I'm on the couch as opposed to my study because I'm dog watching. This isn't too hard, as the poor doggie is drugged to her eyeballs. I'll say no more on the subject.
What about my study, you say?
Well, after a couple of months of sitting at a dining table in the conservatory, on a cold hard wooden chair, I cracked a couple of weeks ago and staged a raid on my office building.
So now I have my office chair, two screens and a laptop dock, and I have to admit, it feels more like a work space. Not that I'm doing a lot of work, what with the dog-sitting and all.
This is the month, I think, that the lock down will bite for me. Normally we'd have been on holiday by now. Usually that's a week or two in the sun, typically in the South of Spain, somewhere with a pool and a view. Ironically enough, I bought a week's holiday this year so that we could have a go at a three week break. Yeah, that didn't work out. More than the missed holiday, though, it's the prospect of an August without the Festival. I know I'm a newcomer to Edinburgh (what's that, 5 years now?) but I've gotten used to hanging around the Pleasance, drinking espresso martinis to keep me going for late shows in hot, stuffy rooms. I drove through Edinburgh yesterday, and yes, we are still here, but it does have the ghost town feel. I'd like to think that the city will bounce back, but a year without a festival puts a big hole in the budgets of a lot of small businesses, as well as the obvious ones - taxi drivers, hotels, restaurants, B&Bs... a lot of folk rely on this month to keep running.
This month, I think, will see a big wave of pub and restaurant closures, as furlough money starts to run out, and the crowds don't return.
Dire times.
Hmm, seems like I should put a cheerful coda in here, but I just can't think of one.
I'm healthy. I'm employed. I have someone I care about who cares about me. I think that's enough gratitude to get me to the end of a post.
It's a stunning production, one of those rare times when the acting, writing and staging combine perfectly. There were enough little touches to make the set dressing interesting without being fussy (why is all the tech so 20th Century? VCRs, CDs, oscilloscopes?) and the lighting was bold and added to the story (might be an idea to highlight the flickering lights near the end, though).
As to the treatment...Yes, it's not the novel, but it does focus far more steadily on the question of what makes us individuals, what makes us human, and whether being either of these is necessarily a good thing.
Ray, the "visitor" character, becomes more complex as he becomes more self aware, and that his terror is caused by being alone, and separate from the planet as a whole, but his earlier scenes as a projection/wish fulfillment of Kris are beautifully written, and very well acted.
If I have a small niggle it's that the other two characters, espescially Fode Simbo as Snow, get less to do - I'd like to have seen more of them (even though Jade Ogugua does get the heart-breaking moment of the play).
Oh, and Hugo Weaving's video diary inserts also worked surprisingly well, particularly the last scene, and the light it threw on the planet's actions.
We're almost at the end of the Edinburgh run here, but if you get a chance to see this production on tour, you should.
Copper disks, given up to the soil, have bounced back as blue flowers, heads as big as mine, unnatural to the clay, but beautiful.
They line the banks of the canal, between his caravan and the line of his canoes.
The door is closed, and I hear his voice booming over the water, as I cycle past.
Is he corrupting local youth, I wonder, or Skyping all the way back to Canada?
Whichever, I wish him peace, and many years of swimming naked, and making prints, of fishing without a rod and painting without a net.
I’m chasing my shadow along the tow path, langoustine from the loch still making my fingers smell, still tasting like velvet in my mouth. Landed this afternoon, cooked a few minutes ago, chased with wine and then coffee, and fuelling my dash back home.
Ducks at Bellanoch (“Hit your brakes, not the drakes” is the warning to motorists on the road across from me) making fussy ‘v’s out across the water, away from me. Another painter lives to my right, and to my left the Add adds itself to the sea.
Faster, as the coffee hits my caffeine-stream, and the wind is at my back. Wild garlic and foxglove, long leaves in the water, rushes laid out like arrowheads. Faster, and six miles to Ardrishaig.
On my left, now, the Great Moss. Watched over by the fort of Dunadd. By the hard rock which submitted to the feet of kings, but which kept their footprints for its own, holding the shape of those feet centuries after their bones became dust.
A sign, briefly glimpsed “Holding Back The Tide”. No time to read the small print, and find out how Thomas Telford out-did King Cnut. But on my left the tide is held back still, and on my right the canal, unmingled.
Pausing, briefly, to open a gate, and enjoy the light. A voice – “Get out, get out, I told you to stay out.” It’s coming from a cottage on the other side of the water, and I’m on my bike again before I know if it’s dog, or wife, or midges he’s casting out.
The path is suddenly paved, and I know I’m coming up on Cairnbaan. So soon? Dawdling in front of me, three teenagers on their own bikes, trying to set their own pace, defying the future rushing towards them by idling away from it. Good luck.
But the tarmac is smooth, and I’m picking up speed. Up and up the speedo goes. Dare I go over 20? I dare, I dare. The road tries to pull me left, but I resist and slow on to the tow path again. My bike grumbles, keen for speed, then chuckles on the gravel.
