burn baby burn

how does a fire make you shiver? well perhaps it doesn't. maybe though the recent destruction of california woodland might send just the slightest tremor through your bones. especially when one of the grandest blazes was set by a ten year old boy playing with matches.

pretty scary i guess, the raw fire power of ... well, a fire. all that property destroyed, kids made homeless and lives derailed. but hey, lets not get too morbid. its relative after all. no matter how much destruction the affluent citizens of california have had to endure in recent weeks its really a drop in the ocean when compared to the devastation caused by the spending flash-over thats been scorching the planet recently. ever see a hedge fund go up?.

of course the blame for the recent economic bonfire can hardly be laid at the feet of any particular individual. or even group of individuals. can it? surely it is inconceivable that some cabal in its anonymously opulent suite in washington, or edinburgh, or genoa or wherever stealthily agreed that interest rates should be kept to the absolute minimum while the resultant brush fire of consumption was milked for all it was worth? until it burnt itself out? thats not what the G8 does. is it?

i mean to say there are people out there pulling down massive, and when i say massive i mean massive, remuneration whose responsibility it is, when not advising governments, to run the banking and investment institutions competently. surely they know how an economy works? surely they understand the concept of boom and bust?

following years of an adrenaline spend rush on the back of fabulously low interest rates, all of a sudden we seem to have run full pelt into a 'credit crunch.' now i suspect that this 'credit crunch' has had a minimal effect on the blazing conifers of california but as far as sterling, dollars and yen are concerned it seems to have jammed the brakes on pretty hard. its all a bit difficult for joe soap to get his head round. isn't it? except to say that even the most ignorant ignoramus could have seen this coming a mile off.

surprisingly enough it won't be stan, or chuck or even peter who is really going to pick up the can here. nope. those guys may lose their jobs but as usual its good old joe soap again on the sharp end. as in california the peripherals, the illegal workers, the not too skilled and the low paid are going to find themselves out in the cold, along with their wives and their kids. their dreams of home and family razed to the ground as they learn how a fire can make them shiver while the corporate generals make sure their ticket to safety includes a big, and when i say big i do mean massive, severance package.

thats whats giving me a chill.

or is that shaking feeling my blood boiling?

definity 4

Q. what do you call someone who does it for money?

A. a social worker


or is that just a tad harsh?

time for a change ........

where me?

.... on an existential trajectory.

where you?

p&l

information technology?

the death of archaeology? and therefore history? unless you want it virtual of course.

p&l

definity 3

to say it gets harder as one gets older is not entirely correct.


peace and love

conversion

so we are finally rid of phony tony. allelujah. a change long overdue. but more importantly the chance for our deceitful (remember weapons of mass destruction anyone?) ex-prime minister to own his true colours.

it seems that the belligerant boy has decided to bite the bullet and come out as a roman catholic. surprisingly it seems the pope is not all that enthusiastic. might be something to do with hubris perhaps? which doesn't readily translate as humility no matter how hard you spin it. or perhaps his holiness is keen to protect his own job. after all tone is looking for career development in a role which reflects his obvious talents and abilities now that he's left gordon behind to pick up the pieces.

it may not come as a surprise that saint tone has waited until now to reconcile his faith with his conscience. after all it could well have limited his personal trajectory as leader of the british government to come out as a papist. especially when dealing with the likes of messrs paisley and robinson. and there is at least one thing he can be relied on for above all others and that is never to let morality interfere with his pursuit of his own personal and political aggrandisement.

it is of no concern to this writer what faith he holds. he could be a buddhist or a baptist or a jew, a muslim or a martian for all i care just so long as he is what he says he is. although i wouldn't complain if he was a buddhist. on the grounds that we might now have less innocent blood on our hands.

of course it may be that his holiness needn't worry too much for the mo. now he's established his credentials god's anointed (not the pope silly, the other one) is being sent to meddle with the middle east. a new testament to the insensitivity with which western governments appear to treat the islamic world. altho could the consensus be that he can't do much more damage there than he has done already? and at least if he's in the middle east he's not burning his brand onto anything else.

and he does like to leave his mark on the things he touches. the uk national health service for one, which has recently had a hefty funding surplus squeezed out of it despite staffing levels that only function if the nurses manage to consistently levitate at least six inches above floor level to minimize frictional drag.

