossip soon" in French? Here's the trailer to a lovely French film we watched over the past two nights: Presque Rien

Should I post only in French for the next two weeks? Or will my endless mistakes drive you nuts?

I just finished reading an excellent novel set on the waters of the Mississippi in 1857, filled with steamships, drawls, gamblers, whores, slaves and - believe it or not - vampires. I sometimes like to listen to music that enhances the mood of a book; it dawned on me last night at the Victoria pub that The Severed Limb go perfectly with this novel, Fevre Dream. Their self-described skiffle sound has that rockabilly mood of the south, even in their Johnny Cash covers. And they have skinny boys in black dancing to their tunes.

They were a great, little surprise, and I'm sure that their song "The Girl from Bethnal Green Road" only promises more chances to see them locally in the near future.



Afterwards, there was a burlesque performance and by that stage it dawned on my drunk mind that it was my first one too. Dance, tits, then a quick run to the ladies to put the clothes back on. The pub never got full - most people there seemed to be mates with the band or the staff - but there was a general air of friendliness that only encourages returns. (Yesterday was the first time I sat through a whole show at the Victoria.) Somebody must twist Zombina and the Skeletones arms until they agree to play there.

I also saw desayuno_ingles yesterday, who was in the neighbourhood to pick up her sowing maching at Sew Amazing. We took her to Broadway Market for some lunch and had a brief look at the new shop/gallery that opened on Mare Street: The Last Tuesday Society. One of the staff was one of those people that proclaim outloud "I wonder how I'll die. Probably from an overdose" and there was a gray parrot observing everyone quietly by the front door - not to be confused with the various stuffed animals about the place.

I spoke to my mom on the phone and it looks very likely we'll move to Brasil for six months at the end of the summer.

From the Debeauvoir newsletter:

WARNING TO CYCLISTS ON REGENT'S CANAL
A cyclist was attacked this week on the towpath through
Victoria Park and sadly such attacks are frequent. Cyclists are advised to
avoid using the towpath at quiet times.

Fuck... I walk the towpath by myself in quiet times all the time. I can even guess where it happened - it's that bit just after the barges, when the towpath dips just before reaching Mile End park. I suppose I could always jump in the canal if somebody attacked me - or could these attacks only be related to cyclists? I could also put my trusty Doc Martins in their crotch, I suppose...

Poll #1520195 Team Terry or Team Bridge?
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 30

Who's the best looking?

Which Team are you on?

I just got back from the Institut Français, where I was tested and interviewed; they placed me in the intermediaire intensive course that starts in two weeks. That's three hours a day for two weeks, which I'm planning on treating like a full immersion by only reading stuff in french, watching french films, etc, during that period. The Institut is just by South Kensington Tube station and I'd say about half the people that walked past me - even in the Tube ride there - were French. Sacré coeur! I'll get my rusty French off the ground in no time.

I also had an interview today with that temp agency I've been working with off-and-on for the past nine years. It's looking very good.

Tonight, we are watching some Wire with our dinner. Tomorrow, I'm volunteering at a LGBT organisation south of the river who need my help promoting a fund raising event in February. On Thursday we pack our bags, take a train to Plymouth and move in with sushidog for good!!

I used to be one of those people disdainful of critics with their up-and-coming recommendations. That was a century ago, when I read Melody Maker and the NME religiously and thought I knew better than them.

Who's got time these days to keep up with music reviews? You got to be grateful for any suggested tidbit that comes your way. I'm happy if someone says "hey check this out, they are going to be big in 2010." Off I go to Spotify, or YouTube, or Amazon, or iTunes, and eventually I listen and make up my own mind.

I'm so glad to say that new Mancunian band Hurts (bigged up by BBC News of all people) are brilliant! They sound like a smooth cross between East 17, New Order, Noel (remember "Silent Morning"?) and somebody else who I can't quite put my finger on yet. Maybe Depeche Mode at their most bombastic? And I like the girl on this video Voguing like it's 1990 while the two boys play Pet Shop Boys.



