13 May 2004
Art again: Cecil Beaton Take II
I finally made it to the NPG’s Cecil Beaton exhibition, this time with free entry and champagne. It transpires he did some really cool portraits of 1930s stage stars but then, as cinema took off, became an increasingly bland artist, reaching his nadir with Hollywood portraits in the 1970s (for example, a rather tragically comical portrait of Barbara Streisand, her nugatory bosom propped up in a particularly improbable costume). Entrance is normally about a tenner, so I’d say just browse the gift shop postcards. A photo is still a photo, after all.
Still better is the free exhibition at the other end of the corridor – a collection of random late Victorian/early 20th century photographs classified by subject. I admit I was only drawn to this room in pursuit of some particularly fine duck pancakes (attempting to subsist on free canapés is the closest I get to mankind's hunter-gatherer roots), however it soon proved well worth it. The classifications are incredibly specific, so one display might be a hundred photographs of children posed with dogs, another entirely women with typewriters.
Most rewarding were the categories pretend transport – automobiles and pretend transport – airplanes. It seems that once upon a time the idea of motor cars and airplanes was so exciting that people would seek out photo studios and have their picture taken sitting in them – indeed, these people didn’t seem particularly bothered whether what they were sitting in looked like a real car at all; at best, this meant a photo of two incredibly po-faced Victorians sitting in a cardboard cut out of a grinning Loony Toons car, at worst a family in Sunday best sitting in a tea crate with dustbin lids propped on the sides. The best picture, however, was of an entire extended family crammed into a cardboard cut-out of a one-seater biplane, a po-faced baby peeking up from behind the propeller, and grandma unfeasibly sanguine whilst clinging onto a wing with her chin.
The utterly appalling David also deserves a mention. Some artist has filmed noted jock David Beckham sleeping for an hour and a half, and then put this video on display in the National Portrait Gallery. All I learned is that he sleeps like a girl and has far hairier forearms than I expected. The blurb states the work is inspired by “artists ranging from Michelangelo to Andy Warhol” – by this I assume they mean copied the name “David” from Michelangelo and the idea of filming someone asleep from Warhol.
Worried readers will be glad to hear I finally caught up with the duck pancakes, and traced my way back towards Cecil Beaton via some splendid spicy sausages and mini-bagels, where I finally found the spot that enabled me to exploit all of the canapé trading routes.
Book review:Catch Me If You Can by Frank Abagnale
I wasn’t a huge fan of the CMIFC movie, but the book contains more detail, and is in many ways more charming. Whilst it’s a shame to discover that some of the film’s greater cons were made up, better still is that real ones ended up on the cutting room floor. I was relieved to hear, however, that Frank Abagnale really did manage to escape the FBI by flushing himself down an aeroplane lavatory.
Towards the end of the book Abagnale spends five months in solitary confinement in a French prison. Literally fed on nothing but bread and water, he survived alone, naked, in an unlit cell, on a hard stone floor wallowing in his on faeces. This is dealt with very movingly in the book, however it was clearly too dark for the movie as the entire episode is dealt with in a single scene where Leo DiCaprio mugs to camera. I suppose this is why I like the book so much: no bloody DiCaprio.
Life note:Buying new trousers
Following a few rotten hangovers I have decided to curb my drinking, and so now plan to drink only when there is a good and specific reason to do so. So, this Tuesday I needed to buy new trousers, and I figured this was as good a celebration as any, and arranged to meet Arkansas, Darien, Abi and Simon in the Red Lion. Fuelled on nothing but half a bowl of chips and far too much of something the barman called “Peanut Grigio”, the evening began with a mystery American guest who bought us yet more wine; passed into Darien reading the newspaper to randomly selected telephone numbers; and then ended with us all being thrown out of a private club that – for some reason – had left its front door ajar after closing time.
Aside: We had been excited by the Red Lion as it is one of the few to receive a score of 100% on the www.beerintheevening.com website (formerly a partner site of www.snoringinthemorning.com and www.toastintheafternoon.com, however they seem to have fallen by the wayside recently). Anticipating ambrosia on tap I was severely disappointed and suspect the pub of engaging in gerrymandering. It was utterly the most ordinary pub in the world.