On the flat, now, the path overlooking the ghost of a rugby pitch, reeds marching from try-line to try-line. I wonder how long it will be before the posts get claimed by creeper. I want to come back and find out.
A glimpse of Arran, and then the path cuts beneath trees, winds in shadow. Let my thoughts be my own, for a while, in shadow. For a short while, and I know the sun lies ahead, but for a short while, my thoughts are dark.
And opening again, to the water, the canal dark on my right, still, and Loch Fyne improbably glinting. Arran so close, so clear, and, picking up the dying sun, a last ferry making the crossing from Portavadie to Tarbert, 15 miles away.
Oakfield Bridge now, and the deceptive cottage, one storey at the front, three at the back. It has more stories than meet the eye. Like most of us. I ignore the road on the left, the smooth path on the right. Straight ahead. Rougher, higher, the view is better.
A moment of sadness, as I see that the new owners have left the petanque court to be overgrown. I give room to another sadness, and wish my dog was running ahead of me, jogging alongside, walking behind.
There was an interesting comment from
nicnac the other dayl, wondering how a dazzling urbanite like me had adjusted to life out in the sticks.It's a good question. Since I left home, most of my life has been spent living in cities, Glasgow and Newcastle mainly. For many years, Glasgow's West End was my manor, and I was extremely fond of the stroll down to Ashton Lane, and a few drinks at the Chip, dinner at the Wee Curry Shop, and then finishing the night with live music at Jinty's, or a cocktail at Oran Mor. Hmm. Come to think of that, it does sound good, doesn't it?
Even more, my one attempt to seriously move away from Glasgow, to Newcastle, was a complete failure. And yet here I am, nine miles outside of Edinburgh, surrounded by fileds and trees, and apparently a very happy laddie.
I think, leaving aside if that's possible my very happy domestic circumstances, there are two things to consider.
One is that I've always been at home in the country - for the last 20 years I've had my place in Argyle, and spent as much time as possible there. You've probably seen pictures of me with walking stick and (sadly departed) dog. There's a part of me that's always needed the green spaces and the (conveniently rounded) hills. Some of my best times have been cycling the West coast, and heading over to the Hebrides. If I don't get that time, there's something missing in my life.
And then there's where I've ended up. Roslin is not your everyday bit of countryside. There's the Chapel, of course. Is the Holy Grail hidden around a mile from where I'm sitting typing this? Well, would I tell you if it was? I was over at the Chapel yesterday (it's a five minute bike ride, and I was having a mini adventure) and it really is a lump of mystery. The Green Men, the Prentice Pillar, the carvings that might or might not be maize, executed a century before Columbus... it's up there with some of my favourite spots on earth. And yesterday I went to the castle only a few hundred yards away. I first visited the Chapel about 15 years ago, and I never realised the castle was so close. After that, I cycle off down a railway path, which would have taken me into Edinburgh if I hadn't diverted to a nature reserve to check out a couple of ugly ducklings.
So Roslin is not Newcastle - I nevr felt connected there, but there is something about this place, about the history, the nap of the land, the confluence of ley lines, maybe, that welcomes me.
And while I'm in the sticks, I'm not a million miles from Edinburgh, either. Maybe I'm still a bit biased by the Festival being so fresh in my mind, but for August, at least, Edinburgh really is the centre of the cultural world. Although there are locals who pretend to loath the crowds (or maybe they actually do, who knows?) I know I'm 20 minutes from the Pleasance, and half an hour from the Assembly Rooms and Charlotte Square.
Anything else? Well there's the two hours a day I'm not spending in the car commuting, which is no small thing. There's the chance to visit other cities - this month I've been in Verona and Venice, this year I've been in Phoenix and Flagstaff, as well as Moorish Spain (yes, again - I seem to love those hills).
So yes - I seem to have made the transition from the bright lights to the full moon, from the Kelvin walkway to a garden full of squirrels, birdlife, foxes and the occasional deer and badger.
Still, I'm not saying I'm no longer tempted by the odd night out.
The case(s) may seem complicated, but they come down at some level to deciding if our government broke the law, and if it did, does it matter?
I won't know the decision until tomorrow, but I'm inclined to think that the judgement will be that the matter IS subject to law, that the Government DID break the law, and that there's nothing the courts can do about it.
I must admit, that's based mostly on my feeling that the courts are afraid to be seen as going against the government. They live a comfortable life, and it would not be made easier if they were to speak truth to power - on the contrary, they will be hounded by a compliant press, encouraged covertly or overtly by the government, and made targets for right wing terrorists, who've already killed one MP.
One of the things that this dismal demonstration of how far we've departed as a country from the rule of law is that Scotland, 5 years ago, could have departed from the country as it was then, from a country that no longer exists.
I'm not someone who is encouraging this clusterfuck, who thinks that a Johnson government, a no-deal Brexit and an innefectual opposition because it makes Independence more likely. I think simple logic makes independence inevitable, and don't see why it should come off the suffering of our friends and neighbours in England, Wales and (however briefly) Northern Ireland.
