Today is my birthday. Today I received a letter from the organisers of the Big Day Out informing me that I am a guest of the festival and if I go the guest booth and get a special wrist band I will be able to access the guests of the festival bar where there are 'real toilets'.
Real toilets! My what a special birthday present that was. I can safely say I have never before in my life received a letter telling me I am allowed to access real toilets but wait there was another first. I was also the proud recipient of a special birthday cake made entirely out of chocolate mousse. A whole cake made out of dairy products that I can not digest. Another first but to be fair The Spatula was not aware of the contents of the cake, she thought it was a cake cake and not a mousse pretending to be a cake.
Today was supposed to be my unbirthday. I was determined to spend the day in solitary reflection. For the most part I managed. I trawled bookshops, saw a movie, walked up and down King St admiring the blue cloudlessness and general brightness of the upper atmosphere. One small coffee stop with Spencer where I announced my contentedness with my decision to spend a day moving from moment to moment with no reference points except my own desire for a cup of tea or to look at a flower or think about the concept of zero or the Australian Antarctic Division.
The Peachettes rather ignored my instructions and cooked a roast dinner, proffered presents and presented a cake, it was a small and unadorned affair on the Peach Deck. It was kind of them to do so but it did rather put a stop to the whole unbirthday project.
M Frankenstein I think I understand now
Plunging my head face first into the over salted ocean in pursuit of the mysteries of the deep I felt a keen sense of comradeship with all those who went before me. Captain Nemo, that 70's guy on a boat with that bikini woman, Captain Zissou, Horatio Hornblower, Charles Darwin. There was a strong and undeniable sense of cartographical freedom until I saw a fish up close and magnified by the miracle of my plastic mask. Mr Frankenstein himself could not have recoiled with as much shock and panic from the very creature he gave his health and sanity to create as I did from the very fish I gave three minutes idle flippering to with idea of having a bit of a look at it.
There are two lessons here:
1. Fish are more alarming than you think they are.
2. If you create a monster it might kill everyone you love and cause you to travel across ice floes until you perish in the company of a vain and idiotic Englishman who is clearly in love with his sister.
There are two lessons here:
1. Fish are more alarming than you think they are.
2. If you create a monster it might kill everyone you love and cause you to travel across ice floes until you perish in the company of a vain and idiotic Englishman who is clearly in love with his sister.
I should be more sure about these things
A list of things I think my mother likes:
Tea - Kwazulu and Yorkshire Gold, never green or mint. She will not take Earl Grey but I do not think she is opposed to Lady Grey.
Custard
Lamb chops
Christmas pudding
Sausages from Bathurst
Blueberries
Chopping wood - with a small axe
Knitting - but not sewing together the finished pieces
Remembering her mother - without revealing how she feels about the memory
Reading novels - never poetry
Knowing how long it takes her to walk up the big hill
Hanging clean washing on the line - I am unsure but it seems to me as though there is a satisfaction in this chore more than in the others
Tea - Kwazulu and Yorkshire Gold, never green or mint. She will not take Earl Grey but I do not think she is opposed to Lady Grey.
Custard
Lamb chops
Christmas pudding
Sausages from Bathurst
Blueberries
Chopping wood - with a small axe
Knitting - but not sewing together the finished pieces
Remembering her mother - without revealing how she feels about the memory
Reading novels - never poetry
Knowing how long it takes her to walk up the big hill
Hanging clean washing on the line - I am unsure but it seems to me as though there is a satisfaction in this chore more than in the others
It is not a daydream if it happens at night
I had my back against the garden wall but was slipping downwards with gravity and the knowledge of useless feet. Three times I had raised the pistol and shot myself in the heart only my heart kept jumping out of the way so I now had all these holes in my chest for no good reason at all. I telephoned for an ambulance thinking these people will know where the heart is. These people can help me.
Terra Nullius
I have a strong desire to set fire to my house just so I can see which single one of my stupid objects will be found unburned and intact, lying face down in the ashes.