I recommend this to: live_life_like, neenaw, denalyia, muftak (the Arthur Baker mix) and knacker_prince.

I remember how Guy Ritchie's second film Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels brought him popularity when it was released, and the follow up Snatch didn't do too bad either. At least I remember everyone in Brasil (apart from me) liking them. Then he met Madonna and got married. Everything after that - Swept Away, Revolver, etc - was panned and ignored by the public. Then he got divorced from Madonna... and came up with Sherlock Holmes, which is getting bums on seats and some awards on the back of Robert Downey Junior. Was Madonna a curse to Guy's career? It's elementary, my dear reader.

Madonna is to films what Morrissey is to up-and-coming bands. It's famously known that any young band that gets Morrissey's seal of approval finds itself sunk after a year or two (some, like Suede, managed to outlast the curse, but just...) Now just imagine if you are a film maker and you marry Madonna! That's like a believer in David Icke's Reptoid Hypothesis suddenly finding himself marrying into the Royal Family.

Sherlock Holmes isn't a too shabby film; it's a perfect, and somewhat traditional, rolicking adventure involving a pair of detectives fighting to stop an evil genius. Think cop buddy films. Think 007 as well as the (now badly dated) 80s adventure The Young Sherlock Holmes. To me, Downey Junior is the reason for watching it: he brings his usual touch of camp to the dialogue that is just a pleasure; he's also a great physical actor not afraid to show off his diminutive frame (unlike Tom Cruise). Jude Law isn't too bad either but, between Downey Junior and the great Mark Strong playing the evil Lord Blackwood, he's left stranded in the background. The cinematography is just gorgeous, even if there's some confusion as to where things are located in London, and I also loved some of the gypsy-like percussion and strings in Hans Zimmer's soundtrack.

It has put me in the mood for reading the original Sherlock Holmes stories (which I remember very well being completely different from the film) as well as watching more Downey Junior films. I never thought I'd say this... but I'm looking forward to Guy Ritchie making a sequel out of this!

I'm loving this unemployment time off work. Yesterday, I had fun with kirstenlj and her son at the Museum of Childhood, followed by a dip in York Hall's pool. Today, I went to the gym[1] and spent the afternoon browsing the net (job sites, school courses, etc). I've also set up an interview with the Institut Français for next Tuesday.

I'm now thinking if I should go back to school and get some skills that are more practical and job-friendly than a MA in Portuguese Studies. I found some good info on horticulture courses but the impression I get is that they are aimed at kids straight out of school and are mostly based outside London. I've got that typical pre-February fantasy of leaving office work for good and pruning park hedges for the rest of my life.

Tonight, I'm seeing Sherlock Homes' latest adventure with an ex-colleague. Tomorrow, I'm doing volunteer work at that LGBT organisation I briefly worked for two years ago (how time flies!)

[1] My number one tip for anyone out of work is to get some exercise into your day. You benefit from the endorphins, the tension release, the routine, and the self-esteem boost of course.

I've come up with a game that involves history books. The rules are as follow:

1) Pick a non-fiction book to read, preferably about a person or period centuries ago. (If you want a real challenge, start with the Egyptians.) In my case, I picked Bill Bryson's brilliant biography of Shakespeare.

2) After you've read it, find a way to move chronologically forward in world history through a subject raised somewhere in the book. I chose King James of Scotland since he came into power halfway through Shakespeare's life.

3) Keep doing this until you reach present day.

After King James I, I was re-directed to the Americas, the colony of Jamestown, John Smith and Pocahontas (the first modern celebrity, in my opinion). My next book will be on the first African slaves brought to the east coast colonies.

The Guardian's most recent books podcast is on the future of Science Fiction. They mentioned how Ursula K. Le Guin had a problem reviewing Margaret Atwood's most recent novel, The Year of the Flood, because Atwood refuses to label her distopian fiction "science fiction" (she calls it instead "speculative fiction".) Something to do, it seems, with Atwood's fear of being shoved into the sci-fi ghetto. I love both Le Guin and Atwood and hope they don't get into any Dynasty-style cat fights that might lead to a balcony fall.

