keep cool and carry

Almost a Wordless Wednesday moment.

prinsengracht

It may be two forty in the morning, but I've just finished work until my 0700 call.

blur

Maybe a quiet blog week as I'll be spending most of it in planes, hotels, offices, cars and taxis.

beats per minute

An early morning bicycle spin today, which was more or less a test that the various parts of the bike in question were functional.

I've been out a few times over the last few weeks but on a different bike with extra lights and other paraphernalia associated with the wintery months.

My last trip on the bike with the thin tyres was the day I slithered rather ungracefully to the icy ground and even now I have the last remnants of the scrapes to my knee.

It started today with me squeezing the tyres and noticing the front one was too squidgy. A few moments with the footpump fixed that and the back tyre seemed okay. I clipped on the little speedo/monitor gadget and remembered to press start.

Pleasant early morning, birds chirping, little traffic and then after about 20 minutes a beeping sound.

The speedo unit was beeping at me. By this stage I'd gone up and down a few hilly bits and was starting to feel the exertion. Except the unit was saying my heart rate was about 35 bpm. That's low. It said it was too low. It certainly didn't feel like 35. More like at least 135.

I decided it was better to switch the unit off and read the instructions again.

cat's eyes

I've been listening to the Cat's Eyes album, which is by Faris Badwan, frontman of the Horrors, and Rachel Zeffira the opera singer.

But this isn't a faux classical trip, just a classic.

The first time I heard it as an album was in reverse, courtesy of that iTunes thing where a CD's tracks get reversed in 'recently loaded' or whatever its called.

And the first striking thing I noticed was the space on the sound. Really wide - a kind of old school analogue stage with the music rolling gently away. I continued with the reverse listening and decided that this was one chilled album.

Most of the songs are only two or three minutes long, but the effect is a very solid work of instantly re-listeneable music. There's all kinds of little sonics included, a touch of early Pink Floyd synth and Cor Anglais on a track called 'Bandit' plus sweeping violas and vibraphones dotted here and there. Laura Palmer would have played it at Twin Peaks.

There's channeling of 60's style pop, and some tricks played with the vocals without resorting to the annoying comedic ueber-autotuning on most of pop radio output at the moment.

Spacey trippy, pass the jasmine joss.

insidious robots among hipsters

I was asked a couple of questions about twitter the other day. In responding I was reminded of a few of the daft things I did when I started using twitter.

I've never paid much attention to the number of followers etc, being more interested in deciding which people or organisations to follow to get information about things I'm interested in. When I started, the whole of twitter was relatively empty compared with nowadays, and it did take a time for some of it to click into place.

My @rashbre is therefore a chronological mix of some friends, some well known people and an eclectic mix of other 'follows' dependent upon whichever fad I'm interested in at a particular time. So there's high-tech, photography, bicycling, music, writing and a bunch of other topics that I track.

The thing is, my @rashbre account has far less followers than another one of mine called @frederickblogs (fred blogs) which I set up as a joke and which has only ever posted six or seven entries.

Then there's the little set of characters I created as part of the launch for 'The Triangle'. @trianglebigsy, @triangleclare, @trianglejake and @chuckmanners. They all get more followers than me, although they all have scripted tweets that blurt out at random intervals. Here's an example from @chuckmanners:

...I am also being folllowed - The sweater has a Danish pattern.
...gaffer tape on a bike saddle is a great way to hide things
...heading for the tube. easier to hide.
...hiding out in this cafe whilst the people who looked as if they were following me walk on by. Call me paranoid??
...theres some smoke coming up from that grill. looks suspicious.
...i think i am being followed along this street.
...this lock up garage looks like something an arms dealer would use.
...That guy across the street has different earphones in each ear. I think he's carrying a wire.
...Just found another Phone sim card in this rental car. That's the third one. Something suspicious about this.

Of course, the messages from Chuck are supposed to be a little bit paranoid, whereas the ones from Jake are more 'whimsical hipster bohemian'. I set them up ages ago and its surprising how when they turn up and interact with one another it creates a sort of vague backstory, which was the idea after all. I see @sarahlund is doing something similar.

And then my somewhat pointless @bubbleoOo which sends streams of bubbles into the twittersphere at random intervals. Simply things like ...oooOOO OO.O o .

Yes, it also has more followers than @rashbre.

And don't get me started on @mrtictac.

right royal edition

There's always a few safe bets for car innovations at the start of April.

Alongside the new Land Rover self-levelling tax disk holder (very useful on a 4x4), there's also the new BMW M3 2011 Royal Wedding Edition, in an exclusive Bridal White, with a special version of the logo.

I downloaded the advertisement using gestures with that new Google Motion software, which interacts via the camera on my iPhone.

It's a lot easier since the AA smoothed the roads around here with their AA Pothole Assist

little eagles

I see its fifty years since Yuri Gagarin's first orbit around the earth. To celebrate it as a piece of Big History there's a new play by the Royal Shakespeare Company. It's by Rona Munro and tells the story of Sergei Korolyov who was the chief designer of the Soviet space programme.

The play shows how Korolyov leaves a Gulag in Siberia after being wrongly accused as a Nazi sympathiser (because they both made rockets). He makes his way some 4000 miles to Moscow whilst still technically under arrest, so that he can rejoin a rocket programme.

Then he juggles the demands of the new politicos Kruschev and Brezhnev whilst figuring out how to get to the moon. He may not have made it to the green cheese, but his teams celebrated many of the other firsts associated with space.