Excuse my poor photography
Artist Alice Amsel floats my boat. I suppose that's why we'll be running a profile on her in issue #1 of PAN magazine this year. Don't worry, a real photographer was on hand to take photos for PAN.
Come on Mister, sure I can write a short story and do all of that other stuff all at once, just let me finish this paragraph then I'll come and talk to you about it
You know those days when you wake up with a head full of sentences but the day, the whole day, has been indentured to a person that pays you to do something other than write? Those days are not ideal days.
So much better now that some of the lame has been deleted
I have found a new pleasure in deleting albums from my itunes. Gone, gone, gone are the boring, the lame, the unamusingly stupid and poor old Ginsberg who these days does nothing but tire me.
A partial list of the deliberately departed:
Belle & Sebastian
Tunng
Wilco
Ginsberg
Joe Frank
Christian Fennesz
Tim Hecker
Triosk
Jose Gonzalez
Micah P Hinson
Mogwai
Jens Lekman
Death Cab For Cutie
Dragonforce
Mountain Goat
Mazarin
A partial list of those who were almost deleted:
Throbbing Gristle
Super Numeri
Art Brut
The Triffids
Cat Power
Ray LaMontagne
Seu George
A partial list of the deliberately departed:
Belle & Sebastian
Tunng
Wilco
Ginsberg
Joe Frank
Christian Fennesz
Tim Hecker
Triosk
Jose Gonzalez
Micah P Hinson
Mogwai
Jens Lekman
Death Cab For Cutie
Dragonforce
Mountain Goat
Mazarin
A partial list of those who were almost deleted:
Throbbing Gristle
Super Numeri
Art Brut
The Triffids
Cat Power
Ray LaMontagne
Seu George
This will be my year of deliberate misrepresentation, where there is livestock there is dead stock
There is an overwhelming desire to express without being understood. Every night as I lay cursing the dark for not being dark enough the same thought enters my head. I want to yell at people in French, or Latin or Estonian. I do not want my words to be understood, I want only the fact that I am speaking them with force and conviction to be conveyed.
I have not been saying what I mean. I have said 'yes' when I meant no, 'no' when I meant yes and 'that is fine' when I meant you are a bloody drongo and I think you just cracked the marble-filled jam jar I've been using for a heart. I haven't been lying on purpose, for most of last year I was remarkably honest until I hit November and performed an involuntary retreat into polite responses and expected conversation and then of course I picked up my own jam jar and smashed it into whatever I could find and the marbles got loose and rolled into my eye sockets and lodged under my tongue.
I spent the first hour of the new year lying drunk in a gutter in Chippendale listening to all the happy chatter happen around me. It wasn't a bad place to be, almost everyone was there, sitting, standing or lying in the road. I could have sat up and joined in the conversation but I found that I was comfortable with my hip on the road, my head on my handbag on the curb, content with my thoughts distinctly my own.
I have been philosophical about my insides. Last year I developed a grudging respect for the vast team of doctors assigned to examine my brain. I even formed a fondness for the young neurologist who delighted in hitting various parts of me with his tiny and delicate hammer. I grew used to the robotic hum of scanners and lying very still in that mechanical tube while nurses counted down the remaining seconds. I made good use of all my limbs, making long lists of things I wanted to do before my gross motor skills took an irreversible turn for the worse and investing in ramps became a priority. I started drumming, moved a piano into the library and impersonated Little Richard, I painted scores of terrible paintings and sketched every small object I could see. I walked everywhere, took up running until a tendon gave out and put a stop to the whole idea and I danced in houses, on streets, in bars, on my bed and I climbed no less than seven separate trees. When the official results came in and I was in fact given the mostly all clear I wasn't really surprised, despite the lists and the activities I had been unable to properly imagine a world where I couldn't walk or wave my arms about on a whim.
This year I have been reexamining my notes on bioethics from law school but they have been unable to explain how I could be so happy to swallow pills to play god but so distressed at the idea of the small life snuffing its own self out for no reason at all.