also not forgetting the institution he was elected to lead. re-formed in his image the labour party now attracts the likes of erstwhile minor thatcher minion and iain duncan-smith shadow front bencher quentin davies to jump ship and join his soul mates on the opposite side. these days free-marketeer quentin has more in common with blaire's version of labour than he does with the conservatives. gulp.

this however is history for tone. from here its onwards and, particularly, upwards. with considerations of electability no longer determining his path to heaven perhaps our good ex prime minister will soon re-surface as the natural born tory he's been all along. once having dealt with that minor detail he'll have shaken off the shackles of both religious and political disguise and be primed for forty days and forty nights admiring himself in the hot dusty wastes. then with a toss of his head and the scent of freedom in his nostrils the re-structured holy tony really will have the chance to consolidate his career ... as the virtual saviour of mankind.

so on second thoughts, if he wants to hang onto his job perhaps the pontiff had better look out after all.

and so had his boss.

peace and love.

music

" of course the big thing about music is not confusing your flarps with your sh**s." sorry to have to admit it but i overheard this one in the pub.

definity 2

use your head....

dance from the heart.

coming out

ok ok ok. so its confession time.

i've always had the feeling that i didn't fit into a neat gender identity pigeon hole. after all who really does? i suppose there are archetypes that society finds acceptable and to which we, the hoi poloi, are expected to aspire. john wayne for example. (marrion morrison to his mummy. christ no wonder he affected a deep voice and pugilistic manner.) what a guy.

then there are the strong women. the psycho sexual behemoths and their 1970s dead-wood dinosaur dogma with which unreconstructed, hairy arm-pitted, retired bra-burners scourge us wimpish males. the andrea dworkins and camile paglias of this world for example. although i notice that, aging gracefully, sister germaine now advocates toy boy joy. (all very well being unattainable when everyone wants to sleep with you. not quite so imposing a stance when no-one gives a toss. eh germaine?)

i guess my point is that we all have to navigate our own course along the paths of passion. and this may lead us round some surprising corners before we stumble over our own true nature.

in my case my friends saw it coming long before i did. all i know is that a couple of years ago i started to dance. i also began to learn to play the chromatic harmonica at the same time. no not while dancing, but in the same month. january 2005 actually. but that's a story for another time and place. and blog.

now in south wales there is not a strong male dance culture. hard to believe i know but none the less true. boys don't dance. they might do a bit of hanky-waving, bell-jangling Morris prancing if their parents happen to have been librarians. and they might have jived if they were teddy boys. but seeing as most of those are now getting to grips with their zimmers that tradition has latterly waned. so generally speaking the BDD rule applies. as i said, boys don't dance.

especially if they are over fifty. the indignity of it all for one thing. i mean imagine a man of some years supporting a not insubstantial tummy, waddling round the dance floor. jesus he'd be sure to curdle the milk wouldn't he? or at the very least frighten the horses. "well may be. but heck," i thought, "i'm going to give it a go."

despite the unease, and in one particularly sad case the disapproval, of my peers i've been writhing, as much as my sagging abdomen will permit, around the dance floor, at least once a week for 30 months. and i'm getting better. couldn't have got worse. i can now spin a lady and lead her through the intricate pathways of rhythmic motion from one end of a staccato brass and exuberant conga melee to the next. without either of us falling over.

but my new enthusiasm has not been without cost. as i dance i find myself more and more in contact with the ladies. ladies of all shapes, ages and sizes. not to mention levels of terpsichorean accomplishment and even, it has to be said, of personal freshness. and the more we touch the more i realise we have in common.

i find satisfaction in the physicality. with no booze in my veins i lurve the salsa rhythm groove dragging my feet over the tiles. i thrive on the intensity of the brief ecstatic relationships and, as my endorphins continue to recklessly bejewel the inside of my skull i find myself bouncing on the invulnerable high the following morning.

in fact i'm so in tune with it all that i think i must be one of them. i have to confess i don't even mind wearing a bit of boys' scent. nothing too over the top. a squirt of lacoste maybe, or the odd dab of paco rabanne. my friends' fears were obviously well founded.

it seems i'm more than just 'one of them'. in fact i've been getting so in touch with my feminine side on the dance floor that i decided its about time i came out and admitted exactly who i am.

so i take this opportunity to proudly announce to the world that i am in fact a lesbian.

anybody want to make something of it?

p&l

definity

mar·riage (măr'ĭj)
n.