One of the podcast's speakers predicted that 2010 will be the year Paranormal Romance novels like Twilight lose their popularity to Epic Fantasy (thank god.) HBO is currently filming a series based on George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” novels, which made me think Avatar's style and success truly is the face of what's to come. The Guardian's Saturday Review also had a small article on Avatar and a recent accusation of plagiarism aimed at it from Russian sci-fi writers. But, the article said, the person with the biggest claim against Cameron is Ursula K. Le Guin (there she is again), whose novel The Word for World Is Forest is uncannily similar to the film. I hear an echo from the time reviewers said Le Guin should take J.K. Rowling to the courts for lifting so much stuff from her Earthsea novels.

Today, I'm finishing off Stephen King's latest novel Under the Dome, meeting a friend at the Museum of Childhood and then going for a swim which will hopefully fix my back.

It's been a real pleasure walking up and down Regent's Canal this past week, the path nearly all to myself. The usual cyclists that love speeding down it as if their jobs were a matter of life and death clearly don't have the guts for a bit of deadly black ice. Sadly, though, the canal is now attracting people fascinated by its spontaneous ice rink quality, and this means that anything heavy, and preferably metallic, is game. First went old bottles, discarded toys and dismantled bicycles that lined the path or the nearby streets. Now they've started ripping off the garbage bins placed by benches. It brings out the Daily Mail reader in me. I was thinking today if maybe Singapore's iron-gloved right-wing government got it right: spit chewing gum on the pavement, pay up a hefty fine; vandalise public property, get caned and left with a nice red scar across your ass cheeks.

What bothers me is that London's canals could be cleaner, home to more fishes and wild plants. But they are littered instead with traffic cones, tires and all sorts of other garbage I often see people chucking into the water. I'd love to have the power of placing a spell on the canal: anything thrown into the water reappears in the person's bedroom. That might be a nicer, bleeding liberal heart way of solving the problem.

Tonight, I'm spending the evening in bed watching brasilian soap operas and reading. I'm hungover from a night out in Walthamstow, where neenaw, king_prawn and I drank the night away while playing a pub quiz. We came second place and won a bottle of white wine called Oliver something-or-other. I naturally had to have it.

I nearly got run over this evening on my way home. A car skidded close to me and missed the sidewalk by very little. Ice, ice baby. I decided it was safer to walk down Regent's Canal despite it being deserted and nobody being able to hear my screams if I fell through the canal's face. Was about to walk down a ramp leading to the canal when I slipped and saved my bones by holding on to a fence. Three teenagers nearby gave me pointers on where to step until I was safely on the path. Then, up ahead, two boys threw garbage onto the canal in the hope of cracking the surface. As I walked past them, the one in dreads told me matter-of-factly that they were going to commit suicide by jumping in the water.

Only one week left of work!

Yesterday, at our book club meeting, I decided to ask The Playwright if she knew anyone who wrote for EastEnders (it's one of my New Year resolutions to get a job writing for a soap). She laughed and said she'd actually written a few episodes for them ages ago ("during Tiffany's time") but got sacked because they didn't like her episodes. She then said the best way to get in soaps was to attend the competitive Writers Academy, though I'd definitely need at least one proven play, film, TV or radio show under my belt. No pressure then.

Sissy A is trying to convince wink_martindale and I to move to Toulouse. She's on her way there this month, to join her boyfriend and work long distance for an architecture company in Montreal. Rent for a two-person flat is around 500 euros. Jobs for those who speak cranky French but fluent English are available. But I could also just take out a loan and be a student for a year; learn French really well for an eventual job; wash some dishes... so tempting. No temping.

I go back and forth on this idea of doing a MA in Portuguese Studies here in London. Really, what kind of job am I guaranteed afterwards? Will I have to return to admin and bite the bullet until my loans are paid off? Or would I do well enough to become a researcher, or perhaps work for a Brasilian organisation? I know I should just take a deep breath and be courageous but I keep remembering the years after I graduated from university and my History and English Lit degree's mystifying quality.