This year will be my year of deliberate interpersonal misrepresentation. If I meet you on the street I am going to tell you I like tomato juice and I am happy to be here. I am going to be impersonal and polite and offer vague and general descriptions of streetscapes and landscapes and a flat pack idea of being pleased to meet someone like you. I am not going to tell you how I feel. There will of course be exceptions, the people who already know what I'm about, people like Spencer and Gemma and the cast of usual suspects and the hard black letters of written words. I suppose I'm talking about acquaintances and strangers and the inevitable people at parties and gigs, I suppose this a broader affair.
Dear World,
Due to the behaviour of your chosen representatives I find I have no inclination to further our friendship. There is no room for new friends in here. My replacement marble-filled-jam-jar heart has shattered and that was the final object I had saved for installing in the ticking part that should beat. These rattling disconsolate marbles now control my in-flight interaction system and they only steady into a gentle rolling flicker in the presence of genuine friends. I am neither hopeless nor depressed. I am simply drawing a line in your stupid sand. This will be your year of leaving me alone.
Regards
Dale R Slamma
I have not been saying what I mean. I have said 'yes' when I meant no, 'no' when I meant yes and 'that is fine' when I meant you are a bloody drongo and I think you just cracked the marble-filled jam jar I've been using for a heart. I haven't been lying on purpose, for most of last year I was remarkably honest until I hit November and performed an involuntary retreat into polite responses and expected conversation and then of course I picked up my own jam jar and smashed it into whatever I could find and the marbles got loose and rolled into my eye sockets and lodged under my tongue.
I spent the first hour of the new year lying drunk in a gutter in Chippendale listening to all the happy chatter happen around me. It wasn't a bad place to be, almost everyone was there, sitting, standing or lying in the road. I could have sat up and joined in the conversation but I found that I was comfortable with my hip on the road, my head on my handbag on the curb, content with my thoughts distinctly my own.
I have been philosophical about my insides. Last year I developed a grudging respect for the vast team of doctors assigned to examine my brain. I even formed a fondness for the young neurologist who delighted in hitting various parts of me with his tiny and delicate hammer. I grew used to the robotic hum of scanners and lying very still in that mechanical tube while nurses counted down the remaining seconds. I made good use of all my limbs, making long lists of things I wanted to do before my gross motor skills took an irreversible turn for the worse and investing in ramps became a priority. I started drumming, moved a piano into the library and impersonated Little Richard, I painted scores of terrible paintings and sketched every small object I could see. I walked everywhere, took up running until a tendon gave out and put a stop to the whole idea and I danced in houses, on streets, in bars, on my bed and I climbed no less than seven separate trees. When the official results came in and I was in fact given the mostly all clear I wasn't really surprised, despite the lists and the activities I had been unable to properly imagine a world where I couldn't walk or wave my arms about on a whim.
This year I have been reexamining my notes on bioethics from law school but they have been unable to explain how I could be so happy to swallow pills to play god but so distressed at the idea of the small life snuffing its own self out for no reason at all.
This year will be my year of deliberate interpersonal misrepresentation. If I meet you on the street I am going to tell you I like tomato juice and I am happy to be here. I am going to be impersonal and polite and offer vague and general descriptions of streetscapes and landscapes and a flat pack idea of being pleased to meet someone like you. I am not going to tell you how I feel. There will of course be exceptions, the people who already know what I'm about, people like Spencer and Gemma and the cast of usual suspects and the hard black letters of written words. I suppose I'm talking about acquaintances and strangers and the inevitable people at parties and gigs, I suppose this a broader affair.
Dear World,
Due to the behaviour of your chosen representatives I find I have no inclination to further our friendship. There is no room for new friends in here. My replacement marble-filled-jam-jar heart has shattered and that was the final object I had saved for installing in the ticking part that should beat. These rattling disconsolate marbles now control my in-flight interaction system and they only steady into a gentle rolling flicker in the presence of genuine friends. I am neither hopeless nor depressed. I am simply drawing a line in your stupid sand. This will be your year of leaving me alone.