1. That moment in love's exhilarating arc when the bump and grind begins its slow transformation into the grump and bind.

and me a wedding snapper too!

WMD ............. again

hi america,

we thought you were flouting the conventions of modern warfare when you sent us ruby wax. but david gest? What a Monster Dummy? we do have a sense of humour. and realise you were only joking. so perhaps you'll come and get him now. it must be way past his euthanasia time.

sweet dreams. well i'll have them when he's back on the other side of the atlantic.

peace and love

off with her head

very tricky issue our monarchy. and everyone in the uk will have their own take. for some it's a piece of very expensive history, for others its an intolerabe affront to their rights as individuals. for most its a bit of colour on the tele at which they can direct their affection/spleen when there's no footy.

personally i think the succession will be interesting. eii has been on the thrown for a long time. half a century in fact. and a particular half century that has seen big changes in the UK's relationship with the rest of the world. my hope is that when she does finally throw in the towel we'll see a reduction in the sovereign's role. hopefully william will keep a lower profile and be more business-like and less prone to donning the ceremonial frocks and the big hats. altho there is a quite a tradition of the latter here. cf elton john.

we could of course cut her head off. (the queen that is) (er ... i mean ... the one in buckingham palace to be precise) we've done it before and that kind of brought home to her ancestors (except one) that they worked for us, rather than the other way round. but if we did that we'd have to restructure our whole system of government to prevent the likes of oleaginous little tone slithering to the very top and declaring himself god. now that would be expensive. and very risky.

the power and the money? can't argue with that. i don't have them either. but would you do the job? i sure as hell wouldn't.

in response to http://turtar.blogspot.com/

british summer time begins 25th march 2007

a cold wind
blows behind
the blind windows of my soul.
eddying along quiet corridors
it entices deserted cobwebs
to dance.

even the banshee has left home.

kicking the weed

i got a sort of grip on my nictoine addiction after decades of trying by treating every cig i didn't have as a victory. instead of seeing each one i did have as a failure. little by little i snuck up on my personal nico-monster until i eventually got the so and so surrounded. he is now coralled somehere in my psyche. but he ain't gone. oh no. trust me. he ain't gone.

for the last more than a couple of years i have been working alongside the West Glamorgan Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse. i started with them as a horticultural tutor but have now moved on to working as a creative writing tutor. it's a great buzz. i meet some lovely inteligent people. and some absolute toerags.

once wgcada clients begin to surface from their addiction they continue to refer to themselves as addicts. its just that now they preface it with the word recovering. after all no-one knows better than they do how easy it is to slip off the waggon and head back to the smack. or the booze. whether this indicates the existence of the 'addictive personality' i don't know. there are a lot of reasons why individualsbecome addicts. all i would say is it shouldn't be discounted.

in my own case i have reached the point where i can more or less take tobacco or leave it. sure it tastes foul. and i can't breathe well the day after a cigarette. which is one hell of a motivating factor i can tell you. especially as i have discovered latin dancing. but i still enjoy a nico-hit. and i wouldn'tbe surprised if other retired puffers share this unrequited vulnerability.

a beautiful young friend recently went to cuba for a holiday. she brought me back one massive cigar. what to do? obviously i couldn't throw her present away. still i couldn't smoke it with my family. all non-smokers and seriously anti. so i waited till new years eve and instead of renouncing the evil weed as i had done for year after year previously ... i lit it up.

it took some perseverance i can tell you. the first few drags nearly killed me. but such was my perversity, not to mention alcohol quotient, that i kept going. my reward was that by the time i was halfway through, and one or two of my mates had had a draw (i did mention the alcohol didn't i?) i was just loving it. the drug had unearthed all my hungry little receptors and were they having a field day? i really didn't want that small brown thing ever to go out. ever.

but it did. and i was desperate for another. drunk as a skunk at 3:00am on 1st january 2007 i would have smoked anything. everything. so i begged a roll-up from another carouser. rolled up and lit up yet again. and guess what ..... this time it really was foul. thank heavens. and i haven't gone back.

i think that what the experience reinforced in me was the understanding of myself as a smoker who doesn't smoke any more. rather than someone who is out of the woods completely. and i think that's the best its going to get.

onwards and upwards.

peace and love

poem for george and tony

Always wakeful, never sleeping

My dogs slip through the smoke that's reeking

From the havoc I have wrought.