Only one more week left at work. Since the snow, Regent's Canal has been all mine. Thank God I haven't slipped and broken anything! I love walking down it at night, past the barges that line the canal by Victoria Park, their engines running and the air smelling of burnt wood. That's what I'll miss the most when I (most likely) return to commuting downtown.

Two decisions for 2010:

1) To become vegetarian. Not right now though - I've got fish in the house and I might as well eat it rather than throw it away. I was a vegetarian before - for a year and a half (ten years ago) - but I didn't do it right (too much cheese). I think I'm ready now. Down goes my carbon footprint. Up goes my experiments with different dishes and spices. I think it would be a great learning tool, and a distraction from impending unemployment.

2) Enroll in the Institute Français and take an intensive course in February, followed by more dispersed classes throughout the year. And start giving Brasilian Portuguese lessons to wink_martindale, blu_bear and desayuno_ingles (or anyone else, really, who's interested.) Good teaching practice for me; good language to learn for you.

Enya, please sing to me throughout the night and don't let the Big Bad Insomnia catch me.

New Year's Day--
everything is in blossom!
I feel about average.

- Kobayashi Issa

We spent the turn over with our friend woodsrule and her boyfriend T, who live just up the road from us in a studio overlooking East London. Their table spread included cheeses, bread, pâtés, vegan scottish eggs, cold cuts, grapes, tomato and mozzarella salad. We brought a chocolate cake, white wine and champagne.

Their balcony, just before midnight, had a view of nearby buildings like Hitchcock's Rear Window. There were hardly any fireworks and just as we popped the champagne it began to snow. People in other buildings shouted Happy New Year or peered at the sky from behind their curtains. We then noticed something tiny flicker above our heads, like a Chinese lantern. Then another. Then another. They were taking off from somewhere around Clapton and moving like UFOs towards the City.

We went back inside and shared our three new year resolutions while standing behind a music stand, heavy metal versions of Auld Lang Syne in the background. Around 2.30am, wink_martindale and I walked home in silence and crashed for the next ten hours.

I hope 2010 brings you a lot of love, peace and success in whatever you choose to do.

Most listened artists in my music library in 2009:

1. Morrissey
2. Madonna
3. Erasure
4. The Cure
5. The Raveonettes
6. Kronos Quartet
7. Suede
8. Cut Copy
9. The Smiths
10. Pet Shop Boys
11. David Bowie
12. The Magnetic Fields
13. Siouxsie and the Banshees
14. Girls Aloud
15. The Mighty Lemon Drops

I honestly don't know why Madonna is so high up. I went through a period of obsessing over "Express Yourself" but, apart from that, I only use her when I'm cleaning the house. I must have cleaned a lot in 2009. Must get her off the list in 2010 and move Girls Aloud considerably higher. Cut Copy were a genuine discovery in 2009 (or was it 2008?) - I loved getting into their two albums and I'm looking forward to seeing them live when they are next in London. I also went through a lot of Mighty Lemon Drops in the spring but can't see them reappearing in my charts by the end of 2010.  My new obsession is M83 and they have a good chance of troubling these charts in 2010.

Most listened tracks in my music library in 2009:

1. Pet Shop Boys – West End Girls
2. Simple Minds – Don't You (Forget About Me)
3. Peter Godwin – Images Of Heaven
4. Dexys Midnight Runners – Come On Eileen
5. White Lies – Death
6. Apostle of Hustle – Baby, You're In Luck
7. a-ha – Take On Me
8. The Housemartins – Build
9. Sugababes – Freak Like Me
10. Information Society – Repetition
11. Madonna – Express Yourself
12. Rachael Yamagata – Even So
13. Hole – Doll Parts
14. The Stranglers – Skin Deep
15. Jane's Addiction – Jane Says

Who the hell is Rachael Yamagata and what's she doing on my most listened tracks list?! I can only assume Last FM is to blame during those times I let it run loose while in the office on my own (or with music-friendly co-workers). Same goes for the Apostle of Hustle track, though I don't mind it so much. Elsewhere, you can see how deeply stuck in the 80s I am, though Hole's "Doll Parts" gives me a brief foot in the 90s as I try to breach the last couple of years with more contemporary pop like Sugababes and White Lies.  I'll do my best in 2010 to listen to new music.  But I ain't making any promises.