It reminds me of the strange reverse logic of space travel. When I used to read comics as a lad, the space stories were futuristic but had possibilities. Most technologies accelerate, but space travel has gone into reverse. There's actually 12 men that have walked on the moon. Some have now died and others are in their later years.

Korolyov's little eagles are still very rare birds.

Olympian restoration

And as if yesterday's picture of Nelson's column wasn't enough, here's the rather sorry state of the Olympic clock prior to its cleanup.

After it's installation and switch-on, we had that embarrassing moment when it stopped. Now it is going OK again, but the splats of paint on both sides are another illustration of the rather central role that Trafalgar Square plays in protests.

Fortunately London is a pretty robust place so I expect that even by the time I write this the clock is scrubbed back into shiny order.

Although I'm still not quite sure about that logo. I can't get the unfortunate rude description of it out of my head when I see it. If you know what I mean.

painting over the cracks

They say 'what difference a day makes' and the transformation already at Trafalgar Square from the situation at the weekend is a good case in point. Most of the signs of protest from the weekend have already been removed and the symbols in Whitehall have been coated with a thin white paint before being removed completely.

The same with some of my work stuff, which has whizzed through various roller-coaster moments over the last few days.

Of course, it still important to register the difference between the superficialities and the underlying situations. The importance of the difference between mere blips and systemic challenges.

Let's say the jury is still out.

our style is legendary

As we arrived in the Tristan Bates theatre, the swinging man on the stage was already swigging a tin of lager and starting a half engaged conversation with some of the audience. We could see the concrete walls reminiscent of a rebuilt town. We knew it was Nottingham, but it could have been plenty of other places too. The sort of town with a sprawling bus station, maybe a largely concrete shopping mall and what gets referred to as mixed housing stock.

Soon there was a music track. Eighties hip-hop and the start of the action. Two kids meet. Both riding Raleighs, one a chopper, the other not quite. They are from different parts of the town. They have their evening meals at different times. The black guy eats at four. The white guy at seven.

They talk about music. They agree to swap music tapes (remember them?). They decide to sniff stolen aerosols together. And so it starts. A friendship, and the turmoil of making way through late school years in a provincial town.

Daniel Hoffman-Gill's writing cuts through. There's little sentimentality but an affection for the characters. They are sharp. They each have a style. They each make a statement. It's a kind of shorthand for people we've all known. Growing up, filtering differences. Trying to make a kind of sense even when the folk around don't match. Seeing how it can change one. To fit in. To be part of the posse. Even a quite small posse with some ragged edges.

Daniel sets questions in his writing. In the manner of an early Chekhov he is using street stories to make a point harshly and leaving the audience to think of the answers.

And also in the manner of a Chekhov, Daniel presents a weapon. Not in the first act, but soon enough for one to be able to surmise it's destiny.

So there's enough here to create thought and discussion. It's Poles Apart from another piece of Daniel's writing which suggests a flexibility and creativity being used within the boundaries of a still small theatre space.

And what about the rest of it? Strong ensemble acting. James Hooton's shadowy one man chorus to create a kind of back beat narrative. The two friends (Dimeji Sadiq and Jarrod Cooke) one of whom morphs considerably in the influence of the other and the grey blank surroundings. A further disturbed individual dressed in a shell suit graffiti (played by Kent Riley) who ratchets the tension. The girl (Annishia Lunnette) who provides a robust counterpoint to the boys and their toys.

A staging that emphasises the concrete. The back parts of a city. The places to go to sniff glue.

The music of a hip hop going on acid era. No guitar heroes allowed in these parties. But oh, to create a style. That is legendary.

divisions

Yesterday's slight preparation paid off as we were able to transition around London without the level of trouble depicted on the television.

We started South of the River around lunch time, at the Mason's Arms, which no longer contains the Rubic cube replica of Battersea Power Station. Six of us enjoyed a raucous and boozy lunch before dividing our separate ways at Battersea Park train station which gave some of the gang a clever way back to the east.

We carried on back over Chelsea Bridge towards the centre. We'd met some of the marchers from the peaceful protest against the cuts and the general impression seemed to be of a pleasant and well natured crowd.

In our case we were heading eventually for the Two Brewers just off of St Martins Lane where we had planned further rendezvous before heading on to a theatre.

We used a pretty circuitous route to get the the area, with various thoroughfares closed and part of the central area effectively cut in two. Unfortunately one of our friends was already caught up in the London bottlenecks and there were hurried text messages before she had to make a sensible retreat.

The Two Brewers was surprisingly busy and it was obvious that about half of the occupants had been on the march. All somewhat incredulous at the television reportage which bore little comparison to the peaceful events of the day.

The last of our group arrived and after a second round of drinks it was time to head for the theatre. A three minute walk punctuated by the drone of several helicopters overhead.

The show was the entertaining 'Our Style is Legendary' by Daniel Hoffman-Gill at the Tristan Bates.

More of that in a separate blogpost.

After the show we hung around to say a brief 'hi' to Daniel, before heading to a conveniently close Thai restaurant for a late evening supper. A pleasant round table near the window, which meant we could all see the escalating number of blue flashing lights passing on their way to Trafalgar Square. Suffice to say they were going left so when we left the restaurant we decided it prudent to turn right.

Then back across to the west. Along parts of Oxford Street and Piccadilly which looked about typical for early hours and also by chance along the edge of Fortnum's still standing largely as normal despite the earlier 'occupation'.

And eventually homeward, with a strange blend of meetings with friends, pubs, Nottingham storyline and a rather strange and divided view of the London scenes from earlier in the day mixing together in our heads.