Sergeants to their charges urging

Bravery through hellfire burning.

This mayhem's mine, this holocaust

On which I'll gorge and then make more.

Pleased to meet you,

My name is War.

Although secure you think you slumber

Hear my gunfire's distant rumble.

You'll not be safe past this day's dawn.

Enjoy your times of peace and plenty

I only need one stomach empty.

Another martyr for my cause

Comes knocking at your kitchen door.

At your service,

My name is War

I may be grand, I may be subtle

Ten thousand troops or a snipers rifle.

Perhaps I'll bomb a shopping mall.

I'll take your soldiers and your children

I'll help your women weep for fallen

Sons and daughters in the long roll call.

My herald is a nitrate roar.

The pleasure's mine,

My name is War.

I'll make you rich beyond your dreams

Stretch your markets at the seams

There'll be no need to advertise.

The profits from my global tension

Far exceed your comprehension.

Invest in arms, you'll find it wise.

In strife and conflict rockets soar.

Its my delight,

My name is War.

I'll shift all you can produce

And neutralise the prayers for truce.

I'll blow your prices through the sky.

Then in clandestine dealing moments

We'll sell the same to both opponents

So secretly they won't ask why.

You question what I do it for?

I work for love,

My name is War

thought for today

mortality?




its a dead cert.



all my love.

thought for the day

love is a bit like food poisoning. you can die of it it but more usually it just hurts like hell for a while then goes away.

there can be a lot of crap to clear up afterwards.

sweet dreams.

epiphanies 'n' 'at

ever had an epiphany then? you know, a sudden, intuitive realization through an ordinary circumstance. that moment when you turn to yourself while peeling the spuds, metaphorically speaking of course, and say 'well just fancy that' or 'who'd 've thought it?' or even 'well i'll be jiggered' as your whole life is hooked, landed and filleted before being mercilessly exposed to you in all its grim and tawdry actuality? and all in the space of a butterfly's heartbeat.
so, come on, have you?

i have.

thats how i know i'm a writer. i thought i'd get the admission over quickly. i reckon that for those of you who were a bit slow to have guessed its probably best to spell it out at an early stage. while out of respect for those who had seen it coming i hasten to confirm your suspicions.

epiphanies after all are known to be almost an identifying characteristic amongst writers. writers and fruitcakes. but for now we'll stick to the former. you know that class of person who sits out the thumb twiddling day waiting for inspiration to strike. yes we (you notice i include myself) are particularly vulnerable to a shot of satori. on the rocks. or anywhere else. if only to break up the monotony.

some may even be self induced. epiphanies that is, not writers. picture if you will the solitary scribe yearning for a flash of blinding insight to leven the ennui. if in response to all that aching need one pops fully formed from the ether, oh happy day, who can criticise the tapper who nails their dowdy colours to the mast of committment. too good to be true many may think. and you might be among them.

which only goes to prove how much of an unwriter you are. because you are looking at the issue in the wrong way. everybody knows that if you are going to be a really good deceiver, which is basically what writers are, then the first person you really need to deceive is ... the first person. ie i. i mean you. or more accurately oneself.

in this case it could be regarded as a pretty neat trick, even a basic skill, if from nowhere you can pull a really convincing epiphany. because then you may be a good long way down the road to success. after all if you can deceive yourself ... other people should be a doddle.

as it happens my own epiphany enjoys a lot more substance than a mere fit of self deception. to start with i wasn't bored. well i was a bit. but i was certainly busy. i enjoyed sedentary employment at that time. and at the critical moment was rushed off my seat.

i was composing a letter to a mrs williams of cockett to tell her that no, the council wouldn't move the play area adjacent to her house even tho it was the nocturnal venue for rabid teen booze, drug and sex orgies and was having a serious detrimental impact on the value of her property and she couldn't get planning permission for a viewing platform so she could sell tickets to her friends to come and watch. and the environmental health department had refused her a license to sell hot dogs.

i was halfway through the epistle when it struck. 'listen mate,' my epiphany suggested in its ethereal, intuitive, but strangely gravelly and cockney, manner, 'you're wasting your time on this one. what you are is a writer. you know, books like.' it looked over its shoulder. then turned back. 'know what i mean? arty 'n' 'at. nobody else may agree but what you do best is write. so get on with it.'

so with customary directness i started a photography degree.