Film review: Van Helsing
This movie is set in the not-too-distant future, where 3D holographic Playstation games are a reality. Presumably, although this interpretation is left open to the viewer, a game was released in which you can do battle with holographic Victorian villains, and then somehow the AI chip shorted and the villains broke free from their programming and started reeking havoc in the real world. Sony is apparently owned by the Vatican in this mysterious future, as it is the Pope who sends out an emissary to hunt down these poorly rendered, pixellated monstrosities before they do any more damage.
Sony do not know their villains, however: why is Dr Jekyll living in Notre Dame cathedral, shrieking “The bells! The bells!”? Why does Dracula live in Castle Frankenstein, in Transylvania? Why are werewolves, portrayed throughout the movie as Dracula’s assistants, the only things that can kill Dracula? As Wayne Bobbitt is probably used to explaining, it’s all just bollocks.
Life note: Ethiopian food - 7 May 2004
To celebrate Deepa's birthday we went to a splendid Ethiopian restaurant near Kings Cross. God knows why the Ethiopians are so thin if they eat like this all the time - we ordered three different curries, and the waiter dumped them all in the middle of a gigantic pancake. This was a splendid way to eat - once I'd persuaded Emily to wash her hands - and plenty more pancakes were rolled out to keep us going. By the end we were stuffed as goats, and again rolled home happy.
The weekend was also spent with the Tongs, each hour marked by a chant of "Happy birthday monkey". On Saturday we had the traditional birthday bonfire at Tongs HQ, in which Deepa and I raided the contents of the neighbour's shed for firewood (Ferklau had forbidden me from burning the shed itself), and Spim drank gin. Sunday morning was spent inexplicably hungover, and we resorted to watching the mid-1960s Doctor Who movies, Doctor Who and the Daleks and Sugar Puffs Presents Dalek Invasion Earth 2150AD. They sucked.
Life note: Wedding fun - 6 May 2004
We met to celebrate the wedding of Mr TimmyB to the delightful Madeleine. Sadly the bride and groom were unable to attend, and thanks to Seamus's hectic schedule we had to hold the celebrations two days two late. Still, we got plenty of Chinese food into us, and rolled home happy. Well done, Tim!
Life note: BotBoating - 1 May 2004
Following the success of our Winchester weekend we went BotBoating over the May bank holiday. This pretty much involved going as far as we could in two days, and then seeing if we could still get back within the third day. It being a relaxing weekend, there's not much to report - more a series of relaxing endeavours which generated an overall feeling of peacefulness. This peace was occasionally broken by Seamus ramming other barges and breaking all their ornaments; Darien or I immitating KGB spies with shrieks of "tutti fruiti tutti fruiti"; Arkansas doing battle with cackling monsters; the operation of three locks to get up to a pub five minute's stroll away; me finally breaking and getting very rude with Dan over board games; and other foolish horseplays.
When AJP Taylor writes this up, in his characteristic style, he will no doubt boil it down to "Six bots went boating from Coventry to Rugby and back. They experienced pleasure but not signigicant incident." AJPT lacks soul.
I finally made it to the NPG’s Cecil Beaton exhibition, this time with free entry and champagne. It transpires he did some really cool portraits of 1930s stage stars but then, as cinema took off, became an increasingly bland artist, reaching his nadir with Hollywood portraits in the 1970s (for example, a rather tragically comical portrait of Barbara Streisand, her nugatory bosom propped up in a particularly improbable costume). Entrance is normally about a tenner, so I’d say just browse the gift shop postcards. A photo is still a photo, after all.
Still better is the free exhibition at the other end of the corridor – a collection of random late Victorian/early 20th century photographs classified by subject. I admit I was only drawn to this room in pursuit of some particularly fine duck pancakes (attempting to subsist on free canapés is the closest I get to mankind's hunter-gatherer roots), however it soon proved well worth it. The classifications are incredibly specific, so one display might be a hundred photographs of children posed with dogs, another entirely women with typewriters.