Regards
Dale R Slamma
One porter, one cider and one beer or Christmas Eve in the graveyard
I don't know what he was singing but everything stopped, the bells, the chatter, the wind in the grass. Everything except the backlit clouds stopped a moment to hear his song. We were sitting in the graveyard drinking, we had about twelve people, two guitars and one tambourine, we had beer bottles in brown paper bags and a thirst for howling out songs. It wasn't until I decided I had better go home, after Madam Squeeze and I picked out our careful moonlit way through trees, over fallen grave stones and down a path towards the gate that I remembered there was such a thing as churches.
The big church near the graveyard gates was busting at the seams with the bespectacled and the solemn. We snuck into the vestibule as the congregation rose as one and began singing a slow and ancient song. I had grass stuck on my dress and tinsel sticking out of my hair. I was holding three empty bottles, one porter, one cider and one beer. The stench of cigarette butts coming out of the empty beer bottle would have knocked out a lesser mortal than me but I felt quite sure that while I was happy to sit an old grave and drink beer and sing I wasn't happy to leave the empty bottles there. The song was slow and ancient and though they must have numbered in the hundreds I could hear above their voices that good old racket coming from the back of the graveyard where Spencer was perched on a headstone leading his own small congregation in song.
I sat at the edge of the circle in the graveyard tonight, lying on the grass to sip cider and puff smoke at the impossibly fast clouds moving across skies, trees and moon. Spencer and Madam Squeeze were there, Madam sitting comfortably beside me, Spencer perching up high strumming out songs. The rest of them howled, sang and rattled with their accustomed abandon, some of them waltzing like the possessed in a clearing. I'm not sure what I was doing, you can tell just by looking at me that I'm more careful with my heart, mind and songs. Some us of talked about ritual and the good urge for joining together in grief, joy, love and song. I wasn't quite ready to howl at the moon as the others do but I can tell you one thing, I'd rather be drinking on a gravestone than don my spectacles and stand in a congregation miming the art of music to what should have been a moving and ancient hymn but had instead the eerie effect of guilt, obligation, ironed trousers and isolation.
The big church near the graveyard gates was busting at the seams with the bespectacled and the solemn. We snuck into the vestibule as the congregation rose as one and began singing a slow and ancient song. I had grass stuck on my dress and tinsel sticking out of my hair. I was holding three empty bottles, one porter, one cider and one beer. The stench of cigarette butts coming out of the empty beer bottle would have knocked out a lesser mortal than me but I felt quite sure that while I was happy to sit an old grave and drink beer and sing I wasn't happy to leave the empty bottles there. The song was slow and ancient and though they must have numbered in the hundreds I could hear above their voices that good old racket coming from the back of the graveyard where Spencer was perched on a headstone leading his own small congregation in song.
I sat at the edge of the circle in the graveyard tonight, lying on the grass to sip cider and puff smoke at the impossibly fast clouds moving across skies, trees and moon. Spencer and Madam Squeeze were there, Madam sitting comfortably beside me, Spencer perching up high strumming out songs. The rest of them howled, sang and rattled with their accustomed abandon, some of them waltzing like the possessed in a clearing. I'm not sure what I was doing, you can tell just by looking at me that I'm more careful with my heart, mind and songs. Some us of talked about ritual and the good urge for joining together in grief, joy, love and song. I wasn't quite ready to howl at the moon as the others do but I can tell you one thing, I'd rather be drinking on a gravestone than don my spectacles and stand in a congregation miming the art of music to what should have been a moving and ancient hymn but had instead the eerie effect of guilt, obligation, ironed trousers and isolation.
Some ideas are stupider than others
You can traipse all over this city wearing dark glasses and a green dress and still not find what you are looking for. I suppose it was hormonal but all the people on the bus made me want to weep, this was not listed as a possible side effect.
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