Still, Lord Pannick, summing up now, is discussing not whether Parliament should be recalled next week, but how it will be recalled.
Here's hoping I'm proven wrong sooner than usual.
- Current Location:Da Office.
- Current Music:Please Release Me, Let Me Go
- Current Mood:Hopeful
..and hear what I say.
I'm of a mind to start posting again. I have a new laptop, and the stirrings of a desire to write longer form than FB or Twitter allow.
I know that this place has been pretty empty since The Great Migration to the Other Place, but I'm still too stubborn to move and, crucially enough, this platform is still here.
So, I'm not too sure of who is still out there — are there others like me, still reflexively checking mentions, but not posting? Let me know, if you like. No pressure, though. I started this journal before I had an flist, so I can easily restart it without one.
- Current Mood:
crushed - Current Music:office keyboards
- Current Location:da office
Well, my MacBook Air lasted a good eight years, but it's gotten to the stage where it won't work unplugged, and a lot of things that should just work just don't. So, finally, with the last of my bonus money, I've given in and upgraded to a new MacBook Pro.
I've been a bit grudging about it, I must admit, but an afternoon of fiddling about, and a pretty smooth upgrade path, have made me a convert.
I think what I was worrying most about was the keyboard — I'd heard a lot of bad things about this one, but now I'm finding it a dream. Possibly the short travel of the key suits me, or maybe I'm just relieved not to be using the spongy, imprecise keyboard I use at work, but this feels pretty good.
More, maybe, about this later. The sad thing is, I wanted to type something long form to get used to the new keys, and this was the only site I wanted to do it on. Transferring files from my old machine, I found emails and entries and scraps of short stories and journalling that I'd forgotten I'd written. Oh, my brothers, the drama, and oh, my sisters, the smiles. Was I ever really that angst wrapped? Ah well, at least, it appears, I once wrote a pretty good Wodehouse pastiche, and that's no small achievement.
I finished off my Edinburgh Festival yesterday with an entrancing story telling session from Mara Menzies, who pulled together stories from her Scottish childhood and her Kenyan heritage to spin a wonderful, scary, funny, sad and uplifting hour. At one point, before going on to tell us about brave princesses, and ships in the clouds, and the shadowman, who builds his body from the best bits of others’ (he took my carpenter’s hands) she asked us to call out the stories from our own childhood – what did we hear about? The audience was typically reticent, and then someone shouted “Ghosts!” and someone else “Wee Willie Winkie” and I called out “Selkies”, because we were in the Scottish Storytelling Centre, and that’s the sort of thing we should be talking about…
And I felt a little jealous, then, that she had these stories of wonder and terror, of heroes and demons, and all I had was a half remembered tale of seals that turn into women, or was it the other way round?
After a bit, though, as I let my mind wander, I realised that I hadn’t called out all of the stories that got me through dark, rainy, Glasgow, that made me able to ignore the bullies, and dream of colour amongst the greyness.
( Read more...Collapse )For reasons too silly to go into, I've been given a set of top-end earphones that are roughly five times more expensive than any previous pair I've had. And they are fantastic, bringing things out in old favourites I've never heard before.
That's put me on a full-scale nostalgia fest, pulling out things I haven't listened to in years, as well as things I still listen to everyday. The obvious stuff benefits — obviously. So The Blue Nile (especially Hats), chamber music of all types, and almost anything acoustic sounds a lot better. Until yesterday, though, I hadn't bothered to listen to any live albums: after all, dodgy recordings in obscure venues aren't likely to offer much of a source to work with, are they?
But wandering around yesterday at lunchtime, my iTunes Favourites playlist served me up with the live version of "The French Inhaler" from Warren Zevon's superbly titled "Learning To Flinch". And it was marvellous, all over again. I mean, it helps that this album was recorded on his final tour, when his voice was already beginning to suffer and every word was imbued with mortality, but the 'phones brought out so much that I hadn't realised was there. Obviously I listened to the rest of the album, and although some tracks have a bit too much looped synth for my liking, it's still an incredibly strong set.
( Read more...Collapse )Ten minutes until my last scheduled call of the week, then I've got a couple of hours to produce a report for Monday morning.
So I thought I'd use the time to throw some more words on the wall. I'm just back from 30 minutes of walking round our tame canal outside the office, and listening to the majestic "Across 110th Street" amongst other tracks, which has really geed me up for... listening to more good music, really.
Quick recommendations on the way out:
Titans, on Netflix, is an excellent piece of superhero TV, bringing the Teen Titans to the screen. This seems to be pitching the 1980s Titans, with Robin on the cusp of giving up the green and yellow outfit (ideal for drawing fire) and estranged from Batman. There won't be many surprises if you've read the originals, but boy, are they playing it Grimdark. I just hope that Dick remembers that he's a lot lighter when he's on his own, and we get him in a new costume in Season 2. Something in blue and black, maybe.
Right, call time, so we'll need to pick up on my health kick later...
Comments
I'm doing just fine with the lockdown. But I do worry about the economy.