Most rewarding were the categories pretend transport – automobiles and pretend transport – airplanes. It seems that once upon a time the idea of motor cars and airplanes was so exciting that people would seek out photo studios and have their picture taken sitting in them – indeed, these people didn’t seem particularly bothered whether what they were sitting in looked like a real car at all; at best, this meant a photo of two incredibly po-faced Victorians sitting in a cardboard cut out of a grinning Loony Toons car, at worst a family in Sunday best sitting in a tea crate with dustbin lids propped on the sides. The best picture, however, was of an entire extended family crammed into a cardboard cut-out of a one-seater biplane, a po-faced baby peeking up from behind the propeller, and grandma unfeasibly sanguine whilst clinging onto a wing with her chin.
The utterly appalling David also deserves a mention. Some artist has filmed noted jock David Beckham sleeping for an hour and a half, and then put this video on display in the National Portrait Gallery. All I learned is that he sleeps like a girl and has far hairier forearms than I expected. The blurb states the work is inspired by “artists ranging from Michelangelo to Andy Warhol” – by this I assume they mean copied the name “David” from Michelangelo and the idea of filming someone asleep from Warhol.
Worried readers will be glad to hear I finally caught up with the duck pancakes, and traced my way back towards Cecil Beaton via some splendid spicy sausages and mini-bagels, where I finally found the spot that enabled me to exploit all of the canapé trading routes.
Book review:Catch Me If You Can by Frank Abagnale
I wasn’t a huge fan of the CMIFC movie, but the book contains more detail, and is in many ways more charming. Whilst it’s a shame to discover that some of the film’s greater cons were made up, better still is that real ones ended up on the cutting room floor. I was relieved to hear, however, that Frank Abagnale really did manage to escape the FBI by flushing himself down an aeroplane lavatory.
Towards the end of the book Abagnale spends five months in solitary confinement in a French prison. Literally fed on nothing but bread and water, he survived alone, naked, in an unlit cell, on a hard stone floor wallowing in his on faeces. This is dealt with very movingly in the book, however it was clearly too dark for the movie as the entire episode is dealt with in a single scene where Leo DiCaprio mugs to camera. I suppose this is why I like the book so much: no bloody DiCaprio.
Life note:Buying new trousers
Following a few rotten hangovers I have decided to curb my drinking, and so now plan to drink only when there is a good and specific reason to do so. So, this Tuesday I needed to buy new trousers, and I figured this was as good a celebration as any, and arranged to meet Arkansas, Darien, Abi and Simon in the Red Lion. Fuelled on nothing but half a bowl of chips and far too much of something the barman called “Peanut Grigio”, the evening began with a mystery American guest who bought us yet more wine; passed into Darien reading the newspaper to randomly selected telephone numbers; and then ended with us all being thrown out of a private club that – for some reason – had left its front door ajar after closing time.
Aside: We had been excited by the Red Lion as it is one of the few to receive a score of 100% on the www.beerintheevening.com website (formerly a partner site of www.snoringinthemorning.com and www.toastintheafternoon.com, however they seem to have fallen by the wayside recently). Anticipating ambrosia on tap I was severely disappointed and suspect the pub of engaging in gerrymandering. It was utterly the most ordinary pub in the world.
Film review: Van Helsing
This movie is set in the not-too-distant future, where 3D holographic Playstation games are a reality. Presumably, although this interpretation is left open to the viewer, a game was released in which you can do battle with holographic Victorian villains, and then somehow the AI chip shorted and the villains broke free from their programming and started reeking havoc in the real world. Sony is apparently owned by the Vatican in this mysterious future, as it is the Pope who sends out an emissary to hunt down these poorly rendered, pixellated monstrosities before they do any more damage.
Sony do not know their villains, however: why is Dr Jekyll living in Notre Dame cathedral, shrieking “The bells! The bells!”? Why does Dracula live in Castle Frankenstein, in Transylvania? Why are werewolves, portrayed throughout the movie as Dracula’s assistants, the only things that can kill Dracula? As Wayne Bobbitt is probably used to explaining, it’s all just bollocks.