I've got an idea for a new American TV drama. It centres around Muslim teenagers in the U.S. and it has Kim Wilde's "Kids in America" as its theme song. And yes, it's set in the 80s.

I also want to know why there are no hauntings or poltergeists in EastEnders seeing that so many corpses litter its history? (Even going so far, as margotmetroland pointed out, of having one open the show's first episode?) I want to write for EastEnders and have the recently murdered Archie haunt the Queen Vic. Mirrors cracked from side to side. People thrown down stairs. Heads spinning. Projectile vomitings. Just another Christmas Special. I'd get those ratings through the roof.

When wink_martindale and I first moved to London, we lived with some crazy lesbians in Stoke Newington. Two of them were big EastEnders fans and they immediately set about unraveling for us the show's Gordian Knot. Somebody gave birth without knowing they were pregnant in the first place? Someone discovered their sister was actually their mom? Sounded like your typical brasilian soap!

My favourite character was Janine, a sort of village punchbag who couldn't help being malicious and starting trouble wherever she went. Her high point came when she "accidentally" killed off her husband Barry after enduring a descent into homelessness and prostitution. But elsewhere, the characters and storylines didn't grab me. Where were the qualities that I loved in brasilian soaps? The magic realism? The werewolves? It was all a bit miserable to the sound of the wrong soundtrack. (Characters listening to Lloyd Cole and the Commotions' "Perfect Skin" while eating their toast at the local caf would have kept me hooked.)

I gave up on EastEnders and went on my merry way downloading brasilian soaps and the great American series of this past decade.

Then a few months ago, I took a writing workshop for a Pakistani soap opera... and I loved it! Why couldn't I get paid to do this every day? Create a whole universe of characters then put them through the grill? Having so many years of LJ Drama under my belt, it all came very easily to me. Coincidentally, my brasilian friend Vini Bambini alerted me at the time to EastEnders introducing a gay romance involving a British Muslim, with flagrant kisses before the watershed thrown into the mix. At the start of these holidays I finally caught an episode and was hooked. Would the two unbelievably good looking men elope to Barcelona? Or would the young Muslim continue to live a lie for the sake of his family and get married to a woman? And to complicate matters, a major murder plot was introduced making nearly every character in the show a suspect.

Now I've got wink_martindale moaning at me because I'm not only hooked on A Favorita but now I need to know who killed Archie in EastEnders and if Janine is going to have a bad end (as my gut seems to tell me.) What I really should be doing is working on my CV and applying for jobs.

2010? Script Writing for TV courses here I come!

I wouldn't recommend listening to M.R. James' ghost stories just before going to bed. The noise in the rest of the tower block gets amplified, the faint light in the hallway intensifies. Can anyone from outside the UK listen/watch the BBC through the iPlayer? Because James' ghost stories can be found there in case you like spooking yourself.

To us, it was part of that old tradition of listening to ghost stories during Christmas because that's the only time in the year when you are guaranteed protection from the creatures of the night. On Christmas eve itself, we watched the BBC's haunted house three-part series Crooked House. (Unfortunately only the third episode is now available on the iPlayer. Maybe you can find the others if you are a good detective.) They aren't exactly great ghost stories, but they have nice classic elements in each one of them; and the final episode, The Knocker, is genuinely creepy and had me and wink_martindale freaked out at one point.

Yesterday, we walked London's deserted streets and ended up visiting the completely abandoned Olympic site, followed by Stratford. It was a bitch realising no public transport was available and we'd have to walk back home. We stopped by a corner shop on Roman Road for some junk food and I picked up a box of Cheerios without realising it had expired in August 09. Later in the evening we spotted a cockroach crawling on our kitchen counter. We are convinced it snuck out of the Cheerios box.

( Daffodils )