Life note: Ethiopian food - 7 May 2004
To celebrate Deepa's birthday we went to a splendid Ethiopian restaurant near Kings Cross. God knows why the Ethiopians are so thin if they eat like this all the time - we ordered three different curries, and the waiter dumped them all in the middle of a gigantic pancake. This was a splendid way to eat - once I'd persuaded Emily to wash her hands - and plenty more pancakes were rolled out to keep us going. By the end we were stuffed as goats, and again rolled home happy.
The weekend was also spent with the Tongs, each hour marked by a chant of "Happy birthday monkey". On Saturday we had the traditional birthday bonfire at Tongs HQ, in which Deepa and I raided the contents of the neighbour's shed for firewood (Ferklau had forbidden me from burning the shed itself), and Spim drank gin. Sunday morning was spent inexplicably hungover, and we resorted to watching the mid-1960s Doctor Who movies, Doctor Who and the Daleks and Sugar Puffs Presents Dalek Invasion Earth 2150AD. They sucked.
Life note: Wedding fun - 6 May 2004
We met to celebrate the wedding of Mr TimmyB to the delightful Madeleine. Sadly the bride and groom were unable to attend, and thanks to Seamus's hectic schedule we had to hold the celebrations two days two late. Still, we got plenty of Chinese food into us, and rolled home happy. Well done, Tim!
Life note: BotBoating - 1 May 2004
Following the success of our Winchester weekend we went BotBoating over the May bank holiday. This pretty much involved going as far as we could in two days, and then seeing if we could still get back within the third day. It being a relaxing weekend, there's not much to report - more a series of relaxing endeavours which generated an overall feeling of peacefulness. This peace was occasionally broken by Seamus ramming other barges and breaking all their ornaments; Darien or I immitating KGB spies with shrieks of "tutti fruiti tutti fruiti"; Arkansas doing battle with cackling monsters; the operation of three locks to get up to a pub five minute's stroll away; me finally breaking and getting very rude with Dan over board games; and other foolish horseplays.
When AJP Taylor writes this up, in his characteristic style, he will no doubt boil it down to "Six bots went boating from Coventry to Rugby and back. They experienced pleasure but not signigicant incident." AJPT lacks soul.
07 May 2004
Life note: Embolina's return - 29 April 2004
We all met in at the splendid Grape Street Wine Bar to welcome Emily home from her jaunt in the states (or rather, to welcome Emily back on a jaunt from her home in the states). Unfortunately, Emily didn't turn up until way after nine, so we spent the evening quietly sampling cheeses, testing the wines and grazing on meze. By the time Emily turned up we had enough time for a hug, and then we all went home.
We all met in at the splendid Grape Street Wine Bar to welcome Emily home from her jaunt in the states (or rather, to welcome Emily back on a jaunt from her home in the states). Unfortunately, Emily didn't turn up until way after nine, so we spent the evening quietly sampling cheeses, testing the wines and grazing on meze. By the time Emily turned up we had enough time for a hug, and then we all went home.
Life note: Southwark Tavern Pub Quiz - 27 April 2004
A glorious week of uninterrupted sunshine was broken by torrential rain, and everyone turned up for the Southwark Tavern pub quiz in drenched summer clothes. Darien brought tAbi, whilst Seamus found a Kelly to bring along. Both were excellent company, which was fortunate as we couldn't hear a word the question-master was saying. Somehow "a few glasses of wine" became "far more than is medically safe", and the next minute I was two stops too far from home, and then the next minute it was three hours after I should have gotten up for work.
A glorious week of uninterrupted sunshine was broken by torrential rain, and everyone turned up for the Southwark Tavern pub quiz in drenched summer clothes. Darien brought tAbi, whilst Seamus found a Kelly to bring along. Both were excellent company, which was fortunate as we couldn't hear a word the question-master was saying. Somehow "a few glasses of wine" became "far more than is medically safe", and the next minute I was two stops too far from home, and then the next minute it was three hours after I should have gotten up for work.
Life note: Splendid weekend - 23 April 2004
This weekend was more splendid than most, almost certainly assisted by the sun which has been pumping raw happiness into the air for the past four or five days now.
On Friday I briefly went shopping with Darien and Brock (very briefly: I asked Darien if I should buy a camera, he said no, and then we all went to eat noodles) and then on to the Bricklayers Arms in Fitzrovia for Andrew and Helen's spendid engagement party. There's no real word for those people who you hardly ever see, take no effort ever see again, but can still chat perfectly amiably to when you do see them; but anyway, there were lots of people like that there. One of them even bought me a glass of wine. Matt Barnes turned up too, however he hadn't bothered eating before coming out so he rushed off almost immediately to get dinner, and by the time he returned I'd gone home. I say "rushed off almost immediately", but it was one of those nights when time is in fast forward, and the hours flash by in between sips of wine.
On Saturday a posse of bots, plus Emily's boy Andy, made the epic trek to Winchester. Thus started a weekend of endless human pleasures - a barbecue, jugs of pimms, racing around playing tennis, climbing trees, watching croquet, ping pong and table tennis. Darien, Lani and I had a stab at making dinner - I was on special trifle duty and, although we left out the tuna, I think it worked out pretty special. Darien got told off for swearing in front of country bumpkids, and in the evening we discovered the sheer wit of the terms "margin owl", "quim carousel" and "demi-tasse of owl clits". No wonder tAbi thinks of us as the modern Bloomsbury Set.
On the Sunday we feasted on sherry-tarnished trifle and walked to Winchester. The sun was shining and the town so old and unspoiled that Winchester seemed to be the most beautiful city on Earth. As children frolicked safely in the river, and cars slowed down so you could cross the road, and all the buildings glistened with care and maintaince, I half felt it was some Disney version of England. We celebrated this fact by going to a pub and playing a game where you can't use words that begin with a vowel or have more than six letters, and for some reason, this meant saying the word "cunt" a lot.
This weekend was more splendid than most, almost certainly assisted by the sun which has been pumping raw happiness into the air for the past four or five days now.
On Friday I briefly went shopping with Darien and Brock (very briefly: I asked Darien if I should buy a camera, he said no, and then we all went to eat noodles) and then on to the Bricklayers Arms in Fitzrovia for Andrew and Helen's spendid engagement party. There's no real word for those people who you hardly ever see, take no effort ever see again, but can still chat perfectly amiably to when you do see them; but anyway, there were lots of people like that there. One of them even bought me a glass of wine. Matt Barnes turned up too, however he hadn't bothered eating before coming out so he rushed off almost immediately to get dinner, and by the time he returned I'd gone home. I say "rushed off almost immediately", but it was one of those nights when time is in fast forward, and the hours flash by in between sips of wine.
On Saturday a posse of bots, plus Emily's boy Andy, made the epic trek to Winchester. Thus started a weekend of endless human pleasures - a barbecue, jugs of pimms, racing around playing tennis, climbing trees, watching croquet, ping pong and table tennis. Darien, Lani and I had a stab at making dinner - I was on special trifle duty and, although we left out the tuna, I think it worked out pretty special. Darien got told off for swearing in front of country bumpkids, and in the evening we discovered the sheer wit of the terms "margin owl", "quim carousel" and "demi-tasse of owl clits". No wonder tAbi thinks of us as the modern Bloomsbury Set.
On the Sunday we feasted on sherry-tarnished trifle and walked to Winchester. The sun was shining and the town so old and unspoiled that Winchester seemed to be the most beautiful city on Earth. As children frolicked safely in the river, and cars slowed down so you could cross the road, and all the buildings glistened with care and maintaince, I half felt it was some Disney version of England. We celebrated this fact by going to a pub and playing a game where you can't use words that begin with a vowel or have more than six letters, and for some reason, this meant saying the word "cunt" a lot.
